#plotdevice

[promisingthings]

melissa schemmenti going exclusive w captain robinson MAY have been ooc but i think there is still a way they can make it in character amd flesh out melissa even more bc of it!!!! if the writers make their relationship go south we can not only see that melissa acts on jealousy far more than she wants to admit / appears on the surface AND we can also make it more clear that melissa WANTS to be special to people (again tough exterior, soft interior trope would be beautiful in a character like her) we see her need to be special in her interactions with family. these people insult her constantly and every interaction we see with them she seems close to miserable safe for her small interactions with kristen marie but she stays and tries to prove herself bc she wants to be seen as superior and INTERESTING, she stopped going to her hair dresser after he called her by the wrong name, she feels a need to show people up, be better, more flashy to them as seen in s1 e2 when she mentions looking better than her cousin at dinner. theres a high chance to make her character way more fleshed out and being able to fix the previous betrayal of having her in a srs and commited relationship. i do think some of her need for uniqueness and people ... needing her is definitely opportunistic and if the writers include that too (if they go through with an idea similsr to this) i might actually pass out.

[blund3r-bust3r]

absolutely obsessed that singed of all characters took the fattest W in the end like here's dr. plotdevice mcwarcrimes chilling in the background actively making things worse for everyone through the whole show but was so committed to minding his own business he walked out completely unscathed with his daughter newly restored. king shit honestly

[kanohivolitakk]

I'd argue that only Botars replacement is really an example of this and that Botar's replacement and Dekar-Hydraxon aren't really comparable.

With Botar, he is a pre-established character whose main purpose in the narrative is to move people around the proverbial chessboard that's Bionicles narrative until he gets killed by Icarax. Thing is though, as the character whose job is to literally move the pieces around so the story can function, Botars narrative function is kinda a big deal in a story that needs characters be able to go from place to place rather fast. It honestly feels like Botars replacement was only added to the story because Greg realized that maybe killing off your personification of a taxi wasn't the smartest idea and thus needed something to replace that function in the narrative. Ergo, why not add a literal replacement to fill the void of Botars narrative function?

This doesn't really apply to Hydraxon and Dekar-Hydraxon. The real Hydraxon never served any purpose in the narrative, as he was already dead by the time the story begins. Dekar-Hydraxon is the main Hydraxon we see in the story. The narrative never replaced Hydraxon with another character, instead being a replacement is simply Hydraxon's backstory to give his character a bit more flavor and depth alongside with showing the powers the Ignika is capable of.

There's also the fact that out of the two, only Botar's a plotdevice. As I said before, Botar's main purpose in the narrative is to move characters/mcguffins/things around and that's it. He doesn't really have much of a purpose otherwise.

Meanwhile, while Hydraxon serves as a major antagonist of the Mahri Nui arc, there's a bit more going on with his character. Not just with the Dekar-Hydraxon shenanigans but also with his connection to OOMN and the Toa Mata/Nuva. There are decent stuff in his character that make him more than just his narrative purpose.

Yes, Hydraxon isn't exactly the most complex character out there. His character is relatively flat and he mainly serves as an obstacle preventing the heroes from completing their goal. Thing is though, this is true for almost every antagonist the series has. At the very least Hydraxon has an unique identity being a ward who isn't evil and just doing his job instead of having the 50th powerhungry warlord with a personality gimmick to make them standout from all the other powerhungry warlords like pretty much every other villain in the series was.

Is the Dekar-Hydraxon thing convoluted? Yeah. But it does have the benefit of making Hydraxon a bit more interesting beyond the "angry jailer who serves as a major arc exclusive antagonist" he otherwise is. If it was just normal Hydraxon with no MoL shenanigans then he'd be far more flat of a character than he is.

"o no we killed the plot device too early"

[dawnlotus1]

SPOILERS FOR CANTO 8 PART 2 :

I think Jia Qiu’s character and role in Hong Lu’s/Jia Bayou roadmap of growth is really important for Hong Lu’s relationship with The City itself.

I think him being a flesh and blood call to action is so so so good for Hong Lu, who spends all of his time as disconnected from the physical world as possible.

I feel like we may still get a distortion from Hong Lu, especially because of “the land of illusion” itself not being very covered by parts 1 and 2, but I was just very pleased that ‘another Citizen Of The City Who Is Still Actively Trying To Figure Out How To Live In It’ was the one to challenge Hong Lu to push himself out of his daze.

Of course I love Carmen as a character/concept/plotdevice, but right now she doesn’t have to figure out how to deal with actually Living In The City and what that’s like. How it feels to try to make up your mind about how you are going to rationalize your life within it, and your actions. She doesn’t have to do that anymore. Shes transcended civilian life.

So for us to see another citizen trying to work this equation out - and being a higher and wiser power that calls to Hong Lu for his inner self rather than a devil-ess like Carmen calling for his inner self I think means quite a lot.

It emphasizes the human-ness of trying to understand what the fuck is going on and not knowing what to do. If Hong Lu/Jia Bayou found his solution though letting it all go, Jia Qiu was dealt a lot of the same cards and decided to take a different approach. Now we get to see two people who must live with their consequences try to make the right decisions to change it, but like we all know in our real world, it’s hard to know what to do even if you know what’s happening right now is wrong.

