#i'm just so mad cause the first seasons plot was SO GOOD

[dylanconrique]

how are you gonna create a show and leave the first season off on such an intense cliffhanger, and then give us a s2 with a whole new cast and characters without resolving any of the millions of unanswered questions from s1????

[cryptfile]

⋆౨ৎ˚ ࣪ over the moon [ benedict bridgerton x wife!reader ]

summary — based on a request but went slightly off with it aka when your husband starts to stay up painting till late you start plotting a good plan to make him go to bed with you and actually rest instead.

warnings — pure fluff, since the rumors of sophie being latina sparked, personally went crazy with the information so it’s implied that reader is latina also, mentions of sex (nothing explicit,,, implied as part of a establish relationship).

side notes — English is not my first language, so if you find any mistakes i’m sorry in advance. this is for my latin girlies out here reading in tumblr, working extra hard to translate your works to bring new content to the page, tkm <3 reblogs, comments and likes are much appreciated,,,as brittany broski once said: i'm a benedict bridgerton believer, i'm a benedict bridgerton ally.

You really didn’t know what you were getting into when you accepted Benedict’s marriage proposal.

Nobody told you that loving an artist is a tricky thing, cause while you’re always giving Ben’s new ideas, you hate him at the same time when he’s at the art studio until late, painting as if the absence of light it’s not enough to separate him from the canvas.

God, it just drives you crazy. He lacks of a schedule so he’s able to keep on painting till the rays of light start to appear again in the window he leaves opened all night long, and you’re afraid he’s going to catch a cold if he continues with his bad habits.

It suddenly hits him, that inspiration he ends up being the victim of, kissing you quickly as he escapes so fast you aren’t able to say anything when he disappears leaving you alone, you tolerate it at first, but the second? The third? He's just testing your patience at this point.

Your marriage has never been a troubled one, your husband does not make you mad most of the time and you enjoy being in love, those little things that made your heart skip a beat. You enjoy talking to him at night, spend your day in his art room as he encourages you to keep on writing that mystery book you're so into lately, bickering about how unfair life is for women your age — Hell, woman of all ages.

You love the sound of his laugh when he's careless about everything else, when he admits he doesn't want to go that night's party cause he just wants to stay home and fuck you senseless, his way of seeing art and explain it to you as something totally opposite as what you really think it is.

Thing is, you choose to marry Benedict Bridgerton cause you're indeed, head over heels with him. You've fall for the charming smile and sassy attitude that made you finally settle after years of being called a spinster. He finds the way to intrude the walls of the maze that was your heart and managed to plant a flag in the middle of it when you're confident enough to talk to him, let alone be seen in public after all the rumors you've heard that he was looking for a wife that season.

Even when you try to avoid him, he makes you fall in no time, following you around like a lost puppy, going to your house to spend time with your family, convincing everyone he's desperate to try the food your nana makes, cause you've talked about how good it taste all the time.

It's almost like he tricked you into make you love him, to have you between the brushes dipped in a funny smell water. He has you hooked by the first months and soon after? God, he has no education when he makes you love him, how he obliges you to stain yourself with all the things he was his daily life mixed with yours functioning so well.

It's a thorn nailed in the palm of your hand, those moments of privacy when the moon evolves you and your lover completely that are now being taken away. It's selfish, surely it's something childish so you don't want to say anything to your friends, or even Daphne Basset when she visits you to have an afternoon of tea free from her kids, asking you about how everything's going days before you came up with this great idea.

You can take the matter by your hands, that's why the next time Benedict's painting at midnight your mind works like a machine.

After all the time together you happen to know him more than you know yourself, the things he enjoys what he dislikes the most — So it's not very hard to plot against your husband.

Benedict doesn't seem to hear you when you silently glide through the half-open door, unaware as the light of the candle lights is not enough to illuminate the whole room, the fire he kept close to the canvas he was currently working on. He looks handsome all concentrated. His brows furrowed as he takes the pigments with his bare hands and mix them in his wood palette to get that exact color he was looking for. A shade of pink for a piece he hasn't shown you officially yet.

"What are you doing up so late?" you ask coyly when you are close to him, hearing how his breath hitched for a second before noticing it's you, your hands coming from behind just to intrude in his space close to the easel. He's taller than you, but it doesn't stop you from standing in your tiptoes, pressing your cheek against the crook of his neck as you hugged him.

You cannot hide that you're tired. You lost the track of time when you got out of bed, so when you have your husband close and finally smell that nice and subtle aroma he carries with him, you relax in his back, the sound of his heartbeat loud against your ear.

"You scared me for a second," he says with a grin, muscles relaxing under your touch. "Didn't hear you coming in."

He has dry paint on his neck, so while you're cleaning his skin with one hand, he leans into you, back pressed against your chest seeking for your warmth, that contact he always seems to enjoy, your attention in all the ways he can get it.

“Bed’s cold without you” you say, fingers on his recently trimmed hair. "Done waiting for'you."

He has the nerve to laugh at your words, slowly at first, the sound of it making your skin shiver. He's going to defend his choices, you know it, and you hate how much you enjoy it, the way he always seems to find an excuse making you totally offended as you retort something equally ridiculous.

"Just thirty more minutes I promise," he says pressing a kiss in the palm of your hand he so gently grabs. "If you stay with me like this, can do the work in twenty."

"You can fool anyone else with that Ben, not buying it" to be honest, you're just trying to contradict everything he says, far from what you thought doing first when you plotted against him. "You said the same last week, amor. Not falling for any more lies."

"Not falling huh?" he asks, lowering the wood palette to look at you, his eyes meeting yours when you're so comfortable pressing your chin on his shoulder, looking at the painting he was doing — "You've learned the lesson then?"

"Twenty more minutes mean an hour in Benedict's language," he's the one that's now offended when his mouth opens in disbelief "Turns out I know my husband, and we both know that’s way more than twenty minutes.”

He loves it. It’s almost a secret, but he loves how you demand his company, the way you don’t fold against anything and you stand for what you believe. He loves how you claim to know him, your lavender smell filling every single space available in the room as he smiles happily in response. He was so unsure of marrying you at first, but now he doesn’t know what his life would look like without you in the picture.

“Ah, I’m guilty as charge” he says, his own hand going to his chest like it saddens him to hear you talk like that. “Thought you wanted me to paint more.”

You've been encouraging him to show his art to more people, a small gallery that displayed his talent, but that’s using your words for his advantage.

“You little bastard, that’s unfair coming from you.”

“Woah woah, you kiss your mother with that mouth?”

“Kiss you even” you stick your tongue out, and he’s suddenly turning you around to place a kiss in your forehead, making you move in front of him instead — “You wouldn’t even imagine.”

Benedict’s a romantic. A poet at heart, so he doesn’t let any opportunity slip to show his affection, his infinite devotion to you. His heart flutters in his chest and suddenly he’s kissing you, staining your white nightgown with the fresh paint of his hands and not caring about it at the slightest. Kisses you like he missed you, like he didn’t see you the whole day when in reality you’ve spent all day in the same house, baking cookies cause you’ve suffered from a burst of love to the kitchen.

“You’re not convincing me” you say between kisses, hands pressing you closer to him. “I’m not leaving this room without you.”

He chuckles at your words — “Not even ten minutes?”

He’s devastatingly handsome in a way that makes you stare at him, wonder what you did to make him so interested in you, so attracted to the point he has to marry you.

"No Bridgerton. Ni diez minutos." To be honest, the accent just makes him go weak at the spot. It's pathetic, but he cannot help it, his brain melts at the sound of your voice, even if he doesn't understand much of what you're saying. "Let's go to bed."

You know it's a weapon, your lips are on his face, and he forgets about everything else: How he's supposed to continue on working when your lips are kissing every inch of his face? Seems like an impossible task now that his hands are on your waist and all he can notice are your pink lips, how you're looking at him through half-lidded eyes cause you're sleepy, an smile that eclipses the rest.

Benedict's no longer worried of his painting. Hell, he cannot seem to remember what shade of pink he was so invested in finding before, but he don't care at all when he's the one now leaning in, kissing you with fervent love as he traces the outline of your lips, almost asking for permission to invade you before deepening the contact, tangling his fingers in the strands of your hair cause he simply cannot get enough from you.

"Take me to bed then, my beautiful wife."

He does not protest next. He loves every second of it, the slight force, your gentle touch when your guiding him through the cottage you two share in Wiltshire, the goosebumps in his own skin when you managed to get what you want.

You win. It's a war that Benedict never intended to win, a disaster he knew it would end up with the result of him leaving his work half done cause he cannot resist to the idea of being tangled with you in such an intimate way. He sleeps so well with you on his arms, burying his head on your hair as he relaxes beneath the sheets, the contact of your skin enough to make him have the best night sleep.

Can he resist it? He's neck deep. Talked about it with his brothers before, drinking too much as the words slurred together and he admits how you got him wrapped around your finger, so in love he would do anything to please you, let alone have your full attention — They surely made fun of him, but is it his fault? Being so in love with his wife?

"Can't say no to you," he says defeated "You know it."

In the privacy of the room you two share, you're washing his hands with a wet cloth, preventing him from getting the sheets dirty before pulling his linen shirt to the floor. It's so quickly, he don't seem to realize what you're doing until he's already in bed, covered with the thick duvet as he searches for you.

He realizes now he should have listened to you before, cause his back is surely happy now that he's able to rest, the weariness of being standing so many hours now falling over him as his eyes began to close by themselves.

"When are you going to stop working so late?" You ask, pressing your cheek against his chest as you hugged him, getting closer to him even when you stole more than half of the bed in the process. The second son of the Bridgerton family does not say anything about it, but instead, enjoys how needy you are of his touch, how you want him around.

"Inspiration always come late, angel" he tries to defend himself as you rolled your eyes. “Maybe it’s a curse.”

"Then i’m afraid i’ll have to drag you to bed every night," you protest. "Cause i'm not letting you stay all night in that studio, crazy man."

"Miss me too much in bed?"

"Hm, what if I do?"

"Cannot blame you," Benedict admits later, using the only traces of force he has left to caress your hair, fingertips against your scalp in a gentle massage. "I'm always missing you when you're not around."

Your heart skips a beat: How could you not be head over heels with this man? He always find the right words, what to say exactly.

Gently, your face come up to press a soft kiss against his lips, a quick one that’s not enough for Benedict when he makes you stay in the same position as he steals a much longer one.

Life is simple with him by your side, you know it cause you might as well be over the moon when you’re alone with Benedict Bridgerton.

Every. single. day.

my masterlist.

[prof-ramses]

Finally talking about Batman Caped Crusader (and villains I want in it)

So, up until now, I haven't shown my love of batman, bat-rogues and dc villains in general on this blog, but having finished and marinated on the first season of the phenomenal Caped Crusader series, I've decided to change that.

The show is basically everything I wanted it to be, and though the way its plots are carefully threaded together and amazing, it's the characters, especially the villains, that stand out.

And since arguably the biggest thing about this series is the ways it's reinventing the villains it uses, I thought the best way to start talking about it was to run through some ideas I've had on how it might portray various rouges going forward.

Starting with Scarecrow, as he's been referenced twice in the series. A blink and you'll miss it easter egg in episode 5 shows a self help book written by Dr. Jonathan Crane, which makes me wonder if this take on Scarecrow will lean more towards something like the guru working for Scarecrow in the TNBA episode Never Fear, or possibly a more diluted character who genuinely believes he's helping people overcome their fears.

Moving on to speculative characters, after some thought I've come up with a take on Riddler that would slot neatly into BCC is a traveling magician/escapologist who draws in crowds by offering a cash prize to anyone who can explain his seemingly impossible escapes. He also plans his tours so he can find and pick off other big time magicians by putting them in death trap to see how good their escape skills really are.

And rounding out the dorks, the biggest idea I've had for Mad Hatter is a scientist with a method of inducing intense suggestibility (either the chipped cards or some form of drug) but can't find funding. Because of this, he makes his living as a taxidermist, which would allow both for some creepy visuals and (assuming they go down this route) a jabberwocky patched together out of various animals as a screwed up art piece

I've seen some people suggest Bane for season 2, but I think it would be more interesting to use one of the lesser used bruisers Batman has gone up against like Blockbuster (specifically the version from Nightwing comics), Amygdala or even Solomon Grundy, what with the supernatural aspects we've already seen.

If they do adapt Mr. Freeze, I know this will upset some people, but I want a less sympathetic version of Victor, purely because I'm sick of everything wanting to be Heart of Ice. Maybe he had his accident while trying to freeze Nora against her will, or maybe he causes out of exhaustion because he was neglecting to sleep.

And lastly, this show has the opportunity to be the first animated series to embrace the supernatural implications with The Ventriloquist. Scarface wouldn't even have to be fully alive, just a cursed dummy that amplifies negative emotions and might even be addictive in a way. You could have Batman and Wesker racing to find the dummy as it's being passed from person to person around Gotham.

