#of the arc that the entire previous movie was about. is it cuz it was too gay? or is it just plain incompetence?

[galaxythreads]

"You dislike Thor Ragnorak, and think Ragnorak, and beyond, plus TVA Loki are rather out of character, so you hate Loki. You hate him cus he's really just a villain and not that complex."

I mean wow you've got me.

Pack up the bags, that's the best argument I've ever heard in my life. If you cannot tell, I am being extremely sarcastic.

I don't have any gifs for this one, but I do have a keyboard, so.

Let's just break this down:

Yes, I and a lot of fans of Loki pre-2017 really didn't enjoy Ragnarok. Fans that came LATER didn't enjoy Ragnarok. Fans who saw Ragnarok first, went back and watched the previous movies with Thor and Loki, then went back and watched it again and hated it. These things can all co-exist. People can really have enjoyed Ragnarok and I don't care? Like, sure, whatever.

The thing about Loki post-Ragnarok and into the series is that he's not Loki anymore. He's an entirely new character with the same actor and name. If someone who hasn't seen pre-2017 is judging Loki off of that, I would agree. Loki isn't that complex. That is the reason that a lot of Loki fans hate anything to do with him post-2017.

Pre-2017, Loki was so much more complex. His backstory and his motivations were deeply emotional and heartbreaking. Just because his arc was a negative one doesn't mean it wasn't an arc. He was still a compelling character because Loki was part of the reason a plot got driven forward. He was part of the story, not just there to look pretty.

Also just the "you just hate him cuz he's really just a villain" makes me really really think OP has very little understanding of Loki's character at all. Honestly, it's funny because it's such a ridiculous take. I want to talk to them and see where they get this idea from, honestly. Defend yourself to me, OP.

(And if we're going by that logic--where we aren't looking at canon to find character motivations and complexity--aren't Slyive, Mobius, the TVA, Thor, Wanda, and a lot of other people "just villains" too?)

[profblahson]

On that Puss in Boots brainrot, so here’s a list nobody asked for that I can’t get out of my brain

Classical Music I think characters would appreciate for one reason or another, usually because of the story or impetus behind its writing or meaning, in an increasingly longer title

Disclosure: these are just my thoughts. Feel free to comment, reblog, add, discuss! I’m just some dude on the Internet talking about fictional characters, have fun with it!

Under a cut cuz it’s long and there’s a lot of video links

My goal was to explore the music a bit more, get into the reasoning behind its existence, and how that story might play into why I think these characters would appreciate to it. (Sometimes, though, it’s a bit more simple than that)

Gotta start with our favorite, fearless Hero

Puss

“Heroic” Polonaise in Ab, Frederic Chopin

You’ve probably heard this one before, as it’s one of Chopin’s most popular works. Some research, however, I found that Chopin apparently didn’t like attaching descriptive titles to his work - “Heroic” was added by the modern listeners and music historians. The piece was written during the revolutions of 1842, and Chopin’s love at the time, Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin de Francueil - known by her pen name George Sand - wrote that the piece had the energy and passion needed for the French Revolution. It seems their correspondence was a part of why it gained the name “Heroic” later in life.

While initially I chose this piece because “haha heroic for the hero,” I found I had a “wait a minute” moment reading about how the name was added later on. If having a title and being perceived a certain way doesn’t describe this cat (at least, for most of the film), then I watched the movie wrong. But the energy and vigor with which it clearly gets performed with, the emotional weight it can carry for so many people, during a time of political upheaval…I think Puss would resonate with that, being a Robin Hood himself.

Death

I have to talk about my boyfriend my boyfriend next, of course, being the reason for Puss’ journey in the first place.

Piano Trio No 2 in e, Dmitri Shostakovich

(This is likely the most difficult piece to listen to and talk about, tonally and emotionally. It’s incredibly dark. I’ve linked the fourth movement, because it beautifully synthesizes all the themes and ideas from the previous three, but if you have the time and spoons to spare I highly recommend listening to the entire composition start to finish.)

I’ve actually mentioned this piece specifically in this context on my blog before, but now I can elaborate a bit more. Shostakovich was heavily scrutinized by Stalin’s regime, and his works and performances were subject to the whims of the government for most of his life and beyond. He often had to write as carefully as he could so as to appear to be aligned with those in power, but often would write using themes and motifs counter to what the government would have liked.

The Piano Trio No 2 in e was part dedicated to Shostakovich’s friend and mentor, Ivan Sollertinsky - who passed away during the writing of the piece -, and part dedicated to the Jewish prisoners of war during WWII. Apparently, Shostakovich heard they were made to dig their own graves, and then dance on them. The fourth movement I linked makes the most clear use of a Yiddish-sounding theme in the violin, and the tormented nature of the composition is undeniable. As a character who clearly values life, I feel Death would appreciate the dedications and thought behind the piece, but also enjoy how beautifully macabre it sounds.

Kitty

Kitty was difficult for me, to be honest. Trying to find something that captures her arc is tricky, as I don’t personally know of much music that discusses trust, both in general, and the way she experiences it. But I do think she has a lot of pride in herself as a strong individual, and has pride in her work, which is why I went with

Danzon No 2, Arturo Marquez

The Danzon is a partner dance that developed from the Habanera, and is an active musical form in Mexico today. Marquez’s Danzon No 2 takes this to the next level, in a high energy and blistering work that will leave you humming it for hours. This piece is important as a modern work, as its popularity brought about not only greater respect for Mexican composers, but caused people (read: Western classical musicians) to explore and perform more Hispanic literature, especially Marquez’s. This is also the only piece on this list by a living composer, premiered in 1994.

Being of Hispanic descent, I felt Kitty would find pride in her nation’s music and dances becoming popular across the world due to the popularity of this piece. We also know this cat likes to dance, and it’s incredibly difficult to resist when listening to it.

Perrito

Nimrod, from Enigma Variations, Edward Elgar

The Enigma Variations are small vignettes written for Elgar’s friends. The most recognizable and known of the Variations, Nimrod is an absolutely gorgeous piece of music. The title “Nimrod” is a play on words - the friend in question’s name was Jaeger; Jaeger means “Hunter” in German; Nimrod was a biblical hunter of fame.

Jaeger was not only a friend, but Elgar’s publisher. He would offer advice and helped Elgar rework sections of music here and there. Jaeger’s presence as a confidant is shown in the slow moving lines, reflecting on years of support. If Perrito doesn’t embody dedicated friendship, support, and love in this way, then again - I must have watched the movie wrong. He learns to sit and listen through his time with Puss and Kitty, and this movement almost forces you to take a moment and really sit, listen, and appreciate what you’re hearing.

Goldi

Symphony No 1 in c, Johannes Brahms

I literally cannot think of a better “just right” story in music history than this piece. Brahms was known for destroying his manuscripts of works and sketches he didn’t approve of - he famously ached and pained over writing his first symphony, despite having already solidified himself as a successful composer. He was afraid of the looming shadow of Beethoven, who he had already been compared to by audiences and critics. Some records say it took 14 - others upwards of 21 - years for him to finish this first symphony, and even still he trialed it before publishing.

It seems things ended “just right” for this piece, after all. It was received positively, and spurred him on to compose his second symphony in about a year after the first. Music historians have pointed to this as a shift in the romantic symphonic style. While comparisons to Beethoven were still made (Brahms apparently being frustrated by this - not because of them, but because he felt it was obvious), Brahms had carved his own path of symphonic writing.

Okay I’m done here that’s as far as I got

If you made it down to here, congratulations! This idea came about because, uh, I thought it’d be fun! It gave me a chance to research a bit, and it was fun to try and think of music these characters that I can’t stop rotating in my head would appreciate.

Music is so universal, you could probably find a reason in any piece to give it to anyone, but that’s also what makes it so great. I am by no means an authority, and if you read all this way, feel free to let me know what you think!

Thanks for your time.

[yourfavouritetragedy]

I was adding onto the DSMP Actor AU post, but it turned into Wilbur musician AU, haha rip me, and I only know SBI anyways so here’s a separate post. (It goes back to actor AU at the end.) It’s hypothetically still in the same universe though, and obviously inspired by it. If anything’s phrased weirdly, it’s cuz this was originally an addition to that. 

tbh I kinda adhered to their IRL careers too much compared to the OP but whatever it’s fine. 

Also frick the “Dream SMP” for not having a better title lmaooo

Wilbur is an indie artist really on the come up

Your City Gave Me Asthma was pretty good for a first release, popular with both new fans and fans of his acting.

He had starred in a short mystery/thriller-ish series that started off disguised as a normal sitcom: Chilly in Lincolnshire {Editor Wilbur ARG}

It had a prominent release because of Jack Massey’s involvement and previous fame, but production was abruptly scrapped before it tied everything up with a bow on top, so to speak. It’s still unclear if this was actually planned in order to tell the story the way they way wanted. 

Even before that, critics had mixed reviews, either applauding the storytelling and acting or calling it “irrationally confusing, an amateurish attempt to box unconventional storytelling into a conventional medium.”

Also SootHouse was a sitcom that achieved a cult following during the two seasons it ran before cancellation. Either you’re a fan or you’re never heard of it, and people constantly forget Wilbur was in it. 

(He was a few other old shows on his resume too. Wilbur always focuses on the newest project, so everyone always forgets about what he was in before.) 

Maybe I Was Boring EP was initially just bonus tracks on his website, but his fans liked it so much he gave it a wider release

In between, he had a few comedy songs go viral on youtube. Everybody was so confused when they realized it was the same Wilbur as musician/actor Wilbur. He laughed about it in an interview, saying “How many Wilburs do you know?” 

That’s when it came out that “Wilbur Soot” was actually a stage name. (”Ha, fair, only one.” “Make that zero-- my name’s not really Wilbur.”)

He kinda disappeared after that?? Didn’t do anything, really inactive on social media. It was semi-confirmed that he was both working on his mental health and prepping some stuff (music, auditions).

But anyways he just released a series of singles, combined into Digital Love {E-girl trilogy}-- he’s transformed his image yet again, but this time he does take ownership of all his past ventures.

The release of Digital Love bridges the end of SMP Earth and the beginning Dream SMP. 

But before that there was MCC and the other stuff.

They are shows where celebrities team up do stuff-- you know the type 

but Minecraft Monday is still inexplicably Minecraft Monday. Some Youtuber just managed to get all these up and coming celebrities to play a Minecraft tournament. 

And that’s where the Sleepy Bois (minus Tommy) met IRL so that’s where they meet here. 

SMP Earth, like Minecraft Manhunts, is also a former show they were on. I’m going to call it World Domination. Don’t @ me; I know that’s trash lol. 

They and the Dream Team met up because of their shared fanbases and were even talking a crossover, but it didn’t really work that well for the stories so they scrapped it

They make a non-canon cross over episode anyways {no IRL equivalent, I think}

Everybody loves the cons. Everytime there’s a con, five friendships are made and eight ideas are created. 

Techno backstory time

He’s done a lot of long running, though not exactly popular, serials and sitcoms: Blitz, Survival Games, and Sky Wars. 

Winstreak: 1000 {Bed Wars 1000 winstreak} was so popular they made a second season, but it never got as big as the first. He worked nearly exclusively with Hypixel Studios. 

He was doing lots of random content for their new Sky World universe {Skyblock} -- the small studio was big on experimentation -- , when a fictional documentary, The Great Potato War, went proper viral. 

They made two sequels WHILE he was doing those celebrity team challenge shows and then World Domination, and they were actually good sequels.

Got a reputation for being shallow and a sell-out, but he makes a joke of it so much he gets away with it and constantly self-promos.

Also a kinda scary to work with for the first time because of how single-minded he can get, but once you realize how socially awkward he is it’s okay.  

Now that’s he’s in a lot of stuff with worldbuilding, he practically has the wikis memorized. 

Tommy mainly did limited series and movies before World Domination, where he met the SBI.

He’d had been a fan of Wilbur for a while, and was super star-struck at first, but got over it really quickly in his Tommy style

He still is a total fanboy at concerts and whenever a new music video drops. “I’m friends with the guy! I know him, Wilbur Soot!” “Tommy, you’re famous too.” “Yeah, cuz I’m practically in the video!” “No--” 

Wilbur takes Tommy to one of his concerts and he’s so hyped the entire time, especially to go behind the scenes and on the stage. 

Sometimes he gets stressed about the pressure of being a child star, but Techno, Philza, and Wilbur promise to stand by him and they make him feel protected 

One time Wilbur’s drunk and almost hands Tommy a drink before swearing and going, “You’re a bloody child! You can’t have that! God, what would Philza think?” Tommy’s not sure whether to be relieved or disappointed. 

Philza laughs at the story and actually lets Tommy try a little in a more controlled, responsible situation. Tommy texts his mum first, and then hates the drink anyways. (”This is rubbish! I am a man, but I’m not drinking this!” Techno: “Alcohol is disappointing. I drink orphan’s tears instead.” “Techno WHAT--”)

Philza had been the star of a zombie apocalypse show: Golden Core 

He did canonically die to a child zombie in the movie version. Yes, they made a movie version of the TV show, because the Golden Core franchise actually has had many other shows {other hardcore series}. 

Everybody tries to get the child zombie props near him because of that (they’re puppets)

He’s done a lot of other things, like in the original actor AU post, but none of them came close in popularity. 

He gives the rest of the SBI the knowledge he’s gained from being in the biz for so long. 

There’s also a running joke about SBI meaning “Spy Boys Incorporated” and them starring in a comedy spy movie

The fans would very much actually like this to happen. There’s so many fanons for it (maybe I’ll write one....) 

Back to the DSMP. Maybe I’ll call it Dreamland or smth. 

Wilbur constantly asks Tommy if he’s okay after any difficult scenes

Especially when they were hanging out together a lot in the exile arc.

All the brother scenes were cut because Wilbur kept breaking down and crying in them.

Sometimes people actually ask Techno and Tommy if they’re actually brothers. Tommy tries to go along with it half the time on the basis of “it’s be funny,” so there’s a subset of casual fans that genuinely don’t know. 

After Alivebur was killed off, Wilbur was going to leave the show to concentrate on his music

But he missed the SMP and hanging so much that he just showed up on set one day saying “I’m a ghost now,” and everyone just rolled with it

Alivebur was so popular that, seeing that Wilbur was willing, they decided to bring him back for Season 3. He’s been avoiding doing heavy scenes, but he still seems really invested and like he wants to come back to the show.

Wilbur talks with Techno about writing and lore a lot

it’s one the few times Wilbur actually seems like the older one

Wilbur attempted to get a D&D group going in the cast, but the show was already close enough, with the amount of improvisation they can get by with

Tommy’s Pigstep cover happened, but the background was Philza clapping barely in time with just Wilbur on bass instead (and of course Techno’s “BAHP”s)

It was a charity stream. They had put on their costumes (clothes only) for a previous goal. 

This one was simply called “We rap.”

Some people were almost disappointed that Tommy was the only one actually rapping, but he was so funny it made up for it. 

Okay I spent the whole morning on this and it got way too long but I think I’m finally out of ideas. sorry haha hope you enjoyed! ^_^

[hetare-ttk]

@ryo-maybe @turbobyakuren

the movie feels simultaneously algorithmically made and crafted by a group of people that kept going “yes put this line here it was on the previous movies audiences will respond to it” the fact that they even shoved a reference to Spider-Man 2’s “my back” line shows you how bad this problem get, the villains have more chemistry which eachother than the Peters do which we don’t even get too much of because they have to act 100% stupid for plot reasons.

Every single problem in this movie is caused by Peter Parker thinking he knows better and the only person that calls him out on it is Doctor Strange which ends up getting dunked on because “well it’s your spell so technically your fault” and “why weren’t you around to help us?” (<-the answer to this question was ‘because Peter Parker’ literally)

The most hilarious part of the whole movie is that not even the big emotional moment of the whole film is saved from “dont forget to put that line in there!” And the emotional weight of THAT scene doesn’t even carry because immediately after they introduce the other petter and shoves you head first into the most awkward hamfisted character interactions I’ve seen in the MCU, it’s so awkward I’m convinced they weren’t in the same room while filming.

The fate of the villains falls apart under any sort of scrutiny and it’s only held together by being vague enough about it that audience can put it in a mystery box and go “yes but what if” something that they were COUNTING ON, to not have to address all these characters arcs they revived, and did nothing of interest with, because once you realize how the final fate of these characters makes no sense whatsoever it trivializes like 80 minutes of this entire movie

And that’s without going into too much spoilers cuz if I can scrutinize and spoil WHY this movie makes me mad I’ll write a whole thesis fkdbkdjd

[revchainsaw]

Bumblebee (2018)

Good Evening worshippers, and welcome! Today the Cult of Cult goes a little more mainstream than usual. It's been a while since i've tackled a big Hollywood superhero film. But I do believe that these sorts of films will be remembered fondly my small groups of people in the future, especially the smaller films that are being overshadowed by the big bad MCU, films like 2018s Bumblebee.

The Messsage

Bumblebee was originally released as a prequel to the Transformers franchise that had started all the way back in 2007. However, reboots had really hit the market as a way to breath new life into struggling franchises, and the Transformers series had already gone to just about every absurd extreme you could imagine. No changes were made to the movie as it was released, but with it's more childish and heartfelt tone, and a new aesthetic that was softer, smoother, and all around just generally more pleasing to the eye, I think it was a wise choice to rebrand Bumblebee as a new beginning.

