#it's hard to overstate how much of that characterization is unconscious

[greenerteacups]

Hermione, in both canon and often in fanon, seems to have predominately male friendships and kind of difficult time building strong relationships with women (Lavender, Fleur, etc.). Even initially with Luna, Hermione was particularly skeptical and had a rocky start.

What's your theory on why this is?

Hermione, especially in the early books, is written by an author who treats her unfemininity as a quality that makes her different from, and superior to, other girls. Hermione is self-serious, intellectual, and decisive, which are classically masculine virtues, which Hermione (and the author) are aware of; and so Hermione eschews femininity in any number of ways. The other girls at Hogwarts, meanwhile, with the exception of Ginny, are often portrayed as shallow, vapid, flirty (count the number of times Lavender or Parvati "giggles" or goes "oooh"), hyperemotional, and boy-obsessed. Meanwhile, Hermione is intense, driven, and oblivious to other people's feelings — in many respects "boyish." Not until the later books, when both the characters and their writing starts to mature, is humanity offered to people like Cho Chang or Fleur Delacour — and even then, Lavender's arc in sixth year is this remarkably mean subplot where a sixteen-year-old girl becomes the butt of endless jokes because she has the audacity to... act silly around her crush. (If you think "Won-Won" is a bad nickname, you need to go see what actual teens in relationships call each other, because I'm telling you, Ron has it easy.)

The narrative wants you to know that Hermione is special, and her specialness is underscored by her difference from other women. In canon, she buys into that specialness, which leads to a degree of disdain for other girls that's fueled by a superiority complex and internalized misogyny. I say this as someone who adores her, and adores her in her complexity: Hermione has trouble forming friendships with women because she believes that she is Not Like Other Girls, and her author agrees with her.

[princesssarisa]

It's very interesting to notice how Disney's Beauty and the Beast draws inspiration not just from other versions of the fairy tale or from Disney's earlier fairy tale features, but from other love stories in classic Hollywood films and literature that were created for adults.

@starberry-cupcake's post on the ways that Disney's BatB changes the tale's core narrative parallel from the Cupid and Psyche myth to Pride and Prejudice is genius. It's slightly astounding that no one on the creative team has ever cited Pride and Prejudice as an influence: but maybe Austen's novel has become enough of a modern myth and influenced so many other love stories and comedies of manners that Disney's creative team really did write the parallels unconsciously. Of course the similarities can be overstated; Belle and the Beast are less mutually flawed than Elizabeth and Darcy, for one thing, and the Beast changes more while Belle changes less than their Austen counterparts do. (I might argue that Belle and the Beast more closely resemble pop culture's simplified ideas of Elizabeth and Darcy than they do Austen's actual characters.) But in terms of plot structure, the parallels are spot-on.

Even if the Austen parallels were accidental, though, the movie's creative team has freely admitted to other inspirations. Screenwriter Linda Woolverton has stated that there's a lot of Katharine Hepburn in Belle. That her characterization in general was strongly influenced by Hepburn's portrayal of Jo in the 1933 film version of Little Women (albeit with her tomboyishness toned down), and that her snappy arguments with the Beast in the dinner-invitation and wound-tending scenes were inspired by Hepburn and Spencer Tracy's similar bickering in their romantic comedies. The animators have also admitted to modeling Belle's appearance after such iconic Hollywood beauties as Elizabeth Taylor, Audrey Hepburn, and Natalie Wood. Photos of those three ladies were kept in the studio for the artists to literally draw inspiration from.

Then there are the other obvious parallels with other movies, which I seem to remember the trivia page of IMDB.com pointing out. For example, there are some obvious parallels with The Wizard of Oz. Belle's iconic blue and white peasant dress looks similar to Dorothy's iconic blue and white gingham dress, and like Dorothy, she's a dreamer trapped in a mundane workaday world, who longs to escape and have new experiences. The Beast's brief "stupid" hairdo during his makeover scene, with its curls and ribbons, also looks like the Cowardly Lion's mane after his makeover, while Lumiere, Cogsworth, and Mrs. Potts can respectively be viewed as counterparts to the Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion themselves. A likable, helpful trio of sidekicks, with Lumiere as the unofficial leader who has all the bright ideas (no pun intended), Mrs. Potts as the kindest and gentlest one despite being made of a hard, cold substance, and Cogsworth as the comically nervous one who nonetheless proves to be braver than he seems. Meanwhile, a shout-out to another classic movie occurs when Belle stands on the grassy hill and sings "I want adventure in the great wide somewhere": an obvious homage to Julie Andrews' Maria at the beginning of The Sound of Music. Appropriately, we could argue that the plot structure of Disney's BatB mirrors The Sound of Music just as much as it does Pride and Prejudice. A free-spirited heroine doesn't fit in with her community; then she unexpectedly goes to live in a new household run by an unhappy, aloof master; at first she clashes with him, but soon she brings warmth and joy back into his life and softens his heart; their growing love for each other culminates in a romantic dance scene, after which she briefly leaves him and runs back to her old home (although for different reasons); but ultimately she goes back to him and they end up together. Fortunately, there are no Nazis in Beauty and the Beast to darken Belle and the Prince's newlywed life.