By the way, if any artists see this and take to one or more of these ideas, feel free to draw your own take on them, just remember to tag me so I can see it :)

[miraculouslbcnreactions]

The show made such a big deal about Ladybug leaving Paris for a week-end in Hack-San without informing Cat Noir beforehand and yet it never said anything about Cat Noir never telling Ladybug that he's gonna leave Paris for a week-end in Backwarder ... or that he's supposed to leave Paris for a few weeks in the S4 finale ... or that he's supposed to move out of Paris permanently in S5. The hypocrisy seems palpable.

In my opinion, it's actually not hypocrisy. At least, it's not hypocrisy in the grand scheme of things. When you look at the series as a whole, it turns out that this is just another case of inconsistent writing because the show does punish Chat Noir for leaving without warning Ladybug, but only when the plot needs to punish him. Let's go over the facts in chronological order!

In the Shanghai special, Ladybug and Chat Noir both leave Paris without warning each other or Master Fu and it's not just fine, it's the right move as they're magically where they need to be for the fight of the day. Neither one of them gets mad at the other for their actions. The issue isn't even brought up.

In Backwarder, Chat Noir leaves Paris without warning Ladybug and it's treated as a non-issue.

In Startrain, Ladybug and Chat Noir both leave Paris without warning each other, but Marinette visits Fu first and gets the horse miraculous so that she's okay to leave. When she learns that Chat Noir left without warning her, she doesn't seem even remotely phased.

In the New York special, Chat Noir leaves Paris without warning Ladybug. This is Very Bad as Paris was left undefended and he knew that was going to be the case. This is a fair critique at face value, but Ladybug is the guardian at this point and has instant access to the horse miraculous, thereby negating the issue, a fact that is never discussed. Fun fact: this is the only instance in the entire series where one of them bothers to tell the other when they're leaving Paris.

In Hack-San, Ladybug leaves Paris without warning Chat Noir and it understandably causes tension, but Chat Noir ends the episode absolving her of any guilt even though she could have transformed and left him a message to warn him that she's assigned a temp hero her Miraculous. A thing we know they can do since this season literally starts with Ladybug playing messages from Chat Noir on her bug phone. She's also the guardian at this point, so she could have taken the horse with her and teleported back or even just taken the horse in case Alya ran into trouble. (Do you see how the lack of consistency just builds and builds the more they ignore established logic?)

The last few episodes of season five see Chat Noir fully aware that he's being shipped off to London and then actually getting shipped off to London, a change that he never informs Ladybug of even though she will now be truly alone. The show never addresses this and treats it as a non issue.

As far as I can recall, those are all of the instances where this issue could have potentially come up along with the various ways the writing handled the issue. As you can see, both Ladybug and Chat Noir behave recklessly when it comes to leaving Paris. They pretty much never let each other know when it's happening, but whether or not that's a bad thing is entirely dependent on what plot the writers want to tell. So hypocrisy on the writer's part, sure, but I'm not gonna give Chat Noir that label when Ladybug is arguably equally deserving.

This isn't as egregious as lore inconsistencies like the way split up amoks and akumas work, but it's still a very clear case of establishing rules and then ignoring them because the writers do what they want! Who needs narrative consistency and good world building?

[saintclarkegriffin]

I'm sorry the more I think about the last scene the less I like it. I mean, did it feel good to see Alicent and Rhaenyra on screen again? Yes, absolutely! Emma and Olivia have top tier chemistry, and their acting in the scene did not disappoint. However, I can't help thinking that the writing of the scene just doesn't make any sense whatsover and makes both Rhaenyra and Alicent look bad. Not in a "they're bad people" kind of bad, but in the "their motivations and personalities are inconsistent" kind of bad.

Putting aside the realism of Rhaenyra sneaking in and out of King's Landing completely undetected... It just doesn't make sense for this scene to happen now, at this point in the story. It's been, what, a month, since Luke has died? And it's been a couple of weeks since a grief-stricken Rhaenyra has said "I want Aemond Targaryen" in front of her entire council. I'm pretty sure that meant that she wanted him dead. But now she's willing to negotiate for peace with Alicent, the mother of that very same Aemond? So what, she just put aside her grief and need for revenge in the span of two weeks? Or did she think that Alicent was going to roll over and accept the murder of her son in retribution? 'Cause in the former case, she's inconsistent, in the latter, she's dumb. Neither looks good.

And Alicent also doesn't look good at all in this scene. First of, the idea that she had no intention whatsover of putting Aegon on the throne BEFORE Viserys' death is completely inconsistent with her characterization in the second half of season 1. There's a whole scene in ep 6 where she makes it clear to Aegon that he is the challenge to Rhaenyra's claim and that he will become king. And then there's the scene in ep 8 where she and Otto are clearly plotting and she says "he may yet live" talking about Viserys... even if her main concern in that moment was Driftmark, she was still very much plotting against the Blacks and Viserys' wishes. But now we're supposed to believe that she really did care about Viserys' wishes and that she only put Aegon on the throne because she misunderstood Viserys' dying words??

And don't get me wrong, I think in part Alicent did delude herself in believing that Viserys wanted Aegon to be king, as a way to ease her conscience. But in season 1 it was pretty clear that her biggest drive and motivation was her love for her children, and the fear that Otto had instilled in her that Rhaenyra or Daemon would kill them in order to get rid of any competition for the throne. It's why she got so mad and scolded Aegon in ep 6, because in her mind he didn't understand the very real danger he was in. It's why she snapped in ep 7, after seeing Viserys' blatant favorism for Rhaenyra and her children, over the physical well-being of Aemond, their child.

And none of this excuses Alicent's actions by the way, it doesn't excuse putting Aegon on the throne and causing a civil war, but it explains why Alicent did what she did. She was a mother concerned for the lives of her children. That makes perfect sense and it's all the audience needs to understand and sympathize with Alicent. But now, after that scene, what are we meant to understand about Alicent? That she was perfectly fine with the idea of leaving her children to Rhaenyra and Daemon's mercy even AFTER the events of Driftmark? That she was so devoted to Viserys that his dying words were enough for her to go against Rhaenyra, put Aegon (who was and still is unfit to rule) on the throne and cause a civil war, even though she was willing to go against Viserys' wishes just a few hours before his death?

I don't know, I just feel like the writers of the show want so badly to show Alicent in a sympathetic light that they accidentally made her character inconsistent. Like "see she can't be evil if she never, ever wanted to usurp Rhaenyra's throne, it was just a big misunderstanding, she's good!". But the thing is... an "evil" character who is consistent in their motivs and actions will always, always be more interesting than a character who is "good" but inconsistent. Not to mention, that if people understand a character, they are far more likely to sympathize with that character because they understand where that character is coming from. It was easy for me to like and root for Alicent in season 1 because I understood her, but now that I don't, who or what am I supposed to like/root for?

Also, I think the writers are doing the exact thing with Rhaenyra... going out of their way to make her more peaceful/less blood-thirsty than book!Rhaenyra in order to make her more sympathetic to the general audience... She lost her throne, her father, her unborn daughter, and one of her sons in the span of a few days... She should be angry!!! She should be furious!!! She should want to light things on fire!!! Not risking her life to try and make peace with the very person who is partially to blame for all of this!!! Let. Rhaenyra. Be. Mad. People will still love her, I promise.

[canonmisogynyvictimstournament]

PROPAGANDA

ARCEE (TRANSFORMERS) (CW: Transphobia)

1.) Transformers has had a troubled history with female transformers as a whole. They didn't really even exist until Season 2. And while they've all gotten the short end of the stick until recently, Arcee, who kinda ended up The Main Girl (sorry Elita) has gotten the brunt of this mistreatment. Mostly talking G1 here.

Toys kept getting cancelled over and over even though she's a main, important character of Season 3. She didn't get a decent widely available toy that actually resembled her G1 version (first one was a Botcon exclusive Blackarachnia redeco which I disqualify because convention-exclusive spider is not what I was looking for, and Binaltech is just kinda a pink and white robot who looks nothing like her, just with her name slapped on) until 2014. I wish I could use bold here, because there's no such thing as uppercase numbers. Before that, you just kinda had to look at the toys from other canons and squint because Hasbro doesn't think the pink girl toy will sell well.

And misogyny present in the fiction? A lot can be summed up in a couple words, namely, "Furman, why?" While most people go with his excuses of not believing in Cybertronian gender, it really comes across as him seeing men as the default, neutral state of being, and women as something that must be explained. Poorly. Explained very poorly. Not to explain things in Tv Tropes terms, but I have to, it reeks of the 'Men Are Generic, Women Are Special' https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MenAreGenericWomenAreSpecial trope.

Let's get us started with Prime's Rib. Oh my goodness, Prime's Rib. So, Furman doesn't believe in Cybertronian gender (and male is seen as default), and this has reflected in his writing. He's going along perfectly fine writing his dudes in the US run of the Marvel comics, Arcee entirely ignored… but what's this? The connected UK comic has her. He can't just ignore her. So, well. He needs an explanation. Explaining a plot hole isn't bad. It's how he did it. Arcee was created in response to a feminist mob who was mad Cybertronians were all guys. I don't think I need to explain this one.

I'm too tired to explain her treatment in IDW now. Something something unnatural attempt to introduce gender into a genderless species, something something, really weird uncomfortable treatment, it's a long story and I'm not an IDW expert, read the TFWiki page for Spotlight: Arcee.

I'm sure there's more in other media, but I've blathered on way too long and I'm starting to get frustrated and tired and AGH FURMAN WHY. He's gotten better, too, definitely not judging his present self over comics that are from many years ago, but asdfghjkl

Ok fine, one more thing. This isn't G1 but Michael Bay stated in interviews that he gleefully killed her movieverse version off specifically because he didn't like her. It's not NECESSARILY misogyny motivated. I wouldn't deem it misogyny coming from a different director with a different film series. Transformers writers have had personal beef with random characters which they wished to unceremoniously kill off before--Animated Beachcomber comes to mind, even if the writers never got the chance. But it's also Michael Bay's Transformers we're talking about here. Can you blame me for thinking that?

Arcee has gotten better treatment in recent years. Furman's clumsy attempts to explain Arcee's gender in tbe IDW run were slowly retconned into some pretty decent trans rep by other authors, she's really just come into her own as a character. But it was a long and rocky road to get there, and I believe we all need to acknowledge that.

2.) Was initially introduced in the 80's transformers movie only after being strong armed by Ron Friedman, being the first female presenting robot to be seen in the show. bright pink, cause, ya know, female. has the most romantic involvement of any transformer ever across all transformations media, cause, ya know, female, and god forbid she be her own person when hasbro can stick to her to Some Guy. she was made trans in the 2005 continuity and was immediately made berserk as a result. marvel made her a freak science experiment to shame feminists. why does the robot have curves when no one else does istg

i love her too much to stand by idly while she's treated this way

3.) hasbro keeps trying to convince people that her and elita-one (another pink fem character) are actually the same. "who cares same lore different names. what do you mean they're different characters?" and constantly flips their lore, designs, and names around with every single FUCKING continuity ie transformers rise of the beasts where they use arcee's design but call her elita-one SMASHES MY HEAD INTO THE WALL bro there's a whole group of autobots called the "female transformers". i don't. there's so little female representation in this series that hasbro decided the best way to fix it would be… segregation, ig. arcee is apart of it obviously. elita-one leads it. reminds me that i should (and maybe sick a couple friends on this poll) make a submission for elita because JESUS CHRIST hasbro fucked her up also apparently in some continuities arcee is trans. upon getting bottom surgery it fucking. idk how turns her berserk?? it's so weird. mind controlled/sleeper agent in like half of the fucking continuities for some reason. in every single one of these continuities she either gets with Springer or Hot Rod and ends up betraying them. every single time why does the robot have boobs

NAOMI MISORA (DEATH NOTE)

1.) I know everyone is gonna submit Misa but honestly she had it worse.

She gets introduced as this competent lady who's gonna help find Kira but then she just, decides to show some teenager her real ID as a show of trust and whoops that's Kira.

Also part of her introduction was her fiance going "You don't need to worry about this tracking down the killer nonsense, you're gonna be my wife, you should just be worried about raising kids in the future :)" or some shit. And it's barely addressed, because she just fucking dies.

2.) She was the only woman in the series to show any level of competence. She figured out more about how the death note works from some small context clues than L did in considerably less time. She was apparently so competent that the author decided to kill her off despite initially planning to make her a main character, fearing she would distract from the L and Light rivalry.

3.) the victim of “writer doesn’t understand women and also hates them” disease. Like, seriously, the author of Death Note could only imagine a female FBI agent as the fiancée of another, more senior FBI agent. The main character Light kills her fiancé Raye Penber (in honestly a really tightly written and cool episode) and so she tries to figure out who killed her husband. Unlike Raye who only figured out that Light was Kira as he was dying because Light basically told him, Naomi figures it out a lot sooner so oops guess she’s gotta die because she’s too good at her job.