Our story is of two friends from two very different worlds and how they came together. Our first character is Bumblebee, then known as B- number sign/it doesn't really matter. Not yet Bumblebee is a soldier set with securing a safe location for the Autobots to regroup and make their home as they suffer a pretty serious defeat on cybertron at the hands of the tyrannical Decepticons. Optimus Prime, here again voiced by Peter Cullen and looking so much more like himself, assigns this task to Bumblebee promising him that they will meet him there when the time comes. Then Optimus fucks off for the rest of the run time making way for our little hero.

Bumblebee lands on Earth and is immediately set upon by John Cena and his military goon squad. It probably would have been wise for Bumblebee to avoid John Cena but in his defense, he couldn't see him. Hardy har har. In his attempt to flee his voice box is damaged, he seeks sanctuary by taking the form of a run down little VW bug, and suffers from amnesia.

Then we have Charlie. Charlie is not like other girls. She likes cars, all the retro music, which wasn't retro when the movie takes place, so I'm supposed to just think she's a rocker but it kinda seems like she'll listen to just about anything. I think in 2018 liking Motorhead and The Smiths (who are used ad nauseum in this movie) is perfectly common, but I feel like in the 80s that was a much different and much older attitude to take.

Anyway Charlie's poor family lives in a super fucking nice house and are poor because the dialogue keeps insisting they are so it must be true despite all the shit they have that actually poor people would sell blood and teeth to attain, but hell, this is Hollywood and Hollywood poor is like regular people upper middle class. Charlies family is so poor that instead of giving her a one time graduation/birthday present to buy a part for a car she already has, they just give her a moped, She also spends all her time at a pull apart where the manager (who might be her uncle that wasn't super clear) is willing to just give her a Volkswagen so I don't understand why she didn't already have the project car up and running. Whatever, it's a plot contrivance. All you need to know is that Charlie is tenacious and hard around the edges cuz her dad is dead and she's not yet mature enough to process that in a healthy way. Maybe her character arch will teach her to let others in, we'll have to find out.

There's also a wacky nerd named Memo, and some bad guys, and John Cena. They are all also pretty archetypal and contrived and don't really do anything of note that isn't just filling a beat that this kind of movie needs to walk. Charlie starts Bumblebee up, discovers he's a robot and the two begin to bond. Charlie learns to make a friend, and bumblebee is learning about himself. They get into hijinks and get revenge on a bully girl who makes Regina George look like a saint, she pretty much only picks on Charlie exclusively for having a dead dad.

The moment Bumblebee is woken back up, some technology goof em up that both he and Charlie are unaware of brings two Decepticon baddies into the picture. I don't remember their names, but since I love The Venture Brothers let's say they can be "Jet Boy and Jet Girl". Jet Boy and Jet Girl are sometimes cars, sometimes various flying military vehicles, and they make friends with the deep state and plan to get all the adrenochrome from all the orphans, or just to go find Bumblebee and beat his ass good cuz their bad guys. Let me tell y'all though, Jet Boy and Jet Girl are so bad that they don't even care that the government is listening when they reveal that they are planning on bringing a Decepticon Invasion and after they rough up Bumblebee real good they are going to destroy all life on this planet. So they start by killing a military scientist.

John Cena is after Bumblebee and he's homies with Jet Boy and Jet Girl until the military scientist butt dials him and he hears the evil plan. John Cena goes from heel to face and helps Bumblebee and Charlie save the day. It's a giant CG clusterfuck climax a la any superhero film in the last 10 years and I basically stopped watching. BumbleBee pulls a Hellraiser on Jet Boy, and then he hits Jet Girl with a freaking boat. Charlie uses her diving skills do dive down and save him, but he's a Giant Robot and he was okay and it was literally pointless for her to to except as a way to show that her character has completed her arch by doing the thing that was representative of her connection with her lost father.

Bumblebee turns into the Camaro from the first movie, meets up with Optimus prime, and the stage is set for this prequel to squeeze more prequels out. So it wasn't very creative, but was it bad? Let's find out.

Please Stand to receive the Benediction.

Best Aspect: Transform the Franchise

Bumblebee was directed by Travis Knight of Laika fame and it shows. This movie marks a stylistic change in the transformers franchise, as in it doesn't look like utter dog shit, but it also represents in many ways a tonal shift. It does hold on to a lot of gross sleaze that has unfortunately been forcibly jammed into the DNA of the franchise but it also attempts to be a more heartfelt entry. The characters of Bumblebee might all be sort of a waste of time, but at least they are doing something with emotions, even if the emotions of the characters are only explored as deeply as a children's cartoon I'm glad they are there. In the previous installments the only thing the characters did between running from action piece to seizure inducing action piece was drool over underage girls like a bunch of chimpanzees at the facility where they test experimental E.D. meds. It was nice to see that at least somewhat tampered. This transformers movie feels more like it's for kids and young teenagers, and strangely that more friendly tone makes for a much less juvenile product.

Worst Aspect: Remember I Love the 80s from the 2000s

I hope you really like Stranger Things. I do, but because Stranger Things was so successful it' s going to be everywhere. Not true Stranger Things just 80s nostalgia porn. This 80s nostalgia is going to be forced on you whether you like it or not, and it's not going to be fun. It's gonna be in your shows, in your music, in your Sunday like Bacon in 2010. It's that or Marvel Franchise Brand Whedonisms. Bumblebee is that brave movie that says, "Why not both?" It would seem fitting that a property as quintessentially 80s as Transformers should feel completely comfortable doing a period piece set in the 80's but it's so fucking half hearted it's depressing. It wasn't done to appreciate the roots of the IP, it was done to cash in on a trend and it feels it. All they did was throw up a date and insufferably force an 80s soundtrack down your throat as if that was enough to convince you that this movie needed to be set during this time. Other than that you could have told me this film was set in 2007 and I couldn't tell you any different.

Best Character: Charlie's an Angel

I liked Charlie. Sure her Arc is predictable, her taste is dumb, and she isn't exactly a master of her own destiny to any degree. But at least she is a woman in a transformers movie who's got something going on. Sure she's defined entirely by grief, but that sure is better than pretending that being able to work on cars is a feminist character trait instead of a weird fetish thing. They certainly do that thing with Charlie, but at least it's not the only thing they throw at the wall. Bumblebee is by no means out of the woods in this department, but it garners a lot of goodwill for trying. Like a racist uncle who just started his journey out of ignorance, but hasn't yet realized he has to stop asking mortifying questions to the barista at Starbucks. Okay, maybe that's an extreme metaphor. I'm saying that perhaps Charlie is not a great character but she's a great character for a Transfomers movie.

Worst Character: It's JOOOOHHHNNNN CEEEENA!!!!

Why is John Cena in this movie? I don't hate the guy, but his character seems pointless. You could remove him from the movie completely and replace him with any one of the random military goons at any point and it changes nothing. What was with that dumb salute at the end? It seems like they put him in this movie in post and it was just to pump up cast list. I wish he was given anything to work with. I can't remember his characters name, and it's not like John Cena did a bad job, I was just annoyed every time they kept giving him hero shots. I felt like I was watching a trailer for a different movie.

Best Actor: Optimal Primo!

Every time Peter Cullen speaks I want to listen. There's a reason they haven't had Chris Pratt or somebody with a bigger name come in and take over the role at this point. He's why the audience keep coming back. Peter Cullen IS Optimus Prime, and there's no changing that. He also wins twice. He's the best actor in the movie AND he's barely in the movie. Good call Peter.

Worst Actor: Mean Girls 2, Meaner and Girlier

I don't want to be cruel so I'm not going to go into to much detail, but there's an actress in this film who's performance is so mustache twirlingly evil and stupid that it ruined my suspension of disbelief when i knew going in that i was about to endure a 2 hour toy commercial about robots that turn into cars. Beldar Conehead was a more convincing human being than Tina.

Best Effect: Goo Be Gone

I really appreciated when the bad guys shot the government nerd into a blast of snot. That was pretty fun for me. Best part of the movie hands down.

Worst Effect: Live Action?

Bumblebee is a cartoon. It's a great looking cartoon but it doesn't sell itself that way. If we were doing a Roger Rabbit thing I'd have no gripes. However, I think CG is just getting worse. I'm criticizing this and it's still lightyears better than the previous entry's on the franchise. No transformation or fight sequence in Bumble Bee had me straining to make sense of what I was looking at. I think it was a great idea to start using some basic shapes and outlines to these characters, and return somewhat to their 80s designs. But at certain points, especially when there were no humans in the shot, i was pretty convinced I was watching Clone Wars. There may not be anyway around this, as the Transformers concept might not be able to be pulled off in any more effective manner. It's a minor gripe, but I just didn't think it looked like anything other than a very expensive cartoon, and in this franchise that's a compliment, because it least it looked like SOMETHING!

Best Scene: Space Opera

I am not a Transformers fan. I missed the boat on the cartoon as a kid. I would sometimes catch it at friends houses but I was more into Batman, Star Wars, and Ninja Turtles. By the time I came onto the scene the world had moved on to Beast Wars. I did one day arbitrarily decide that my favorite Transformer was Sound Wave. He looked great in this. I am a big fan of the return to form with a lot of the character designs in this. They really did keep the things that worked from the other adaptations, and they are steadily removing the things that didn't. For this reason, the scenes on Cybertron, particularly the battle with Soundwave (i prefer for personal reasons) looked great and were exciting to watch. I remember thinking Cybertron used to look like a Marilyn Manson shot a music video from inside to dumpster. This is so much better.

Worst Scene: Blocking the Box

There's a scene in Bumblebee where Charlie's family decides the best way to save their daughter was to cause a pile up of vehicles in an intersection, and it's pure contrived writing that saved any character in that sequence from being killed in a horrific traffic accident. It was stupid, played for laughs, and it wasn't exciting as much as it was anxiety inducing. I also thought that there was no reason the covert military group covering up extraterrestrial life wouldn't just disappear this family of fucking morons in their little piece of shit car. The logic of the scene was just so childish like, "No they won't hit me, I'm a good person."

Summary

Bumblebee may be remembered fondly in a decade. I think especially if the Transformers franchise were to end here. It didn't get the publicity of the other films, and that really is a shame. For my money, this was the best Transformers movie so far. I was very tempted to give Bumblebee a C, it does just enough to right what was wrong from the other movies to make me appreciate all that work. This movie has heart, and if you are at all into Transformers then l think you should see it. It's still pretty stupid, and pretty basic. It's not offering anything new to the genre, and it feels like a commercial for more movies. I really wish we could just get movies that want to tell a story. I thought it over and decided that it wasn't fair not to grade Bumblebee on it's own merits. Bumblebee is substantially better than the films that preceded it, but that's not saying a lot, when the films that preceded it are joyless exercises in self abuse.

Overall Grade: D

[monkey-network]

Why EVE is The Best

Heads up. I’m basically gonna sperg about this whole film, so spoilers for this twelve year old film. Enjoy!

Wall-E is one of my favorite films; I would gladly kill and extort to bring the sequel I had in mind to life in any way; animatics would pleased me if nothing else but anyways. I love this film and one of the biggest reasons for that is the character EVE, a character that stuck in my mind longer than most if you can believe. So, better time than any, Imma just ramble about why I love this character. And, before we begin, I’m gonna say EVE is a girl, Wall-E is a boy due to my brain believing they were respectively female- and male-coded for most of my life but do NOT let this stop you from envisioning them however you please. If they’re both girls or boys to you, all power to you. With that said, here we go...

The Design

Now I’m not saying she has the greatest robot design ever; I don’t look at eggs and remember better days when I got to watch that film for the first time in my old house. But Pixar certainly knew how to make simplicity work to perfection. Simple shape, simple mechanics, simple movements. All feeling right at home with her coming from the more advanced future, especially compared to Wall-E where he’s literally a more grounded looking robot. Thematically, this design is fucking genius. A scouter robot with the ability to fly with ease and yet carries a literal arm cannon with incredible fire power. Both expressing how she can have her head in the clouds, observational when necessary, and yet trigger happy amidst the slightest inconvenience or surprise. *MWAH* What the fuck? It’s a great duality where the hard, more logical exterior possesses a sweet and approachable core just waiting to be shown and it’s wonderful seeing Wall-E, this literal block head, fumble his way into having a simple conversation with her. Now I can’t really disassemble how the programming in Wall-E works where they can behave like humans but follow objectives like a machine... but, I can try. With this scene.

Now take this with a grain of salt, the inferencing is more to the imagination otherwise the fun of this movie is tarnished. But from this scene, it’s clear that in this universe robots can show feelings for one another but can’t be romantic with humans because they can recognize human emotions and reactions but do so in an automated sense. The film expresses their curiousity just enough to where their reactions to human things and functions are within reason and yet doesn’t toy with the viewer’s believability. EVE is capable of responding to Wall-E’s advances but doesn’t 100% reciprocate his feelings because Wall-E isn’t her directive (least not yet, that’s for later). Not to mention, she isn’t that adept at romance unlike Wall-E who, by being alone with Earth’s technology, was able to learn and process human romance through the Hello Dolly VHS and potentially other things over the years. So this conversation works with the two having their limited knowledge, we don’t know how much they know, and the film keeps focus on having a balance between somewhat logical reactions and minor impulsive humane reactions that makes them alive but only just enough so it doesn’t feel like them being robots is pointless... Phew. Speaking of which, you know what isn’t pointless? Her motherfucking buster cannon.

Her whole ass arm houses a gun capable of nuking an entire cargo ship in a matter of seconds and it makes sense that she’d have it cuz how can a scouter robot defend themselves but beyond that, it’s just so goddamn cool. Like yeah, I can express how this symbolizes about America and... how they want to fuck their guns or something but who cares. She has a FUCKING ARM CANNON and it’s badass, end of discussion.

The Hanger Moment

Much as I love the moment where the two are in space flying, I honestly say that this moment where the two are in Wall-E’s house during the darude sandstorm is incredibly important. EVE is reasonably taken to his home and naturally, when the lights come on, she looks through the stuff he gives to her. She gets to take it easy for once, things can be quiet after she blew up a whole ship, have a giggle or two at the trinkets he’s collected, with the cigarette lighter being a good tool that’ll be used for later.

She’s curious, bouncy, still a bit quick on the draw, but is nonetheless taking in a lot this robot on Earth has to offer. It’s this and the small 1v1 they had before that is a lovely seedling to not only their connection but EVE’s development on her own, where we hardly need dialogue to show how she’s feeling about it all. And yeah, I’m with plenty of people to say that if this movie was just about the two of them being on Earth it probably would’ve been the greatest Pixar film of all time for many. Fortunately the plot kicks in when Wall-E shows EVE the plant, forcing her to go dormant, thus pulling Wall-E into an adventure on the Axiom ship. And I say fortunately cuz this is where EVE goes from good to great as a character.

The Axiom

While it’s something where we all wish that this film wasn’t the densly plotted, society driven second half, I say the second half on the Axiom carries the film’s themes and character building for EVE to good heights. We enter EVE’s territory, the slick, iPhoney synthetic world where humans have become literal potatoes and everything’s more or less automated. For EVE, the first half of the film lets us see the more playful side of her and doesn’t mind being around Wall-E, but isn’t immediately won over with the concept of love. She’s still goal-oriented and trying to keep the two stuck on Earth would’ve made her arc as open-ended and ambiguous as The Good Dinosaur. Time on the axiom puts her original sense of thinking to the test when Wall-E tags along.

To share the bigger picture real quick, the human element of Wall-E is complimentary to Wall-E and EVE’s humane behavior. To quote RealJims’ honestly flawless analysis, “What better way to show the humanity in a robot than to be among humans that act like robots?” For Wall-E the robot, this works perfectly as a fish out of water story. His time on Earth affects not only a few humans, but other robots like MO and the secretary machine, as minor as it seems.

So when Wall-E seemingly fucks things up, EVE is rightfully peeved. His slip ups especially with the Diagnostics scene tests her goal-oriented nature and patience, to a tasteful comedic strength. Doesn’t mean they now turned Wall-E stupid, the film makes sure the monkey wrenches are only accidents from someone severely out of the loop of things. This leads them and us well into

The Depths of Space

The scene where Wall-E gets launched in the escape pod thrills me with joyfully painful suspense every time. EVE making a mad dash to him as Wall-E madly tries to get out of the soon exploding pod, leading to it exploding and we get this from EVE. The wide eyes of terror followed by the whispering “No”s gives me shivers every time I see it in full. 

Now one could argue her concern was more for the plant getting destroyed, but I say she was more frightened at the idea of both Wall-E and the plant getting nuked. While Wall-E did make her mad, she nonetheless cared about him and wasn’t expecting the tiny bot asshole to send him to death. So it’s like, “Oh no, both my purpose and the one that helped me are both gone.” 

Luckily, thanks to some foreshadowing, Wall-E made it out alive with the plant in safe keeping and EVE seeing Wall-E actually care about her goal makes her beam with joy, being that reasonable spark that brings the two closer together. I mean if your love interest cheated death to help you out, why wouldn’t it? Everything about this moment is what made EVE stick with me long after I watched the film; the emotional journey the director was able to convey with her is so well-built to this point, it’s still amazing how they were able to do it with little dialogue or facial expressions. I especially love the emptiness we get of the two of them in space, where it adds focus to the two of them especially. But my god, that’s only half of it...

The space dance sequence between the two is still one of Pixar’s most gorgeous scenes. The way Wall-E is able to keep up with the fire extinguisher after having trouble in the film’s beginning, the wide shots of space, the lovely glow of the engines, the music. I especially like to think of this scene as a parallel to EVE’s initial flight on Earth. For her, it was that rite of passage after the touchdown and now she gets to share that same moment with someone she’s grown to like or appreciate. Then again, this isn’t the moment where EVE loves Wall-E. We’re close, but we need that one inch to finally show her the truth. That’s when she sees

The Recordings

The moment where EVE gets to see the memories of her time on Earth, including her dormant stasis, is where shit finally clicks. She essentially gets to know how Wall-E felt not only about her, but about love. Even when she couldn’t be there, she sees now that Wall-E cared about her and is able to process what Wall-E processed when he looked at Hello Dolly at one point. Scene also works because getting her directive, or the plant, was generally done and done with, she finally gets time to focus on something else, on her feelings for someone else. This leads well into... the well that leads to...