IMDB.com also notes some parallels with the 1958 Leslie Caron movie Gigi. The young male lead played by Louis Jourdan in that film is named Gaston. Like Disney's Gaston he's a playboy with a cocky attitude, and Gigi refuses to be his mistress just like Belle refuses to be her Gaston's wife. The characters go in completely different directions, though, since Gigi's Gaston redeems himself and gets the girl in the end, while the Beauty and the Beast Gaston... not so much. Lumiere's characterization is also clearly based on Maurice Chevalier, who plays a major role (and sings his most famous song, "Thank Heaven for Little Girls") in Gigi too.

Then there's the Beast's "death" in Belle's arms, which seems to draw strong inspiration from two romantic death scenes in earlier Hollywood classics. First of all, the camera angles are nearly identical to those of Tony's death in Maria's arms in the original 1961 version of West Side Story, as I remember IMDB.com pointing out. The fact Belle's appearance was already partly modeled after Natalie Wood probably helped to bring that scene to the animators' minds. But I also think they drew inspiration from another famous Hollywood death scene: the death of Greta Garbo's Marguerite in 1936's Camille. I've never seen anyone else notice the similarity, probably because the characters' genders are reversed, but I've noticed it ever since I first saw the Camille scene in the 1982 version of Annie. The dialogue has clear parallels, with the dying character resigned to their fate because death will set them free from their life as an outcast (the Beast's "Maybe it's better this way" echoes Marguerite's "Perhaps it's better if I live in your heart, where the world can't see me"), while their lover urges them "Don't think such things"/"Don't talk like that" and tries to convince them that everything will be fine. Then the moment of death is conveyed by Marguerite and the Beast's eyes, as they roll upward and then drift closed, and the reactions of Belle and Robert Taylor's Armand are very similar, as they both pause in horror, then plead "No, no... don't leave me..." and bury their faces in their beloved's chest in anguish.

In all these inspirations and homages, I think it shows that with Beauty and the Beast, Disney set out to create not just another children's movie, but a movie in the spirit of a Golden Age Hollywood classic that adults could enjoy too. In particular, they set out to create a genuinely romantic picture, which adult couples could enjoy as a "date movie" just as much as their kids would enjoy it as a fairy tale. And as we all know, they succeeded with flying colors!

@ariel-seagull-wings, @themousefromfantasyland, @the-blue-fairie, @thealmightyemprex, @littlewomenpodcast, @adarkrainbow

[eleutheramina]

Jack Atlas Analysis - Part 2

Who is FC arc Jack?

How about DS arc Jack? - here

How could the DS arc have done better with regards to Jack?

Part 2: How about DS arc Jack?

DS!Jack is certainly in a much different situation that FC!Jack, and I think the line between character derailment and character development can be hard to draw sometimes. There are some who would argue that the change of lead from Tomioka to Yoshida does change him into a different character, but again, I don’t wholly agree with that. I actually am pretty fine with his characterization for most of the arc. I’m not going to touch on Team Satisfaction and how that retroactively affects Jack’s character because that’s a whole can of worms I don’t care to open. 

So who is DS!Jack? Well, he no longer holds his King title, he is definitely not unbeatable, and his Satellite origins are revealed to the public. He spends the first couple of the episodes unconscious, the third in the hospital with a broken arm. FC!Jack would probably think DS!Jack is pathetic and a disgrace. 

Less of Jack’s Internal Monologue More than how he’s characterized himself, I think one of the more subtle but significant differences about DS!Jack is how his personality is conveyed to the audience. Whereas FC!Jack has a decent amount of moments of internal monologue, I feel like there’s relatively little of Jack’s internal monologue for most of the DS arc. This, I think, contributes to why DS!Jack feels different than FC!Jack even right off the bat. Not to say FC!Jack doesn’t also convey a lot about Jack through his body language, actions, or dialogue, but I think how DS!Jack is characterized relies on it more heavily.

