#if anything it's a mordecai appreciation post

[unproduciblesmackdown]

furthermore going like okay not Sure of timeline things But. concerning bonus material Atlas's Actual Shirts deal

a) that bonus material is bonus material but this sure seems to fall into the [could be canon] &/or [basically is, but unseen within the main material b/c there's not really a place for it there] realms

b) both acknowledging the Marriage(tm) with a critical deconstructing lens huh. the girls & the gays. fucked up that someone might for example have an ongoing Gayce Moment (presumably aro as well, hardly irrelevantly) where their transactional associations must hinge on math, murder, etc

c) appreciating like okay mordecai would've lost everything but the clothes he was already wearing when he had to impromptu hightail it out of nyc, so that's when atlas must've given him his own clothes; this is Definitely Years Later (edit: definitely Months! Perhaps years! plausibly like a year or two! and apply that throughout the rest of this post)

d) when i) mordecai can surely have afforded to replace all the lended clothes & ii) his fumbling to argue the Practical Reasoning behind currently(!) wearing atlas's clothes still means it's Not for practical reasons. years later. while dodging & glaring at & competitive with & needling at atlas's wife. Oh You Know

e) and what a choice on atlas's part to give mordecai his own clothes. sure, that could've been the quickest way to give him Anything to wear (not now bloodstained, for instance) but buying new clothes would be like some possible Next Day shit, or, i dunno, asking around for Other people's secondhand clothes, both of which account for: this being several years prior to when this conversation could've happened, mordecai was how old when he met atlas? 16-18? 21 while we have it that:

this, after the fray at the lodge (noticing for the first time mordecai still has marks on his face from that here. it's been seventeen years Still noticing brand new things. like wick in volume one looking at a group photo in the café ft. the only characters known to us being mordecai, atlas, & viktor. what are you interested in about that hmm???) wherein, with the band on the stage, mitzi with a ukulele, & the dialogue suggesting as much amidst the context that atlas didn't really start being allied with marigold until after the lodge fray proper slaughter, atlas seems to be in the earliest stages of Meeting His Wife here. with his Ferocious Little Shadow. who i also note is looking Entirely Away even as prior i've simply interpreted this as Keeping An Eye Out &/or general disinterest in Anything going on at the speakeasies. competitive to near-homicidal relationship with atlas's ever-present wife....which, remembering what i was getting at in the first place. if atlas's shirts are noticeable big on mordecai at that point, surely all the more so originally. and he kept them! and kept wearing them! for Emotional Reasons Only Actually. goodness gracious.

f) where's the walking on sunshine mitzi & mordecai shopping montage? which did apparently happen, unless instead mordecai then rushed to get new bespoke shirts himself to avoid others Perceiving him judgmentally and the walking on sunshine montage specifically. she gives him a makeover (from buttonups to buttonups. whaddaya gonna do) she asks him for begrudgingly familial makeup touchups....she shares intimate exclusive secrets with him concerning my firm [they were both in on atlas's death, and so would atlas have to have been too] stance....Girl,

g) "atlas and i discussed that" what???? who???? when & why???? mitzi kicking her legs like so tell me about your Ferocious Little Gay Little Two Steps Ahead Shadow. did atlas volunteer mordecai's Entire Backstory as he knew it? did he provide it upon Request? did mitzi ask "why's ya boy wearing shirts that don't quite fit" and atlas goes "oh yeah that's because they're my shirts. i have noticed this without saying anything. for years" like imagine. what's going on around here

h) i forgot how i planned to work in this image of "i love this shot of & Look for mordecai." disheveled freshly wounded undershirt towel suspenders now as fashion accessories over pants Annoyed Sideeye & it Does help that elsa, real fave tertiary character, is here serving as well with the waist pants & putting her hair up & they're both always serving anyways. You Better Not Be Cunty Mordecai when i get over there to fish the shotgun pellets out of your body, Said No One!!!

anyways recap atlas giving mordecai his own shirts (at all genuine or All about trying to spam the [benefactor] key so mordecai sticks around & shoots people for him?) mordecai accepting and continuing to wear them for years until thwarted by atlas's wife whom he is Competitor with and now in one of those classic duos of "do we hate each other? well maybe, but also no of course not. we also share an understanding we can't have with anyone else. which is a secret about the same guy who neither of us wanted to die but were both involved in his death" mitzi Knowing things about mordecai, oh i know all about you wearing my husband's shirts years later, mordecai is at atlas's funeral nobody else we know but mitzi & asa are there obviously mitzi would have to know about this too like. transcendent. fluorescent. head in hands. happy pride

[asksoldieron]

SO-16: And Here's the Action!!

If there's a lot of engagement on this, this post is liable to get real long, beware before you expand.

No art, and I'm pissed because I had a really cool idea for this one. Erik is playing with guns and guns are cool! I have played with some guns (in a controlled environment, don't get nervous) and I can confirm that they are very cool. Not cool enough for me to spend money spraying more lead indiscriminately around the environment, but if forty feral hogs habitually showed up on my lawn, I'd have me some fun. Well, I'll edit the art in later, at some point, hopefully.

*ahem*

Welcome to the Engagement Lounge, for The Chatterbox Massacre (SO-16) an instalment! Short comments can go in the replies, but there's a 475 character limit. Longer ones will need a reblog. Remember to @asksoldieron if you're reblogging someone else's reblog, so I can see it too!

😭Waaaaaah I wanted to draw St. George-in-Erik firing guns with magic but I just CAN'T yet! I mean, non-zero chance I'll screw up my first couple illustrations when I can draw again, so I probably shouldn't draw that one first anyway, but I wanna see it. Damn.

IRL, I'm not fond of violence as a solution, but as a writer I appreciate the expedience. BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG! Okay, and now we have a whole bunch of NEW problems. I suppose that's not really a solution at all, but it's still gonna look cool when you imagine it. That's how come they say it's not possible to make an anti-war movie. You script it and make it part of a narrative and put some good actors and effects in it, and it just looks cool. Can't help it, gotta roll with it.

On the other hand, while Erik certainly doesn't deserve to die for being who he is, you can see why the cops prefer to kill immies on sight. Look what they can do! But, on the third hand, look at what Maggie can do. Nobody's going to unload on her for being magical unless she does something and they see it.

Poor Maggie made a little error and punched Mordecai when she really didn't need to, but if you've been reading you may suspect who (or what) put their finger on the scale, and who helped her shrug off David's little god trick. But to tell you the truth, it's like that because I forgot how magic works when I wrote the first draft. I needed her to punch him in the face! Fortunately, their unseen observer needed her to punch him too. We'll get to that when they get home again.

I was surprised by how little time it took to actually kill everyone. (Ha-ha, there's another one of those things I can only say because I'm a writer.) I was worried it needed to be more epic. The spouse advised me that that's just how it is when only one guy has a working gun in a street fight. It's over. People are dead and that's forever. On to the next thing. Bleh. I don't like the idea of it, but it rings true enough.

John is... not doing well, is he? I'd been planning this scene for years but that caught me off guard. I didn't realize what the situation would look like to him until I got him back inside and George handed him a gun. Well, let's see, Erik's family are right there to help him and he knows that, and he's holding an object that will get him out of the way so Erik can go home. Uh, yeah, why wouldn't he? (Currently writing the next 6 and I've almost got him out of Prokovia, and the plot, for the time being. Jenny will put him back together and Rob will forgive him, but Billie might not...)

Next instalment goes up on Erik's birthday, and mine! It's not birthday-themed or anything, but after all this nonsense his family do finally have enough information to get him home. They just have to put it together!