The Dumpster Moment

The scene with the recordings is where things finally click, but the moment with EVE and Wall-E in the ship’s dump is where it comes together. After getting betrayed yet again by AUTO, EVE’s concerns are now less with the plant and more for Wall-E and thanks to the moment previous, I can totally buy this. It’s teeth gritting seeing her try to rescue a now broken Wall-E from getting ejected into space and losing his energy thanks to a destroyed chip. So when we see her finally toss the plant aside and says Wall-E is her directive now, I tear up. It feels like a genuine, built up declaration on her part; the moment where EVE can rationally return his feelings ten-fold and truly be there for him. But that isn’t all to it, because Wall-E reasonably struggles his way to the plant to show that to save him, they need to get to Earth which means getting the plant back to the core of the ship.

This gives EVE newfound resolve and puts that to the test, where she has to basically defect against AUTO who’s become the physical antagonist of the film. The escape sequence is a bit of a step down since putting humans in danger doesn’t really affect the film’s themes all that well, but I can’t argue that pitting the captain against AUTO is a bad climax. 

The Death to Wall-E

Thinking about this film after so long, it is still pretty fucking shocking to realize how punishing they treat Wall-E in the final act. It’s even more shocking when you realize how the roles have reversed, where Wall-E focuses more on EVE’s goal with the plant instead of EVE herself and vice versa. Then again, I say it’s fair that they did this, to show how much Wall-E was willing to sacrifice for the one he loves which makes the painful wails we hear from EVE feel all the more impactful. Like you’re serious with her as she struggles to accept his death before they reach Earth. And speaking of Earth...

The Finale

Now, I can’t help but argue it’s an unfortunate plothole that EVE is somehow able to fully repair Wall-E in spite of never fixing anything else in the film. Then again, it’s fucking pumping seeing her move quick to put him back together and it’s that final stomp on the heart when, even when he’s fully restored, Wall-E bares no memories of her or anything. You see her desperately try to get him to remember anything only to be met with an emotionless, reset shell. In finally understanding Wall-E’s feelings of love, she can’t really be with him. Until...

True Love’s Kiss Saves the day

I can get scientific with how getting his memories back was possible, but I won’t because the scene just works. It’s quiet, takes it time, and that last eureka moment with the two truly get to hold hands makes up for any scattered logistics. I’d say this is where Wall-E finally gets the love, but the same can be said for EVE, after everything she went through. I’ve admittedly seen a few talk about how the female lead is only valid through the love of another, typically male, but I believe what works 120% here is that the two characters basically have themselves figured out, Wall-E more than EVE, and EVE’s journey is never hindered for a sudden realization to love. She still succeeds in her mission, but the stakes for her have risen once she comes to terms with her newfound feelings and these feelings aren’t out of pocket. Wall-E has his feelings for EVE from the getgo, but dedicates to helping EVE with the goal, even if it means death. The connection they get to have is earned and is what drives the plot. EVE earns what she realizes she wants and that makes her a great female protagonist in my eye.

The Conclusion

Wall-E is a pretty warm movie; a film how the love of two brings humanity to salvation and vice versa. How EVE and Wall-E’s love is synonymous to the intertwining of modern and older technology to shape the world. But honestly, that probably wouldn’t have worked as well without how great they made EVE as a character. Wall-E is great too, but it’s astonishing to see EVE’s journey with Wall-E and show her natural growth of understanding something as warm as romance. Her journey is pretty synonymous to how I feel with the movie overall. The time we get of them on Earth is symbiotic to the time we get in space; we get an intimate journey that expands to a film about society but remains personal and intimate nonetheless. And with EVE, we get this superbly fleshed out character that’s emotive, understanding, and above all gets a resolves that’s awesome to see every time I catch or just think about this film. What else is there to say?

They’re the Best.

[ladyloveandjustice]

Saw the My Hero Academia Heroes Rising Movie!

It was a lot of fun (and the animation in the second half was AMAZING eye candy) but also KINDA STRANGE in some ways. 

The previous MHA movie was set between the second and third season, so I assumed this would be the same and be set between the third and the currently airing one, but this actually seemed to be concurrent with wherever the manga is right now, and referenced several events that haven’t happened in the anime yet, and featured characters that haven’t appeared yet. Not like super huge spoilers, but like, for instance, Todoroki quotes something I GUESS Endeavor must have told him in the manga but hasn’t said to him in the anime yet at a dramatic moment? even that dude who caused all the controversy with his name reveal recently factors in and appears for a few minutes. So if you’re an anime-only like me, fair warning for that.

There were also a lot of hilariously contrived things in this movie including the entire premise which was like

UA: so we’ve been roasted in the press and lost the trust of society for being irresponsible supervising our students who are currently being targeted by a villainous organization that will take any opening to attack them. what do we do?

Aizawa: well I think we should send the entire class of first years to an isolated island with ZERO adult hero supervision,where the nearest help is like a thousand miles away and they can easily be cut off from communication with the outside world! Also we should task them with protecting the entire populace, and do absolutely nothing to check up on them or keep the League of Villains from following them and attacking. This is a cool island with no crime on it usually so, y’know, it should be fine.

UA: brilliant!

It did make for some cool fight scenes and having all the peeps in class 1A get to show off their powers a bit, which is something the first movie didn’t do very well. The first half of the movie was very obnoxious in the ‘guys fight, girls are in charge of evacuation and don’t get to fight bc we’re not going to bother to hide our sexism here’ but the second half had all the kids teaming up for cool combo attacks which mitigated it a bit. 

also Bakugou and Deku’s contrasting ways of dealing with the two little kids they were protecting WAS side-splitting; at one point poor Deku has to crawl on Bakugou’s back and SHOVE HIS FINGERS INTO HIS EYES and prevent him  raging out at these small children and it made me laugh so hard, as did the little girl saying “OH HEY IT’S THE MEAN ONE” when Bakugou arrived to rescue her.

BUT HEY SPEAKING OF BOTH COOL FIGHTS AND REALLY CONTRIVED THINGS, THAT ENDING.

in an article I skimmed, Horikoshi mentions the movie is basically an idea he considered for the final arc, and I was like “huh I wonder how that works” but when you watch the last half of the movie YUP it’s truly a bunch of climactic shonen final arc resolution events happening that are then immediately undone and it’s just SO awkward and hilarious. spoilers under the cut

Basically, Deku and Bakugou fight a villain who is basically All for One except it’s A Different Dude.

Deku is all: KACCHAN I WILL SACRIFICE ONE FOR ALL AND GIVE IT TO YOU SO WE CAN LIKE, BOTH HAVE IT  FOR A WHILE AND BEAT THIS GUY WITH DOUBLE POWER AND THEN  IF WE LIVE YOU’LL JUST HAVE IT I GUESS

Bakugou: wtf really. (his conflicted, upset and uncomfortable expressions here were REALLY detailed, like I said the animation was gonzo, but it was honestly rlly weird to see him experience a lot of emotions at once IM NOT USED TO HIM HAVING MORE THAN ONE)

 DEKU:  YEAH WHY NOT, JUST FUCKIN’ TAKE IT, YOU GET TO HAVE EVERYTHING JUST LIKE WHEN YOU STOLE MY LUNCH MONEY

Bakugou: oh shit...we’re going to slowly reach and have our fingers brush each other and struggle until we finally clasp hands aren’t we... 

Deku: YEAH THAT’S RIGHT BITCH!!! AND WE’LL MIX BLOOD WHILE MIGHT U TOUCHINGLY PLAYS IN THE BACKGROUND 

Bakugou: fuck. Kirishima can’t ever know about this 

Deku: NOW ACCEPT THIS HAND, AND THUS SYMBOLICALLY YOU ACCEPT THE HAND I OFFERED YOU WHEN WE WERE FIVE OR WHATEVER, CULMINATING YOUR ARC AS MY RIVAL AND GIVING YOU THE POWER TO BECOME SUPER SAIYAN

Bakugou: oh no you’re not kidding I look so stupid.

Deku: That you do, Vegeta.  NOW ARE YOU EXCITED TO BREAK YOUR ARMS!!!

Bakugou: didn’t you spend like, a whole episode realizing you have legs??? what happened to that? but yeah actually i am i have always wanted to show i can break my arms with these powers way better than u ever did!!!

Deku: honestly I couldn’t have chosen anyone more deserving than u to feel this pain

anyway they fight together and then pass out and All Might arrives ten minutes late with starbucks: what the fuck did you do young midoriya

Deku: I’M SO SAD I SACRIFICED MYSELF AND MY DREAM. 

All Might: NOT AS SAD AS ME IF YOU GAVE MY POWERS TO YOUNG BAKUGOU! THAT MEANS I ACTUALLY HAVE TO SPEND A TIME WITH HIM NOW. DO YOU KNOW HOW ANNOYING THAT WILL BE FOR ME

Deku: sorry

All Might: oh thank god i guess Bakugou passed out conveniently before the powers fully transferred so you still have them or whatever

Deku: wow that is incredibly convenient.

All Might: alternately maybe my mentor was doing me a solid from beyond the grave and stopped the power from transferring to someone obnoxious with the other One for All-ers. Thanks Hero Mom :’). always looking out for me.

Deku: uhh when i proposed a similar theory about the people connected to One for All helping me you said it was stupid-?

All Might: YEAH WELL THAT WAS WHEN YOU SAID IT WASN’T IT??? SHUT UP.

Deku: anyway in the trend of convenient happenings, when Bakugou woke he remembered nothing about this fight...

Bakugou: Assagdsfasfasdasd WHY ARE MY ARMS BROKEN???

Deku:... so our relationship in the main series isn’t affected and -

Bakugou: WHY ARE MY ARMS BROKEN IN THE SPECIFIC EXACT WAY DEKU’S ARE ALSO BROKEN???

Deku: ...and the status quo can remain!

Bakugou: you know what. I’m not going to question this any further. because i don’t ever want to remember the fact i held hands with a nerd. god i love repressing.

***

Like can you imagine if Horikoshi had gone through with this, what a depressing ending this would be without the reset???. “all that stuff about this being the story of deku becoming the greatest hero lol we pranked you’  I’M GLAD HE CHANGED HIS MIND but also it tickles me that he apparently thought at one point that holding hands with Deku was the ultimate endpoint of Bakugou’s character. I hope in his original plan Bakugou had held hands with everyone else in Class 1A at that point and Deku was the Final Step. 

Anyway, ridic contrivances aside it was a fun movie and it was very fun to see it in theatres with everyone very excited and cosplayers and all that. JUST PREPARE TO DRINK IN THE SHONEN, CUZ THEY AIN’T HOLDIN’ BACK.

[thefudge]

Sorry if this sounds dramatic AF but damn if I’m still not blue AF about Kylo/Ben after watching TROS 2 days ago. We only got to see this other side of him for such a short time and even then I had some gripes about it (the pace at which he turns to the light had me going “???”). Sigh, thank god for fanfics.

aww, well i haven’t seen the movie yet (and at this rate…will i?), but i understand where you’re coming from. i always suspected they *had* to kill him off because they’d written themselves into a corner. they weren’t comfortable giving him an identity that might upset the fans (aka a death that felt earned). as always, they wanted to have it both ways. 

first off, this guy was a contradictory mess of a character. and not like good contradictory, where it’s nuanced and complicated. no, it’s just shoddy writing. there were some really important aspects regarding his backstory that were left out of the movies for some reason and shoved into the extended stuff, but when you read them they make his character make even less sense. and they kept retconning him to be more or less “evil”, depending on what they felt like selling (remember when they dropped that info about how actually, he wasn’t the one who killed the other jedi students, but tried to save them? i mean, isn’t this really important??? wtf??? hello???). so this shows that a) they couldn’t be bothered to include more individualizing details about his actions/personality because b) they wanted this character to be as vague and malleable as possible, so that when the time came, they could rewrite him to suit whatever trends disney wanted to follow. so, they never had a clear vision for him as a character because they never wanted to have a clear vision. they kept going back and forth, making him both vader and anti-vader, out of fear that the fans wouldn’t like anything they’re not familiar with. he was basically a trial-run of a character. so when the gig was over, he was shut down. they didn’t have the balls to make him a truly strong villain who could live or die on his own terms, but they didn’t let him inhabit ben solo, nor did they they let him forge his own middle path. i never really bought the idea of redemption for him, cuz adam driver plays the guy like someone who needs a fresh start. that’s why i was so excited about Grey Jedi, once upon a time, because kylo seemed to hint at the fact that you can’t “return” to a previous self and you need to forge a different path that doesn’t adhere to a jedi binary. as flawed as TLJ was in some respects, i liked kylo’s philosophy that there was no room for him to go back to his family and the resistance, even if he did “atone”. that’s why i thought he had such a complicated relationship with the name “ben solo”. that’s why i would’ve liked for him to die on his own terms, doing the right thing as kylo ren. i mean it’s sure nice to see harrison ford again…but the moment with his dad didn’t feel earned or honest. there’s more than one way to do good and acknowledge the harm you’ve done without a gimmicky “i know” moment from han solo. 

as a sidenote, i saw the clips of him after “turning” back to the “light” (sigh…) and yeah, it was rushed as hell, but i did like adam’s performance? the uptake in personality was a welcome change. there were little things in his performance that made this character far more interesting, almost like adam was still playing him as a kid not entirely comfortable with the light. so i think the feeling of regret ppl feel has more to do with the fact that his character’s potential was never quite fulfilled. killing him off COULD have been satisfying and earned if he had been a consistent person for the past three movies, and not a chess-piece they kept moving around because they had no damn clue what to do with him (this is applicable to all the characters in this new trilogy). ultimately, they played it very, very safe. so the problem isn’t him dying, but rather the execution of his entire story arc leading up to it. 

[chyrstis]

I won’t ask for much (but just this once, I’d like you) 4/10

I spent way too long looking at warplanes for this one, because 1) they’re pretty, and 2) after mentioning a certain someone’s plane in the previous chapter, there was no way I wasn’t going to have it pop up again.

Pairing: Sharky Boshaw x John Seed Rating: E (but only for Ch. 10, the rest are a solid T) Word Count: 3.5K  

Link to AO3!

Ch. 1 / Ch. 2 / Ch. 3 / Ch. 4 / Ch. 5 / Ch. 6 / Ch. 7 / Ch. 8 / Ch. 9 / Ch. 10

—

Sharky steals a boat. It just happens to be John’s boat, and when it’s damaged along with his boathouse, John proceeds to lay out a means of having Sharky pay him back. [No Cult AU]

———–

“So, where is it? Where’s all of the shit-talking I used to look forward to? Like, by now I was getting ready for the good stuff, but it’s running out.”

Sharky paused, dropping the tire back down into the back of Hurk’s truck. “About what?”

“Really?” Hurk asked, gaping at him. “You know, the asshat that’s been blackmailing you into doing his dirty work for the last month and a half? Thinking he’s slicker than a greased pig, and he might be because who the hell knows what he uses to keep his hair like that. And palms. You grease those too, not just for jerking, and cuz, you’re killing me here.”

“It’s…I’m not gonna lie, he’s really wigging me out at times. Acting like it’s good to have me around to help and shit. ‘Cause I don’t always work on the boathouse. I’ve helped Joe, I’ve helped move stuff around on the airstrip, I’ve run stuff down to the Peggies’ church. And yeah, being told ‘you’re going to do this today’ instead of doing what I was planning on doing sucks, but the Peggies are kinda nice.”

He wasn’t thinking much of it when Hurk grabbed the firehose running out front. Jerry-rigged outside, it was usually his last-ditch effort when any of the fires outgrew their boundaries.

So, it was easy enough to grab. Easy enough to aim, and - in Hurk’s case - easy enough to point and shoot, especially while he kept his mouth running, none the wiser.

“And John’s all right, too. I know it’s kind of-whoa, whoa, what the-“ A wave of freezing cold water hit his chest, and Sharky sputtered as he threw his hands up. “What the fuck, man? Jesus, just cool it! Cool it!”

Hurk aimed it up and away, and jabbed a finger at him.

“Straight talk. You point me to the spot in the woods where my fave cuz’s tied up and waiting to be beamed up, and I swear I’ll let you go. ‘Til then, you better talk faster, because I don’t even know where to go with ‘Oh, John and the Peggies? Yeah, they’re all right.’”

Teeth chattering, Sharky shrugged. “I don’t know what to tell you, man. It’s better. Like he’s decided it’s okay to be a person for once.”

This time he was hit in the face, and he threw both middle fingers Hurk’s way before finally wrangling the hose away from him.

“That’s up my nose now,” he grumbled, feeling it burn as he forced air through it. “Up my nose, which is one of the top ten worst feelings to deal with. Hope you’re proud of yourself.”

The spray at Hurk mid-apology was kind of a jerk move on his end, but Hurk had earned it. That and the noogie, as Sharky wrangled him under his arm. If he was going to be forced to drip-dry out here, he wasn’t dealing with that shit alone.

The roar of an engine overhead made him loosen his grip, however. Both of them glanced up, their attention won by the plane soaring by.

Usually Sharky would catch one every once in a blue moon out over here. With the steep hills, it wasn’t always best if you needed to land the plane in an emergency, but that didn’t stop anyone from taking them as high as the pilot wanted it.