For instance, we don’t get much (or really, any) internal monologue about Jack’s feelings about his loss. Jack’s first action in the DS arc is to knock down a vase in anger because of his Satellite background being revealed; he also reacts similarly angrily when it makes the headlines in episode 31, paired with a flashback of his defeat and Yusei’s words about his pride of being a King, as well as when he hears his fans’ cheers and imagines Yusei’s face very heterosexually in the fountain. 

Both the reason for and the impact of not knowing a lot of Jack’s thoughts regarding his loss is, I think, that the audience mainly has Carly’s perspective on him, especially in episode 31. I think this contributes to the foreignness of DS!Jack--after all, Carly did not exist in the FC arc and we as an audience are not used to her perspective on Jack being the primary way we know him. I don’t say this as necessarily a good or bad thing, just to be clear. 

Right at the beginning of the DS arc, Carly is introduced and given an amount of protagonist-like focus to rival Yusei’s, especially notable since she does not initially have any clear connections with any of the other established characters (unlike Crow, who gets a comparable amount of focus but is retconned into being revealed to have been friends with Yusei and Jack). 

Unlike Jack, Carly does get both internal and external monologues, and the amusement park plot of episode 31 is primarily from Carly’s perspective. She doesn’t know where Jack is trying to go or what Jack’s intentions are for 90% of the episode, and so neither does the audience, and only when she figures it out do we know that he’s heading to the tower. We don’t get to hear Jack mourn his loss of his Kingship when he’s staring at the fountain; it’s Carly who narrates his hurt for us. 

This is especially clear with this shot:

Carly is literally looking at the audience during her internal monologue, suggesting she’s talking to us. Also lowkey this line is funny in hindsight because like she does melt his heart later. 

Even while they’re watching Kiryu and Yusei’s duel, or even in episode 37, we basically don’t get anything about what Jack thinks. We only get what he says to Carly or Mikage (most of which is exposition about Zero Reverse or Team Satisfaction), or Carly’s perception of him. 

Jack’s Relationship with Carly Jack’s initial interactions with Carly feel fairly in-character to me. He’s pretty indifferent to her initially, but if Jack is someone who evaluates people based on their merit, I think the moment when Carly defends him from a blast is when she overcomes the threshold to be worthy of some respect by Jack. And even then, he continues to seem either indifferent or annoyed by her--he initially leaves her apartment without any notice, he gets fed up with her antics to get a scoop from him, and he leaves her at the park and does what he’d originally set out to do. Even after the scene at the tower at the end of 31, he continues to not show much warmth to her at all for the remainder of their interactions before she becomes a DS. 

The impact of the scarcity of internal monologues for DS!Jack is that the development of Jack’s feelings for Carly is kept under wraps for most of the arc. FC!Jack has copious monologues about his being King, etc. As for DS!Jack? Well at one point, he thinks, “What I need to protect” when staring at Carly’s glasses. . . and that’s basically it as far as what Jack thinks about Carly.

The rest is conveyed through Jack staring at her glasses a lot--often paired with or commented on by Mikage, which helps put what he’s doing in a more explicitly romantic light--and conversations with Mikage. Indeed, we only fully understand his motivation when Mikage asks him directly why he’s going to Satellite. Contrast with FC!Jack whose motivation is clear from the beginning and which we hear from his own words. 

Now, I think having Jack’s feelings be mostly beneath the surface is a smart move; in hindsight, it’s pretty clear that he has feelings for Carly, but because they are not overstated, Jack doesn’t seem too lovesick or sentimental in a way that would definitely feel out of character. Rushed Relationship Development Even the most ardent of Scoopshippers can probably agree that the leap Jack and Carly’s relationship takes is a large one. In their duel, it is beyond clear that Jack is extremely in love with her, extremely considerate of her wellbeing, her feelings, her desires, and willing to die with her, and Carly’s feelings are of similar intensity. 

Now, I do think we see that Carly as a character understands and pushes Jack in ways other characters don’t, and in a way that I can imagine Jack eventually also comes to reciprocate. 

But ultimately the relationship itself is quite rushed and the two lack actual quality time together on screen. The scene where Carly is imagining Jack in her apartment and crying about things he took from her helps in creating the illusion that they spent a lot of time together and were able to get close--but ultimately, we don’t get to see much of that on screen, and I think that’s probably the biggest weakness of this subplot. Suggested interactions don’t make up for onscreen interactions, especially when it comes to moving characters from feeling lukewarm about one another to the passion and commitment that Jack and Carly display in their duel. The scenes from episode 29 and episode 31 get references in flashbacks a lot later in the arc--and while they’re certainly shiptastic, they don’t feel commensurate to the intensity of their feelings for one another later.  