[Back to site?]

[horsegurltrainor]

Hi hi! I just wanted to say I really appreciate the support on my Dorothy x Mordecai fics. It's so sweet people would not only read them, but leave such nice comments as well!

However, I also wanna give a shout out to my good friend @silver-heller. He also has a ship with Mordecai, Mordecai x Silver, and it's so adorable! I love how he writes Mordecai, and his OC Silver is so fleshed out it amazes me. I adore that knife fielding, sassy cat! His series Mordecai x Silver fics is accessible for anyone who wants to read up on the ship outside of his other series (though his series are also fantastic).

No one has to show interest in anything they don't want to, of course, but it kind of gives me bad vibes that we have similar writing styles, use almost the same tags, but my friend with the openly trans character who also posts way more often than me barely gets any attention.

It really bothers me in this fandom that it feels like it's super easy for Mordecai x female ships to get a comfortable amount of attention, but others get thrown to the wayside. So, I'm giving my friend this shout out!

[terrakatten]

1) Apologies for how long Chapter 9 is taking

I'm so sorry about how long Chapter 9 of Bloodied Snow is taking to coe out. I went through a bit of a motivational stump, and just as I was climbing out of it, I got smacked in the face with 4 days of work in a row, *all of them being late shifts as well.*

As I type this out, it's the night before the final day of these late shifts, with tomorrow's scheduled to go from 2:30 to 8 PM. What this means is that I'm properly screwed from making more progress on Chapter 9 tomorrow, as I generally do my writing in the early afternoon; and I won't be having an afternoon at all.

Thankfully, after this last late shift, I have a small stretch of days where I'm free, and can finally get Chapter 9 completed.

2) In the meantime...

I'd greatly appreciate small feedback on the current 8 chapters, as well as any questions about Johan, Mordecai, any other character in the plot, or anything about the story in general.

Anything you'd like clarified, or are intruiged to know, etc etc. Any miniscule thing you can shoot me about Bloodied Snow would be a little godsend for me as it would help keep my motivation up and keep ideas floating around in my head which I can put to use.

**Regardless!!**

Thank you all for the support Bloodied Snow has recieved since Chapter 1. I feel immesurably happy to see that my writing is decent enough to warrant reading it- gives me a nice, warm feeling in my soul.

Gonna be going to bed as I hit Post on this, so- have a good day/night!!

[vaulthunterlands]

My God Mordecai is hilarious in comparison to Zer0. Zer0, the sniper class of BL2, is this high-tech, unknown species that is such an efficient deceiver and killer that they are quite possible unkillable by a mortal man, meanwhile Mordecai is just,,, dude with a gun and his pet bird best friend. It's so funny because they're just such polar opposites despite being snipers.

[appleb18]

I Wanted Believe in Steven (A Critical Steven Universe Post)

Steven Universe, a popular show that has won the hearts of so many people. It had good songs, talks about mental health and relationships, a lovable cast of characters and it’s revolutionary for representing LGBT. As the show finally wraps up with Steven Universe: Future being the series finale, I want to say this… I used to believe in Steven Universe. I truly got into it when it first came out and then I started to appreciate it more as the show progressed even with the flaws. However, as time moved on, the show’s flaws have outweighed the strengths, making my enjoyment decline and become critical and nitpicky towards it. So I believe it’s time to point out the many problems with the show.

The Glory Days of Steven Universe 

Before I begin ranting about the show, I want to talk about when I actually liked Steven Universe back in seasons 1-3. It was when everyone actually enjoyed the show before it went downhill. 

- So before Steven became really annoying, I actually liked him when he was developing in season 1. He was very immature at first but he gradually grew. He became a member of the Crystal Gems and finally summoned his shield. 

- Peridot’s redemption was handled very well and I enjoyed her character throughout the whole show.

- The show once balanced filler and plot. 

- I enjoyed the Crystal Gems chemistry back in seasons 1 - 3. They acted like a family with Garnet being the wise guardian, Pearl being overprotective, Amethyst laidback and Steven maturing.

- The songs are great.

- The messages are relatable such as “Love Letter.” Garnet tells Jamie that love-at-first-sight doesn’t work. It takes time and a lot of work. You must know the person first before you begin to love someone.  

Those are the reasons why I enjoyed the show back in the day. Now it’s time to talk about how the Crewniverse messed up everything. 

Inconsistencies. Are. Everywhere 

Steven Universe is well known for having no consistency and that’s one of the major problems with the show. While I can forgive season 1 animation because let’s face it, not every show has good animation like Phineas and Ferb. Though having characters go off-model consistently gets really irritating to watch. It’s irritating because most of them are professional storyboard artists and yet they’re doing a very sloppy job.

The reason behind unprofessional animation is Rebecca Sugar wanted her crew to have artistic freedom and have their own stylistic choice. They can draw whatever they want as long as the viewers can recognize the characters. There are many problems with this. 

While it’s nice to see the artist's own style it doesn’t work with a cartoon that’s story-driven. You’ll probably argue that some shows like Adventure Time and American Dragon go off-model. However, it’s just redesigned and they stick with it till the very end of their respective series. 

Also, shows like Ren and Stimpy and Flapjack go off-model because for comedic effect.

So stylistic choice doesn’t mean artists can draw whatever they want. It means that a character has their own style. 

Terrance and Philip from South Park 

Elmore characters from The Amazing World of Gumball 

Each of them has a unique character design. It’s not the Korean animator's fault for it, they’re given what the Crewniverse drew, trace it and just animate it and they can’t fix their errors. What makes it upsetting is that animation pilots and shorts made by a single person or independent team with very little funding have more consistent and appealing animation than Steven Universe. 

I ain’t an animator, but I know when animation goes off-model. Sadly, it’s not just inconsistent art that the show suffers from, but inconsistent writing and discontinuity as well.

Such as in “Are You My Dad?” Aquamarine and Topaz knocked out Steven and then she abandoned him while they took Lars, Sadie, Onion, Jamie, and Connie. Then in “I Am My Mom” they lure him and The Crystal Gems out for information to find Greg. So if you wanted to get information to find him, why didn’t they just grab him when he was knocked out? 

Also, why did Aquamarine agree to Steven’s terms? Her wand is the most broken weapon in the show. She could’ve grabbed everyone including The Crystal Gems.

Garnet couldn’t tell Steven about her future vision because it wanted him to go more? If she just told him about Greg's capture, he would have understood. Also, she gave him future visions in “Jailbreak,” “Snow day” and “Future Boy Zoltron.” Why didn’t she do that for that kind of situation? 

The Crystal Gems, who have special abilities, summon weapons and powers that fought Gems and Corrupted Gems and yet they were beaten by a freaking Steven Catus, Really? 

We saw Lapis control the freaking ocean in “Mirror Gem”, “Ocean Gem” and “Why So Blue”, so why didn’t she use that to remove the injector?

After 6,000 years of waiting for Pink Diamond, Spinel got news about her Diamond and that she gave up her physical form to give birth to Steven. It changed her appearance from happy go lucky to edgy. Now she wants vengeance. So I’m wondering how was she able to get an injector and a scythe, then go to Earth in under a few hours? 

In “Giant Woman,” Pearl explains that two gems have to decide to fuse together and they have to sync with each other to do it. In “Change Your Mind,” Steven fuses with the Crystal Gems midair while they are in their gem state.

How the hell did Connie get affected by Blue Diamond’s pathokinesis when Lapis Lazuli arrived in “Reunited”? 