[thecountesstribe]

House of the Dragon 2x3 episode reaction. I have alot of thoughts, bare with me.

The episode was eh but that's mostly just because it's the calm before the proverbial shitstorm.

BAELA “I COULD SMELL BITCH FROM A MILE AWAY AND IT'S ON SIGHT” TARGARYEN, HOW I LOVE YOU!! MOONDANCER IS BEAUTIFUL! MY BRAVE GIRL DID HER THING. IKTR POOKIE!! HER SASSING RHAENYRA, 10S across the board. I know Rhaenyra is tired 😩

I'll always feel for Rhaena, she finally was able to speak although, I wanted more dialogue from her, it's fuckin owed atp HBO, but you could feel her resentment, her anger and her frustration during her scenes. I feel so bad for her cause the only people that are really looking out for her are Rhaenys and Baela. Daemon don't give af, Rhaenyra is trying to find a balance between being a mother and queen but you could see that there is a distance between her and Rhaena even though she lived with them instead of on Driftmark with Rhaenys. When Rhaena first accepted the “mission” and walked off you could tell Rhaenyra wanted to tell her something but it looks like she doesn't know how to talk to her, which is fuckin sad. So those headcanons of her probably only having her brothers to talk to and Luke by extension makes her situation even worse. The glass child fr. So she's most definitely claiming a dragon this season and honestly good on her. Although if they do write Nettles out I'm gonna be pissed. That scene with Baela and her warmed my heart though. Another thing Rhaenyra totally brushing her feelings aside and being like my sons, my sons, my sons is totally not helping her character either. I'm honestly mad they fumbled the majority of the team black relationship dynamics. Rhaena going to ward is literally foreshadowing her future in the dance so I'm not mad at her, she did become everything Rhaenyra wanted her to be, was literally the last of the Targaryen's future and history before Dany came along. I know one thing though they better give her Morning idgaf what they gotta do. That is one important part of the plot I won't forgive if they rewrite it.

Honestly I don't give a damn who gets pissed but fuck Corlys. I said what I said and I'm not taking it back. I don't ever want to hear another “Rhaenyra and her bastard boys usurped Rhaena and Baela”, Corlys is just as misogynistic as the rest of the men in the realm. In the books the succession of the Driftmark throne was up in the air but they rewrited it in the show and yes Baela and Rhaena didn't have a claim to it cause Laenor was Corlys firstborn in the show and he did legitimize his boys but he had an opportunity to make Rhaena Lady of the Tides, she would've been either way had she married Luke as intended but he didn't and you wanna know why? Take a guess, exactly. It goes without saying. I understand him not naming Joff, he's heir to the throne in case anything happens to Jace but he could've named Rhaena and he didn't. So fuck him. Also foreshadowing for the end of the dance.

I wish y'all could've heard the long drawn out exhale that I let out knowing we gotta be see Larys Clubfoot ( the old man was so real for that name 🤣🤣😭😭🤣) more on my television screen. So Crispin, Clubfoot and Gwayne and Aegon, I can't win. Battle of the incels and they're failing upward while we lose 💔. I'm sick. The only thing I like about Gwayne is him irritating crybaby Cole and immediately clocking that there's something going on with him and Alicent. He's messy, I could appreciate that.

Young Rhaenyra was a nice little surprise even though the context for the scene was dark. Daemon getting his death notice in Harrenhal (also foreshadowing) and his dream sequence was peak if you ask me.

I need Rhaenys to never ever in her life speak on Luke's name again. I understand what she was trying to say but even having the audacity to insinuate that it's Luke's fault the war even started cause he took Aemond's eye (he was literally trying to protect his brother and her granddaughters) and that Otto and Weak King Vizzy T council wasn't planning to usurp and kill Rhaenyra from the start is blasphemy to the highest degree. Her clocking Rhaenyra's council was good though. The men in this show are just so ughhhhh. Why did they give Rhaena and Rhaenys an off screen goodbye when she was one of the most important people in her life and especially since she's gonna y'know...

Helaena telling Alicent she forgives her is so gonna hurt when we remember in future episodes. This is gonna greatly contribute to Alicent's suffering especially when Helaena goes off the deep end. She's going to realize she had a hand in destroying one of the purest and greatest things in her life and we the viewers are gonna be hurt.

Didn't expect to get a full blown view of Aemond hanging out but okay I guess. There he goes again not addressing his problems (his bum ass older brother, his nuisance, his bane of his existence) and going to take it out in somebody else though 🥱.

Sept Rhaenyra had the same energy as Arryk pretending to be Erryk and you can't convince me otherwise. I know they were gonna do a reunion between the two but Rhae still trying to be a pacifist and not knocking Alicent's head about even a little bit was stupid to me. She literally tormented her and her children for years! What more was there to say? Get in the field Rhaenyra!! Do you guys really think Alicent didn't know Viserys wasn't talking about her son Aegon? Let's all bffr for a second. She knew and they wanna chalk up the entire dance to it being a mistake is rather irritating. Alicent being prideful and can't admit to her wrongdoings even after the fact that Rhaenyra told her the prophecy is not in the least bit surprising. It just cheapens the outlook on the whole “Dance of the dragons” honestly.

I hate the fact that the writers spun the show into an Alicent vs Rhaenyra situation when the whole gist of season 1 and the books was Rhaenyra vs Misogyny. Women not being allowed to rule because they're women y'know.

In terms of screen writing HOTD IS WEAK and I'm blaming the writers for not reading the source material before putting pen to paper. Don't get me wrong I'm not saying they can't rewrite certain stuff, it's a given with the limited amount of episodes per season, sometimes you do need new plots to shock the viewers and you can't really get into everything but at certain points it's downright ridiculous. Spinning the conflict into a misunderstanding is stupid and I stand by that.

[fallloverfic]

TGCF donghua Season 2, Episode 3 thoughts

Screaming through my tears of happiness. Spoilers under the cut (also book/story spoilers, for folks just coming in from the donghua).

We may only get him for a minute or two BUT I LOVE ALL THE PRECIOUS SECONDS OF YIN YU, MY BELOVED T-T The second he started talking I had to pause to scream adlkjaldaj

I also love how obvious this is. It's a nice way to set up for the audience "yeah, something's fishy here and it's not just He Xuan". I'm just imagining Hua Cheng like taking Yin Yu's bandages off and unrolling his sleeve to properly set the scene for Xie Lian to see the shackle alkdjalj Cause it'd be funny. Yin Yu, tiredly, "Yes, Hua Chengzu, whatever you want, Hua Chengzu..."

They are so cute. I love them so much.

I imagine a bajillion people have said this but this is very funny as a comparison to Beast giving Beauty the library in Disney's Beauty and the Beast. Hua Cheng knows what makes his gege happy: a fully stocked armory. Xie Lian's pose is so adorable T-T "I really do" indeeeed. Their back and forth kills me T-T

E-ming, babyyyy T-T gets some sparklies cause it's so happpp cause Xie Lian is noticing it :3333

ALSO E-MING'S CHIRPING???? IT'S SO CUTE????? THE CUTEST THING IN THE WORLD????

Xie Lian leaning over to pet Hua Cheng's weapon while Hua Cheng is wearing it ends me. Just ends me. Bless them all.

Spider-man Xie Lian was hilarious aldkjalj You think "oh he's not being good at this whole sneaky thing isn't he, Yin Yu is probably like "how long do I pretend I can't tell he's like 10 steps behind me"" and then WOOP SPIDER-XIE LIAN alkdjaldkja

Spider-Lian, Spider-Lian, does whatever a scrap collector god can...

I also love the parallel stuff with Lang Ying and Hua Cheng, setting up for Hua Cheng to later impersonate him. I know part of it is just twigging Xie Lian's memory of Hong-Hong-er, but the first time it happens (with Lang Ying's silhouette after dropping the bandages fading into Hua Cheng's face in the present), I think it's a clear set-up for the later plot of Hua Cheng pretending to be him.

Also Ruoye and Xie Lian being badass: I am always here for it.

Qi Rong getting a second of reference. I'm so excited to see how he's handled, terrible man that he is, love him.

Wind Master was also really funny, "I never want to go on patrols with you ever again!" aldkjaldja He's so mad aldkjaldaj

Wonderful episode. I cried. I screamed (no literally I had to pause and make myself be quiet alkdjaldja). E-Ming's chirping T-T Yin Yu T-T Hualian. So adorable.

Other episode thoughts for season 2 (didn't start till episode 3):

S02E03 (you are here)

S02E04

S02E05

S02E06

S02E07

S02E08

S02E09

S02E10

S02E11

S02E12

[destinygoldenstar]

☀️This Jake Stan Is Routing For Him To Take REVENGE☀️ - Total Drama Viewer Reacts to Disventure Camp Season 1 Episode 11 “Lights Out”

(EDIT after reaction, again. There's ONE POINT in this reaction where I just... BREAK, Get so bloody pissed. It's personal stuff I got triggered by. So... be aware when that comes. You might know what scene it is.)

Jake gets slay pass.

I don’t make the rules. Jake gets slay pass. And he better use it

🔥OPERATION GET REVENGE ON ELLIE IS A GO🔥

And at the end of last episode Jake said he wanted revenge, so YEAH. I'M SUPPORTING HIM WANTING THAT.

I don't hate Ellie, but what she did was screwed up. Gaslight your friend with their personal trauma and ruin their relationship with someone, all for your own personal benefit? Yeah. YOU BETTER BE SLEEPING WITH ONE EYE OPEN TONIGHT.

SHE BETTER PAY

Okay I'll specify. I don't THINK she's going, that would be way too obvious and easy. So it's a, "I don't necessarily have to win, I just have to make sure you lose" situation.

Jake doesn't have to get Ellie eliminated. He just needs to make sure revenge is served hot.

And don't go after Gabby. She did nothing wrong.

I will make it clear, cause last episode it might have been confusing how I worded it: Jake is NOT 100% 'the victim' here. He was stupid, he's the reason their evil plot even worked in the first place. Being traumatized is not an excuse for impulsive behavior. Being gay is not an excuse, either. I'M AWARE OF THAT. But did he do anything to DESERVE this prior?

Did he target you? No?

Did he personally go after YOUR relationship with your partner for the sake of the game, Ellie? No?

Did he ever treat you like shit? No?

SO WHAT THE HELL?

Oh god, I'm already fueled up with fire and my eyes are crusty cause I woke up an hour ago. It's morning where I'm at. I know. Weird for me.

So lets get into it and see some chaos unfold.

*I got an ad for an ice drink*

Okay even the episode itself is telling me, "GOLDEN, YOU NEED TO CALM DOWN."

"I said I'm sorry."

Oh my god we're jumping right into this. Here we go.

"Do you have any idea what you did? You got Tom mad at me AND you voted him out!"

"Do you think I get some sick pleasure from this?"

"Maybe you do!"

"I feel terrible, Jake."

"Oh don't pull that crap with me!"

"You can't just say 'I'm sowwy' and expect me to forgive you for something that HURT ME THAT BADLY."

...

Flash back to every time Jake said sowwy and didn't get forgiven.

BUT despite the hypocrisy, I'm still on his side in this argument. I'm sorry. He has every right to be pissed.

"God will those two ever shut up?!"

YOU CAUSED THIS. YOU TOLD ELLIE TO DO THAT TO HIM.

YOU SHUT UP.

"And you two, why should I ever trust you again?!"

YOU SHOULDN'T.

YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE TRUSTED THEM AFTER THE FIRST BETRAYAL.

"Wow, Ellie's mad that someone lied to her."

"Wow, what a damn hypocrite you both are. Who would've thought?"

They're BOTH stupid, okay?

Miriam's just walking by completely out of this XD

"Eh I'm chilling. Where's my coffee? Elders can drink coffee, right? I'm just chilling and making white noise out of this."

"Smell that? That's the smell of tension."

...I need to get a Febreze in my room.

"And none of it is targeted at me!"

...

HOW?!?!?!

HOW IS NO ONE AFTER YOU?!?!?!?!

HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE?!?!?!?!

YOU SHOULD HAVE THE BIGGEST TARGET ON YOUR BACK!!!!!

YOU MADE THE PLAN. YOU BETRAYED SEVERAL PEOPLE. YOU CAUSED THIS FIGHT. YOU DECIEVED EVERYONE IN THAT ELIMINATION.

HOW IS NO ONE AFTER YOU?! THAT MAKES NO SENSE.

"Don't you get it Golden? I'm the villain! Therefore I'm completely excused for everything I've done!"

SURE. EXCUSE THE BEHAVIOR OF THE ONE PERSON WHO ORCHESTRATED THE WHOLE THING.

SURE.