This one wasn’t too high in the sky, though. Painted a darker color, it cut a fine line through the air above as it climbed. Spinning in a smooth arc, it curved - rounding back - and Hurk let out a low whistle.

“Look at that, huh? Bet Nick gets up to all kinds of fancy shit up there when he’s off the ground.”

“Yeah. Should ask him if he’d take us up sometime.”

Watching the plane loop back, the pull was almost strong enough to make him want to book it to Nick’s right now. He’d always been curious about the high that came with being in the air; how that ramped up during a dive, or even on a sharp turn.

Something about this plane bugged him, though. Like there was something he was missing that should’ve hit, but wasn’t.

“Uh, I don’t know. I’ve been up in a bunch of choppers, man, and it’s real sketchy once the cross-winds hit. Gets my lunch doing a loop-de-loop hairier than any airshow’s special, and that feeling even hits when I’m in Tulip.”

“Why? Your ma’s damn good at what she does.”

“It’s always squirrely, feeling the entire thing rock back and forth, back and...” Hurk paused, and slapped at Sharky’s waving arm. “What’re you doing? He can’t see us from down here.”

“And why not? Yeah, he’s – or she, could be one badass babe up there - not skimming the ground, but they’re low enough to see what’s down here if they angle it right.”

Almost as if listening, the plane came back over; the roar of the engine echoing in the air as it came closer. Getting a better look at it now, he could see more of the slick paint job; the dark grey really reminding him of a color he’d seen recently.

As in, within-the-last-couple-of-weeks-or-so recent. Like in a hangar, half-hidden under a tarp.

Finally slapping those last missing puzzle pieces into place, it all clicked this time, and Sharky’s eyes widened.

“Uh, I think that’s John.”

“Say what?”

Hurk’s surprise wasn’t too far off from his own. “Dude, that’s his plane. I don’t think anyone else around here’s got a ride like that.”

Or even in that style, period. It stood out in the sky, and Sharky almost laughed to himself. He would want that attention, and showing off while he was at it? Seemed like a standard thing he’d try for, if given the shot - and right now? He looked set on taking it.

Diving down, his breath caught as the plane soared in a set line towards the ground. Daring to get as close as possible - cutting it a lot closer than he would’ve if given the chance - only to shoot back up above the trees, spinning on the exit.

Yeah, that was John.

Whistling loudly, Sharky whooped before punching Hurk in the shoulder. “Oh, come on. That was pretty fucking neat.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Hurk cracked soon after, smiling. “Okay, it was pretty rad, but if that is him, and we ever run into each other and get to talking about it, we ain’t saying shit. Not a single word set on complimenting, talking nice, or doing any of that. Period.”

The plane didn’t come back this time, heading out over the fields as it faded from view.

“Nope,” Sharky said absently, as he kept his eyes skyward. “Not a single fucking word.”

---

Later that day when he messaged John to tell him he was heading in, he didn’t get his usual answer.

Busy in the hangar. Stop by there, will you?

The doors were open as he pulled up outside, and he couldn’t see John when he stepped out. His plane was front and center, one of the side panels open with a tool cart rolled up next to it, and he walked up to get a closer look.

“Tempting as it is, try not to stick your hand in there.”

Sharky held both up, and quickly stepped back. “I didn’t do it.”

“I didn’t say you did anything.” John walked up from behind, wiping his hands down with a towel, smirking all the while. “Just wouldn’t want to lose a finger now. That would be a surefire way to ruin an evening.”

Against all odds, he hadn’t lost one yet. Not to any of his homemade whizzlers, not to any of the cherry bombs, and not to that one incident with the paper cutter in school. Now, really would be a lame time to do it, and in front of John? He’d never live it down.

Flexing his fingers - all ten of them - he shoved both hands into his pockets, and turned towards him.

Dressed in his version of casual, the shirt John was wearing was still too pricey to be anywhere near oil or heavy machinery, but that didn’t faze him. His hands were dirty and he was doing the work. Actually getting in there and taking care of it, instead of shoving it onto someone else, and Sharky could respect that.

But the moves he pulled in the air earlier? Thinking back on them made a whistle want to slip out. John could fly. There was no fucking doubt about it, and he’d be lying to himself if he said he didn’t want to catch him up in the air again at some point.

“So, uh…you take her out today?”

“I might’ve had to check to see how things were running,” John said with a shrug.

“You fly out over towards the Henbane?”

John raised his head, eyeing him curiously. “Maybe. Why do you ask?”

“See, I was out with my cousin Hurk. Just unloading some tires to use for um, crafting purposes.”

“Crafting. I never took you for the type.”

“Not like the kind with paper, glue, and scissors. Like tire sculptures, or just taking the shit apart to see what we can get out of it, ‘cause there’s at least twenty things you can do with a worn-out tire. We’ve honed it down to an art, man.”

John said nothing further, only examined his hands as he wiped off more of the dirt. He looked up to catch Sharky’s eye while he worked, reminding him that he’d been telling a story before he’d trailed off.

Sharky cleared his throat. Loudly. “Uh, anyway. You, flying.”

John redirected his attention to his hands, but Sharky didn’t miss the way his lips had curved up. “I thought it was you, working?”

“Me, working, distracted by you, flying, and I know I got twisted around in the middle of that, but I saw you earlier. Your plane flying over my house. Now you’re the only guy around here with anything coming close to having one of those warplanes they’d call you in to borrow for re-enactments, movie deals - or, hell - for admiring and shit, so don’t go denying it. And don’t go fucking with me either, ‘cause I know what I saw.”

“Good eye. Sharper than I expected.” John set the towel down on the cart, and walked over to the plane. “Perhaps you can put that eye for detail to good use tonight.”

“What?”

“Affirmation does need some tuning. I was hoping to have it finished before you came by, but…” John frowned, eyeing the engine with distaste. “As you can see here, I’m not quite done yet.”

“Ah, I get that. Shit never works out how you plan it, not with cars, bikes, and I guess planes fit in there too. You wanna get that oil changed before the sun’s up? Should take twenty to thirty minutes max, giving you time to see if the tires are bald enough to turn the road into a dirt-covered slip and slide. Probably would've noticed before then, but it's good to check. And if you’re looking at that, might as well try the brakes.”

He watched John roll over the tool cart, giving him a glance over his shoulder as he did so. Taking the gesture as a signal to keep on going, Sharky took a place just behind him by the cart, and settled in to watch him work.

“…And that weird leak you forgot about two weeks ago? Kiss your afternoon goodbye, ‘cause your radiator’s busted and might’ve been roasting your car from the inside out.”

“Sounds like someone’s speaking from experience.”

“Man, you don’t even know how many times I’ve had my shitbox crater on me. And I take care of it. Maybe not using the stuff that’ll keep the mechanic off of my back if I need to bring it in, but it runs. And I can keep it going on nothing but lint, duct tape, and quarters if I have to.”

“And somehow, in spite of that, it hasn’t exploded or found a way to catch on fire?”

“It did catch on fire. Once.”

John’s eyebrows flew up. “With you in it?”

“Sort of. I might’ve hopped out right after the smoke started coming, ‘cause that crisped-up burnt smell ain’t normal even with a busted heater, but I handled it. Drove it right on down to the Spread Eagle just in time for Happy Hour, too.”

Blinking at him, John slowly turned back to the engine. “Is that the same car you’ve been bringing here?”

“Yep.”

John paused again. “The one that I’ve ridden in?”

“Same one. Drove it, too.”

A few emotions crossed John’s face then. Disbelief held on the longest, as he turned to look right at Sharky.

“What? Like I said, it runs. Long as it does that, I don’t need anything fancier than that to get around. And, hey, if that shit ever does go up and someone needs to handle it, you know I’m damn near certified by this point.”

“Knowing that the county’s resident pyromaniac should be able to put out the fire he also started is not as reassuring as it sounds.”

Sharky frowned. “Yo, you really wanna say that? Seeing as you’re someone that keeps talking shit, all while needing people to call you, confide in you, and hire you for the whole defending-them-in-court thing? Not doing great on the being-anything-but-a-dick part. Just saying.”

John narrowed his eyes, but didn’t fight the point. Just went back to work, and Sharky wasn’t sure what to do with the victory.

Shaking it off, he crossed his arms and tried not to fidget as he watched him. Doing nothing at all was the real challenge, having no choice but to be patient and keep an eye on John instead.

But he hadn’t kicked him out, or told him to go where he was needed most. He was sure he would’ve told him to head down to the boathouse by now - or hell, that he would’ve gone on his own - but he didn’t feel like leaving yet. Not even after the dig. Curiosity won this fight, and he’d let it do its thing for a little while longer.

Glancing over at him, John gave it a second and gestured towards the cart. “Can you hand me that wrench?”

Sharky followed his line of sight towards it. Taking it, he handed it over and couldn’t hold his tongue any more.

“So, you do all of this on your own?”

“It’s important to be able to identify problems as they appear. I could hire someone to do that for me. Easily leave this to them, but having that knowledge beforehand - especially if I do end up having to land - is crucial. And I refuse to let willful ignorance prevent me from fixing anything well within my power and ability. That, and laziness.”

“Laziness?”

“What’s my problem becomes someone else’s to fix. To mend. Affirmation is my responsibility. Shouldn’t I be well aware of how it’s operating before I take off? That kind of carelessness can be prevented.”

“Makes sense.”

“I hope so. Any pilot would do the same if they had any degree of pride in their skills.”

Sharky rubbed at his neck. “Yeah, guess Nick goes through the same checks too. And if I had one, guess I’d have to break out the old toolbox and get into it.”

“Treated better than your car, I would hope?”

“Uh, still fucking rude for one, and two, hell yeah I would. Shit, the closest I’ve come to flying, period, was through honoring Clutch Nixon a few years back – rest his badass, no-longer-beating heart – and I was airborne long enough to love it. If I had a plane, I’d treat her right.”

Sitting up, John gave him a long look. “That doesn’t count.”

“What don’t count?”

“Stunt driving isn’t close to the same thing.”

“So you say, but you haven’t taken a motherfucking dive off of a cliff, amigo.”

“It’s not-” John pressed his fingers to his temples and sighed. “There are measures taken.”

“Yeah, and I know you gotta do more than mess around with your joystick up there, but the fall’s real. The pounding in your heart as it just-” He clenched his fist, and let out a breath, “Fuck, man, you feel alive coming back from that. And get one hell of a massive boner while you’re at it.”

Lowering his hand, John leveled a flat stare at him.

“Yeah, had to give that last one a solid seven point five out of ten. Hell, maybe an eight.”

Still clenching his fist, Sharky held the eye contact, grinning awkwardly all the while. At least until he noticed the marks on John’s face. Three small dark spots, all of which came from his equally stained fingers.

The snicker slipped out before he could help it. “You, uh, got a little something on you.”

Gesturing towards his face, John reached up and nearly added another before glancing down at his fingers. “Shit.”

“Yeah, dude. Might be able to connect the dots at the rate you’re going.”

“Let me just…where did that get to?”

He sorted through the items on the cart before finding the discarded towel, and checked it before swiping at his face.

“Might wanna go to the left.” John shifted it, the spot turning into a streak, and Sharky grimaced. “Uh, maybe to the right?” Streaked again. “Huh. Think you might wanna go back to what you were doing the first time.”

“You aren’t helping,” John said, slapping down the towel to search through the items on the cart. “So, how about you go occupy yourself over there, and we’ll get back to this when I’m certain I’m not covered in dirt.”

John had pointed towards the refrigerator, and Sharky gave him a passing glance before skipping over towards it.

“Could be worse, man. Not like it’s a sharpied dick, or anything.”

Prying the doors open, Sharky didn’t know what he was looking for at first. He knew John had hidden the mystery beer here last time, but that wasn’t what he spotted. No, on the shelves was a pack of his old faithful, and he felt a tear come to his eye.

“Is that acceptable?”

Sharky reached in and held up the six pack, sighing dreamily as he hugged it to his face. “Amigo, I think you’re my new best friend now.”

He heard John scoff somewhere behind him, and turned to see him parked in front of a small handheld mirror. One of the streaks was a bonafide line traveling up the side of his face now, and smeared more when John swiped a finger through it. Tossing the mirror back onto the cart, he clenched his jaw, and went right back to the plane without even waiting for him to come back.

“So, John,” Sharky started, popping the cap off of the beer, “you want me to stick with you up here, dude? ‘Cause I was going to head on down to the river at some point. Just looked like you needed me more up here than there at the time, and…”

“There’s no need.” John replied, his back still to him. “You’ve been making significant progress lately down at the boathouse. Anything else would put you ahead. And after staying up here as long as you have, you’ve earned the time to yourself, if you want it.”

Free to go? Again?

That had him scratching his head as he polished off the beer fast. “Uh, okay. Like, I can do whatever the hell I want?”

“Whatever you want.”

That was music to his ears. At least it would’ve been every other week leading up to this one.

Thinking it over for a while, Sharky tried to think of anything he would’ve done with the time. Anything pressing he’d set aside to come out here after helping Hurk earlier, but couldn’t put his finger on a single thing. Just a whole lot of nothing that would’ve led to a night spent in his underwear on the couch mixing together shit he probably shouldn’t have, or up at the trailer park tuning the speakers.

So, when he looked back over towards the plane, he aimed the bottle in his hand towards it. “You still need someone up here?”

There was the sound of metal hitting metal as John froze. But when he turned to face him, there was no mistaking his surprise.

"What?" Sharky shrugged. “I’ve got the rest of the day to myself, and usually that’s spent doing jack and shit when work’s not coming in, so…if you need it, I’m here. Not that it’s really that big of a deal anyway, you know?”

That got him a smile. One that John held onto long after Sharky expected him to drop it, and he chuckled. “I suppose not.”

“This’ll be the highlight of my day, and I’d like to stick around. Unless you want me out.”

He thought it over, but not for longer than a minute. “If I did, I would’ve told you so.”

“So, back to work?” Sharky asked, starting to smile himself.

John stepped back and held out a hand towards the plane. “Back to work.”

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh S3 Ep 12: Seto Discovers Hostile Takeover Tactics

For April Fools, I’m actually going to update this blog. I know, right? It’s been a little while.

I’ll have you know that, if I had more time, you were *this close* to getting a recap of this hot mess movie.

Buuuut it turns out that movie is a lot longer than I thought. Soooo many bad wigs. Maybe another April Fools.

Anyway, back to Yugioh, are you ready for MORE BUSINESS?

Cuz if you wanted to watch a kid’s show with stocks in it well, I had no idea it would be the one about the playing cards. Really didn’t see that one coming. Stocks are going to be traded in a little bit, but currently, all we have to worry about is that Tristan is a monkey and Kaiba’s about to die.

He seems cool with it, both with being “dead” (still unsure if Tristan can be human ever again) and watching Kaiba become dead.

This is some high level freaky sci fi thing just stuffed into a side plot? Like...what purpose is the weird monkey robot?

(read more under the cut)

Joey has completely run out of his thimble full of patience, and he’s taken over the part of Den Mother in lieu of Tristan being too horny/monkey to manage it himself. Watching Joey slowly become more and more too frustrated to Even Deal With This Right Now has been his character growth this entire arc.

And the team’s somewhat amusement and concern that one of their best friends--who they saw...pretty much die--and is now a very horny monkey is like how you would notice that your engine light is on. Like they just have so many other problems right now. They’ve decided they will get around to deciding what to do about this...later.

They’re definitely going to deal with the monkey later. Eventually. So they just tied him to the truck and continue driving.

Like that’s what they actually did, they actually just tied him to the truck and kept driving.

Eventually, they do make it to the scene of the Kaiba card crime in their 3 wheel pickup truck, but unfortunately, so does the weird satellite laser, so once again our team does not make it in time to really make any difference. The Yugi team is consistently like...3 minutes too late. Should be their team motto.

So Noah’s big plan is to make Mokuba watch Leichter--the hard to spell Big 5 with the very Dixie accent--explain in great detail all the ways Seto screwed Mokuba. And it was...something that I don’t think most kids would get. Last week it was a .com analogy, this week we’re straight up jumping into hostile takeovers. Seto decided to use the Big 5 to buy up a majority of the stock and fire his Father, but realized that Gozaburo would absolutely not let that happen.

So, Seto set up a whole plan to make it appear like he was losing the stock race, by leaking the whole plan that they were secretly buying allll the stock straight to Gozaburo but while pretending to be Mokuba (I assume by pinching his nose while shouting through a telephone) and then driving Mokuba to Gozaburo by attacking him point blank.

Did any children watching this show understand this? Did any of you?

Anyway, for some reason Mokuba is shocked that this happened.

And then we get a flashback to remind us that yes, Mokuba was here when this happened. Maybe didn’t understand it at the time, but overall, should know by now that like...this happened. Noah revealing this to him really shouldn’t have been such a shocker, right?

Mokuba describes it as “the worst day in his life” which is kind of a lot since two seasons ago Mokuba was chained in a castle cell for several days (possibly weeks), turned into a playing card while his body was a zombie that did dishes for Pegasus, died in a VR game because his brother couldn’t play nice, then last season, got abducted and then was suspended from the bottom of a flying helicopter by one single rope tied around his waist, was imprisoned in a box warehouse where he barely escaped, found out one of his good friends is pretty sure he’s an Egyptian Pharaoh dont-think-about-it, only to find all of his other friends were now attached to torture devices and about to be drowned in the bottom of the sea or squashed by a couple tons of cargo container. And then the next day, 3 people got sent to the hospital during the tourney he’s the manager of and only one of those people isn’t still in a coma, and now there’s at least one serial murderer on board his blimp and there’s nothing he can do about it.