She was fine when BD did it the first time.

Mean Lapis and Bluebird are still on the loose. I know most shows leave things unanswered but you can’t leave two villains out there. They can still do harm to others 

I really wish the Crewniverse showed more professionalism because there are so many errors in the show and some of them are so simple to fix, yet they don’t and that’s what I call lazy. 

The Cast of Characters Don’t Do Much

I used to like the cast of characters, even the humans I enjoyed watching. When season 4 - Future came in, they got ruined. Most of them don’t do much in the show. I feel like they got sidelined because the Crewniverse had no idea what to do with them. 

Let’s first talk about The citizens of Beach City and how they are the most boring characters in the show. At first, they weren’t so bad because they did have a role to play in the story like when The Cool Kids talked to Steven about his mother when he found out that she was a war criminal and he blamed himself for his mother not being around anymore. They also helped him not get scolded by The Crystal Gems when they found Peridot’s escape pod. 

There’s even some slice-of-life episodes that I did enjoy watching such as

“Sadie’s Song” 

 And “Historical Fiction”

But now they don’t react to any Gem situation anymore. They just stand around and serve no purpose to the plot. Look at “Future”, throughout the whole epilogue mini-series, the humans didn’t do a dang thing in the series. For example, The Cool Kids, Lars, Sadie, and Shep don’t talk to Steven about his mental health when he was about to crush them with his force field. It just makes it feel that they don’t care about him or oblivious about that experience

Then they didn’t do squat when Steven became a monster and I know they're just humans but their friends and the show focus on them a lot, so they have to use them. It made me wonder why they even focus on them in season 4 and season 5 if they're not going to serve their purpose in the story. 

Now let's talk about the more interesting characters and how the Crewniverse wasted them. Many Gems and few human characters (Lars, Greg, Connie) get them characters to grow, face struggles and have moments that can make a character likable. After all that, the Crewniverse had no idea what to do so they just left them. 

Peridot’s redemption was well written. from season 1 - season 3. From a villain that has unknown technology and feels more alien than the Crystal Gems to a member of the Crystal Gem. As much as I love her development and she’s my favorite, however, she doesn’t do much in the show. Most shows that give a lot of development to a character are part of the main cast but in Steven Universe's case, she gets put in the barn with Lapis Lazuli and does nothing. She’s never involved in major story arcs such as she didn’t come along to help Steven to get his dad back in Zoo Arc and didn’t help with beach city citizens getting kidnapped in Wanted Arc. 

Even in the Pink Diamond Arc, she has no part to play. All she was in that arc was a punchline and a hyperactive character with no defining moments. While it’s nice she has a new outfit, it doesn’t change anything. 

Peridot had the potential to be a really great character but she got wasted because they had no idea what to do with her.

Pearl and Garnet never got their own character arc. When they fused with Steven to become Rainbow Quartz 2.0 and Sunstone it was rushed. I know they didn’t have time to do their arcs but if they cut townie episodes and focused on their bond it would’ve felt more impactful for him to fuse with them. Season 4 could’ve been Garnet and Season 5 could’ve been Pearl. Just look at Amethyst where she finds mutual respect and love for Steven and that’s really great to see. With them, we don’t have a moment like that.

A good example of using characters is Regular Show. They used their characters pretty well, giving each of them a good amount of screen time. 

Benson’s drum solo 

Getting to know more about Skips history

Muscle Man setting his ashes free at Great Trucker Graveyard 

High Five Ghost reunited with his love interest 

Pop’s proving that he’s part of the guys for Guys Night 

Rigby graduates high school

Mordecai painting for Benson

And what I like the most about is they all have a moment together as best friends. Such as in “Parkie Rewards,” although Benson doesn’t win an award, the gang made their very own award and paper trophy. Benson made a speech about how he appreciated his staff workers. 

I really wish Steven Universe had something like that and I really wanted to see more of Lapis, Garnet, Amethyst, and Bismuth but sadly the writers aren’t giving them much to do anymore. 

A Shift of Pacing 

Steven Universe really wants to tell a story like most cartoon shows are doing such as Over the Garden Wall, Adventure Time, Owl House and many more. They keep adding episodic episodes in the middle of unresolved conflict and have the concluding rushed. An example of this is the Cluster arc. 

Peridot tells The Crystal Gems that the Cluster will emerge at any time… AT ANY TIME! So the gang planned to create a gem drill to destroy it to save the Earth. So instead of working on the drill, they kept delaying it like 

Garnet told her story to Steven of how Ruby and Sapphire met 

Celebrating Steven’s birthday 

Peridot processing on becoming a “Crystal Gem”

I know Peridot was working on the drill and I like Peridot’s redemption but it’s a life or death situation. You can’t do other things when the Cluster can emerge at any time. The way they resolved the arc was really rushed. The Crystal Gems finally locate the whereabouts of Malachite and so Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl go to Watermelon Island and fuse to Alexandrite to defeat her. Then the Cluster emerges and it’s up to Steven and Peridot to deal with it. Instead of destroying the Cluster, he talks to it and it stops itself from emerging by bubbling itself. The way the writers conclude the arc was so anticlimactic and rushed. It ended two major plots, Malachite and Cluster in two episodes and Steven just talking to it was ridiculous. The Cluster arc should’ve at least had two episodes and Malachite should’ve come after the event because she was briefly mentioned in three episodes. 

Adventure Time has a mini-series that primarily focuses on plots. It resolves conflicts and it doesn’t waste any time such as Islands, Stakes, and Elements. 

People tend to blame the network for the inconsistent schedule and hiatus. While it may be true, however, it’s not really a big issue with the show. Gravity Falls isn’t consistent with its schedule but it has better pacing than Steven Universe. From Nov. 26, 2014 - Feb 16, 2015, the ep “Northwest Mansion Noir” was released, another month of waiting for “Not What He Seems.” Then we have to wait for four months, July 13th, 2015, for “The Tale of Two Stans.” Then there’s Steven Universe where we have to wait for six months for the next episode and it is just Towney episodes and it doesn’t even matter to the plot. So I pretty much don’t understand why people are complaining about the Steven Universe hiatus when Gravity Falls, a well-written show, has a hiatus as well. 

They could’ve had a well-written story if only they weren't so focused on the human side of Steven and cut most of the filler out. 

Action Doesn’t Have Consequences 

In most shows, movies, and video games, characters will make rash decisions that have other characters disagree and even have a bit of a falling out.  

Look at Gravity Falls “Land Before Swine.” Stanley doesn’t like Mabel’s pet pig, Waddles, and he left him outside when there was a Pterodactyl in town. Stan left Waddles unattended and caused him to get captured.

Soos messed up a lot in the episode. Without thinking, he barged in as Dipper developed the film which ruined a good picture of the dinosaur.

He tries to be optimistic when Mabel finds out Stanley left him out however it ineffective when he ravels the yarn back up and thus cut the clear path and accidentally break the lamb

To prove their worth is by Stanley fights the pterodactyl to save Waddles 

And Soos and Dipper make up when he apologizes and he admits he made mistakes.  Dipper and Mabel then took Soos advice to follow his lead and walk in a straight line as for dinosaurs' eyes are so far apart and that it can’t see in front of itself and the plan went well. 

So with Steven Universe, most characters in the show have done pretty terrible things and the show never atoned for their actions. 

In “Island Adventure”, Sadie trapped Lars and Steven on an island by hid the Gem portal with leaves so she can hit on him.  Although she saved his life by poofing the gem monster with a pointy stick, it doesn’t help the fact that she trapped them for a month! It is also idiotic that the show treats Lars as he’s the bad guy where in reality, Sadie is! 