"You know this is your fault, right?"

THANK YOU, MIRIAM.

"I know."

I know too. She DOES feel guilty, I'll give her that.

"You know, at one point, I thought I could trust you, and maybe I was too quick to judge you. But you've proven you're just like Grett, Fiore, and Alec. You're a no good trouble maker. Anything to win money, right? Shows your character through and through."

👏

THANK YOU. CALL HER OUT ON HER BULLSHIT.

THIS IS GOOD.

THIS IS GOOD CALLING OUT.

"Okay, I'm not about to be shamed for wanting to win. As if you don't?!"

Oh come on Ellie. You know she's right.

LISTEN TO MIRIAM. She's calling you out to try and HELP YOU BE BETTER.

She's not saying this to hurt you.

"Why would you vote with them in the first place? They betrayed you."

THANK YOU. FACTS.

"After we voted out Fiore and Alec, who would've been next?"

Depends. Depends what the challenge was and what the relationships were.

"Alright, fine, it would've been you."

"See why I did what I did?"

Yes.

But you could've done it WITHOUT HURTING PEOPLE.

"It doesn't bother me that you kicked Tom out. It's a game after all. But maybe you should've done things in a way where they wouldn't get hurt."

👏

THANK YOU. THANK YOU. THANK YOU.

YOU COULD'VE JUST STOLE THE FUCKING IDOL.

"It was the only way, Miriam. I'm sorry."

NO IT WASN'T.

Are we SERIOUSLY going to say "But Ellie was just playing the game, so it doesn't count."

Was Jake and Tom's relationship 'just a game?' She didn't have to go the personal route. She could've just stolen that motherfucking idol and all her problems would've been solved.

Yes I'm still calling that out. Add that to the counter I did.

But look, I'm SO HAPPY that Ellie at least got called out on her bullshit... even if that got twisted in her favor.

There's slandering people and intentionally hurting them, and then there's calling them out when they did something wrong because they care about you and want you to be better.

MIRIAM WAS CLEARLY DOING THE LATTER.

SHE CARES. SHE WANTS TO HELP YOU NOT MAKE THESE MISTAKES AGAIN. LISTEN TO HER.

I hope this episode at least ends with Ellie taking what Miriam said to account and realizing she was right. That would be WONDERFUL.

I know you're better than this, Ellie!

PLEASE ELLIE. SEE THE LIGHT.🙏

"There is no light, so it's impossible to navigate without a flashlight."

That sounds like a safety hazard.

"Two of them contain drained flashlights."

Um... I count three, your honor.

That's an animation error.

"You will have to trust each other to share items as you make your way to the surface."

OH I KNOW WHERE THAT'S GOING...

It sucks cause I think both Jake AND Ellie need that immunity more than the others.

UM, THAT'S LIFE THREATENING. WHAT?!

IS THAT A SCORPION?!?!

*Gets a 'take your style quiz' ad*

No THAT's the monster. Gotcha.

Why am I getting so many ads today?

"Trust others? I can't name one person I trust here."

Okay, yeah, she has a point there.

"Two of them are backstabbers, one of them is pissed at me, and the grandma is a grandma."

YEP THAT'S A SCORPION

Oh, BYE ELLIE XD

Is this cause I gave Jake slay pass?

I know HE didn't do this, but uh...

"You know, Golden told me to get revenge on Ellie, well here you go."

I DIDN'T MEAN KILL HER.

Well shit. Let me guess, Ellie has the batteries.

"We can find the exit without a flashlight!"

What are you gonna use? The wall? Idk how helpful that is.

Oh, Ellie doesn't have batteries. Okay... how is that gonna work, then?

*SQUIRMING* THAT'S TERRIFYING...

IDK IF I SHOULD CHEER CAUSE ITS FIORE OR FEEL BAD FOR HER CAUSE ITS A KID-

"I'm not leaving you!"

AW WAIT, SHE CARES ABOUT HIM?! WHAT?!

"Why did I feel worried when Alec got attacked by the scorpion? It's like I... cared about his well being? Weird."

Well... I'll be damned.

I thought didn't care shit about Alec. Huh.

Villain found family.

MY GUY. YOU ARE A BEAST.

FIGHTING A BEAST.

"What's wrong? I heard screams around here."

XD

THE DEAD PANNED WAY SHE SAID THAT.

"Oh. You. See ya."

XD

OKAY, THAT'S DESERVED. HONESTLY.

"There's a scorpion here."

"More reason to dip."

"I'm gonna DIE."

"See you in hell."

...actually, it would be fucked up if you left him to DIE, so...

But ditch him afterwards.

"This way!"

*Doordash ad*

"LET'S GO GET DOORDASH!" XD

"Not another scorpion, please..."

OH IT'S WORSE THAN A SCORPION MY GUY XD

"...kinda wish it was now."

XD

"Give me your flashlight. I can guide you along the way."

Uh, how do I put this? NO.

"Do you think we're gonna trust you?"

"Cause uh, I think I learned something from last time!"

"I can't steal your flashlight! I'm small! If I try to run away with it you'll catch up to me quickly."

Uh, yeah no. Still not buying it.

"I hate to say it, but the girl's got a point, Jake. Give her your flashlight."

"But-"

"Just give it to her."

Oh my god Miriam...

LET ME GUESS, SHE'S GONNA DIP, AND THEY'RE GONNA SAY IT WAS JAKE'S FAULT

Even though JAKE was the one that was NOT trusting her, and MIRIAM was the one who agreed to it.

"It's obvious I'll do my best to leave them the first chance I get. They're the fools for trusting me again."

Yeah, they're... oh my god.

If it's entirely Jake's fault, MAKE IT ENTIRELY JAKE'S FAULT, is all I'm saying.

If you want to paint the narrative that Jake is a gullible moron who believes EVERYTHING he's told. Fine. Then swap the dialogue here and have Jake be the one to suggest giving the light to her. Then I'll believe it was entirely his fault. THAT'S NOT HARD.

If you want me to hate Jake, MAKE ME HATE JAKE.

OH HEY!

I thought you guys were eliminated! What are you doing here?

OH SHIT...

Um...

I didn't think we'd be dealing with MURDERERS...

Holy shit this just got a lot darker.

"When I found out at the hotel that Derek and Trevor were exterminating the animals in the forest, I was about to take justice into my own hands! But I remembered that the last time I tried, things didn't end well..."

"And how did you know it was them?"

"I may or may not have threatened the hotel receptionists so they would tell me the truth."

Oh my god Gabby, I love you XD

"I did all your spy work for you! You're welcome! Torture always works!"

(No it doesn't)

"I wanted to call the police! But with my record, I knew they wouldn't listen to me, so I remembered that you're a cop."

So Gabby's a delinquent...

Honestly I'm not surprised.

Also Tom was a spy, where'd you get this from?

"Then what are you? A ninja?"

XD

THAT'S WHAT I'VE BEEN SAYING THIS ENTIRE TIME.

"I saved your life. You should thank me."

Facts.

"I can't believe I'm forced to work with you again."

I know. It sucks. You really should ditch him.

"Calm down. You're acting like Jake."

OH SHUT UP. YOU DESERVE IT.

"Listen Ellie, I still think back to the early days, when we were the two outcasts of Team Purple-"

LA LA LA LA LA, I'M NOT LISTENING.

NOPE. NOPE. NOPE.

YOU HAD YOUR SHOT ALEC.

YOU HAD THREE SHOTS, ALEC.

THREE STRIKES. YOU'RE OUT.

I'M NOT LISTENING.

"What do they teach you in school nowadays?"

Bunch of useless shit, let me tell ya

Ditch him. Ditch him. Ditch him.

YEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSS!!!!!!!

OH THAT'S SATISFYING!!

OH I LOVE THAT

Why is Ellie being such a girlboss this episode? XD

And after I swore revenge on her at the start too

"Bye Alec."

"Oh fuck you."

XD

THAT'S WHAT YOU GET.

YOU DESERVED THAT.

Ellie is seeing the light and I'm gonna be proud of her if she does!

"I think we should take the path to the left."

You guys can SEE the light, right?

Fiore can't really trick you with the light source, can she?

"Gays and boomers first."

AYO. THAT'S OFFENSIVE.

"You did put the batteries in, right? I can barely see a thing."

Again, Jake is the 'moron' quote on quote, but he's the one questioning this shit.

NO JAKE

Oh please tell me he didn't DIE from that.

Fuck you, Fiore.

I don't care that you're a kid. Fuck you.

"You meant for this to happen, didn't you, you brat?!"

Is Miriam gonna beat her ass? PLEASE.

XD

YES! GET. HER. ASS. MIRIAM.

GET HER ASS!!

"I should call child protective services on you, you know?!"

Is that directed at Miriam or me cause I'm routing for Miriam to hurt you?

Would love to see that in court.

"Did you attempt murder on Mr. Jake... whatever his last name is?"

"Um, I'm a kid your honor."

"I'm going to take that as a yes."

OH. HELLO.

THIS IS CONVENIENT.

"Are you okay? What happened?"

"Like you care."

And here we go.

He's still mad at you. For good reason.

"No thanks, I'd rather be in the dark than-"

*Ad on a hurricane*

He'd rather be in the dark than in a hurricane. Honestly, fair.

Okay she saved him.

See, she ain't gonna leave you for dead.

Aw, Alec being so worried about Fiore though...

Damn. They actually have a bond. Who would've thought?

"Go for immunity! We can't let Ellie or Jake win."

I hope Jake DOES get immunity. HE NEEDS IT.

"And don't even get me started on what annoys me the most about you..."

Ellie looks so done.

"UGH, consequences for my actions SUCK."

"Bruh? Why you pissed? I only took advantage of you, triggered some PTSD, betrayed your trust, lied to you, and ruined your relationship for my own personal benefit to win money. You ask me, you being pissed at me IS TOTALLY UNCALLED FOR."

"I WAS THE PLAYING THE GAME. THEREFORE, IT DOESN'T COUNT."

I imagine they were there for hours of Jake just nonstop ranting.

"I hope you know, Ellie, I am PISSED at you. And Golden told me that she wants me to give you karma. Well here it is! I WILL NOT SHUT UP FOR THE REST OF THE TRIP."

"Tom warned me about you, and I decided 'Huh, you know what? Ellie isn't such a bad person.' Of course Tom was right. He's always right. And now, because of you, he won't ever talk to me again! You were never hurt like I was. You don't know what it feels like to be cheated on!"

Honestly, EVERYTHING he said there was just FACTS.

Ellie, you screwed him up beyond repair. That needs to be made clear to her.

Though I will say this: Trauma and being gay is not an excuse XD

He IS wrong on that front.

Oh they made it. Cool.

Who gets the immunity though?

Talk it out? Please?

"Only one of us can win..."

"If you give this to me, maybe I'll forgive you."

Yeah, he does need it.

The opportunity is open, Ellie! Redeem yourself!

COME HOME. COME TO THE LIGHT. GET YOUR FRIENDS BACK.

"You know what? You can eat shit and die."

WHAT?!?!?! ELLIE NOOOO

NO YOU WERE DOING GOOD

WHY?!?!?!?!

"And 'BOO HOO, AWWW, I GOT CHEATED ON'. GROW THE HELL UP JAKE."

WHAT THE FUCK?! 😠

"You say you're a victim, but you're really just a sponge for drama. You feed off the smallest setbacks, acting as if the world's against you."

😠

"Tom probably saw it too."

DON'T YOU DARE DO THAT TO HIM.

"You have no right to shame me."

YOU HURT HIM. WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?!?!

"After you voted out Gabby, I never pulled this on you, cause I have some sense to not be a dick."

BULL. SHIT. 😡 THAT WAS FIORE AND ALEC.

"Maybe if you weren't so annoying, your boyfriend wouldn't have cheated on you."

*Paused the Episode on this frame*

...

So, this is being written TEN MINUTES after I paused the episode in that frame.

What happened in between that ten minutes was that I PAUSED the episode, got out of my seat paced around my room in rage, SCREAMED THE F WORD, I'm lucky my family isn't home at the moment so they can't hear me, and I left the room and paced around in my kitchen to calm down because I felt SICK, HURT, TRIGGERED, and ATTACKED.

Not the writer's fault. They don't know. But... OMG

YOU. YOOOOOUUUUUU

YOU CANNOT DO THAT

I am VERY EMOTIONAL in this segment if you can't tell.

YOU CANNOT SAY THAT TO PEOPLE.

YOU CANNOT SAY THAT TO PEOPLE.

Maybe in a separate post, when I cooled my head, I'll talk about WHY this scene hurt me so much.

But my reason is not actually based off the characters. Roles swapped, I think I'd still react this way.

Bottom line is, remember when I said earlier that Miriam was calling Ellie out to help her?