But sure Moki, this is your worst day.

Convinced that Gozaburo (I will never spell his name right, PS, my apologies) thinks Moki is on his side, Kaiba decides to do the deed. In his school clothes. Not entirely positive that baby Kaiba has any other outfit than his school clothes and that purple coat.

Like did Seto get off school early to go and do this, or did he honestly clock in at 8 AM, harass Joey and Yugi for a bit, maybe take a test, turn in his diorama of mitochondria that he made out of twizzlers or whatever, eat lunch while making fun of the skater kids who botch it on the stairs, scribble some art in art class until 3 PM, and then take the bus back home to do THIS?

And so although the Big 5 were still majority shareholders, they couldn’t really control Seto Kaiba--which leads me to think that at some point he managed to get their stocks away from them...somehlow...probably more insider trading, he seems really into that.

Anyways, long story short the Big 5 really screwed it on this one. I mean the company has to be run by a Kaiba per the Kaiba rule that we learned in S1 (kind of a weird rule this family enforces, when all of the Kaibas are SO BAD at romantic relationships that they can only date trading cards, or can’t stop getting abducted long enough to even go on a date with a real human ((Reminder that Mokuba and Serenity are the same age, but he’s 1/millionth as horny as any of these High School Juniors that are into Serenity)))

Leichter (who is the light purple font here, I uh...forgot to cap Leichter’s face so it’s somewhat confusing) decided to just continue explaining, mostly for Mokuba, I assume, because...everyone here already knows what’s happening.

And at this point he reveals that he does have a Blue Eyes.

Again, very surprised Noah gave him that card but youknow...the power of...whatever the hell is going on there between Kaiba and that paper card.

Anyways, the Blue Eyes gives him a win, so I guess he’s figured out somewhat how to use this card? Like it’s significantly less bad than it was in the previous seasons. Maybe that separation between him and the paper card in S2 was good for him. Got his relationship back on track.

So like, something that is kind of vogue right now in more adult TV is this tendency to try and make all your characters relatable by making them realize and obsess over how they messed up to the point that they can no longer make any moral choices.

And that was the thing I was worried about in this arc, I was worried that the one guy on the writing staff who SUPER stans Seto Kaiba would make Seto into some sort of Bojack Horseman, who becomes so obsessed with his guilt that he kind of becomes a victim of what society did to him rather than a guy who ever made a choice. And Bojack’s not a bad show or anything, I did watch all of it, and it’s supposed to be more about society than the characters. But, as his problems from his youth compounded, he loses all of his agency as a character. If you are forced to be an ass then...well you can’t be one, by nature of what it means to be an ass.

Does that make sense? I see that more and more in shows these days, just a constantly apology fest whenever writers do a villain background episode.

But yes, Seto was trained to be a shark, but he was already a shark from day 1. He was always like this from the moment he was put in that orphanage. No apologies on behalf of the writing staff are needed and I’m glad they didn’t make any. It was somewhat refreshing that Seto never once apologized during this entire episode. He is awful, and he is completely fine with that.

And like, Bro hates it when you do this type of parallel comparisons between characters, but I freakin love it because he might be an English major but he majored in technical writing, and I was minoring in film for a hot minute so I love analyzing stuff and he can just deal. So lets dive in. We just came off of a whole arc talking about Marik’s tragic backstory and it’s really interesting that Seto’s tragic backstory mirrors Marik’s a great deal (especially since Kaiba was the one who was supposed to inherit the magic rod) but the two of them have a very different response to it.

Marik’s background gave him absolutely no agency. Even when he did lash out against his father--that was the rod rather than Marik himself. He lost his nut because he got tortured by his Father and lived a very shelted life underground, there was no choice there. He even has a brother that he threw into the coals (well, stroke of lightning) for his own ambitions.

Seto, on the other hand, was also tortured by his Father, but lived a shelted life so far above everyone else, that he never really left that lifestyle. But, unlike Marik, when he got the chance to make a choice, instead of getting out of the Kaiba house to save his Brother, he decided to freakin destroy it, even if it involved torturing Mokuba (momentarily) in the process.

Both are destroying their Father’s legacy while also trying to rule the world at the same time, two different villains, two different ways, one isn’t necessarily better written than the other, but it does feel like Seto has a lot more control of his own life than Marik, who is currently bumming around in Tea’s brain.

But I dunno, maybe Seto will have a big moment where he will feel an ounce of guilt and we’ll find out that everything he did was secretly a good thing or The Only Way something. I might eat my words later and be somewhat disappointed. We’ll see.

If you just got here, this is a link to read these recaps from S1 Ep1, in case you felt like reading a novel’s worth of Yugioh, since we are on S3.

[dokidokiliteraturegirls]

 Hello everyone! Yui here, with today’s special feature, DDLitG Behind the Scenes: What’s the deal with Ako?

In this special update we’ll talk about her character in general, design, her place in the story, and more! So get comfortable in your seat, get yourself some good snacks, and let’s delve into the background of DDLitG’s 1st-ish original character~

Who is Ako?

Ako, formerly known as “female student”, was originally one of the many NPCs used by the game’s engine to fill its world with nondescript background characters, so as to make it feel less empty. However, Sayori took a special interest in her, and decided to befriend her, following the steps of a young MC who befriended Sayori in a similar situation and ended up saving her life. This would in turn allow Ako to grow as a character beyond her 1 line of coding and get her own sprites, as well as being able to interact with the world. She would later go on to fall in love with Sayori and shenanigans ensue.

Ako was created with the purpose of telling the story of the Friendship arc.

Designing Ako.

Let me make one thing clear: I’m not a character designer. I don’t know jack about it besides the very basics. But I did try to make someone who looked mildly original and, most importantly, different from the other girls.

Originally, she was going to be the image of a shy, fragile girl who Sayori befriended out of pity, more than anything. Based on this initial idea, I made this beta Ako design on one of my copybooks when I should’ve been working:

As you can see, her very first sprite was the one where she’s shyly looking away to avoid eye contact (and to seem annoying, but more on that later). I was happy with the pose but not with her face, as it looked super unoriginal. She resembled Ochako Uraraka from My Hero Academia a bit too much, so I tried to change her hair to make her stand out more. Here is her second iteration:

This time, I felt like I cranked it up too much to the other side. Now she stood out TOO much. Her hair felt like it came more from a protagonist than someone who’s supposed to be a background character. I adopted a new philosophy after seeing this result: she had to look as bland as possible. She had to be the kind of character you see all the time in the background of an anime - those simple, unassuming designs you’d never look twice at because you’re too focused on the protagonists with candy-coloured hair. In DDLitG’s canon she’s a filler NPC brought to the forefront, and her design had to reflect that more than my desire to make her look “cool”.

With this in mind, we come to Ako v0.3

As you can see, this is much closer to her current design. But this was still a sketch (even the drawing above is very much unfinished). As you can see, I got closer to her 0.1 version with the hair, but changed the eyes to make them look more unique, giving her that more neutral, “nothing” expression. Having finally found some ground I was comfortable with, I redefined her design a little further, gave her some more details around the hair and clothes, adjusted the proportions of her body (because apparently I draw heads huge), and made her finalized design.

I was happy.

What’s with this sassy... monochrome child?

If there’s one constant to be found in the pictures above, is that she was always meant to be black and white. There are plenty of reasons, which I’ll list because, honestly, there are a lot.

1. I didn’t want to look her like the rest of the cast at fucking all. She is an OC introduced in a story with already established characters made by a much more talented writer. She’s an outsider, someone who doesn’t belong with this cast of colorful characters, and I wanted readers to be able to tell that at first glance. No, she’s not like the other girls. They don’t belong in the same place. She is not a member of the original DDLC cast, and it shows.

2. I know I can’t draw as well as Satchely, so trying to copy DDLC’s art style would just end up looking awkward and wrong. I had no choice but to do my own thing. And if I’m doing my own thing, why not take it all the way? I already gave myself artistic freedom, I might as well go crazy with it~

3. I just adore characters in a fictional universe that look different from the rest of the cast or have some strange design choice for literally no reason. Like Krillin from Dragonball, with his eyes that make him look like he belongs in an entirely different manga...

...or even Jotaro Kujo, whose hat merges with his hair because why not!

I live for dumb crap like that.

4. A huuuuuge inspiration for me while writing (besides my own uninteresting life) is music. Many times I listen to a specific track or imagine situations with specific background music to make them seem more real, and be able to better portray the feelings of a scene when writing [For example, I listened to My Chemical Romance’s Welcome to the Black Parade a lot while writing Monika’s Death].

Ako’s creation was no exception. Her appearance was partially based on the cover for not only one of my favorite Vocaloid albums of all time, but one of my favorite albums period: Wowaka’s glorious Unhappy Refrain.

I’ve been writing stuff based on this album alone for years because it’s just so damn striking to me. The picture of the faceless schoolgirl falling into the unseen abyss, the background uninterested characters that imply they are used to seeing fellow girls suffer, the distorted world they live in, the album’s way to explore teenage depression, the freaking name of the album, EVERYTHING! IT’S SUCH A GOOD EXPLORATION OF THE DIFFICULT LIFE TEENS FACE THAT OFTEN GOES UNNOTICED!! AAAAAAHHHH IT’S SO GOOD.

5. Ako was also based on a previous design I made for another character meant for an original visual novel I was writing and I’m probably never going to finish, who was also going to be monochromatic to reference this album (in that context it made more sense though cuz every character was a musical reference).

This character, in turn, was based on Monoko from Yume Nikki, which is more obvious because of her crying eye and extra arm.

So basically at this point it would’ve been weird if I hadn’t made her monochromatic.

Naming Ako

This was one of the most difficult parts, ngl.

As I mentioned, Ako was originally going to be a fragile, shy girl. Based on this, her original name during the design face was Moromi, which is one more letter than “Moroi”, which Google translate promises me means “Brittle” or “Fragile” in Japanese.

However, after the philosophy change that happened during her conceptual stage, “Fragility” was no longer at the core of her character, as it was now “Nothingness/Blandness”. Because of this, I changed her name to “Ako”.

Many people have submitted their interpretations of the name, ranging from its meaning “To teach/to learn”, and “To yearn for”, which all fit better than the original tbh.

The intended meaning is for “Ako” to be read as “A-Ko”, which is a way by which Japenese media often refers to filler characters, as it translates to “Girl A”.

Examples of this can be seen in Super Danganronpa 2, where a character in a videogame is called “A-Ko” to hide their identity...

...and in a movie called “Project A-ko”, which was a parody of the anime tropes from the time, so they gave the protagonist the most generic name ever. The antagonist and side character, by the way, are called “B-Ko” and “C-Ko” respectively. This movie is fucking awesome.

This name also made sense in the context of the story, because we already had a character named “Student A”, so this goes to show that the game just gave Ako the default name it had stored for female NPCs.

Blinded Ako, or How I Learned to Convey Emotion Through Ahegao

When I came up with Ako, she was meant to have most of her character revolving around her infatuation with Sayori. She was, after all, written in the story with the purpose of falling in love with her, and nothing else. Her character, personality, likes/dislikes, and hobbies came afterwards. As the story progressed, however, I decided that she should have a personality separate from just being in love with another character. So to separate the actions she committed under the influence of her passion, I did a little design change in the middle of the arc: Blinded Ako.

In this version, Ako has been literally blinded by love and stops being rational. This is represented by the hearts covering her eyes, and clouding her judgement. This was done not only with the purpose of representing she was past her breaking point, but also to differentiate the Ako that makes mistakes with the Ako that was introduced in the beginning of the arc. Almost so as to make them two different characters, so when she is reintroduced as a regular character after Friendship, readers could think “oh, she’s not going to do dumb stuff again, she’s not blinded by love anymore.”

Many people compared the above panel with “ahegao”, a trope in hentai manga where a character does a silly face to represent them breaking from enjoying themselves so much. This was done partially on purpose. The main idea was to represent Ako being blinded by her infatuation for Sayori, not to equate her sate of being with anything sexual. It DID end up looking more hentai-esque than I expected though, as, well, Ako is in black and white, and the heart eyes are also a trope in ahegao. And she’s sweating. And she’s saying that she’s about to break....

.....

....well at least I drove my point home.

Ako’s musical influences

Above I mentioned how music was a big part of my inspiration, and how I listened to Welcome to the Black Parade while writing Monika’s Death, so the question in no one’s mind is: what music did Yui use as inspiration for Ako’s character and the arc? 🤔

Well, hypothetical reader, the answer is that since Ako was meant to be bland and flavour-free, her original depiction is not based on a song or anything. Her desperation towards Sayori and Blinded Ako, though, are based on TRONICBOX’s 80′s style remix of Ariana Grande’s Into You. And yes, this 80′s remix in specific. Not the original song. I highly encourage you to give it a listen and pay attention to the lyrics if you want an insight into how Ako was feeling during her breaking point.

Also, as a side note, no one has asked me this, but I imagine Ako’s voice to sound like the vocals of Panty and Stocking’s ending, Fallen Angel. It’s a truly beautiful song, and once again, I highly encourage you to give it a listen and pay attention tot he lyrics if you want an insight in Ako’s current feelings towards Sayori.

Ako’s reception

This is more something personal than an explanation of the character, but it’s something I want to share nonetheless.

Remember when I said Ako was meant to be annoying? Yeah... xD

When I decided to add a new character I did so under the idea that everyone was going to hate her, because it’s a purposefully boring OC made by some insane person with the sole purpose of being added to an already interesting and loved cast of characters just to fuck everything up.

The first scene I ever wrote for Ako was the part where Monika asked if she had hurt Sayori, and she said “Not intentionally...” while looking away, which is why her first sprite ever was in that position. She was meant to make people feel frustrated over this girl just looking away from her problems and avoiding responsibility, while also telling Monika to her face that she had done something bad to Sayori. Readers were expected to hate her. That’s why in the beginning she says she doesn’t like literature, to assure you that she’s not joining the literature club. That’s why there’s a scene where she gets punched in the face. That’s why she looks so extremely out of place.

YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO DISLIKE HER!! omg I’m still surprised at how warm the reception was, you guys are just too nice for me~ ❤️

Because of the unexpected reception I had to change some parts of the arc, which were originally going to be much crueler towards her [I even questioned adding the punch at all, but it was an important part of Monika’s development so I felt it]. I also established her as a recurring character in spite of her dislike of literature, and did my best to make her less hate-able than she was originally going to be, even cutting some planned lines of dialogue that made her pretty irredeemable. Looking back, I am glad I did those changes, we ended up with a well-liked and pretty nice girl because of it~

Final thoughts

The introduction of Ako and writing Friendship in general was a very intense experience for me. It was very difficult to balance Ako as being both relevant to the story and moving the plot forward, but not make her the sole focus of everything and have her obscure everyone else, because OCs in established pieces of media tend to do that.

This arc also got a LOT of mixed reviews, some people liking it, some hating everything I did. This made me really question what I was doing and at many points even regret I was writing Friendship at all. At a certain point I lost almost 50 followers in a single update.

I also had trouble writing some parts because they were too sad. And that’s not my style! I like writing happy people being good friends, damn it, not everyone crying and hating each other.

But when all is said and done, I’m happy I wrote both Friendship and Ako into the story. I’ve received many wonderful, supportive messages telling me how much readers enjoyed it. Even some people saying they had been in a similar situation to the one depicted in the story, and were glad to see a story that showed a positive outcome.

Will I write more OCs into DDLitG?

Meh, who knows. I love writing more original stuff and expanding the world of DDLitG, but I also feel like if I introduce yet another OC, people will crucify me and hate me for flooding the story with too much stuff that’s irrelevant to the DDLC they’re used to. That being said, writing this blog is my first, and very possibly last chance to expose my stories to such a large audience. And seeing people like what you do not only because you’re riding the coattails of a recognizable brand, but because they like what you do with it, makes me pretty darn happy. Being completely honest, I’d like to add another character. But just one. And only if it’s something that will push both the story and the girls’ character arcs forward. Not just adding OCs for the sake of it.

Thanks for sticking until the end of this BTS, and I hope you found it an enjoyable read, or at the very least I made you a little bit less bored~ ❤️

Next time, in DDLitG Behind the scenes: What’s the deal with The Perfect Yuri?

[dumbledoom]

Writers are legit, kudos dudes

So I have dabbled in writing fanfic just for fun and I've let my sister post some of my stories on her blog. Anyways writing is fun. It's a really cool way to put your imagination to the test and see what it comes up with. So I was writing a fanfic for fun today, and I dont really share or post them at all cuz idk. But I was thinking to myself, like writing fanfic is really fun, this story is working out well, it could be it's own stand-alone story if I really make it my own and then a thought crossed me....the characters are already developed, that's why its "easier" to write fanfic bcuz you already have an established character!!!

Like it's such a simple and obvious fact,, DUH! These characters are already developed in personality, interaction, and appearance (depending on if it's a book or movie or game or something else) their backstories are known and you typically have an idea of how they'd act in certain scenarios. Alright cool! But like if you ever tried to develop your own character outside of a fanfic, that shit is fucking impressive!

Authors and writers, whatever you call yourself, you make an entire person, which is amazing, and you develop them through words. Like it's a simple fucking concept but if you tried to do it, like good fucking luck keeping consistency and originality and creating a character that people get invested in. Like that takes a good goddamn while.

It's not like you can just be like, "and she was short and she was salty and she thrived off the fear of others" and be done and that's the definition of who your character is.

There's so much more to it! The planning, the explaining, the creating of habits, mannerisms, ticks, the arc and development of how they respond to whatever happens in the story. That's a lot of hard work that I dont think writers get a lot of credit for. That shit is hard!