Amethyst, although I do like her character development in the show, however, she did pretty a messed up thing and they never resolved it. In “Maximum Capacity”, Greg finds out that he’s missing the fireworks and Amethyst shapeshifts from Steven to Greg to cheer him up. She changes back and gets mad at him for not spending time with her. So she shapeshifts to Rose Quartz/Pink Diamond which causes Greg to look away and it’s the second time she has done it, and then Steven comes in to stop and question both of them. Amethyst feels guilty and left. So in order to make things up, she came up with an idea to clean that the Crystal Gems can clean out Greg storage. So this is really messed up. She shapeshifted as his wife and not only it scarred Greg but Steven as well and yet the writers never decided on how they can properly make it up. That’s so horrible. 

Lapis Lazuli took the Earth's water, almost killed Connie, broke Peridot's tape recorder and called it garbage, and she took the barn. When she finally comes back to help the Crystal Gems to fight against the Diamonds. Her response to everyone was “hey”. She never apologized for anything she has done. I know she has PTSD but it doesn’t excuse her actions. 

The only character that actually feels guilty and has to make amends of her wrongdoing is Pearl. She deceived Garnet by keeping rebuilding Gem communicator so she can fuse with her to form Sardonyx to make herself feel better. Steven and Amethyst find out and spill the beans which gets Garnet mad and Pearl feels guilty. In the last episode of the Sardonyx arc, they get trapped by Peridot. When they were about to get crushed, they two finally talk and Pearl apologizes to her and calls herself “just a pearl” and Garnet tells her you are your own gem and that makes her feel better and fused to Sardonyx once again. 

Now it’s time to talk about the second major gripe with the show that everyone has and it’s the Diamonds being redeemed. The Diamonds are tyrannical fascist dictators that caused genocide many species, colonized many worlds, corrupt gems, shatter gems that don’t obey, have an army, gems that are off-color are put to the underground, and force fused shattered gems into a Cluster. After what they have done, you think they need to pay, right? Unfortunately, since Rebecca Sugar said ``there are no villains' ' and the show is about empathy, the Diamonds, especially White Diamond, get a clean slate. So it’s fine to have a villain be sympathetic and have a sad backstory, it makes them more human but having them redeemed is something you should never ever do, especially what they’ve done. They have very little screen time to show their development and have doubts about their empire. 

Then they made them worse when in Steven Universe: “The Movie” and “Future” 

In Steven Universe: “The Movie”, The Diamonds become clingy aunties to Steven and tell them don’t do evil things anymore like calling other species “equal lifeforms”, disband their arms and not shatter gems.

In Steven Universe: “Future”, The Diamonds abilities have a completely opposite effect towards Gems such as 

Yellow Diamond’s ability to change from poofing gems to fixing 

Blue Diamond’s ability to change from sad blue orbs to happy blue clouds 

White Diamond's ability changed from manipulation to control her for a brief moment. 

Having them become good and having emotions won’t cut it. They can’t atone for what they’ve done for the past millions of being fascist dictators and just saying “I’m a good Diamond now” can’t wipe away their past actions. It doesn’t work like that! 

My Little Pony Friendship is Magic, A SHOW FOR LITTLE GIRLS, have a better-written villain redemption than Steven Universe and I ain’t kidding. Discord was the main antagonist for “Return of Harmony”. All he wanted to do is cause chaos. He was defeated by the mane six at the end of the second part of the episode.

In season 3, “Keep Calm and Flutter On”, Discord was reformed by Fluttershy because Princess Celestia believes he can be a good ally and knows that she can do it. 

Throughout season 4, everyone still doesn’t trust him even though he’s friends with Fluttershy.

In the season 4 finale, he sided with Tirek and he betrayed them because he thought he’ll be rewarded for it. 

Then he was betrayed by him. After Tirek and Twilight fought, she gave up her magic to save her friends, including Discord. It made him realize that friendship is more precious than anything of what he’ll give him and that’s when he’s been fully accepted as a friend to the mane six. 

I also want to talk about Rose Quartz/Pink Diamond. While many fans in the community and the Crewniverse always point that she’s terrible and I agree she is. Such as leaving Spinel for 3,000 years, cracked her first Pink Pearl, abandoned her Diamond duties to be free, started a Gem war that cost many Gems to shatter to pursue her own goal, bubbled Bismuth, gems got corrupted, and left Steven with the burden. It is indeed bad but when compared to the Diamonds, she’s more of a saint than them. At least she does develop, doesn’t shatter gems and save the Earth from the Diamonds. 

With story pacing being all over, villains and even characters aren’t paying for their actions and a cast of characters aren’t doing much, what’s the most problematic of the show? Well, it’s a combination of all my problems into one and that is…

Steven “Center Of” Universe

The major problem with the show, the one that brings down the show a lot and it’s Steven Omnipresence. First off, I don’t mind when a show has a protagonist point-of-view like Ben 10, Phineas and Ferb, Over the Garden Wall, etc. As long as it's written well and keeps the story moving, it’s fine but with Steven Universe, it has tons of problems. Steven's point-of-view is the cause of all its flaws and I can’t stress it enough about it. 

So let’s first talk about the obvious one and how it’s only Steven's perspective. The problem with this is we only see things if Steven is there to witness it. The show introduces a fascinating world of Gems and yet the show doesn’t dive into that because Steven doesn’t care about and all he does is hang around Beach City. Steven will never explore unless he chooses to and some major plot points are offscreen which you should never do, especially it’s a story-driven show. An example of this is “Wanted Arc’” and yes I’m using it the third time as my example because it really is a terrible arc. When Steven comes back home, he had some information about Homeworld, discovered that there’s a mystery about Pink Diamond shattering, Off Colours, Steven can bring back people from the dead and Lars in space. With all that, what does Steven do? Nothing. Throughout his adventure in space, he never mentions it to the Crystal Gems and instead of that being the main focus, it’s townies and Connie. While Steven is doing Beach City fluff, Lars is actually progressing the plot by him developing and escaping Homeworld with the Off Colours. I truly wonder why the Crewniverse believes that Beach City is more important than Gems? 

They got interesting lore and I truly want them to explore it more but they had to waste all that and have the most major plot points be offscreen for Steven's perspective. 

The second problem with Steven p.o.v is his contestant presence. The show will always be about him, no other characters get the spotlight or do anything unless he’s there. There’s rarely a scene that doesn’t have Steven and it’s frustrating when there’s a well-rounded cast of characters that I want to see more than him. We’ll never see them interact with other characters nor explore different parts of the world. Other shows have done it such as 

Amazing World of Gumball - “The World”

Adventure Time - “Varmints” 

Avatar: The Last Airbender - “Zuko Alone” 

Rick and Morty - “Tales From the Citadel”

Imagine how great it will be if explore more of the cast like  

Uncorrupt Gem characters and Curley Lapis going by their day in Little Homeschool. 

Lars becoming a space pirate 

Lapis and Peridot becoming friends 

Pearl meeting up with Mystery Girl

Volleyball recovering from her trauma

Ruby and Sapphire being their own individuals 

They got a lovable cast of characters that I want the show to further explore and yet the Crewniverse don’t do anything with them and that’s such a missed opportunity.  