THIS ISN'T THAT. THIS IS NOT 'ELLIE CALLING JAKE OUT ON HIS BULLSHIT', THIS IS NOT 'ELLIE GIRLBOSS MOMENT'. THIS IS SHAMING.

This is SHAMING someone with serious mental problems that need help.

This is not 'Oh, Ellie's ROASTING Jake right now, what a powerful moment for her! Hell ya, he deserved it!'

THIS TRIGGERED ME.

I actually KNEW this scene existed before I watched the show. But I had no context, didn't know what episode it was, didn't know when it showed up, and I didn't remember the exact dialogue. But it was in a clip of a reaction that was cheering for Ellie doing this.

I won't give names, I won't throw hands, that's not their fault if they see it that way. This is just VERY PERSONAL FOR ME.

I won't give massive details, because it's so personal, but why it triggered me? I HAVE BEEN THERE IN MY LIFE.

I HAVE BEEN THERE YEARS AGO, MULTIPLE TIMES, WITH MULTIPLE PEOPLE DOING THIS SHIT TO ME. Acting JUST LIKE how Ellie does here, towards me.

It caused me a lot of problems growing up. My family AGREED with the people doing that, so that was not fun. They said 'I needed to hear this. I deserved it.'

So I KNOW WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT. This shit does no favors to the person you're 'roasting'. If anything, this makes the behavior you're calling out WORSE. They act even MORE like this whiny bratty type as a way to cope with the thought that everyone hates them!

ELLIE. YOU CAN'T DO THIS.

THAT HURTS PEOPLE.

I DON'T CARE IF IT'S JAKE. I DON'T CARE IF YOU HATE JAKE. THAT'S NOT THE POINT.

YOU CAN'T SAY THAT TO PEOPLE.

I'm not saying Jake is innocent and doesn't deserve calling out. BUT, THAT'S NOW HOW YOU DO IT

EVERYTHING Ellie said in that was just... ANGERED ME. IT ANGERED ME.

I gotta calm down. I'm sorry. I gotta calm down. Peace.

(That time card isn't an exaggeration)

I'm calm. I'm okay. I went for a walk. I got some lunch. I'm good.

Fuck you, Ellie.

I can finish the episode.

Oh.

I thought Ellie was gonna get immunity. Guess not.

Wow, actually, thinking about it, she would've gotten immunity, something good for her game, if she DIDN'T waste time saying all that shit to Jake.

She could've just said "lol nope", shoved him, and then LEFT.

And she would've gotten immunity.

But no. She had to psychologically damage Jake instead. That was more important.

'For the game' my ass.

"Once again, Ellie proved what a backstabber she is. But at least this time, she didn't get away with it."

I don't want to say 'for no reason', cause you WERE being a bitch to her. But at the end of the day, you vote her off...

Unless she sides with the villains again...

Shit...

Ooooooooooooooooooooooohhh shit.

I think this is it for Jake.

"Am I nervous about tonight's vote? Yes. I feel like I have no control. It all depends on Fiore and Alec."

That's true. They could vote Miriam. Or you.

Cause you and Jake are sure not as hell voting together after you both pull that shit on each other.

"In just a few short days, me and Fiore went from enemy number one to being the ones in control."

I know. That's crazy.

You guys orchestrated the whole thing, confessed that, and no one went after you. That's crazy.

Oooooooohh god...

I'm actually feeling kinda hopeless.

I think I know who it is.

'JAKE'

Yeah...

'ELLIE'

Should've went for the gold.

'ELLIE'

'JAKE'

Aaaaaaaannnnnd I know Fiore's handwriting at this point.

It's over.

*Long Depressed Sigh*

...I knew it.

We didn't get revenge. Goddammit.

"Whatever. I don't care."

"Spoken like a man who cares."

"Miriam, I'm so sorry to be leaving you. Maybe if I had taken things differently, none of this would've happened."

Yeah...

"Thank you so much for supporting me. Everything from my grandmother to Tom..."

Oh come on, don't make this sad for me.

"Don't fret, kid. I thought I wouldn't open up to anyone here. But you were patient with me, and taught me that I shouldn't judge people so quickly."

Yeah. He's chaotic like that.

"You may be down, but you're not out. Play your butt off Miriam. We'll see each other when this is all over, okay?"

Yes. Win for them, Miriam.

Awwwwwwww💗

...damn. I'm gonna miss that trainwreck.

"These people voted out Tom and Jake. They've fooled me time and time again. They think my days are numbered, but they don't realize who they're messing with. No more Mrs. Nice Gran."

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHH YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSS

GRANDMA'S GONNA SLAY!!!!

Aaaaaaannnnnddd that's it.

Welp, all my favs are gone.

That's usually how it is, so I don't really care about that sort of thing.

Damn, Jake got a bad ending.

Either bro gets therapy, or he's coming back more hostile and broken and distrusting of everyone around him than ever before.

In that sense, I think Jake left the show with the worst outcome 😢

Part of that IS his fault, I admit. If he had just cooled off for two seconds and listened to Ellie, he would’ve survived and gotten a friend back. But no.

So as much as I hate the scene, I admit I DO LIKE the idea of Jake getting called out for his bullshit. In any other circumstance, HE WOULD DESERVE IT.

BUT HOLY SHIT ELLIE, IF THAT WAS YOUR INTENT THAT WAS NOT THE WAY TO DO IT.

I can totally imagine that Jake comes back in a future season and he’s this bitter, hostile, whiny, “Don’t trust anyone. Everybody is out to get me. Everybody is an enemy who wants to hurt me.” And being even MORE unpleasant for his peers than he is in this season. (Except with Miriam) And a deeper layer being him acting that way because of self loathing. “Ellie was right. I am a dick. I don’t deserve to be loved at all. I’m going to be alone in the end.”

I would hate it, that would probably be obnoxious depending on execution, but I think that would be a consistent writing transition. (Again, kinda like Teruko)

So… I didn’t think I was gonna like Jake as much as I did. I mentioned before but I saw some out of context clips, some of them being only about hatred towards Jake and that calling out scene. So I thought, cause I didn’t know context, “Oh, he’s probably this massive dickhole of a person.”

And then I watch it for myself and look where we are. I love this trainwreck.

Not in the sense of “Cinnamon roll baby girl did nothing wrong and his trauma excuses him of all his actions” Cause uh… hell no.

It was just very refreshing for me to have a character whose experiences and issues actually make them hard to deal with and messy and ‘annoying’. Especially for someone like me who didn’t have exact experiences but also acted like that years ago until I got help.

There’s a GREAT VIDEO that really fits this topic, I’ll put it here. It’s about flawed characters and the discourse surrounding them.

(This also works for Ellie, and other characters in this show too.)

I defended him when no one else did. Till the end. I did it. I did the impossible. Hello. I’m a Stan.

Fuck you, Ellie. Fuck. You.

Okay I have two different takes, objective and subjective.

Subjectively I think I hate her now. Just cause of that scene being WRONG on so many levels.

But objectively I see her POV in the sense of “She’s too far gone”. And Jake was giving her shit. And she didn’t want to listen to Miriam. I said this last time. This is a cool concept for a character and I’m down for it.

But yeah, she’s too far gone.

Right now, if I was being subjective she’d be an F tier just for that scene alone.

/j. CALM DOWN.

But she is one of the more interesting and intriguing characters left, and I do think she has a chance to win still.

In Total Drama, they usually DON’T let villain/morally grey characters win just because that’s an ‘unpleasant ending’. Unless it’s Heather, but even then that’s… debatable cause of the season.

But you know, this is an indie show. They can do whatever they want. So who knows.

Miriam’s gotta get revenge on her though. She’s our only hope.

Jake passed on the slay pass to Grandma Miriam, and trust me. SHES COMING FOR YOU ALL.

If you guys want me to continue these reactions, be sure to let me know.

[steddieunderdogfics]

This week’s writer spotlight feature is: @fandomlover1992! FandomLover1992 has 7 works in the Stranger Things fandom, and all of them are in the steddie tag.

@kaypie91 or anonymous nominator recommends the following works by @fandomlover1992:

Hello My Old Heart

Nothing Sweeter Than My Baby

A Rage That Never Wavers

Chained Up Fire

Finding Krampus

"I love her story lines so much! It never fails, once I get an email that one of her fics have updated I drop everything and RUN to ao3. Her fics really make you feel the feels." -- @kaypie91

Below the cut, @fandomlover1992 answered some questions about their writing process and some of their recommended work!

Why do you write Steddie?

Honestly, when I first started getting obsessed with Steddie, I wanted to read a very specific AU. I loved the plotline of season 4 but I was literally distraught by Eddie dying LOL! And I was like he doesn't have to be dead in an AU. He can live happily in an AU with Steve 😍😍😍

What’s your favorite trope to READ?

I love enemies to lovers. It is just such an amazing journey to see two characters go from one extreme to the other. To go from completely loathing someone to 'I'll kill for you.' The journey can be comedic but also humbling as the characters have to be able to say 'maybe I was wrong about you.'

What’s your favorite trope to WRITE?

I love, love, love soul-mate AUs. Particularly ones where they know it the moment they see each other. It just makes me feel so warm and fuzzy when someone goes, "Yes, this is the one. I don't need to look any further this idiot is mine and I'll love him and wrap him up in a blanket and feed him."

What’s your favorite Steddie fic?

Oh Goddess there are so many. Honestly the fic that I am constantly astounded by and just re-read all the time is Hic Sunt Dracones by Just-My-Latest-Hyperfixation. I am just so floored by the level of passion and imagery and masterful storytelling.

Is there a trope you’re excited to explore in a future work but haven’t yet?

I love reading a slow burn Enemies to Lovers but I feel I'm too impatient to write it. I'll be like chapter 1 going good, they hate each other and….boom chapter 2 they're in love and married. So, I really want to challenge myself to be patient and let the plot flow nice and slow.

What is your writing process like?

So, it's extremely chaotic but I love it. A lot of times I won’t necessarily have a story or plotline at first, but I will just have a scene in my mind. So I will write that scene and then reverse engineer the story to that scene and that's how I create the plot. For example in Nothing Sweeter Then My Baby, it was the scene where Eddie finds Steve at the bakery and he knows that Steve is his soulmate, but Steve is denying it and is so scared to be discovered. So, I had to be like ok why is Steve hiding? Why is he running? Why is Eddie so desperately looking?

Do you have any writing quirks?

Yes, when I start a story it is so chaotic. Cause I never ever start at the beginning. I will write like two scenes that are not in any shape related, then a single line will pop in my head and I'll write that but I won't finish it and I'll just start writing another one and next thing I know I have 5k of gibberish.

Do you prefer posting when you’ve finished writing or on a schedule?

When I finish…or when I'm like ok I need to post people are starting I'm dead lol!

Which fic are you most proud of?

Honestly, not to sound pretentious but all of them. There was a time when I looked at a blank page and felt nothing but hopelessness that I could ever fill it, much less be able to write 10,000 words in one sitting. As weird as it sounds writing Steddie has given me the hope, the skills, and the drive to become a published writer someday

How did you get the idea for Hello My Old Heart?

So, I was reading Bad Beat by LexiRoseWrites and I just kept getting this idea about Eddie being so mad at Steve at the end, he just picked up and left town. And poor Steve is pregnant and alone. Lexi gave me her blessing to write it and I tagged her work as inspiration at the bottom.

When writing Hello My Old Heart, what was something you didn’t expect?

I didn't expect the plot to take me where it did. I had planned it just to be a heartfelt, angsty story but through workshopping some ideas I came up with the Brenner/pills plotline.

What inspired Nothing Sweeter Than My Baby?

I always loved the idea of soul-mate identifying marks and how that would affect real life. So, I thought it would be really cool to combine the idea with royalty core and draw out the dangers one might experience being the soul-mate of a very important and powerful person.

What was your favorite part to write from Finding Krampus?

The parts where Eddie makes Steve blush. I love that little cat and mouse games where they are both attracted to each other but are scared to make a real move so they just flirt and blush and giggle. I find it so sweet and exhilarating.

How do/did you feel writing A Rage That Never Wavers?

When I started, I was going through a very difficult time. When I'm overwhelmed or just so fucking done with everything and the people around me, I just want to be alone and self isolate. I felt like no matter what I said, or did or even wanted, everyone was attacking me. So, I came up with a scene of Steve alone in a cabin in the woods and he was just scared of everyone including Eddie. And so I reversed engineered, what if there was a magical reason this was happening and therefore a magical cure. Don't we all want that when we have anxiety and the world is pressing your chest and getting air feels like a battle. I am doing much, much better now and I am very determined to finish the story before Halloween.

What was the most difficult part of writing Chained Up Fire?

Honestly, it was probably one of the easiest stories to write. It just flowed out of me. Full disclosure I'm having trouble picking it up because I feel like it's original enough to publish, so who knows?

Do you have a favorite scene and/or line from any of your fics?