Of course, I imagine part of this is because, at its core, YGO is not a romance anime, and the DS arc just really needed to move the plot along. Kiryu and Yusei’s duel, and Jack’s subsequent leaving of Carly, starts in the episode right after the tower scene. The writers needed Jack/Carly’s relationship to go from point A to point B as efficiently as possible. 

Part of the drama/mystery of the Jack/Carly plot is that the audience isn’t fully sure what Jack feels until the duel itself, even though it’s hinted that he cares for her; Jack’s confession of love comes as somewhat of a surprise. But I think this also meant that we did not get to see a lot of the moments of them caring about each other on screen. And I also think that it’s possible to increase their onscreen interactions and make their bonding more obvious without sacrificing too much of the mystery surrounding Jack’s real feelings. Continuity With FC!Jack One thing I do think the DS arc does well is articulating Jack’s FC character pretty accurately and continuing his arc with similar themes/ideas. “Change Destiny” is a really heavy-handed card, but I do think that the idea of Jack believing he is destined to be King or walk on the path of the King, and then abandoning that concept entirely for a path he makes himself, is consistent with FC!Jack’s doggedness in being King and the way Godwin/Jaeger talk about it as something he’s meant to be.

Although the execution was not great, I think the idea of Jack being tempted by the idea of being a Dark King - one who “needs not friends, bonds,” and rules over the whole world turned into hell, is an extreme version of the loner king who abandons friends for something better, as Jack did

Similarly, the idea of a real King that Carly hopes Jack will become in episode 59, though cheesy, does expand on the idea of him being a King in a way that is also consistent with not being a loner/gaining bonds. When Jack calls himself “a person who would never give a thought to others... willing enough to betray and hurt [his] friends, sacrificing any and all for [his] own ambitions” — I think that’s spot on who Jack is in the FC arc. 

And Godwin and Jack’s dramatic exchange during their duel at the end of episode 63 about the only way to being a King is being alone, about how Jack abandoned bonds — that’s pretty congruent with FC Jack. And having Jack say that he also abandoned being the King, when his attachment to being the King was the cornerstone of his character before, is an effective move in terms of rounding out his character arc. The other biggest flaw with Jack in the DS arc is that we don’t see him struggle more with abandoning that identity.

In fact, DS!Jack spends a lot less time angsting talking about being the King--which again, makes some sense because he lost the FC and the focus of the story shifts/expands to be more about the Signer vs Dark Signer conflict. If it is brought up, it’s mostly to emphasize that he’s not the King anymore, such as when he corrects Mikage about calling him King in episode 32, or when he calls that man “a different person” to Godwin in episode 42. 

Jack feels notably less condescending and egoistical in the DS arc, even from the very beginning. Part of this can be explained away by the fact that he is no longer in the settings in which his ego can shine the most--the Duel Stadium, or his mansion--and therefore doesn’t really have that many people to look down on anymore. I also think part of it is because, due to the lack of internal monologue (and the use of Carly as a viewpoint character), we don’t hear his thoughts as often, disparaging or not. 

The most we see of the condescending Jack is probably in episode 43, when he beats up Yusei when he’s upset about having to fight Kiryu. It’s also the main time we see Jack talk about how he feels about losing his title - he says Yusei “dragged [him] off his throne and gave [him] such disgrace.” Here we see how this aspect of Jack, rather than mostly serving to make him look cruel as it had in the FC arc, actually helps to challenge Yusei’s character. Indeed, in general we see Jack is more supportive of Yusei. We also see a bit of Jack’s old boastfulness when he says that “Your Earthbound Gods aren’t so great” and saves Martha’s kids in episode 46. 

Jack also doesn’t push other people away as much in the DS arc, though he definitely still does at some points. When Mikage tries to draw closer to him, he ultimately rebuffs her. Even Carly initially leaves without much thought and brushes her off when she first tries to talk to him. When Yusei’s talking about his nakama in episode 45, it’s Jack who says he’s not anyone’s friend. Jack is also arguably the most closed off from the other Signers. No one knows who he’s dueling, and he’s the only Signer to not have anyone watching his duel. 

Yet he also more openly cares about other people. Yusei’s injury in episode 35 gives him great concern for him that honestly he doesn’t show Yusei much during the FC. We are shown Jack’s old caregiver, Martha, whom he clearly cares for. And of course, there’s Carly. 

Finally, Jack has more moments of generic heroism in the DS arc, whereas in the FC he basically has none. He goes into the crumbling Arcadia Movement to save Aki, and he also dramatically saves the orphans from being sacrificed to the Earthbound God Uru. Whereas Jack could be said to be one of the antagonists of the FC arc, he certainly is portrayed as more of a protagonist in the DS arc, when the grander Signer-Dark Signer conflict plays out.