Then the third most egregious problem with Steven p.o.v is he’s the communicator. The show tries to message that talking things will work but no one really talks to each other unless it’s Steven. Characters barely make their opinion or a chance to speak for themselves while Steven's opinion will and shall always be in the right and we barely see characters talking to one another. Examples of these are…

When Steven bubbles Bismuth, Pearl and Garnet don't say a thing and just let him. They don't question why he did or lash him out for it. They just went along with it. Steven decided to unbubble her in “Made of Honor “ for a wedding without talking to anyone else about it and again, they still haven’t asked questions and they just went along with it. 

In “Reunited”, instead of Crystal Gems look at each other to find their strength like Garnet telling Pearl she’s her own Pearl, Pearl telling Amethyst she’s isn’t an accident, and they tell Garnet that she’s a great leader, Steven has to remind them what they are supposed to be. 

Blue and Yellow had issues with the Gem Empire but too afraid to say to White Diamond. Until Steven arrived and that’s when they tried talking to her.

The Diamonds become good because Steven tells them being a fascist dictator is bad and they agree. They disbanded the Gem Empire and changed their abilities to help Gems under two years. 

Steven made Pearl talk to Amethyst. 

The message the show tries to tell that people should communicate is completely flawed because rather than have other characters improve their lives by talking to one another, they made Steven the messiah that every character looks up to. Steven will change your mind and you have no choice in the matter. 

Conclusion

With the end of Steven Universe, I  want to say that this show could’ve been better. Steven Universe was created by Rebecca Sugar, a former storyboard artist for Adventure Time and the one who mainly writes episodes about Marceline and wrote songs for the show. When she announced that she's left AT to make her show, I was excited and had such high hopes for it. I really want this show to succeed and it could’ve been the next Adventure Time, My Little Pony Friendship is Magic or Gravity Falls but sadly it failed to do so. The show flaws outshined it the strength by it was handled unprofessionally, wasted their characters, the pacing is all over the place, no character pay for their past actions and Steven’s point-of-view. I don’t think it’s the worst show I’ve ever watched nor a masterpiece, it's just a disappointingly average show in my personal opinion. I hope Rebecca Sugar and her crew not just see this as their progressive show by representing LGBT and messaging but also see what they would have approved of on the show and how they could’ve made it better. I had a lot of good memories when I first watched the show. It had the potential to be better but it never filled the promises they made.  

[demigodofhoolemere]

Liken the Scriptures

Something I'm completely in love with and I always ask other Mormons if they've ever seen them: Liken the Scriptures. Now having been more involved with the LDS community on this site and realizing that I haven't talked about it nearly enough, I thought it high time to make a post about it and shamelessly promote my favorite thing in the world.

Liken is a movie series of scripture stories (from both the Book of Mormon and the Bible) imagined as musicals. The premise is that in the modern day, there is a child who is facing a difficult challenge in their life, and they are told stories from the scriptures that relate in some way and the child can use the lesson they've learned from the story and apply it in their lives. When told these stories, the child will imagine it in their minds, everything set up like a play with songs and all, so that they can really get a feel for the story and put themselves into the shoes of the people who lived it.

I have found many times over that these little movies have helped me to remember the stories better than I ever could on my own, and give me a serious appreciation for the real thing. They’re not only educational, but incredibly fun and truly wholesome entertainment, with lots of comedy gags that are a grab-bag of scripture references and hilarious anachronisms (my personal favorite is the sundial watch that appears in all of them). It’s serious when it needs to be and funny when it can be. One minute you have an upbeat and fun number and the next minute the jokes are turned off like a switch and suddenly you're feeling the Spirit strongly, or vice versa, and the transition is so natural and organic. The songs are so well done, the acting is so powerful, there are completely brilliant musical motifs and overtures, the sets and costumes are somewhat cheesy and are clearly church budget but in the best and most fun possible way. The messages are moving and they stay with you.