For Nothing Sweeter Then My Baby: "Eddie’s heart was slow, proud, heavy and belonging to Steve. And by everything that was holy and unholy in this world, he would deliver it to Steve at his feet."

Do you have any upcoming projects or fics you’d like to share/promote?

Yes, when I get all my WIPs done, I am going to start on a vampire/ABO/royaltycore fic that I'm too excited about.

Outside of these questions, Is there anything YOU would like to add?

No, just that it seems silly but writing Steddie has legit changed my life and gave me hope again that I could be a professional writer. And I love the supportive community so much and I really, really hope that it stays strong even past the series finally.

Thank you to our author, @fandomlover1992, and our nominator, @kaypie91! See more of FandomLover1992's works featured on our page throughout the day!

Writer’s Spotlight is every Wednesday! Want to nominate an author? You can nominate them here!

[sweetmariihs2]

What would the villain "King Cedric The Great" have been like if STF's story hadn't changed course?

Something that makes me so mad is how Cedric is presented to us as the main villain of the show since the beginning and the end his villain arc is considered a side quest in a regular episode while a villain that was introduced last season had the end battle against the protagonist and a 3 episode special (the last one).

Imagine how amazing it would be if they kept the rythm of season one for the rest of the show instead of expading the universe in a unnecessary amount like they did.

The climax of the show would be Cedric betraying Sofia (like the one we saw in day of the sorcerers) and the end battle would be against him, dethroning him. He could have taken over the kingdom just like the dynamic that Princess Ivy did, transformed the castle of Enchancia into his castle and arranged armies, ways to defend himself with magic - in short, what Ivy and Vor did.

After the main protagonists suffered a lot to finally get to the throne room there would be a big argument about Cedric's "you never treated me well! I just wanted to be respected! Now you're going to pay for what you did!" and Sofia would have to talk to him to make him regret and think about his own actions, so that in the end she could take the amulet (or whatever he was using to rule the kingdom, but the amulet, according to how the season 1 was trying to go with the show, is the most interesting option) from his hands and he would be arrested.

Cedric would have that conversation with Roland, and then he would have a way to redeem himself and ask for forgiveness, so that at the end of the series everything would end well and happily.

They made the Amulet of Avalor a big deal since the first movie. Let's pretend we don't know what happens in the next seasons. Since episode 1, the main villain focus has been Cedric wanting the amulet. As we can see in behind-the-scenes archives (The STF pitch bible and so many more, like the character descriptions videos), the only villain character created since the beginning of the series is Cedric, and that's it, that was Sofia's menace. So much so that he was the villain of Once Upon A Princess, he worked well that way, considering that even in the film he was a little neglected due to the target audience (small children) and the main subject of the film, which was Sofia getting used to the royal life, but after the movie ends you can imagine that later he would have more importance in the story, even in his last scene, which had a tone of "I may have failed now, but I'll come back later!"

The climax should have been around him getting the amulet and taking over the kingdom like the dictator the show gave us tips that he would be (the whole song Cedric The Great). But I'm not talking about Day Of The Sorcerers, nor Grimtrix and his magic stones or Order Of The Wand, I'm talking about Cedric managing to trick Sofia and get the amulet he wanted, which would cause a big problem in the plot. However, I can't say how he would do this, as we know the amulet has consequences, but I'm just saying that since the beginning of the cartoon the directors have been working on Cedric as a villain and I think what they did to him at the end of the show is more than disrespectful to his character arc (or the beginning of it). Let me elaborate.

He got a nice "villain arc end" of episode, got his redeption and overall got a happy life, and his story is good, really,... but it makes me pissed how they structured the story for him to be the villain only to be left aside in the end for a plot that was not so interesting and not so faithful to the essence of Sofia The First (Vor, the mistic isles and the protectors).

Cedric should have been a king for a whole day and get everything he wanted (except that he would notice little by little that this wasn't what he wanted at all, but he's too proud to admit his own mistakes and go against his own words, because now if he go back he will be arrested and hated by the whole kingdom, there's no turn back.) He would be defeated by Sofia's words, the castle characters team work and specially his own morality. Only to say sorry later and be redeemed. I don't think that this should happen in the very end of the last episode, I would say that the main battle should have ended in the episode before and the last episode should be kept only as a "happy end" and what happened after the final battle.

CAN YOU IMAGINE HOW AMAZING IT WOULD BE TO HAVE KING CEDRIC THE GREAT AS OUR MAIN VILLAIN LIKE THE SHOW WAS PROBABLY INTENDING TO DO AT THE START??? AHHHHHRHHHSHHHH

The directors may not really thought about making him the main villain, but I think that that's the only way the story should go on based on the info we got of what was the sketch of STF. In other words, that was the only possible way to go with this story, but they managed to "take the car off the track" and pull the story to a different way. I have some theories if why this happened (public, people leaving TV to pay for streaming services and Disney Junior's attempt to keep getting the attention of the public through adding more and more stuff to the show that was supposed to hype the chidren but that didn't worked and just pushed STF farther away from it's roots and og story), but I won't get into detail today

Now for what I personally think it would be like, based on everything we saw from him at the start of STF and also my own interpretations, I think his character would be like Turbo from Wreck It Ralph, or Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland, or even the Snow King from Ever After High (this is the most similar dynamic in my opinion!)

I'm trying to give you guys an idea of what's on my mind. It's a bit hard to express in words but I think that it's understandable enough through the phrase "king Cedric the great as the main villain".

The hype that this episode would have had in the fandom oh my god

[aspiring-holistic-otaku]

Season 3 Ramble #8 - A is for Anime(solo reprise) ver.3

Hadn't been doing the run-up posting I usually do for my rambles due to work and such but here we are!

How this ramble is gonna go is I'm gonna list my top 3 movies watched this month then top 3 series for same, AAnd now that I actually have a semi decent number of anime under my belt I'm gonna do a quick top ten of both at the end.. after that if you wanna stick around, instead of the usual post ramble ramble, I'm gonna add a bit of the recording I did with the homies, as a sort of prelude and promise that we will have that conversation in future. I really think it's an important and potentially fruitful discussion to have.

But In any case getting into the episode now

TOP 3 MOVIES 

3) Belladonna Of Sadness (1973, 1hr33m, Mushi Production)

Crazy movie. I don't think I can accurately talk about it without it sounding too wHild… I'm still gonna, but I'm gonna open with what Google says about it.

A peasant woman is raped by the local lord on her wedding night. To take revenge, she makes a pact with the Devil himself who appears as an erotic sprite and transforms her into a black-robed vision of madness and desire.

As I said.. wHild… and that's just the summary…the details of the actual movie are like…woah.. but in any case it was great, actually something that'd been on my watch list for a good long while so I'm glad I could actually finally watch it. 

Glazing over the plot which the summary does a pretty good job of covering anyways, the visuals were absolutely stunning. They're by Yoshitaka Amano, probably most famously known for his final fantasy illustrations. For the most part the visuals are done in what looks like watercolor paint, which is just wild in my mind,, like wHy?? He definitely pulled it off though which is even more crazy cause a good amount of it was done in an almost slideshow kinda way which I usually don't like but he still pulled it off…crazy…. Should be kinda obvious from the summary but moderate tw. Still definitely strongly recommend.

Small sidenote - in making this ramble I found out that belladonna of sadness is actually part of a trilogy called animerama,, so now I have 2 more old ass movies to look forward to. Hopefully they're just as good or even better…

2) Lupin IIIrd: The Gravestone of Daisuke Jigen (2014, 51m, Telecom Animation Film)

Ever since I watched my first lupin movie 3 years ago I've been locked in. In fact it was such a good watch that I've limited myself to one a year. Thankfully the trend of awesomeness has continued up to this point but enough premature glazing. 

This movie is basically centered on Jigen, as you can probably tell from the title. Just a point of clarity for those who don't know much of anything about lupin, Jigen is basically the gunslinger of Lupin’s crew. So as this is basically his movie, he's ofc facing off against a gunslinger. The title is so named because this guy, the gunslinger they find themselves up against, makes graves for his victims before killing them. Nobody's ever gotten away from him. In fact he's so good that he uses dice to decide how many bullets he'll use to take out his target. Ice cold mf.

Pretty good action from start to finish though I’m a tad disappointed there wasn't more gun-slinging, though from what I gather Jigen’s whole thing is speed, accuracy and efficiency,, so maybe a barrage of bullets wouldn't have made sense. In any case we get to see all of the crew besides goemon, dry cry as he's my personal fav but still solid. The art direction was great from all angles as I've come to expect. Not too much to say cast wise as on Lupin gang’s side there's a cumulative effect of greatness where every time you see them it's generally a continuation of past interactions, as in there's an obviously rich history there. That being said, the dynamic is still great and from what I've seen, you can pick up any of the movies and immediately love them. But anyways, on the other hand, the main villain/organization felt a bit hollow. Which is something I've come to kind of expect with movie exclusive antagonists in general. It's just a matter of time efficiency. I think when it comes to anime movies, you're generally not watching for the antagonist unless they have to do with the main storyline. Otherwise you're kinda watching to see how the protagonist will beat them in about an hour. Though I will say as far as visuals can speak, they definitely spoke volumes in that sense. Also, given the geopolitical climate we're in, I liked the villain/organization and how they were handled... trying not to spoil too much there but if you so much as peek between the lines you probably get it.. In any case definitely highly recommend.

Side note - every lupin movie I watch further solidifies my decision to get into the series… just watching the movies first for some reason…

1) Mind game (2004, 1hr44m, Studio 4°C)

Honestly,, I don't even want to speak on it for fear of sullying its greatness. It's one of those life changing before and after watches fr. This is something I'd been really wanting to watch since ver.1 when I started getting into Studio 4°C through their awesome anthologies genius party and genius party beyond.

I'm gonna default to the anilist description here which is kinda almost decent relative to the sheer phenomenal amazingness of this movie.. but I digress.. so according to anilist..

Audiences will begin to grasp what they are in for early on, as loser Nishi, too wimpy to try to save his childhood sweetheart from gangsters, is shot in the butt by a soccer-playing psychopath, projecting Nishi into the afterlife. In this limbo, God - shown as a series of rapidly changing characters - tells him to walk toward the light. But Nishi runs like hell in the other direction and returns to Earth a changed man, driven to live each moment to the fullest.

The last bit hints at the greatness of this film. Right there that small difference in speech speaks volumes in my personal world of language. It's not just a movie. It's film. 10/10. absolute cinema.

As I said I don't even want to talk about it too much because I don't think it possible to do it justice through mere words, but I'm gonna put a bit more glaze on it before I wrap up the movie list and move on to series. This movie beat out studio ghibli’s, Miyazaki directed, howl’s moving castle in the 2004 Japan Media Arts Festival. Further, this was a debut work for the director Masaaki Yuasa, who would later go on to found science saru studio. I was so moved by this movie that I've decided I will watch everything masaaki yuasa has and will ever direct. 10/10. highly recommend. end of glaze.

hm: under the dog, Mezzo forte, blood: the last vampire, 4°c (sweat punch, short peace from last time)

Top 3 Series

3) Frieren: Beyond Journey's End (2023-2024, 28ep 24m, Madhouse) 

This is something I'd been seeing around for a bit but was intentionally ignoring because for some reason I got it in my head that it was based on this sad little one shot called The hero’s party on their way back home, and I was NOT watching an entire series based on that.

In any case, in talking with my bros recently they all insisted that it was the best anime released in the past year, one of them declaring it was in his top5 all time. So I pushed past my fears and binged it all in a day. V thankful for the bros.

The story here follows an elven mage called frieren and her life after defeating the Demon King and bringing peace to the world.

As you can tell from the summary it's largely a slice of life but it has its fair share of well placed scraps. It fills a certain fantasy gap where you get that day to day rose tinted indigenous peoples’ lifestyle feel, that I think most people would want if they actually lived in a fantasy setting,, not that constantly under threat from dragons and shit usually focused on. And as I said there are some well placed fights. The pacing also felt perfect. Like I almost felt bad binging it because I could tell that once a week watch would've been REALLY good… one of the few series I don't want to read the manga for, I'll definitely be watching weekly whenever season 2 drops..

Great cast though kinda small, pretty brilliant visuals and sound direction. Very very very solid all round, what I'd call supremely balanced tbh. One of the bros put it really well in that he said he has synesthesia so everything has colours for him, and the colours of every aspect of this show came together to paint the perfect picture. Now I don't have synesthesia myself but I could definitely feel, not just see, how well orchestrated it all was. definitely strongly recommend.

2) Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (2007, 27ep 24m, Gainax)

Yes. It's 2024 and I’m just watching gurren lagann and you'll hear why that is if you listen in to the post ramble ramble,, but suffice to say, you can never be late to true greatness and Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann is definitely in that category. 