To make a character that people fall so completely in love and head over heels for is time consuming and takes a lot and when you look at books and movies and games that are original or first time games (ie not sequels, not based off of previous characters like superheroes, not super cliche stories) there's usually A LOT of characters that have to be created! So not only is character development challenging, but to have to do it for upwards of 4 or more main/supporting/essential characters is mind boggling.

Creating people that are not you. Like if you have multiple personalities or multiple sides to your one personality and you just break it up then yeah it might be a bit easier, but to make diverse, independent, well-thought-through, and truly developed characters with depth is a very impressive feat.

There will always be people out there with differing opinions about characters and there will be debates of "oh that was good" or "eh it was superficial and lacked depth and development" but like you can tell when effort was put into something and when it wasnt. Predictability is lazy and boring writing. Plot twists, changes of heart out of no where, creating many levels to a story and even a character so that the mind gets engaged to properly think things through! That is the proper development that goes such a long way!!!

So like kudos to you guys and your madd creativity skills to have original ideas and create entire people and worlds out of thin air. That shit is madd impressive and I respect the hell out of you for it.

I'm an absolute nerd when it comes to analyzing things like this and really digging into stuff that I enjoy to truly appreciate the art. I dont know if other people think this way, but yeah...that's all I got to say about that...

@winchester-with-wings

[hanasaku-shijin]

It has come... the LWA finale....

guys i dont want it to end im

IF I NEVER EATCH THE FINALE LWA IS TECHNICALLY NEVER OVER FOR ME WHAT IF I JUST

NEVER WATCH THE FINALE UNTIL IM ON MY DEATHBED

i saw before but i’ll say it again NO THEMSE SONG IN THE BEGINNING CAN ONLY MEAN ONE THING

IT’S

COMING IN THE END

BUT WHICH SONG

CUZ MIND CONDUCTOR WOULD BE RAD BUT BOOOII

IF IT’S SHINY RAY, THE SONG THAT STARTED US OFF 5 MONTHS AGO

IM GONNA BREAK DOWN

who am i kidding im gonna cry anyway

HERE WE GO HHEEEERE WE FUCKING GOOOOO

old men ew bye

bruh

BRUH IM GOING BACK TO WHAT I SAID ABOUT THE HATRED NEEDING TO BE OVERPOWERED BY LOVE/HAPPINESS

BOOOOOII I SWEAR TO GOD

JASNA

PLEASE

OHHH CANT CATCH IN ON YOUR BROOMS MAYBE BUT I FUCKING

HAVE AN IDEA OF WHAT BROOM CAN REACH IT AND OH MY FUKCING GOD PLEEEEEAAAASSEEE

THAT WOULD BE

THE ULTIMATE BEST THING

UM HI DIANA WAS THE FIRST PERSON SO VOICE SUPPORT FOR AKKO INSTEAD OF DOUBT

EXCUUUUUSE ME IM FUCKING EMO

UM

UUUHHHMMM

OOHHHH

 MY GOD

AKKO AND DIANA

ARE GONNA

RIDE

SHINEY VOLLEY

A G A I N

OH MY FUCKING LORD IN HEAVEN IM

GONNA STROKE IM HAVING AN ACTUAL STR O KE

WE GET IT

A SECOND TIME IM

HOOOO MY GODDDDDDDDD

OOOHH MY HODDDODD

ALSO THE WAY AKKO SAYS EVERYONE’S NAMES BUT!! DIANA’S!! SHE SAYS WITH SUCH RELIEF!!! BITCH IM FUCKING CRYING

THIS IS

REALLY HAPPENING

IM GONNA

CHAROIX SHOULDER TOUCH

//HUFFS IM

FUCK

LORD

THAT SHOT OF THEM ALL CONSTRUCTING THE GIANT BROOM

AKKO AND DIANA TALKING TOGETHER WITH ONLY EACH OTHER

CROIX AND CONSTANZE BEING TECH TOGETHER

O H  

 MY  G

FCK GUC

OH MY GOD

THE

THE W HITE

ROBE S

THE CHARIOT HATS

THE 

THEEHE HT OUTFITS IM

IIMMM

OHH MY HOFD DOD OHOG DKOHNG  FB SKBFKDHB KVLRIGZGSK.SFBJD

IM SERIOUSLY ABOUT TO CRY

THIS VERYS ECOND

OH MY GODD LOOK AT THEM!!!!

MY GIRLS!!!!

IM GONNA

I NEED A MINUTE IM FUCK

OH NOOO

I CANT DO THIS YOU GUYS I CANT

OH 

MY GOD

LOOK AT THEM

ALL CHANTING TOGETHER

DIANA AT THE HEAD OF THE PACK

NO WONDER SHE FLEW SO DETERMINEDLY IN THE OPENING THEME SONG ALL THIS TIME

LOOK AT THEM GOOOOOO

I AM THE

MOST

SHOOK

EVER IM

IM FUCKING

HOLY SHIT

CROIX TELLING IT LIKE IT IS

FAILURES AS TEACHERS LMAO U BET BUT DONT DOUBT THEM DAMMIT

A BELIEVING HEART IS YOUR MAGIC CROIX COME ON SAY IT CHARIOT SAYY IIITT 

SOMEONE’D BETTER SAY IT

OH YM GOD

LOTTE USED A FAERY!!! FINALLY!!

JASNA THE ANCHOR THE BOOST

THEY JUST GONNA FALL OFF LIKE ROCKET BOOSTERS

PUSHING EACH OTHER UP HIGHER

OH FUCKING SHIT

THIS MEANS SUCYS GONNA PAT LOTTE IM

NOT READY

FOR THIS

ALL OF THIS

SHE OPENED HER EYES

FUCK

THEY ALL HAVE THEIR OWN WAYS OF HELPING TO BOOST THE OTHERS

pff that random lady in the crowd was Hannah’s va just sayin

okay bet andrew is helping somehow yes wonderful ANYWAY

BACK TO MY GIRLS PLS

old men GO AWAAYYY

AAHHHH

AAHHHH

LOTTE AND SUCY

COMBO

AND DID THE THING

AND HEY LOOK NOW THE BOYS ARE LIKE ‘WITCHES ARE COOL’

ahem akko just a suggestion but

instead of holding onto the broom handle why not

hold onto diana 

good god UM THE AIR PRESSURE ARE THEY OKAY CAN THEY BREATHE???

just wondering

THIS IS ONLY 10 MINUTES IN UM IM DYING IT’S TAKEN ME 20 TO GET THIS FAR

JESUS

AKKO AND DIANA NEARLY GOT HIT BY OTHER MISSILES AND DIED TOGETHER 

LORD IN HEAVEN

GOD CAN WE STOP

SWITCHING BETWEEN DIANAKKO AND OTHER THINGS JUST KEEP US ON THEM PLEEEEASE

FOR LONGER THAN 2 SECONDS

okay everyone is giving them energy to go on neat

LOL FUCKING

CHARIOT AND CROIX JUST WATCHING A MOVIE OF THEIR DAUGHTERS POTENTIALLY ABOUT TO DIE

HVAING A GAY OL TIME TOGETHER

WATCHING A FUCKNG MOVIE 

MOVIE DATE IM FUCKING LOSING MY MIND

CROIX IS STREAMING THEM

AND SHE’S!!

LETTING CHARIOT ANNOUNCE!!!

LIKE THE PERFORMER SHE ONCE WAS

LIKE SHE HAS IN ALL THE OVAS DURING EMERGENCIES

SHE GETS TO DO IT AGAIN

BIIITTCCCHH

ALL THESE ELEMENTS COMING TOGETHER

OH MY GOSH STOP WITH THE OLD MEN GETTING IN THE MIDDLE FO FUCKING EEVRYTHTINNGG

I KNOW WE GOTTA MAKE THEM BELIEVE IN THE WITCHES BUT

CAN WE PLEASE JUST

FUCKING

PRIME MINISTER IS FUCKING MVP

OH MY GODDDDD

DIANA

JUMPS DOWN

AND 

PUSHES HER ONWARD

OH MY GOD

IM FUCKING

YOU GU Y  S

 YOU  GU Y S  

HELP ME

SHE MADE THEM INTO LITTLE DREAMS!!!

I M

SO FUCKING SHOOK

DIANA’S FUCKING KEEPING WATCH

WARNS AKKO WHENN TO HANG ON

KEEPING AN EYE OUT FOR HER 

GOD

GODDDDDDD

OH YM HGOD

DIANA IS FUCKING 

FLYING THIS FROM THE BACK HOW EVEN

HOOWWWWW

CAN SHE MANEUVER

I MEAN SHE’S DIANA FUCKING CAVENDISH BUT GOD

AKKOOOOO

AKKO GET BACK ON THE BROOM PLEASE

oh thank god

diana was FOLLOWING HER EVERY STEP SO SHE COULD CATCH HER AGAIN

LOOK AT THEM GO LOOK AT THIS TEAMWORK

OH SHIT

OH GOD

DIANA 

SCREAMING FOR AKKO

A G A  AIN

THIS IS THE 3RD TIME 

I

OH MY GOD I HAVE TO KEEP PAUSING TO SCREAM

Oh my god

oh MY GOD SHE KEEP

SCREAMING FOR HER

OH MY GOD MY HEART IS TOO WEAK AND GAY FOR THIS

oh my god did she 

the bird

oH MY GOD

D I A NA A

DIANAA

OH MY GOD OHNMY Y GOD D

OH Y GOD!!!

MY HEART IS SHOOK IM SHOOK OH MY GOD

OHHH 

NOOOOOOOOO

OH MY GOD S OH MY GOF DIM GONNAC RY THTI SIS IT

THIS

IS

 EVERYHTING

SHE CAUGHT DIANA IN RETURN

SHOOTING STAR CAME BACK

SHINY RAAAAAYYYYY

IS PLAYING IM

OYU GUSYS 

I CANT IM GUFKCING

THIS IS 

EVERYTHING

you guys

im

im literally crying im typing through tears i cant fucking see

im

they

they held hands 

they did shiny arc together

tehey

im

is this real im really fucking i cant see im c rying

oh my god

this cant be real this has to be a dream i 

i

the magic

all over the world

oh my god the rod is 

disappearing

AKKO ALMOST CRIED BUT

SHE LET IT GO

look 

at them

standing on top of the wORLD TOGETHER

what in the name of all that’s holy did we ever do to deserve Little Witch Academia

OH MAN

CHARIOT IS KEEPING HER HAIR RED!!! JUST LIKE!!! WHAT NEON AND I SAID!!!

OH MY GOD

OOHHH MY LORD

CROIX IS GONNA

CURE WAGANDEA’S POISON

FOR CHARIOT

OH YM GOD

THAT IS A PROMISE

FOR HER TO RETURNT O CHARIOT

ONCE CROIX HAS FGOTTEN HER SHIT TOGETHER

wow um fuck me Chariot is so fucking GORGEOUS WITH THE RED HAIR LIKE THIS????????

holy fuck

OH!!!

MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LOOK AT

THEM ALL

BEING 

FRIENDS

DIANA AND AMANDA HAVING TEA

SUCY AND CONSTANZE

HANNAH AND JASNA

LOTTE AND BARBARA OVER NIGHTFALL HOLY SHIT THAT IS SOMETHING THE FANS HAVE BEEN CRAVING SINCE EPISODE 4 HOLY SHIT

oh my god oohh my fCUKING  GOD

EVERYONE CAME

TO WATCH AKKO FLY

AND

SHE

DID

IM

OH MY GODDDDDDDDD

YOU GUYS

THIS 

THIS IS IT

AND IM

I AM

SO

FUCKING

HAPPY

THIS WAS EVERYTHING WE EVER COULD HAVE WANTED AND MORE

THIS INCORPORATED EVERY ELEMENT FROM THE SHOW’S PREVIOUS 24 EPISODES ALL INTO ONE

EVERYTHING WAS RIGHT HERE PERFECTLY IN ITS PLACE

EVEN AKKO FLYING HER BROOM SO MUCH FROM THE FIRST OPENING THEME

FINALLY IT MAKES SENSE WHY THEY PUT THAT IN THE OPENING IF SHE COULDNT FLY

CUZ SHE LEARNS TO

AT THE VERY

VERY

END

i....

have never seen

a better anime ending

ever

like literally im not even just saying that

this was

 the best

thing

ever

in my entire life

god bless Little Witch Academia

[beached-thing]

Reasons why Guardians of the Galaxy 2 was a trash fire (SPOILERS):

I say all of this with full awareness of the problem being that I’m a huge fan of the ‘08 Guardians comic, which the films don’t even remotely try to follow, but I’m still gonna bitch about it, so let’s go:

The infantilization of Groot (let’s kick off with possibly the silliest complaint). In the comics, Groot has the canonically highest IQ of the Guardians and is a literal genius. When he’s in small tree form, it’s how he regenerates, he doesn’t revert back to the mind of a child like in the films. As such, Groot’s characterization is the most wildly different between the comics and the movies, out of all the characters (but followed very closely by Drax). I get that cute mascot characters sell tickets but it’s just so devastating seeing our good tree boy get such mistreatment! Especially since, honestly, he was much less cute and much more annoying in this sequel than he was in the last installment. Sorry, but it’s true.

Gamora is still a characterless foil for Peter to touch without permission and forced to have some “unspoken” bullshit with. Peter and Gamora aren’t a couple in the comics and would never be, for the exact reasons we see in the film. But they pair them off together anyway cuz what’s a movie without a bad “guy pesters a girl into giving him a chance” trope subplot? Also, they retained Gamora’s laughably bad makeup and extensions from the first movie for some reason. Poor Zoe.

Speaking of which, why isn’t Mantis green?????????? She’s supposed to be like the exact shade of green Gamora is. Mantis is named mantis cuz, like, the fucking insect....which are greeeeeeeeeen. WHY ISN’T SHE GREEN? More importantly though, why isn’t she getting paired off with Peter like she ideally should be? This weird quasi-relationship shit with Drax is funny (and frankly, Drax tellling Mantis that being ugly is good is my favorite part of the film, for personal reasons I care not to share lol), but like, it’s obviously not gonna work out so why not put the canon ship back in the waters? (Because of my previous bullet point, unfortunately). I loved Mantis as a character though, well written and thoroughly enjoyable. By far my favorite character. I just want to her to be all happy with Peter and also BE GREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEN. Oh well. Maybe we’ll get lucky and she’ll end up being a lesbian in the films since Phyla is nowhere to be found (I will return to this point btw, ready yourselves).

Drax. Oh Drax. I want to love you. You’re the main comic relief. And frankly you do a good job at it. But...I just prefer you as a stoic Riddick-esque character. I realize this is an unpopular opinion and I don’t know why I feel the way I do. But I’m just not feeling this new and possibly improved Drax. I get his appeal but...I’m not connecting. 

Rocket.................actually I don’t have any complaints with Rocket. He’s the only character that they are doing right by. If he’s not in the Captain Marvel film though, what’s even the point of making Guardians movies, ya know?

Peter, aka Shit-Lord: I HATE YOU IN THIS FILM. YOU WERE SO MUCH MORE LIKABLE AND TRUE TO CANON IN THE FIRST FILM. But they made Quill so fucking pushy and creepy toward Gamora in this one for the sake of a bad awful boring played out relationship dynamic so instead we got this motherfucker. Chris Pratt gave a solid performance, as he is prone to do, but the writing was bad and thus Peter was bad. Unfortunate. 

Yondu’s character arc was some bullshit. They worked so hard in the first movie to establish that Yondu was an abuser. Like, they told a very clear child abuse narrative. And it feels so cheap that they retconned it by going “See? He was a good father after all!” Hey Marvel, The Walking Dead wants its glorifying of a piece of shit storyline back. I don’t know, y’all. I’m willing to hear out redemption arcs, but this wasn’t even that. I’m gonna maintain that it was a retcon. It wasn’t a redemption arc, it was a retcon. I liked the original Guardians team teaser at the end of the movie though. Good stuff.

Stop teasing Cosmo if you’re not actually gonna use him. I get that adding a telepathic talking astronaut dog to a film would seem like a ridiculous move in any other film, but it’s very fucking okay to do it in this one. We have to see Howard the Duck cameos that literally no one on Earth cares about, but you won’t give us everyone’s favorite leader of the Guardians? Shameful.  

Nebula is not a compelling character. No slight to Karen GIllan’s performance, but like...who actually cares about Nebula? She’s boring and they probably brought her back to the sequel just so James Gunn could point to her and say “Hey look, we gave Gamora some slight character this time!” At least Nebula’s existence forced these films to pass the Bechdel test, I guess. Could be worse.

Why did they lay on the Hasselhoff references so fucking thick? One mention would have been slightly funny but they really kept pounding this joke into the dirt until it was a bloody lifeless corpse. What the fuck?

Brings me to my next point: so so so many out of place comedic moments and not enough focus on plot and characterization. The story was pretty standard comic book shit, but they could have gave us something with more punch if they had spent less time in the writer’s room giving Drax a bunch of jokes instead of investing in other characters and their motivations. There was something going on with Rocket, right? Who knows, not like they were dedicated to telling that story.

I’m not a huge fan of Peter’s father in the comics, but using Ego in this film to make Peter a god for like 5 minutes on screen just to rip the powers away in the end is...actually that’s such a perfect comic book thing to do. I want to criticize that but that might be the most comic book thing in the entire MCU.

WHERE. THE FUCK. IS PHYLA-VELL? I am fucking SEETHING. Phyla is my absolute favorite character in literally all of Marvel, and she is a core member of the Guardians, but is nowhere to be found. Almost like Marvel studios are fucking cowards that won’t put a canon lesbian up in their shit. Exactly the kind of bullshit you’d expect, unfortunately.