This is already long, so I'm going to talk about great things from each of them under the cut.

~~~~~

Nephi & Laban (2003)

- a primary classroom that I feel like I've been in before

- the “imaginer child” somehow manages to continually break his imagination’s fourth wall and talk to Nephi

- Nephi (about Laman and Lemuel): “🎶 The older ones play games that I don't always like to play🎶” Lemuel in the background: “Let’s beat Nephi with a rod!”

- Laman is played by Ice from Hocus Pocus

- the song where the brothers are drawing lots is a literal boyband number and I honestly have no words for that experience

- Laban sings a lot about how much he loves his possessions, Zoram is just going with it and the guards are exhausted with their boss

- there’s an incredibly moving number involving Sariah praying to God for comfort, and honestly the raw emotion emanating from her as she cries to Heavenly Father is so powerful and so relatable and it makes me cry with her

- the best method ever of avoiding showing somebody get killed

- a gorgeous closing number that includes the repented Laman and Lemuel but also foreshadows their future by having them not sing the line “I’ll follow thee through all my days” with their brothers

Ammon & King Lamoni (2004)

- Abish is a significant central character and is treated as a scripture hero in her own right, and gets her own incredibly inspiring song about sharing the gospel that has always really resonated with me

- Lamoni is awesome, his servants are great, the queen is amazing (sadly there is no ‘to me he doth not stink’, but her very presence in general makes up for it)

- subtle acknowledgement of Ammon’s past with the sons of Mosiah

- Ammon has a lovely song about the blessings of missionary work and spreading God’s word. During this song he has a picnic with a bear, teaches it the gospel, and gives it a bottle of honey as a thank you for its time. I couldn't make this up if I tried.

- after Lamoni orders his servants to watch the sheep, the servants have a hilariously pessimistic song where they're bemoaning their upcoming deaths, and instead of showing Ammon chop off arms we’re treated to the servants coming back with an upbeat and lively song celebrating the fact that they're alive, and they retell to Lamoni the story of everything that happened. The sequence is incredibly clever and the choreography is the BEST.

- a deep and thoughtful number about Lamoni reconsidering his entire life

- something I really like about this one is that unlike the others, this time it's not the imaginer child who personally needed to hear the story but actually the person telling it

David & Goliath (2005)

(There are 2 versions of this because they re-shot the modern day portion to use a different imaginer child. The one that gets sold with the set is the second version but the first one is still out there if you look for it and personally that's the one that I get more emotional about.)

- Goliath is played by Thurl Bailey and David’s brother Abinadab is played by Alex Boyé which is really all you need to know. Thurl uses a club as a microphone while he sings about murdering the Israelites. This whole thing is gold.

- honestly all of David’s brothers are such characters, they're great. There’s a song where they’re all arguing like children over which one of them is going to be king, and there's another where they’re meeting Samuel and their father keeps trying to promote each of them and after each of them is rejected he continues to claim that the next one in line is his favorite, and when David is chosen he acts like he knew it all along even though they didn't bring him in the first place

- David has a couple of different numbers about the Lord seeing what's inside of you and using you for good things even if you feel so small

- Saul has a complete mental breakdown which results in the best song I've ever heard in my life

- there’s a very reverent sense of companionship between David and Saul, and they have an absolutely gorgeous duet where Saul reminisces about how he used to have the kind of faith and goodness that David does, and David assures him that it's never too late to let God touch your heart

- the Philistines are completely wild and ridiculously over-the-top and their crazy outfits range from Rastafarian to Rod Stewart and their weapons are all completely made up and it makes no sense and I love it

- David: “🎶 and he will soon be 6 feet deep, I’m giving you my oath 🎶” Saul: “But suppose he were 6 feet deep, why, he'd still be 3 and a half feet tall!”

- a servant uses finger guns

- “I Am David” makes me feel like I can do anything

- Saul’s future is foreshadowed by him looking super confused and uncomfortable about David getting the kingdom’s praise

Alma & King Noah’s Court (2005)

- Noah’s courtroom comes complete with animatronic jaguars

- Noah is insanely high-maintenance and his kingdom is some sort of wild media circus and one of the priests reminds me of my uncle as a rockstar

- within the child’s imagination Alma himself also imagines a few things and has to snap out of it so there’s some imagination-ception going on here

- throughout the whole movie Alma is so earnest and genuine and it's so sweet

- Abinadi makes me cry like a baby every single time

- I kid you not, Noah and the priests have a disco number. There is a straight-up disco number in the middle of the courtroom. I can't even begin to explain.

- Seriously though. Abinadi. He ruins me. I always cry. I'm crying right now.

- Alma ruins me, too.

- Honestly the theme of conversion and baptism in this one just gets to me (I suppose it does with Ammon as well but for whatever reason Alma is different). I've been raised in the church myself, but my mother and my paternal grandmother are converts, some good friends in my stake were converted, and I've been blessed to be able to see our closest family friends come to believe the gospel and get baptized, and sharing the light of Christ with others is such an important thing to me that I can never come out of this one with dry eyes.

The First Christmas (2006)

- all of the shepherds are super cheery and optimistic except for just one who's very bored and very tired

- Zacharias and Elisabeth tug at my heartstrings in the worst way

- the angel Gabriel is the absolute best in every way

- any scene with Mary in it is so beautifully powerful, her songs even more so

- there's a scene with the Biblical era equivalent of nosy relief society sisters and it’s great

- honestly there are so many powerful scenes in this one, you've got Mary and Joseph looking for a place to stay and you've got a choir of angels giving glory to God and you've got the shepherds celebrating the birth of Christ and you've got the manger scene and... chills the whole way through

- gloomy shepherd: “Nothing ever happens out here, I mean nothing!” *brightly glowing Gabriel appears half a second later*

- if you've ever heard BYU Vocal Point sing ‘He’s Born’, this is where that song comes from

Esther & the King (2006)

- My favorite. My absolute favorite. There are no words that can convey my love for this movie. Stick my DVD copy with me in my coffin when I go.

- All of the songs are so catchy and amazing and I love each and every one of them with all my heart.

- The maidens waiting to meet the king all do the most ridiculous and flashy things to try and impress him and Esther’s just like ‘um...ok...’ and Hegai has the best reaction faces ever to grace this planet

- Teresh and Bigthan are so weird and a little crazy and I love it. They're like if Timon and Pumbaa were villains.

- what I love even more is Haman, oh my word, he's so vain and childishly absurd but also somehow manages to be truly menacing and awful and it's incredible

- Esther’s relationships with Mordecai and Ahasuerus are perfect and so sweet and all of them individually are such good people

- her songs are so breathtaking and strong and she's my hero and I love her

- Haman has the best villain songs in the history of villain songs. I will never ever tire of them.

- wonderful use is made of the chamberlain with the unfortunate name of Carcas

- there's a song for the part where Haman keeps giving hilariously specific suggestions for gifts that he thinks are for himself and then he goes to cry to his wife when he has to do all of it for Mordecai

- early on Esther has a song asking the king if he can love her for who she is and in the end it gets so beautifully flipped on its head and he's the one very humbly asking her if she can love him and it's the sweetest thing

- the word ‘news’ in the closing number “There Is News Today” is subtly but clearly pronounced like ‘noose’ because Haman’s about to be hanged and it's amusing in a weirdly morbid way

Samuel the Lamanite (2006)

- the imaginer child has been doing this for so long that her imagination process is evolving and now she sees herself physically partaking in the story and interacting with the citizens of Zarahemla and at one point the storyteller goes ‘can you imagine how it must have felt to be a believer in a time such as this?’ and her eyes are wide as she nods her head in fear like ‘yes I'm living it right now and I want out’

- the wicked people in the city sing about how great they are and while doing this they are continually casually awful to the people around them

- there’s this narcissistic archery corps who have the run of the place for some reason

- Nephi II and Nephi III are super sweet

- there are wonderful songs about never being alone because God is within and He shares His love

- Samuel looks very accurate to that figurine

- someone throws a rock at Samuel but it bounces off the wall and comes right back to hit the guy in the face

- the bad guys have a song about how it's been 5 years and nothing Samuel prophesied has happened, and for whatever amazing reason it's a mariachi number and the screen transitions into sepia and they have a piñata that looks like Samuel but they can't hit it no matter what they do

- interestingly, even though this one is filled with a lot of funnies, it's also the most dramatic because the villains become completely ruthless and the believers are literally almost murdered

Daniel & the Lions (2006)

- Darius is overstressed by his job and Daniel has basically become his therapist. Darius has a jazz number about his stress and how he needs help.

- Daniel is so calm and sweet and always has the best advice to offer. His relationship with Darius is very brotherly and loving, and he deals with the men who want him dead with such grace and patience.

- the king’s messenger (to a noisy crowd): “Put a sock in it!” villager #1: *whispers* “What’s a sock?” villager #2: *shrugs*

- Daniel only buys fruit and vegetables from the marketplace in reference to earlier in the book of Daniel where he refuses meat

- There are 3 main bad guys who go after Daniel, and the leader of the band is properly creepy. They also have a fully choreographed number about spying on Daniel while he's literally like 5 feet in front of them and he keeps looking back at them awkwardly, and later they literally have a Beach Boys number in the middle of the throne room and it's the best thing that's ever happened to me

- Darius’s heart is absolutely broken when he realizes that by law Daniel has to be sent into the den and it’s so gorgeous

- when Daniel is taken away the bad guys become very dramatic and act like they've made so many sacrifices for this victory and they're waving around red flags and it's somehow amusing but darkly disturbing at the same time

- Daniel and Darius have an incredibly powerful duet about the Spirit offering peace in times of need and it makes me cry

- the lions are played by people in costume and Daniel can talk to them

- Instead of just making them peaceful or causing them to lose their appetites, the angel turns the lions into vegetarians. They suddenly have a lively number about how excited they are to be vegetarians now. Vegetarian lions. I couldn't make this stuff up. It’s golden.

Jonah & the Great Fish (2011)

- Jonah is played by David Osmond

- I still love this one but personally I don't feel it's quite as good as the others, which has everything to do with the underwater sequences. The ‘great fish’ is given a name and a life story and he has a fish friend who follows him everywhere and for some reason they're given a large amount of screentime. I still kind of like them, but I’m sure I would like them better under different circumstances. It feels very weird and out of place here. The imaginer child and her storyteller even talk about them like they’re real characters. There are also villainous sharks for some reason. The only thing that makes sense about anything that happens underwater is the sequence when Jonah is inside the fish. I don't want to seem like I'm bashing the movie because I don't mean to, I definitely still adore it and I would still recommend it. There’s just stuff that doesn't make sense.

- The way they portray the contentions in Nineveh is to have the city be divided into the Left Siders and the Right Siders, and they all wear a glove on the respective hand and wear different color schemes. The architecture is different on both sides and even all of the names begin with L or R. Everyone is very unnecessarily dramatic about staying on their sides of the dividing line and there's an awesome musical number about how much they all hate each other and how important it is to pick a side. This clearly happens a lot because the king and queen are very tired of having to break up fights and after everyone has cleared out they have a beautiful duet about their hopes that God can help their people.

- Jonah has a great song where he's pledging himself to God and promising to go wherever he is asked, and then he's told to go to Nineveh and he goes, “EXCEPT THERE!” and suddenly the entire song backtracks and takes on a feeling of panic as he packs up all of his things and sings about running as far away as possible

- the mariners that Jonah hitches a ride with take advantage of how desperate he is to run away and they scam him out of almost all of his money, also the captain has a mullet

- when thrown overboard: “So this is how the story of Jonah ends, huh? Prematurely, in the first chapter. I think about verse 15...”

- Jonah has a beautiful repentance song when he's inside the fish, and the entire ending where Jonah is in Nineveh is really well done and the closing number is very uplifting and moving.