Firstly I kinda watched it as a meme seeing as last ramble I focused on the supposed relationship between sacred geometry and JoJo's bizarre adventure… if that sounds crazy then you should listen to the ramble… not that it'll sound less crazy but..yh.. anyways I was vaguely aware that gurren lagann focused a bit on spirals so I tapped in for the meme. 

To summarize the lengthy anilist summary,, In a far away future, mankind lives underground in huge caves, unknowing of a world above with a sky and stars. yada yada yada blah blah blah Simon, Kamina, Yoko, and the small yet sturdy robot, Lagann, journey to the world above and find that the surface is a harsh battlefield, and it's up to them to fight back against the rampaging Beastmen. Pierce the heavens, Gurren Lagann!

Again I'm gonna fall back on the words of another of my bros from the session, I think he had it in his top 10 or 5,, but he said he considers gurren lagann to be a perfect starter anime in that it perfectly showcases almost everything the medium of anime has to offer. Action, comedy, philosophy, slice of life, amazing cast, brilliant visual direction, solid sound direction. etc. the term “starter anime” gets thrown around a fair bit and I usually think it's a rubbish term because of how insanely diverse the medium is and how specific different individuals tastes can be,, so like to say this or that anime is a good “starter anime" never made sense.. but when he said it, that was the very first time I actually thought it made sense..

Definitely super highly recommend, a recommendation to pierce the heavens if you will.

1) Akiba Maid War (2022, 12ep 24m, P.A Works)

Gotta say it was a tough call between this and gurren lagann but it won out for 3 reasons. #1 it's shorter, and that's not a lazy pov, I just personally tend to give more ratings to shorter series in general because I think being able to do something amazing in a short amount of time deserves more props than doing so in a longer span of time. personally.. #2 it was FUNNY. AS. FUCK. I'm coming to realize that when it comes to anime specifically, comedy may be my favourite genre. I can't quite put my finger on why but I think it has to do with how far animation as a medium can push physical humor.. idk.. lastly… idek why I felt the need to justify all this…it's my list… but lastly,, and most importantly. maids. enough said..

The story here follows the dealings of different maid cafes in the town of Akihabara. I say dealings because in this show the maids basically act like Yakuza, having turf wars, extortion rackets and drug trades(just a point of clarity for those who've never heard the term, you've probably guessed but Yakuza are basically Japanese gangsters). In any case this is all under the table as they pay off the police and act the usual cutesy part in front of civilians. That may be a bit of a spoiler but a gif of it was going around a lot last year i think,, with this one maid gunning down a bunch of other maids and it was made to look like an idol rave with the glow sticks and everything + the “twist" if you can even call it that happens in episode 1 so it's not like some major turning point spoilers + "wars” is literally in the title, so with all due respect, you can bite me.. 

In any case, as I said this shit was funny ASF, mainly because of the opposing imagery of maids and yakuza they somehow pulled off perfectly.. like I can't begin to explain how crazy it is to see maids cussing each other out with the most obscene language, fighting it out in the craziest brawls, then turning around and going “welcome home master”. 

Fairly small but very strong cast, all funny in their own unique ways from the hardened criminal type to the frightened newbie. the visuals were great, sounds direction solid, I really really loved the op and ed, cause they just perfectly matched the shows energy. Kinda episodic for the most part but that fit the crazy, “you'll never guess what happens next” energy… Just great overall like wow.. a bit surprised I haven't seen it around more but I realize comedies don't tend to get that much ratings on release, if they do get attention it's further down the line as a “hidden jewel".

But in any case yes. 10/10. definitely highly recommend. please go watch this. have a good laugh, give thanks for life and go see the beauty of the world.

hm: Flying Trapeze, Goodbye Mr. despair (from s2)

Top 10 Movies (no order)

A Silent Voice, Memories (anthology directed by katsuhiro otomo), One Piece Movie 6: Flower Island, Tokyo Godfathers, Mind Game, Ocean Waves, Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind, Sword Of The Stranger, the Lupin movies (just watch all of them lol), Maquia: When The Promised Flower Blooms

hm: Words Bubble Up Like Soda Pop, Animatrix, GITS Innocence, Wolf Children, Princess Mononoke

Top 10 Series (no order)

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, Akiba Maid Wars, Nichijou, Hyouka, Mononoke, Sonny Boy, Tatami Galaxy(all spinoffs, movies, everything.), Steins;Gate, Dorohedoro, Angel Beats, Durarara!!(all seasons)

hm: Baccano!, Pluto, FLCL up to Progressive, Cowboy Bebop, chainsaw man

[markantonys]

I'm curious how "Rand pushing his friends away 2.0" will go. First go round was cause he was scared of hurting them (which is book accurate). The second time in the books is a trauma response so it could go that way in the show too but I just wonder if they don't want to get repetitive of him pushing his friends away. But it is kinda important 🤔 one of the main things is Rand believing his friends aren't in his corner cause of his trauma and self hatred so maybe they lean into that more

yeah it's interesting to ponder! like you say, in the second half of the series it's less "rand pushes his friends away to protect them" and more "rand's friends are geographically separated from him for a long period of time and continue to worry about him despite not being able to see him, whilst rand's deteriorating mental state leads him to incorrectly think his friends have abandoned him and don't care about him anymore" - so if the show went that route in future seasons, i don't think that would feel repetitive with him pushing people away to protect them in s2! and the much stronger EF5 friendship they've established would make it all the more heartbreaking to see rand losing faith in his friends and all the more illustrative of what a bad place he's in (vs. in the books where most readers genuinely believe him when he says they've abandoned him, because the EF5 friendship was relatively lukewarm and the evidence that Everyone Still Cares About Rand was definitely there, but not too strongly or frequently)

it's interesting that rand appears to have actually learned the "pushing people away just makes you and them more vulnerable" lesson after s2 (judging by his Amateur Therapy Session with mat and his apology to egwene), so the approach on that front going forward would have to be either a) rand didn't genuinely learn this after all and is right back to his old tricks in s3, b) rand did genuinely learn it now, but backslides later due to trauma and his deteriorating mental state, or c) the "push people away to protect them" thing is all dealt with in s2 and rand's future isolation will be due to different causes (such as the plot-mandated separation i mentioned above). all 3 seem equally plausible to me!

(but i definitely wouldn't be mad about option C, particularly when thinking about rand's romances. good god the "aaaaahhh i can't be with you i'm soooo dangerous" got SO tiring in the books lmao, like it's not unreasonable for rand to feel that way given the Everything and i'm not unsympathetic towards him, but it just got so tiring! and it made the romances even more difficult to enact than they needed to be & made rand see even less of elayne and aviendha than he already would have due to plot reasons. it also caused a hell of a lot of cognitive dissonance and breaks in rand's own internal logic and characterization, where he's on the one hand going "aaaaahhh i can't be with you i'm soooo dangerous" & refusing to stay in caemlyn with elayne and avi for more than a night lest he draw the forsaken there, and on the other hand he's agreeing to be warder-bonded to everyone & going "come on min, time to bring you into an active warzone" & flaunting his relationship with her in public for all and sundry to see. so the show needs to do SOMETHING here, whether it be preventing his "push them away to protect them" attitude from recurring at all after s2 or making it recur only much later once his bonds & romances are all squared away or saving the bonding until after his epiphany or simply just equalizing his behavior towards each of the 3 so that nobody's getting exceptions to whatever show!rand's internal logic rules end up being.)

[daenysx]

don't look under the cut if you haven't seen the first episode yet angels <33

okay, i cried twice watching it and i don't know it might be cause of hormones or something BUT jace and rhaenyra reunion was really good and jace looks great (he def looks like a stark and i'm living for it)

seeing daemon again was amazing considering him being my favorite before having aemond, i love matt smith's daemon so much and he didn't disappoint. for me, daemon is the character who always makes me expect something terrifying to happen because he's impulsive and he resembles a dragon too much and i can't wait to see more of him this season (he's like my first love in hotd lol and he's insane i love him your honor)

AND coming to my mad bf now. first, i love how ewan curves his lips when he speaks, it's like an important piece of aemond and he does it so well. what i like most about this ep is seeing how he's aware of things especially his mother's love for rhaenyra and how she thinks he started the war. he is aware of his power when he's with vhagar but also it felt like he doesn't brag about it like he used to, he seems kind of reluctant now that he couldn't control his dragon once (it's what i felt watching but of course you might disagree) and- i don't know, it so nice to see him back (and the look he gave to alicent sitting at the table- i love him so much!)

(i've always loved the dynamic between daemon and aemond, especially when i first read them in the book. i don't know if the show will be different but so far i'm getting what i want from them. ewan and matt will be perfect delivering the resemblances and differences between them i just love seeing them being aware of the opposite because they have a lot in common and they both look so good, it's a delight to see them)

AND FINALLY BLOOD AND CHEESE

the book version is different as you probably know and reading that was HORRIFYING to me. helaena and her children never deserved that but that's the key thing for both hotd and game of thrones, innocent women and children suffering for crown conflicts and men's decisions. phia saban is amazing, i cried when helaena was leaving the room it was so heartbreaking even though the plot is different from the book but honestly i was expecting to see more tension

of course i don't expect the same plot for each occasion in the book, but blood and cheese is essential for many things and i wouldn't include alicole into this. i don't know what we'll see at the beginning of the next episode but hopefully we get so see more of helaena (i honestly don't have anything against alicole but i never felt them being too important for me, they didn't surprise me but you know, maybe just for this scene i wanted to focus on only helaena)

overall, it's amazing to see all of them back. i missed watching hotd so much and i missed the fandom. these are my first thoughts based on the episode (i literally finished watching it 5 minutes ago) my inbox is always open for your opinions if you wanna share something, love u all <333333

[fenrislorsrai]

I Know Where I'm Going

Season 2 is just Neil Gaiman attempting to get us to read and watch all his favs while looking for Clues.

so got "I Know Where I'm Going" from the library.

as a mundane note on the DVD, the subtitles are incredibly hard to find on the menus for some reason. I finally gave up using the onscreen menu and forced it through opening a track direct on my player. So if you get the DVD, there ARE subtitles, you just gotta work for 'em.

also there's several points where they just subtitle it as "speaking Gaelic". It's effectively shot from a non-Gaelic speaker's POV so I'm okay with it not being translated but it would have been nice is there were subtitles, in Gaelic, for those sections.

This movie rates an enormous HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM from me. Many interesting coincidences.

Free fic title for folks: "may your pulse beat as your heart would wish"

Rest under the cut in case you want to watch this.

You can read the plot on WIkipedia so I'm not gonna focus on the relevant bits for Good Omens cause that's why you're reading this.

First up you get the female lead meeting with her father for dinner, who specifically mentions coming from Eccleshall to see her off. This is a different town than Eccles of the Eccles cake, but did make me go look that up.

The tartan hills sequence really is direct from this movie as part of a dream sequence. Joan's father had warned her she was marrying a man, not his company, but the dream sequence does involve actually marrying the company as shown off by some large industrial machinery. big HMM there on theme.

She's clearly marrying this guy for safety and financial security but you never really learn much else about him. She seems to have worked for him and then climbed into position of getting married. You hear this guy's voice on a shortwave radio but never actually see him. He's also described with general disdain by the locals as an imposter. He's not the real lord, he's just the guy with the money.

Which is something that comes up repeatedly thematically as New Money vs Old Money. even the Old Money doesn't have much and that's why they're renting out to the New Money because they're land rich, cash poor as are post of the people that are in the area.

There's a bit where the rich new folks go call on one of the old nobles and comment on how she's only got three servants on a quite big house and she comments on "don't need them when I have guests" and then you get to see Torquil, who actually is a lord (and the love interest here) getting told to set the table for the elderly noblewoman he's visiting. Which he does. and for the rich New Money folks who do nothing to help.

You also have a conversation with some of the locals making fun of the rich industrialist paying money to import salmon, when he's got salmon swimming in the stream of the land he's renting, but isn't catching. He's also having a swimming pool built... on an inland, which they all think he's mad for. (considering the ocean murdering people is a plot point, wanting to swim in warmer non-murderous water seems pretty reasonable)

But there's an overall Vibe of the new money having MONEY but not class.

Torquil has class but also responsibilities. He's only here because he's been serving in the Navy and is home on shore leave. Catriona, who provides Torquil and Joan somewhere to stay while waiting out the stormy weatehr has been providing housing a unit of soldiers up until about a week ago. So you get that clear "they're doing their part for the war, the New Rich aren't".

You also get Joan attempting to pay a local fisherman quite a lot of cash to take her to the nearby island in heavy weather. It's really too much cash for him to refuse. That could buy him ability to marry and buy a boat of his own. Torquil is Pissed Offabout it though because he considers it thoughtless. You could wait and not risk that man's life over this. He eventually gets talked around but goes with on the boat trip since he actually IS in the Navy and can manage to help get engine restarted in boat when they get swapped.

So a lot of themes in common, but lets get back to the real meat here: THE CURSE.