Moondragon? Nah. if they won’t put a lesbian in their film, they’re not gonna put a canon bisexual woman in it either. Fucking shameful, especially since her and Phyla are so magnificently gay for each other. We need that. We need that.

That’s all I can think of right now, folks, but I think that pretty sufficiently sums up why I have so many problems with Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. It just wasn’t very good, y’all. I hate to be that person, but read the comics, honestly. They are really really good and there’s a scene where Gamora gets burnt to the crisp saving the entire team from certain death, and lives cuz she’s a fucking badass with actual character and importance.

[mojorising74]

I am a Monster.  Let me tell you why.

So, I have had many people really want to know why I didn’t enjoy The Last Jedi and I’ve held back answering because the film is fresh and I don’t want to ruin anyone else’s experience.  I did post a four word review of the film on Facebook (”That was... not good.”) and I was stunned to discover that this opinion was not a popular one.  Literally stunned.  So stunned I actually began to question my own thoughts on the film.

And taking some time away from the film and considering all the moments in the film I can recall, (I’ve only seen it once) I’ve decided to alter my review.

That was... really not very good.

So, here we go. I’m gonna break this down in the order as it was experienced by me.  I’m not gonna go back and edit this, so I apologize for typos. But I really don’t want to spend any more time on this then I have to.  This feels like my eulogy to Star Wars.  And I don’t want to linger here.

First off, the opening crawl.  This is a weird one, contested by many, except those in the theater with me.  The crawl was slanted, drifting slightly off to the right of the screen.  It was weirdly noticeable by everyone in my group.  We were slightly off to the left of center in the audience, but measuring the distance at the top of the screen to the scroll on our side vs the distance on the other side made us feel really confident that that the scroll was in fact slanted.  Like, Rian Johnson was putting his own slant on things (I see what he did there).  Or maybe the projector was tilted.  Either way, I missed the entire opening crawl because my brain opted to obsess over this detail.  I’m willing to accept most of the responsibility here, but yeah.  Slanted crawl pulled me out of Star Wars and made me think about how crawls were shot on a plate and how easy it would be to tilt the camera to give it a new cinematic flavor and blah blah blah.  Basically the slanted crawl had no bearing on my overall enjoyment of the film, other than I had retained nothing from the crawl going in and the movie was going to have to stand on it’s own cinematically, with no summary backstory.  

Good or bad, in the interest of full disclosure, I present this fact for your judgement.

Yeah, it’s gonna be that kind of review.

Right off the bat we get the first ESB call back of an evacuation shuttle leaving a planet while the First Order looms in the background.  From the trailers, I’m already expecting an AT-AT walker snow planet battle, so immediately I’m put on the defensive that the film is not gonna learn from criticisms of The Force Awakens and is going to attempt a rehash of “greatest hit” moments from the greatest Star Wars film.  George Lucas referred to this as “poetry” when he recalled certain elements in the prequels, saying “They rhyme.”  The new films seem to be seriously leaning in to this theory, but it feels like fan service rather than nuanced storytelling.

I’m disappointed by this but it is in no way a deal breaker.  Back to the movie.

Poe, by himself with no squadron waiting, decides to face off the First Order’s new weapon (The Dreadnaught) by flying his tiny x-wing to meet them.  We are then subjected to a laurel and hardy routine sponsored by Verizon Wireless, where General Hux is made out to be a total buffoon and completely incompetent.  (People will remember that one of everyone’s favorite part of the prequels was how the robot army was totally incompetent and easily out smarted by our clever heroes.  Or, the opposite of that.)  

But this scene also made me wonder about the intelligence of our hero as well.  He flies out to meet the star destroyers and only then does he decide to charge up his boosters for his daring plan?  “But Carl, he was playing it by ear!”  No, the generals on the resistance ship clearly know what his plan is and disapprove.  So, Poe actively decides to show up for this fight completely unprepared.  But whatever.  That’s a nit pick.  I know that, but these things start to weigh on me.  See, it wasn’t a story element that he needed more time to charge the boosters, it was a purposefully extended scene to stretch out a “can you hear me now” joke at the sake of plausibility. 

Disagree with me?  Think of the scene like this.

Hux gives his speech about how he will not take prisoners (instead of just shooting the guy out of the sky which would have delivered that message so much more succinctly).

Poe says his first line “I’m holding for General Hux.”

Hux looks confused for a moment, but quickly realizes he’s being played. “Blow him out of the sky!”

Cut to: Poe’s ship where his engine charge is ready and he blasts off and away.

All the same story beats with a quick, satisfying laugh that doesn’t stop the story or undermine the competency of the characters involved.

Speaking of competency, that brings up my next note.  Poe is a fucking Mary Sue.  Holy shit.  The next sequence of Poe destroying ALL but one of the cannons recalls one of my least favorite moments in Force Awakens.  That one shot where Finn is watching Poe fly around bulls-eyeing something like NINE tie fighters and several ground troops without even breaking a sweat.  It sets up this ridiculous expectation, that either Poe is that much better than everyone else in either the Resistance or First Order, making everyone else depressingly bad at their jobs, or him impossibly good.  Either way, it’s lazy story telling.  

We’ve seen good pilots in both of the previous trilogies, all of them having force powers to help them fight at elevated levels, but I’ve never felt, watching any of the other films, that one pilot was enough to single handedly sway any battle.  Battles in the previous films always felt epic and sweeping.  Poe feels like an OP video game character.  The kind that inspires patches to reduce his power because he kills the fun of playing the game and takes away the sense of menace from the foes he faces.

So, we’ll skip the next few nit picks; (bombs “falling” in “space”; why are space bombers slow when there is no gravity or atmosphere? Why are bomb bays triggered by a single button garage door opener? Why would you waste bombers on a mission that clearly calls for a missle or.. an unmanned vehicle blasting into hyper space?  We’ll get to that later cuz holy fuck.)

I want to point out that I’m getting nit picky at this point, but watching the film, I have NOT checked out.  Still engaged.  Still excited.  There is some Star Wars shit happening and I am in for the ride!  Woo hoo! Snoke is pissed and is gonna murder the fuck outa that buffoon Hux for letting the Resistance escape into hyper space.

So, the rebels come out of hyperspace and Leia casually mentions that she has a tracking device to help Rey find her way home.  

LITERALLY MOMENTS LATER, the First order leaps out of hyper space and everyone starts screaming “They tracked us some how!”  My brain, which has been literally processing story elements that are fed to me as they are fed to me immediately makes the connection between the First Order tracking the Resistance and the bracelet on Leia’s arm.  Those mother fuckers are tracking that shit, and that means they can also find Rey, which means Rey and Luke are in danger as well.  Hux even says “We have them tied to the end of the line.”  And this is further cemented as what is happening when Snoke suddenly forgives Hux like he’s the best general who ever lived.  Like maybe he just explained to Snoke that they found the tracking signal and he’s about to serve up Luke Motherfucking Skywalker.

Except, that’s not what happened.  What actually happened is that the First order had finally perfected some 50 year old Imperial technology that was briefly mentioned in Rogue One.  Hux didn’t have a clever plan that pleased Snoke.  He had some technology.  Technology that Snoke would have already known about.  Snoke sent Hux back to work like he nailed it, when he should have been like “You fucking idiot, you are the luckiest son of a bitch in the world that you completed that technology cuz we should have finished these guys already.  I’m taking a body part.  Get back to work.”

And the secret space tracker that Leia had?  Didn’t need it.  Finn steals it briefly in a cowardly attempt to save the girl he has a crush on, But other than that, it has almost no bearing on the story.  Rey uses her connection to Kylo to fly back and surrender to him.  The tracker was only used as a plot device to introduce Rose, and to show Finn in a most unheroic light.  Again.  A familiar bell rang many times in The Force Awakens.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves, because the best moment in the movie happened before this and I want to talk about it.

Kylo and the first order have caught the resistance with their pants down and they are fucking shit up.  Kylo cruises in on the lead cruiser, aims at the bridge, and suddenly senses his mother standing there.  Overcome with emotion, Kylo realizes that he can’t kill his mother.  That doing that would mean there is no chance for his redemption.  And he CHOOSES TO SPARE HER LIFE! 

But oh shit, two other fighters are cruising with him and they dont hesitate to fire on the bridge.  There is an explosion and Leia is sucked out into space.

Ladies and gentleman, this was possibly the greatest moment in Star Wars history.  Leia was dead.  Her death had powerful meaning.  In the moment of Kylo’s redemption, he has it stolen away by others.  His path to forgiveness destroyed.  He will never be forgiven by the other characters in the film.  he is doomed to fight as evil because the forces of good will give him no quarter for killing their general.  He is a cursed man.  His guilt will know no bounds.  

I sat there in the cinema, speechless.  Completely destroyed emotionally, openly weeping.  Carrie Fisher leaves the film, her character arc complete, her death a meaningful and truly shocking moment in the film.  Absolutely stunning.

And then she opens her eyes.  And I start crying for a different reason.  She holds out her hand and force pulls herself to safety, ignoring the other heroes on the bridge who were also blown out into space.  She chooses to use her magic powers to save herself and let everyone else die.  

Like a fucking hero.

I was stunned at how terrible this moment plays on screen.  Truly stunned.  Leia had literally just given a speech on how soldiers die heroes but never commanders.  Her first chance to put her money where her mouth is, she ignores her own advice and saves her own skin instead.

This also gave me the stunning revelation that Leia would not be dying in this film, because as bad as Rian Johnson is at Star Wars, he’s not so bad to miraculously save a character only to kill her off later because her epic heroic death is still waiting in the wings.  Knowing that Carrie Fisher had died made me feel like her character would never get the incredible exit from the saga that was just missed in the preceding opportunity.  Princess Leia will die off screen between films.  Or she will be digitally reincarnated.  But neither of those things serve her memory or her character.  The Force Awakens had a lot of missed opportunities, but none of them like this missed moment here.

Meanwhile Rey is trying to convince Luke Skywalker to come back and he insists that he has no intention of ever returning.  WHY THE FUCK DID YOU MAKE A MAP TO WHERE YOU WERE HIDING?  WHAT THE FUCK AM I WATCHING? WHAT THE FUCK! WHAT THE FUCK!

While we’re here, Chewie eating Porgs while they gather around him to ponder the deaths of their kin is nothing less than horrifying.  These creatures are sentient and aware they are bing eaten, and instead of running for their lives, they stare sadly at the creature eating them.  These creatures are not long for this world. This is my only note on Porgs.  

They’re... fine.

Also, ghost Yoda can shoot lightning bolts?  Is that something they could always do?  Why the fuck are we fighting a war when theres an army of lightning powered ghost warriors wandering the cosmos.  Hey Ghost Yoda why don’t you make yourself useful and ghost your way into a star destroyer and lightning the fuck out of power core?

Ghost Yoda shooting lightning fundamentally breaks Star Wars.  

Moving on...

Seriously.  We’re just getting started.

Back at the resistance, Finn has decided to sneak off the cruiser with Leia’s bracelet.  Now, remember, at this point in the film, I’m still thinking the bracelet is the way the First Order is tracking the resistance.  The whole “they must be tracking us through hyper space” plot line feels super thin and the only thing holding it to reality is a passing reference in a film that takes place roughly 50 years before this one.  Remember, there is literally no reason, that I as a casual movie goer, should think that the First order has in fact figured out this new tech and are not following this bracelet instead.  Nothing about Snoke’s response or Hux’s response suggest this is the case.

So, I’m thinking, fuck yeah.  Finn has figured this out, and he’s gonna try and lure the First Order away by pretending he’s Princess Leia.  Like a hero.  This is gonna draw the First Order off the Resistance and put Finn in a lot of danger.  Danger that’s gonna get super cool when Rey follows the beacon home and discovers her friend captured by storm troopers!  What a crazy action packed reunion that’s gonna be!

Oh wait.  Finn is sneaking off to lure Rey away from the First Order, so the two of them can be together after the resistance is destroyed, or something.  Like a... hero?  Is this really the conclusions a hero comes to?  I mean, i get it, the movie calls him out on this, but like, didn’t we already do the “Finn is running away” plot line in the last movie?  Didn’t we already resolve that he’s not a coward and willing to fight for what’s right?  He knows Rey won’t be cool with this move.  What the fuck is he doing?  WHAT THE FUCK!

Ok, so, he tells Rose what he was really up to, and she magically understands the quantum mechanics of tracking a ship through hyper space.  Finn and Rose, the janitor and the repair girl, within moments of being presented with a problem come up with the most far fetched solution that could possibly be, WHILE IGNORING THE MOST OBVIOUS PROBLEM IN THEIR HANDS (I mean honestly, even if someone had briefly looked at the tracker and said “What about this”, followed by a quick explanation and I could move on, but in the 2 1/2 hour run time there just wasn’t enough time to address this obvious plot hole).

So, Finn, Poe and Rose decide to disobey orders and embark on a mission after being told that there is only one man in the galaxy that can hack into a first order star destroyer.  This man, will be identifiable by his flower pendant.  That he always wears.  At all times.  So he can be identifiable.  To people sent to him to hack secret codes.  You know, just in case.  Also he is always at the high stakes gambling tables.  Not eating.  Not reading the paper in his apartment.  He exists in a constant state of high stakes gambling.

Sigh.  Fine.  Let’s go find this guy.

Finn and Rose leave in a shuttle and are immediately identified as a shuttle leaving the ship by the First Order but they are told to ignore the shuttle and to continue chasing the main ships.  This scene is really fucking important for later on in the movie so let me reiterate on this point:  A shuttle left the resistance ships and was immediately tracked and identified by the First Order.  Yeah, you know where I’m going with this, but let’s just leave it here in your fucking brain for a minute, the way it sat in mine for the rest of the movie.

So, now we get a weird story arc for Rose.  Rose hates everyone who lives in this city.  Why? Did she live here?  No.  She was a slave growing up in a mine somewhere else.  But rich people who live in this city built weapons from stuff the slave children mined so fuck this town and everyone in it.

This,’rich people were mean to me so I hate all rich people’ storyline feels like a super weak attempt to make a political statement about classism and suggests that future Star Wars films are going to be about the poor people rising up and defeating the elitists who are literally getting rich off of watching us kill each other.  This is a clumsy metaphor for what’s happening in the world. (It also completely ignores that this city is also home to the sometimes lover of one of our main resistance heroes, so maybe not everyone is so bad?)

But fine.  Clumsy metaphor.  Poor people good, rich people bad.  Got it.

Rose and Finn find the man they are looking for but are immediately arrested and thrown in jail.  The absolute worst jail in movie history.  First off, they are locked up together.  But not only together, with a third person.  A magic person who claims (and actually does) he has the exact skills the duo is looking for.  Skills our characters have been told do not exist outside of the man with a flower on his coat.  

This new man breaks them out of jail with items he snuck in (deus ex incompetence), only to discover that BB-8 has already dispatched the guards and was literally moments away from rescuing them himself.  I point this out because none of the suspension of disbelief required above was necessary to get out of the situation.  The movie just did it.  Inexplicably.  Just crammed in a  moment to waste our time.  

Which I suddenly realize is a recurring theme in the film.  Cramming in moments that have no bearing on the story to fill time.

Fine.  They escape.  But they do not try to reconnect with the guy they saw at the casino.  They instead decide to scrub the mission and head back.  I’m weirdly on board with this because this whole plan was incredibly contrived from the beginning.  Anything to get back to the story at hand.

But this new person they met in jail just keeps forcing himself on them, rescuing them at the last moment from... I’m not sure what.  Going back to terrible jail?  It’s not hard to break out of.  They’ve already decided to leave the planet empty handed so, I’m not really sure what the stakes are for this camel cat chase scene are supposed to be.  Like, it seems to be a crazy desperate escape from being temporarily hindered.  Whatever.  All your friends are dying in the slowest chase scene across the galaxy ever, but this action packed chase scene has almost zero stakes.  Think about where you’re investing your story moments, people.  

Shake it off, there is still a lot of movie to get through, but at this point, the movie is actually working against me.

Ok, so Finn and Rose escape the gambling city, leaving the slave children to be whipped and beaten for their participation in the escape, and all of the camel cats are immediately round up and returned to the stables, to be also whipped and beaten for running away.  (This is proven fact when we revisit the children later on and find them still working in the stables, sweeping straw. If the camel cats were still gone, there would be no need to tend the stables and we already know the slavers are not opposed to beating the children or the camel cats.)

But hey, none of that matters cuz “Game on!”  We have a hacker!  Who claims he can do the thing.  With zero credibility or references.  But by god, this is our only hope.  Cool.  Lets break into a star destroyer.

I wanna pause here to point out there is a storyline happening between Kylo Ren and Rey that is STUNNINGLY good.  Like it’s happening in a different movie.  It’s layered and nuanced and tragic and heartfelt.  Love love everything in this storyline up to the point that Kylo Ren pulls a Homer Simpson trying to murder his omnipotent son, Bart, in that one Tree House of Horror episode just before Bart turns him into a jack in the box. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4T8x7T4Vao

Kylo Ren is moderately more successful then Homer and manages to kill off Snoke by cutting him in half with my favorite move from the Star Wars video game.  And then comes the dance fighting ninja guards who are TERRIBLE at their jobs.  Just terrible.  There’s no other way to explain what happened to human resources.  The outcome of what happened in that room is going to reflect very poorly on the Royal Guard.

But the movie insists I need to watch the Rose Finn stuff so it sends me back to them sneaking onto the star destroyer, where they are immediately identified by an astro mech who spots BB-8.