~~~~~

Really though, I highly recommend Liken to anybody. I can't do these movies enough justice, they’re amazing. I put them on whenever I'm feeling bad, they just have a way of healing your heart and uplifting your spirit. They’re a wonderful reminder of how present our Heavenly Father is in our lives.

[aracelislindsay-blog]

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[unproduciblesmackdown]

days after the bit of rereading inspiring it Hraaarghh summoning the power to verbalize "i appreciate how much Everyone's Really Motivated Rn Huh & Barely Keeping Ahead Of Things is set up / converging At This Moment for the gamers in lackadaisy"

go mitzi lmao with the fraud or whatever (more importantly robbing the last friend in the world cashed in like poker chips you said it wasn't gonna be like that it wasn't supposed to be but etc Great Exchanges) stringing back together the symbolism necklace, are you sure progress is the world, all this on the line to barely hold things together a bit longer & then the payoff of this relies on what's going on with the other active players in the operation, which is "even more haphazardly strung together into an operation" and "it's going: bad"

which is to say, getting An begrudging shipment of goods based on a bluff, which hasn't been made yet, things are hanging together by a thread as it were, mostly nobody's having a good or particularly strategic time but now they're sure More In It than ever. and killing a guy from the most powerful enemy to make around here who is already on the defensive (ft. good offense style) but whoops where's the other guy? well that's probably fine, as was almost getting shot, and the entire run isn't even completed & compare this to the success of the marigold trifecta operation we were just shown. really ramping up the "no way this can go on indefinitely, & only would keep going on if you Need To Believe It Can Work Out rather than bring down disaster 5 min later"

shoutout to zib in whatever stage of imprisonment he's in where initially it's like "well dropping your access to / affiliation with lackadaisy pin down a drain could solely be about 'ha ha, now Another authority won't detect this'" but i'm supposing it's (also) about giving up on the operation / actually intending to cut his losses. But What Will Happen....and will the time devoted to his establishing any rapport with a prohibition bureau agent lead to him Learning Anything important? hmm

meanwhile there's viktor over there not wanting everything to end with paisley & regret, who's also like "wow i'm moved to tragically look at these unanswered letters from my Daughter daughter, whoops i lost (a picture of) her to the abyssal underworld (basement space) & can't manage to retrieve her (photo) from it. sure hope i don't get a call from elsa telling me a daughter figure is doing her first rumrunning challenge for the vine"

lmao MY guy. you imply around mordecai that marigold WAS up to something that could've played into atlas's death, On Top Of that Something's Up currently that's involving him but he doesn't understand it and he can't get any info from marigold about it, it's like two nights later & he's asking gracie about it, what a special time they're having. unfortunate that it's gonna end in ten seconds based on "mordecai is pushing a guy like thrice his size along on a squeaking desk chair through the obstacle course of an abandoned brewery so i don't think that's prime conditions to evade the savoys' detection / catching up to that" and "also wip sketch pages suggest serafine's about to noscope gracie 'what's going on here' shoot first ask questions of the guy who was supposed to have shot him already later" so like, a) mordecai will presumably have the info about gracie's scheduled Next Meeting With Drago (in several days) so like hm what's he gonna do? we know drago is focused on marigold. does he have info for zib, for mordecai? how would mordecai approach a meeting with a fed out here & as little Specificity to work with as he's had in questioning gracie, even if plausibly drago Does have more relevant info? i guess you could abduct him too, for a start. risky, ups the stakes, but that's just what he's Already done (as has Everyone Else, as per the central topic of this post) and so now b) seems like the savoys' getting to go "uhhh so. what's up" about mordecai's antics (like. also do we really think the savoys believe he's Having Fun anyways. i Guess. just also probably they'll very easily readjust that belief lmao)

actually this is just a paragraph break for the hell of it. MY GUY....so that basically it's looking like another thing that'll happen is mordecai will have to accept an Affiliation Outside Marigold with the savoys, simply b/c suddenly they have all this leverage knowing he's up to something, But based on what they've Just said & done, they aren't particularly interested in Telling On Him but Are particularly interested in "yeah we don't assume we or you will work at marigold forever, so also we Do want to be allied outside marigold forever" and like seems plausible they could be interested in [find out what's going on at marigold that Concerns Them but that they can't be more privy to than they are now] designs as well anyways. difficult to imagine that they can get on exactly the same page here, but it could be some Good Enough compromise between all of them. and i hope so because they Are still crushing it out here and i certainly think their allying in recognition of We're All Out Here Doing What It Takes To Survive is a basis of encouraging clarity / accuracy on the matter and of course a powerful teamup to maintain & work with & because like lord the [this is a narrative] target on mordecai otherwise perhaps lmao like he does not have the insulation of "wow, family, beautiful" or "wow, romance, beautiful" or "wow, the 'innocence' to have been insulated from This Kind Of Situation in the first place, beautiful" or "wow, randos happen to find you useful AND personable, beautiful" or "so you're up to violence in the violence business & so is everyone else but did you see all these preceding points?? watch out" like boy he needs the backup here. fingers crossed my special little guy. and rooting for the savoys too. anyways

and like see all my murder mystery musing but ofc i dunno what marigold's other Ventures and other Warnings and other Thorns are all about, but that we know Something's Up, and it sure could be that like whatever retrenchment type of maneuvers might've led to some situation of marigold like ummm maybe we care more about an alliance with atlas being a potential liability rather than an asset and then that nonzero involvement in the interest of Indefinite Survival For The Business will have been a little domino of its own destruction set off. would be wild if such "whoops trying to outrun one's own doom was feeding into it??" & Cycles Of Violence & stuff were like some fundamental themes driving the whole narrative here. would be wild if it was like nooo not the isolated guy too Weird to everyone else nooooo....at least one way or another getting up to plenty of Drama first. that's right

[saigontimemd]

Mass Effect: Andromeda | 30 Day Countdown |19-10

Still condensing a ton of questions into a single post.

19 Days: Where would Ryder fall in the classic Paragon/Renegade morality system? What would their D&D alignment be? If you know their personality type in any personality typing systems (such as MBTI and Enneagram - you can find various type descriptions and tests using Google), feel free to add and discuss them here.

Mordecai would probably be 90% Paragon, 10% Renegade - with that 10% being when his temper overrides him trying to do the right thing. D&D alignment would be either Chaotic Good or Neutral Good. Blue-Sky would match up with his Paragon/Renegade score mostly (might be 95/5), except she’d be an asshole when whoever it was had it coming. Alignment would be either Lawful Good or Neutral Good.

18 Days: What qualities does Ryder like and dislike in other people? Are there any things they particularly appreciate or can’t stand?

Mordecai likes a good sense of humor, a dirty mind, but preferably both; the only thing better than busting balls is busting balls together - something he and his sister do quite often, usually to each other. Banter is key. He also likes assertive personalities because it usually means less responsibility for him. He hates people who think they’re smarter than they actually are, and he also hates it when people don’t know when to shut up; put both of those together and you’ve got his least favorite people in the galaxy. Blue-Sky doesn’t care as much about ‘the bantz,’ but she also has a lot more patience with people in general. She actively dislikes mean people. Both Ryder siblings appreciate intelligence - in fact, they prefer to hang out with people smarter than they are, if only to learn from them.