Torquil has never been in the nearby castle, which is basically just a standing square tower. Not have any of his immediate ancestors because everybody knows about the curse and that he can't set foot in the castle of Something Terrible Will Happen.

This gets called back to several times but without any indication of the exact nature of the curse.

This IS a romance so the whole point is this delay in the travel makes Joan reconsider marrying the rich guy. but before that, you have Joan and Torquil split up. They have a farewell kiss and then part ways. Torquil wishes her well and suggests since some pipers got hired for this delayed wedding, she should have them play a tune they heard earlier in a dance scene.

meanwhile, he's been delayed so many times getting to the same island (which is his home), his shore leave is now over, he has to go back to the Navy. So is walking off to catch a ride and goes past the castle.

Stares at it and is "okay, Joan's right, this is stupid I've been scared by this curse the whole time" so goes into castle to climb the tower actually see the curse carved in stone.

OH HEY, THAT CURSE AIN'T WHAT YOU THOUGHT. It's one of those written in such a way it can be read several ways. One of which is "you can never leave this place without the person you love." oh hey, are those bagpipers playing Our Song???

Happy reunion had, Joan wants to be with Torquil nevermind marrying the company for riches. what they do about Torquil's leave being over, IDK, movie over, this is a romance, off we go.

[mdhwrites]

So, what do you think would have happened to Amphibia if its third season got shortened down to three hour long specials like Owl House did?

So A: this question is flawed. The shortening wasn't told to TOH's crew post S2. They were told WELL in advance. Dana is on record (source) for having said as much. The news came down on episode 7 of S2. Reasonably, this probably meant not a lot of S2A could have been changed due to deadlines but I don't know how all this works that well. For the sake of this, I'm going to mostly assume that something could have started changing starting episode eight and more drastic changes could be done after the mid season hiatus.

B: TOH needed S2B to mostly look identical to setup for going into the human realm, for having the Day of Unity as the finale and for the Collector to be set up as a villain by then. There are maybe two episodes you could change but nothing that is emblematic of the problems of S2B as a whole. Here's an entire blog about that. Btw, I published that blog before the finale came out and my opinion is mostly that that blog is kinder than it should have been.

C: I am not going to say this is a better version of Amphibia. Some might though. A lot of people think S2B and S3 of Amphibia is loaded with what they see as filler. Even I agree that you could probably cut a fair amount and not lose the core of the show. I'm about to demonstrate that. Also, just inherently because of a faster pace, the show would have to be more about the trio, or feel that way at least (again, I'll get into it), which the majority of the Amphibia fandom argues is what the show should have done anyways. So yeah, it's kind of an interesting conundrum.

D: I'll mostly talk about the weaknesses of this rewrite once I'm done. For anyone who needs a refresher though: S2, Episode 7 of Amphibia, the last one before this change, is one after Marcy at the Gates and has the segments "Scavenger Hunt" and "The Plantars Check In." Oh and before I get to the three specials, I'll mostly just be trying to slot in episode segments because that feels the most fair to actually capture a reasonable timeline for the show. Like I'm not coming up with cheats to handwave issues that this change would cause. As such, I'm not going to do something like cut The First Temple in half just for the sake of claiming more time. Once we get to the specials, that will change because those episodes' structures would have inherently changed, kind of like how The Hardest Thing has a different structure due to its extended run time. Until then though? I'll mostly be trying to effectively Mad Libs this off of what we already have despite the fact that the creators would have, at least if they're responsible, made changes to work within their new time frame. I'm going to give myself one unreasonable shift in return for this handicap effectively of not being able to change the core structure of the show or its plot points.

ANYWAYS. With that out of the way:

For the sake of pacing, you probably do Lost in Newtopia and then the Sleepover to End All Sleepovers as episode 8 because we can't literally go straight into leaving Newtopia and one could argue that the sleepover is important foreshadowing. However, the next episode is then a double whammy of A Day at the Aquarium to say farewell to Newtopia and still have that touching confirmation of the found family before then skipping Night Drivers and going straight to Return to Wartwood for the second segment, bringing us up to nine.

Then I would actually move Toad to Redemption into the first slot for episode ten because it is thematically important and a good rallying moment for Wartwood. You could also replace with Ivy on the Run for the sake of Sprivy and just make episode 13 into episode 10 by making After the Rain be the mid season finale. It's dramatic enough to do so and lets:

The First Temple opens S2B and episode 15 of the normal show, New Wartwood and Friend or Frobo stays too in order to help setup Wartwood's relationship with humans besides Anne and to get Frobo in. That brings the count to 12.

Then you do episode 17 as episode 13, Barrel's Warhammer and The Second Temple, because we do still need a bit more time with Sasha to prep for True Colors and The Second Temple is obvious. However, I'd probably swap their positions because then episode 14 is The Third Temple (so you don't have two temples literally back to back, even if the two are different episodes like in the actual show) and The Dinner... With Battle of the Bands being cut. It's Sasha's weakest episode, is just kind of reinforcement of a few elements and some expansion on the three's relationship, though mostly Anne and Sasha. The Dinner is needed though to get Sasha with the other two and heading to Newtopia because...

There is a quarter season finale now with True Colors. It is ABSOLUTELY the most radical choice in this rewrite and you could arguably say that it's not fair because Disney wouldn't have allowed them to have that episode as anything but a season finale. This is the only 'cheat' I'll give myself since I'm not altering episodes drastically or the like to fit in with the new time frame. Plus side: They'd have the compelling pitch that in five episodes, they CAN get back to Amphibia to make that the season finale. Otherwise there isn't really much to change before S3 because so much has to wait on the major turn of Andrias becoming the main villain. That version of this outline though, that S2 doesn't change at ALL, is... A genuine nightmare on a lot of fronts and honestly less reasonable than thinking this would be allowed and I'll get to why after the outline. Oh, there is one change that needs to happen unfortunately: Frobo probably doesn't make it in this version after this. Polly and him unfortunately just aren't important enough to really get the wrap up they do in S3. It does mean that mechanic Polly during the ending probably has an RC robo or the like with her to help explain where her being a mechanic came from.

Anywhos: Episode 16 is The New Normal... Mixed with Anne-sterminator. Anne is honest about the danger they're in from go and instead of the quarantine montage, we get her actually beating the Cloak Bot first try to show how far she's come to her parents and to show off the new powers alongside their cost.

Then you do Fight at the Museum followed by Turning Point for episode 17 to start the ball rolling on getting back as well as get Sasha into place and finish up her arc.

Episode 18 has Temple Frogs because the Plantars DO need to still connect with Earth and Temple Frogs is EASILY the best episode of that as it explores how different Anne is from the start of the show and how that isn't entirely a good thing because of the things she's now ignoring, fits thematically with the show as a whole and is just a lot of fun. The other side meanwhile is Olivia and Yunan. I would almost not advocate for keeping this episode for a lot of reasons but it's kind of necessary in order to set up for:

The Core and the King is in episode 19 because Andrias' backstory is REALLY important to how he is beat and to also understand what the Core is and what the kingdom of Amphibia can do. What the stakes are to all of this. It is also the one segment in the actual show itself that explores the villain so you can't really cut it. The other half of the episode though is If You Give a Frog a Cookie because we need Terry.

Especially because you might have noticed that I didn't include Mr. X. There just isn't room for them for the most part which luckily... Is okay. He's fun but his parts can be mostly replaced either with faceless people or Terry. You can also just go with his first appearance actually being him taking the Plantars in this episode. Maybe there's been foreshadowing at the end of Earth segments of someone watching. Something that only takes a few seconds but builds up to honestly having Escape to Amphibia be mostly the same as it was but with a reduced cast and less familiarity with Mr. X as a villain.

So that covers S2. Now there are 3 45 minute specials on average to cover all of S3B. Or more so there's two specials to cover the seven episodes between Escape to Amphibia and The Hardest Thing because Amphibia's finale already had an extended time slot. As 45 minutes is effectively two episodes each, you need to save on three episodes. Six segments.

That's... easier said than done because the segments are actually incredibly important to Amphibia's storytelling and these specials could technically be split into four segments each but more likely they actually have to tell a through line story per special. You can't jump AS MUCH as you could before.

So Special 1 starts with effectively Commander. The reintroduction to Wartwood and the finalizing of Sasha's new self after her character arc is not something you can really leave out. Plus side is that Commander Anne is a really efficient eleven minutes to introduce what Amphibia is like now and you probably don't do the pampered brat routine with the Plantars which is not a real loss. The theme of this special though is allies so the target of Sasha's mission when Anne gets back changes.

The goal is now to free Mother Olm. This way you can skip the Olms themselves and still get the prophecy and foresight from Mother Olm that sets up the finale. It also allows a smooth transition into meeting with Mother Olm in general. She warns them they'll need allies once they're done and we get a montage of the a lot of what people consider filler in S3 with getting allies, though mostly the Toads, Newts and the Killerpillars probably. You could also do this with people splitting up so that each one gets a truncated version of the full segment to get them. Then the final portion of the special is Sasha and Anne hoping their efforts paid off before Sprig shows Lief's hidden room to get Lief's letter.

Then Special 2 is effectively episodes 16 and 17 of S3. Just consolidating the army, heading out, then protecting Earth after midway through the special everything goes wrong. Not really anything even has to be changed here really except just smoothing out the transitions between segments. Admittedly, the Plantars probably rely more on Domino 2 to replace the loss of Frobo and unfortunately Polly just doesn't have a lot to do in All In.

Then Special 3 is literally just The Hardest Thing. Pretty much no changes I think because the elements for it have still been covered.

And that's it. It's not by any means perfect of course. Elements are rushed and some elements probably feel neglected or abandoned entirely. I already mentioned Polly but this version also means Sprivy is ignored post S1 effectively and just has a nice come back at the end of the finale (which is a good argument for Ivy on the Run over Toad of Redemption for the filler segment in episode 10 of the rewrite). Worse yet... Sprig is kind of ignored and Anne and his friendship is mostly left fallow. I admittedly don't think the show does the best job keeping it burning post S1 but S1 sells it HARD already as part of the stable base of the show so it's not a big problem. It also harms the connection to Amphibia itself so a line like "They aren't Amphibia's greatest treasure" doesn't hit as hard.

It would almost certainly feel actually rushed... Which is a fuckton better than what happened with TOH because TOH doesn't feel rushed. Its three specials are incredibly bloated with plotlines THEY introduce, or S2B introduced, that go nowhere. Or hell, resolutions that mean nothing, like how Luz finishes her character arc THREE. FUCKING. TIMES. Even people who love TOH still will admit the majority of For the Future is filler. That it does nothing to actually move anything forward, wrap much of anything up that couldn't have been left alone (besides Stringbean but that moment is cut off at the knees immediately by the finale's dream sequence) and those are people who won't bring up how Willow had her power problems resolved literally two seasons ago. S3 is so bankrupt on what to do to fill the time that they bring it back anyways, alongside Kikimora who has NO REASON to still be a villain we're dealing with.

That is the HUGE difference here. TOH doesn't actually feel like we're missing out on anything with its S3 besides fluff and maybe a bit of exploration on the whole Grimmwalker thing. The specials just don't feel like they actually know what to do in the first place though. It makes it feel like we're mostly missing out on filler but there's already so much of that in these episodes. Even the elements that could have been expanded, like Belos backstory, the human realm shenanigans and the Collector's redemption are rough because none of these are from before the shortening. Only Hunter's arc is really something stared BEFORE THE SHORTENING. Belos' backstory and the contradictory nature of The Collector, like how he absolutely knows what death is during Hollow Mind and is a complete evil fucker there... Are written in S2B. They were included and written as part of the shortening. Hell, the human realm and the Collector as a whole weren't even planned for S3 supposedly. They were things they wanted to do but didn't have a place for them and so just jammed in these MASSIVE new elements that needed more time than was available with no care for the fact that they had NO TIME. (I don't have a source for this unfortunately.)

Admit you didn't have a plan for your show without admitting you didn't have a plan.

That also brings up an element that I brought up at the top: How much the story might have actually changed. I'm having to work off of the main outline provided by the show but it's entirely possible that The Core might not have been included. That Earth might not have. Changes would have happened to the overall story and it's kind of impossible to reasonably guess how. After all, I wouldn't have guessed that an all powerful child and a trip to the human realm would have been responses to a shortening for The Owl House.

So I did my best and I still stand by that this would still be a fine to good version of the show. That it wouldn't have been impossible to tell a full narrative with the time given. One that is still thematically coherent, has a strong finale that doesn't contradict itself and still has plenty of fun in it to counterbalance the higher focus on the more dramatic elements.

That's still a LOT better than can be said for TOH's finale, let alone its three specials.

======+++++======

I ended up just rewriting the outline as a way to give it more thought instead of copy and pasting the first one I wrote. *whimpers*

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