Moments later they are caught by the First Order, but BB-8 is not captured.  Even though he is with them and was the reason they were caught in the first place.  Somehow, he isn’t captured with them.  the movie suggests it’s because he is hidden under a box, but the Star Mech saw him through the box and the astro mech is present for the capture, but has now apparently forgotten about BB-8.

Sure.  Fine.  Moving on.

Now, I forgot to mention something because during the throne room fight, the movie felt like it was winding down, but I remembered from the trailer that Captain Phasma still hadn’t shown up in the movie and was getting worried that Phasma might be under utilized in this storyline (unless there was some big reveal coming up that totally legitimized her involvement in the film.  Spoiler alert: there isn’t.)

Seriously, why is Phasma in your movies?  Are you trying to make a statement about Boba Fett?  That the only thing a villain needs to become iconic is a cool costume?  Is this a bet you guys made with the original trilogy guys?

So, Phasma shows up, escorts the prisoners to the hangar (not the brig) in order to immediately execute them.  Not interrogate them.  Not hold them prisoner. “But Carl, they knew Finn and Rose would never talk so no need to question them! Also, the hacker already told them everything they wanted to know.”  Ok, first, hacker John only told the First order about the ships sneaking off the spaceship.  Information he was only privy to because he was allowed to be a part of a top secret mission briefing by Poe leading a mutiny against Laura Dern.  And also, master interrogator Kylo Ren is on this ship.  He can mind rape these kids and get all their secrets.  There is NO WAY execution is the next step in the plan. Zero chance.

Hang on.  Hold up.  Let’s talk about Laura Dern who has picked the absolute worst teaching moment that any officer could choose.  The resistance is in tatters.  The main general is in a coma.  Your captains are going down with their ships one at a time.  DON’T BE COY WITH THE DETAILS WHEN DEALING WITH YOUR BEST PILOT!

Also, what the fuck is up with your hair and wardrobe?  Purple hair?  That’s it?  You were like “Space movie lady?  Purple hair, right?” and everyone was like “Sure. That sounds right.” Lazy lazy lazy.....

Whatever.

So, Phasma is gonna execute these fools but KABOOM! and Phasma and her troops disappear.  Finn is surprised by this and decides to make his escape.  But then suddenly out of the smoke comes (wait for it) CAPTAIN PHASMA!

Wha...?  Where did she go?  Did they all run off for a second and then suddenly go “Wait.  Did we kill those guys? Do you guys remember why we came in here?  Fuck.  Lets go back and kill those guys before we leave.  We got the order all mixed up again.”  Just... baffling.  They jettisoned her out of the scene, just so she could reenter the scene dramatically.  Just because the shot of her coming out of the smoke looked cool.  That’s it.

So, now Finn and Phasma fight.  And the backstory between these two characters is thick, and by thick I mean, non-existent.  Nothing feels earned in this battle, including Phasma’s incredibly lack luster “death”.  So, Finn the janitor lucks into victory against the hardened warrior... again.

Man, have we ever seen Finn win a fight in these movies?  Have they been trying to sell us an incompetent hero?  What exactly has Finn done to help the resistance in either of these films?  Is Finn the worst character in Star Wars?  Talk amongst yourself.

But before you do, I want you to consider one thing.  After watching the film, I was pretty vocal about how Finn, Rose and Poe’s plan did absolutely nothing to affect the outcome of the film.  Their adventure was completely pointless.

But I was wrong.  They did cause one thing.  

On the Resistance ships, 30 evacuation shuttles are slipping away, under the assumption that the First Order won’t be able to see the shuttles.  This is a stupid plan, especially since the movie goes out of it’s way to explain that the First Order can ABSOLUTELY track shuttles flying away. (Editor’s note: its been pointed out to me that the shuttles were using cloaking technology, cloaking technology that the First Order had no problem seeing past, simply by possessing the knowledge that it existed.  Lazy lazy lazy...)

But let’s buy into this.  The resistance is escaping, and Finn, Poe and Rose have handed a traitor over to the First Order and directly caused the deaths of 23 of the 30 ships flying away.  Two thirds of the survivors were killed because Finn, Poe and Rose didn’t follow orders.

Now, this is fucking dark.  Holy shit, hubris killed the resistance.

But in the next scene, Poe is leading the goddamn charge against the walkers.

YOU DON’T GET TO DO THAT.  You disobeyed orders that killed off almost 300 of the remaining 400 soldiers.  You are summarily executed.  Not the hero of the final battle.  After Poe and Finn’s bullshit, the entire resistance can fit in the goddamn Millenium Falcon.

These characters are not heroes.

So, lets skip over the nit picky shit (Finn can suddenly fly a ship?  When did he learn?  He’s been in a coma since the last movie and one of the main plotlines of the last movie circled around Finn not being able to fly a ship.  Why drop a battering ram so far away from it’s target?  Why not blast the base from space?)

So, then Luke Skywalker shows up and fools everyone into believing he’s actually there, when he isn’t.  It’s magic and shit.  No one can touch him.  (Except we’ve already established that you can indeed touch him through the void, but Nvmnd).

This scene is annoying for two reasons.  One, it’s lame.  Two, the director went through so many lengths to set this up.  He showed a shot of Rey looking at a drowned x wing, so when Luke shows up magically at the end of the movie, folks are like, “He must’ve force lifted the x-wing out of the water and flown it here.”  It was such an easy head fake explanation that utilized information the audience knew from past movies along with necessary story elements to make something believable.  

There are so many head scratchingly stupid moments in this film, that it absolutely stuns me this much thought went into this sequence. To maintain my suspension of disbelief in this moment, the director offered a single well thought out visual to sell Luke’s silly plan to the audience.

So that tells me that the filmmakers were perfectly capable of taking moments established in previous films and building on them smartly.  They just... didn’t.

It’s like when my teacher would give me lower marks then  the rest of the class, not because my paper was worse, but because I was capable of so much more.  Yeah, it seems unfair, but fuck you.  Life isn’t fair.  You get to direct endless Star Wars movies for the rest of your life.  Try not to piss in my mouth while you do it,

Which brings me to my final example of why this movie completely fails.  Laura Dern decides to save the resistance by launching a ship into hyper space directly into the main star destroyer.

Are you serious?  Has this always been an option?  It literally destroyed the ship with the hyper space tracker.  All of the other ships could have escaped if that first bastard who went down with his ship would have done this.  Every death star could have been destroyed with a single freighter.  Holy shit, we could build a canon that shoots things at light speed and destroy everything.

If this has always been an option, it’s ridiculous that it is only thought of now.

Also, if the First order only has one ship that cant track the resistance ships, why not just everybody scatter into hyper space in every direction?  They can’t follow everybody.  if 10 ships are left, 9 get away.  there are literally dozens of different ways to get out of this situation that even the most inexperienced leader could have sussed out, other than abandoning ship to everyone’s immediate execution. 

Heroes are supposed to be great.  There are no great heroes in The Last Jedi.  

So that’s it.  Not a good movie.  Soup to nuts an utter failure.  On par with the worst of the prequels.  And once everybody has had a little time away from the film, you’ll all agree with me.  Just like you all loved the prequels for a little while, until some sober son of a bitch walked up and pointed out a few failings.  

And then the whole goddamn thing comes tumbling down.

[monkey-network]

The Fiasco Finale of Future [1/2]

So in the penultimate episode of Steven Universe 2, the climax of both the season and series as a whole... is a group hug. As I expected, plenty were not too pleased with this turnout. Some felt it was anti-climatic, some felt it was resonating, and others tried to own the critics by digging deep into the scene like they always do sucking this show’s co- Coming from nearly a month later, I’m... split. One hand, I didn’t mind the climax. On the other hand, it was pathetic compared to plenty of other finales I’ve seen in media. It’s like this show as a whole, I enjoy it, but I also enjoy smacking it upside the head cuz it made some Karen-esque, All Lives Matter type stupid shit that I just cannot get behind. So you know what, Perry the Platypus, let’s mix it up. I wanna express the good and bad of this climactic end to the show and see where we can go from there. You ready?

What’s Good:

You truly wanna know what makes that final hug a great scene? A real showstopper? I have the truth, the best truth behind this, you won’t believe me but here goes. The climax worked because A Hug Is Nice. That’s it, there’s nothing else to it beyond a hug being nice. “But Monkey, you incel troll, there’s should’ve been more to that. The episode shouldn’t have taken that long to get to that point.” Well, in typical fashion, let me put it this way by talking about Spider-Man 2 (better than Spiderverse, don’t @ me). The whole movie is centered around Peter’s life getting shat on. He’s getting fired left and right, his people are abandoning him, he even loses his powers, he’s just at his utter lowest. But at his apartment, while contemplating, in comes his landlord’s daughter, Ursula, who offers him some chocolate cake and a glass of milk.

We can say the scene comes out of nowhere and that this is all that happens, feeling pointless, but I say this is an important scene because after everything that happens to him before, this one gesture from somebody out of nowhere to be honest was one of the nicest things he’s received in a while. It’s the seedling of a scene that keeps Parker going before Doc Ock comes to make him truly spring back into action. Above everything, it was nice. Like a hug.

I don’t need to be philosophically deep with SU2′s meta to tell you that a hug can be a worthwhile thing to get more than anything. It doesn’t resolve all the baggage Steven has in his mind, but a group hug from the people closest to you (and the Diamonds) can be a gesture so nice, it can numb you out, if only for a moment. Only other times where Steven got a hug was when he felt everything could be okay. With Lars, Peridot, and Connie after her “rejection”, and it’s after that “rejection” where he slowly loses it in his attempts to shake off that harsh feeling of abandonment and that everything can be okay. It is something where he can turn to the others for help but the concern of their response makes him reasonably suffer in silence. That last part is a little dumb, but I’ll get to that later. He can’t really hug himself because it doesn’t work like that. The point being that Steven, at his lowest, just needed something nice to consider. And a hug from everyone who loves him (and the Diamonds) can be that piece of chocolate cake he needed to be at ease, again, if only for a moment.

Like let me tell ya, as a deliriously depressed man that constantly wishes for death, a hug shouldn’t be spat on. Whether it be from your friends or mommy, a good hug can, at the very least, keep you sane and going. It isn’t medication, let’s not get it twisted, but a healthy remedy nonetheless, especially if you’ve ever felt touch-starved like I have before. It’s an affectionate gesture that for what it’s worth, should never be taken for granted. And while Steven could’ve well gotten this big type hug at almost any time he desired, I can at least appreciate the show for saving that at the right time. Whew. But, while the moment itself is nice, it’s predictably almost everything around it that unfortunately puts the moment in a vacuum and me with a bad taste in my mouth.

What’s Bad: 

Let’s get this out the way, because I’m such a literal bastard... *inhale*

Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis. Penis.

MUSHROOM! MUSHROOM!

Congrats on those with the corrupted!steven theories who no doubt had it hard on when this horned trunk ascended, hung its head high, and beat its meaty chest with blind rage, the crewniverse certainly had the balls to go with this design and a long discussion of utilizing Monster Steven’s full potential. And if you think I’m nasty about this, hoo boy, be glad that words are all you’re seeing right now because artists no doubt had a field day potentially ruining this design for you even more. I’m surprised Tumblr’s flagging system hasn’t taken down whole posts with this. HEHEHEHAAAAAAAA!

As you can probably tell, I’m not a fan of this Diamond Dinodildo’s design (say that 5x times fast). I mean Rebecca could be as horny as she pleased with this show, but this is next level, I tell you. But seriously, it honestly sucked that this is what they came up with when it served no purpose to Steven thematically other than him being a literal peen of a monster. Said this before, but what does becoming a corrupted looking amalgamation mean to him beyond “he’s a monster”? Corrupted gems weren’t the worst things in his world, they were products of a even worse thing. Turning into a diamond like figure would’ve said something about the cycle of abuse making you not feel like yourself, but a reflection of who you not only resent more than anyone, but were the indirect causes of your newfound issues. That would’ve took his struggle in the Diamonds Days arc to its next logical extreme, and brought most of Future’s episodes centered around Steven’s issues to a sensible turning point. Being a warped Diamond version of himself would’ve meant finally embracing inhumanity, and that would’ve conveyed the peak of Steven harshly feeling less like a human over the course of the season, especially when we had several episodes and new powers centering around him being inhuman. And a previous episode had him try to shatter a Pink version of White Diamond, two beings generally responsible for everything that’s happened to him. And it isn’t the design that made this a turn off.

What was Steven even gonna do as a monster? He does nothing to the town, he never even makes it pass the cliffside. He doesn’t even try to attack anybody, the only times he does is when he’s provoked by either the Cluster, the Diamonds, or any of the gems. Spinel raised more hell than Steven. So on the look back it’s insultingly sad they hyped up this big dick energy only to do... genuinely nothing. He already didn’t deserve turning into Pinky the Phallisaurus, but having him not even do anything as a monster left far more to be desired. Mob Psycho 100 did this nearly identical, but better. You can’t deny that it would’ve worked better with 22 minutes, actually give him something to do beyond screech and stomp like he’s Scrat from Ice Age. As much as I don’t like Change Your Mind, 45 minutes worked to its favor to do everything it did. Oh wait, this episode did make good use of time... with a fucking pity party.

They wasted my baby

This is. The WORST scene in the entire series and I’ll stand by that 100%. It’s one thing to show something offensive, but it’s another to have something be completely pointless. Yes, Connie talked some sense into them, but we didn’t need to waste time having White Diamond and the others bitch about something everyone who isn’t a toesucking simp should’ve figured out at that point. Not like it mattered, the Diamonds and Spinel never show up after this episode anyways, so good job making them count for something, I guess. This as well as minorly acknowledge the fact that the gems had a lot to do with Steven’s mental trauma because hey, we don’t have to hold these gems too accountable for child neglect. Speaking of which, where was Jasp- This plays well into my previous point, we aren’t shown what Steven was gonna do as a monster, so what else is the episode to do beyond holding him back in time to just make the characters go “All is lost” for one second before getting back up like this is Marvel’s Captain Driftwood?

Friendship is Magic had this type of moment in its penultimate finale but in that, more time was given to show the villains getting the upper hand, Twilight at her low point, her turnaround with her friends, and the lead in charge to defeat the villains. While some moments felt convenient and downright insulting, they made the most of their limit. The same can’t be said for this and it makes no sense. Speaking of things that make no sense:

Was this shapeshifting or corruption? Rushing or dragging? This personally bothers me because people are saying he shapeshifted even when they were also on board with him corrupting. But what was the point where monster Steven cums cries into the ocean turning it pink?

Now if Steven got himself corrupted, this would make sense since the three Diamonds are there with so fully turning him back to normal wouldn’t be an issue. Questions would arise about how corruption can happen to a human, then again this is Steven Universe, fans never really wanted you to ask questions. But if this was shapeshifting, then why have this permanent monster form? It would’ve made a little more sense of Steven changing his shape depending on his emotions, like what we’ve seen before. Additionally, Steven should have been capable of talking normally instead of roaring and growling like he switched brains with an actual animal. Just because he kinned Godzilla’s joystick doesn’t mean he was unable to speak to anybody, that is if he shapeshifted. Lastly, and this is more implicit than my previous points:

This season shouldn’t have tried tacking mental issues and trauma onto this dickslap of a climax. I’m on the side where we should’ve seen more from monster Steven, but what does this tell me for the topic of mental health? Nearly killing people on three separate occasions didn’t help, but having him transform into a near mindless beast is a backhanded way to convey post traumatic stress. Let me put it this way, if we didn’t get that episode where we learn Steven had held up trauma and stress from Doctor Priyanka, everything surrounding it afterward wouldn’t feel as fucked up as it did. Yes, understanding a root of a character’s problems is good, beneficial even, but having your character nearly, sporadically, commit MURDER THREE TIMES only to then have him become a wildin’ creature does nothing, if not disgust. It's disgusting when you talk about PTS one minute and have your main character be socially dangerous the next. You’d feel sorry for him, sure, but I gotta say nearly killing people is not something we should just hand wave. That is not a good or realistic depiction of depression and post traumatic stress; especially when you trying to discuss this with children. And don’t try to justify it by saying it was necessary for his downward spiral. Having to think and see death before my own eyes in real life, there should’ve been a better way to make Steven hit rock bottom without putting other’s lives on the line. It wasn’t compelling or resonating to see him become a witless creature after saying he could get away with anything, it felt jarringly hallow and teeth gritting sadistic to think this was acceptable. It took him turning into a literal creature to finally go to therapy or a throwaway line about therapy in this show’s case? Are you kidding me?

The hug is a nice moment on its own, but it took far too many kneecaps to get to this point and think it’s believably or justly earned. I can make fun of the monster design all I want, but what they put Steven through to get to this point is the most insulting writing I ever have to think about. Because you know what that hug told me, personally? It’s that you can commit near irrefutable atrocities, you can behave like a blithering rampaging beast all you wish, but that won’t matter. Because you’re valid and your people will love you. That is not only asinine, but it kinda pissed on what I went through growing up. Like, as idealistic as that felt, it didn’t add up because it made the mentally unstable come off as more unstable than they mostly are. You can disagree all you want with this, it won’t change the baffling fact that I came to this conclusion in the first place when I didn’t want to. “But the crew said in an interv-” NO, just nope. If the message the show gives is this polarizing for those that invested or were concerned with it, maybe the message wasn’t clear enough, who knows? I can believe Mr. Rogers never fucked this up when he made his show. I tried thinking of this differently, but I can’t excuse what they did and how they did it. Bojack Horseman never pulled this with its main lead and when it truly did, that was given more time to sort out; not an 11 minute epilogue in its final moments. The hug was nice, but this episode was trash.

Speaking of which, next time...

We Finally Look to the Future

Here’s Part 2, if you’re up.