17 Days: List some of Ryder’s favorite things - colors, food, music, etc. Is there anything of this nature that they hate? Do they have any hobbies or skills outside of combat?

Mordecai’s favorite color is turquoise; he loves pizza, steak, and buffalo wings - total carnivore, although he also really really loves citrus fruits, particularly oranges and nectarines. In general he just loves to eat, which stands at odds with trying to be as attractive as humanly possible at any given time; at least he’ll get plenty of exercise being a Pathfinder. He’s got a wide range of musical tastes, but gravitates towards anything heavy that he can also sing along with. Melodic hardcore/punk is usually his go-to, although he’s also got a soft spot for 1990s-early 2000s Earth hip-hop because of the wordplay and mellow beats. Both he and Blue-Sky sing, often together. He’s self-conscious about doing it in front of others, though. Lastly, he’s a gigantic nerd; total sci-fi/horror bookworm, loves watching old human shows (particularly Star Trek, which his mother was very into). He’s a lot better adjusted to life in space than a lot of his contemporary soldiers. Blue-Sky’s favorite color is forest green; she loves milk (dairy products in general, really), pizza, and bananas with peanut butter - she eats a lot healthier than Mordecai does. She loves any music she can sing and/or dance along with, although she favors genres she can harmonize to. She’s also a total nerd, though her tastes run more towards sci-fi/fantasy.

16 Days: How would Ryder define their sexuality?

Mordecai is between a 2 (predominantly heterosexual, but more than incidentally homosexual) and a 3 (equally heterosexual and homosexual) on the Kinsey scale. He’s had more relationships with women in the past, thinks they’re generally better kissers than men, and just really likes feminine aesthetics in general, but he also finds that men tend to be more dominant and BOY does he have a submissive streak in bed. Like, seriously; flip him over, he’s done.

Blue-Sky has only ever had relationships with men in the past, but she’s completely open to relationships with women. She’s much less concerned about gender than she is mental and personal compatibility; she’s more sapiosexual than anything. Too bad not many others can keep up.

15 Days: Delve into the Ryder family background - how is/was their relationship with their father, sibling and mother? Do they get along, hero worship, close twin connection, sibling rivalry, was it strained, was it distant, etc.

Relationship between Mordecai and Blue-Sky is fantastic, not least because Blue-Sky did a lot of the raising once Mariah was gone; they were already close before, but entered ‘ride or die’ territory pretty quickly. They would literally take a bullet for each other without a second’s hesitation, and they’re pretty much constantly on the same mental wavelength. There’s always a bit of rivalry between the two, but it couldn’t be friendlier. Mordecai is probably smarter in terms of raw intelligence and wit, but Blue-Sky is composed, analytical, and not as constantly clouded by emotion like Mordecai is, so she’s perfectly happy to take the lead, and he’s perfectly happy to be the ‘dumb’ muscle. Mariah died when they were both really young, so it’s hard to say what they felt beyond your run-of-the-mill child-mother adoration. Their relationships with their father have steadily deteriorated over the years, although Blue-Sky’s connection is stronger since she has more in common with him personality-wise and she mostly understands why he is the way he is, even if she doesn’t like it. Mordecai resents Alec, and although he doesn’t broadcast it, the air between them is decidedly frigid.

14 Days: Describe some important or formative events in Ryder’s history. How did these impact and shape them?

Mariah’s death was probably the biggest formative event in Mordecai’s life, and started him down the ‘you never have to miss someone if you never get attached’ path pretty early. He wanted to avoid counseling, so he, the more introverted of the siblings, put on a mask of smartass commentary, and as he got older it just stuck; he’s still deeply introverted, but he only lets on when his guard’s down. Between that and his dad pushing both of the siblings away from himself, Mordecai quickly developed a ‘me and my sister to the end, fuck everybody else’ mentality. The second biggest event would be what both siblings just call ‘The Split:’ when Alec had them assigned to completely different posts across the galaxy. Alec had hoped that separating them would allow them to both grow as individuals, and although he partially succeeded, he strained his relationship with Blue-Sky and destroyed it with Mordecai. In return, Mordecai devoted pretty much all of his time at Arcturus to pissing off his dad; outscoring every other Arcturus assignee and earning quite a few medals (and breaking more than a couple of his old man’s combat records), but also banging anything that moved and racking up a laundry list of misconduct/insubordination offenses - intentionally overshadowing his glowing record with his own rap sheet.

13 Days: Why did Ryder join the Alliance military? Later on, what were Ryder’s reasons for signing up to the Andromeda Initiative? Were they seeking adventure (or glory, or a challenge), wanting a new start, running from something, following their family, trying to secure a future for humanity, did they simply feel railroaded into it, etc.

Mordecai and Blue-Sky both joined the military because their father pushed them towards doing so (well, less ‘pushed,’ and more just ‘expected’). There are so many varied opportunities within the military that they both figured ‘Why not? At least we’ll stay together.’ And then they got assigned to completely different things - on Alec’s request, no less. Mordecai signed up for the Initiative because his sister did, and there was no way he was going to let her see a brand new galaxy without him. He doesn’t have any huge, altruistic motivations, he just wants to explore the galaxy with his sister. And hopefully piss off his dad some more.

12 Days: How will Ryder feel upon waking up from cryo? Relieved, excited, scared, impatient to get going, lost, etc.

Petty daddy issues aside, Mordecai’s incredibly excited to see a new galaxy, not least because he’s a huge sci-fi nerd. All those Saturday mornings watching old Star Trek reruns have not been lost on him. Blue-Sky is excited too, though she’s got a little more of the ‘pure spirit of exploration’ thing going on. She wants to see humanity move forward to the stars.

11 Days: Once in Andromeda, what are Ryder’s goals? What drives them?

Mordecai’s original goals are to just go along for the ride; he’s not planning on making any hard decisions or taking charge of anything. Maybe see some new planets, meet some interesting aliens (and get very well-acquainted with them), but nothing heavy. Obviously that’s all going to change in several ways. One, most of what he’s done in his entire life has been, at least in some manner, toward the goal of making his father’s life difficult; he hasn’t ever really lived for ‘himself’ in nearly 20 years. Two, he’s going to have a fuckton of responsibility and nobody to pass it off onto; the thought might occur to him, but there’s no one else who can fill those shoes, and he knows it, so saving the Human race in Andromeda is going to be priority number one. Can’t say he’ll deal with the stress in the healthiest of ways, though.

Blue-Sky is very interested in diplomacy and sharing cultures, and hopes to do her part in helping humanity find its place with the other Andromeda races. She’d love to make first contact with a new race. Still, she’s not expecting to do any of the leading herself. That’ll be a surprise.

10 Days: Will Ryder ever miss the Milky Way? What things and places will they miss most?

He might miss the Milky Way, but he’s honestly not all that attached - Mordecai only gets attached to people, and since he’s purposefully kept himself from actually letting anyone besides his sister into his life on a meaningful basis, there’s no worries. Anything else he’d miss - music, books, movies, television shows, etc. - he’s bringing with him. He’ll miss hearing new music from bands he likes, but he figures there’ll be plenty new stuff in the Andromeda system. Blue-Sky is just too excited about the new galaxy to miss the Milky Way much.