Carmen lives an ideality. Jia Qiu lives in Hongyuan and The City. Getting a wake up call with a 10 ft staff forces Hong Lu to have to express his inner self out loud and to others after repressing everything to only his mind. He has to do it because his way of life is being attacked, and he must defend himself to stay around. He’s forced to start consider his opinions as well as his own commitment to them as they are voiced, because he must make an argument that would pursue someone else. I think this struggle with connecting with others is just as huge as his own struggle with connecting with himself, so anyway. This was nice to see as a confrontation.

TLDR : Jia Qiu is a citizen of The City making his demand for expressed identity from HongLu/Jia Bayou different than a chat with Carmen in his journey of self actualizing.

[9-1-1-buddie]

Tommy really played himself, thank you for your service Mr. Plotdevice.

(You could almost feel sorry for that guy, but no.)

He went after Eddie first (you can't change my mind on this matter), opportunist he is he made an ol' switcheroo once the possibility of Buck presented himself, knowing that Buck originally wanted Eddie and there being a possibility of Eddie wanting him back. He still went for Buck. Fearing the entirety of their 6 month relationship, that Eddie would come between them and ultimately ending it with Buck to save his heart and whatever dignity he had left (None, really. You brought yourself into this situation by willingly dating a guy who obviously has something going on with his best friend).

Forward a couple months, he meets Buck again, hears that Eddie 'The Competition' Diaz has left the state and Buck. He leads himself into a false sense of security, only for the reason he broke off with Buck in the first place to actually come true: Buck chooses Eddie without a second thought and verbally spits him in the face while at it.

Eddie Diaz, haunting the narrative from over 1000 km away, and he doesn't even know it.

Now my question is: Does Buck tell Eddie about this?

[lalalaugenbrot]

Hey ;-) ich bin mir nicht sicher in welchem Ausmaß das bereits besprochen wurde und ob meine Hörkbrilld einfach wie Beton auf meinen Augen sitzt, aber wie ist es möglich, dass man Heides „wenn man Etwas sehr liebt. Kommt man zurück“ nicht und ausschließlich auf Leo beziehen kann?! Ich meine ganz sachlich gesehen, was sonst könnte sie gemeint haben, die schöne Stadt, seinen Vater, sein „tolles Leben“ in Saarbrücken? Ich glaub nicht. Das einzige was ich mir mit viel Fanatasie noch vorstellen kann ist, dass Heide sich selbst meint? Das Adam aus Liebe zu ihr zurückgekommen ist? Aber ich finde, dass wird durch üs Storytelling nicht in dem Maße unterstützt? Mich würden deine Gedanken interessieren…

hey anon! also mein großer EdN-Heide-Deepdive steht ja grundsätzlich noch aus und ich drück mich ehrlich gesagt auch ein bisschen davor, weil ich mit der Szene wirklich sehr unglücklich bin und sie bezüglich Heides Charakter weder edn-intern noch folgenübergreifend in irgendeiner Weise logisch oder nachvollziehbar finde. Meiner Meinung ist Heides "Charakterentwicklung" in EdN einzig und allein ein Plotdevice, um Adam aus dem Bunker ausziehen zu lassen und seine schwelenden "Bin-ich-wie-mein-Vater?"-Sorgen nochmal neu aufflammen zu lassen bzw. auch dem letzten Zuschauer einleuchten zu lassen, nur um diese dann als Parallele dem Fall (aka Karla, die ihrer kriminellen Mutter nacheifert) an die Seite stellen zu können. Und so sehr ich es schätze, wenn die Ermittler mal nicht nicht buchstäblich in den Fall verwickelt sind, sondern der Fall stattdessen dazu genutzt wird, das Privatleben der Ermittler zu spiegeln – so war das nicht gedacht! (Wobei natürlich dank Pia-Entführung DfL weiterhin allein auf weiter Flur mit dieser Errungenschaft bleibt, und DfL macht das wirklich so so so großartig mit dem spiegeln! Da steckt so viel drin!! Warum nicht immer so?!)

Aber gut. Wenn ich die Metabrille mal absetze und für einen Moment die Heide-Adam-Szene als so geschehen aktzeptiere: dann sehe ich, dass Heides Verhalten sich in dem Moment verändert, in dem Adam vor ihrer Berührung zurückschreckt. Vorher will sie ihm eine Decke bringen, sagt, sie hätte gerne vieles anders gemacht, will ihm tröstend die Hand auf den Rücken legen. Aber Adam weicht vor ihr zurück und macht ihr Vorwürfe. Daraufhin steht Heide auf und wird plötzlich diese harte, fremde Heide, die diese schrecklichen Dinge sagt. Ich würde daraus schließen, dass Adams Zurückweisung sie verletzt und sie jetzt zum "Gegenangriff" übergeht (und das ist auch, was es so schwer nachvollziehbar für ihren Charakter macht, weil wir sie eigentlich nur defensiv und passiv kennen – außer vielleicht das eine Mal, als sie Roland ins Schlafzimmer schiebt, um Adam vor ihm zu schützen). Als Adam dann aber seine Tasche packt und sie verlassen will, bereut sie, was sie gesagt hat schon wieder. Sie ist wieder die kleine, abhängige Heide. Früher war sie es von Roland, jetzt ist sie es von Adam. Sie braucht ihn, er kann sie jetzt nicht verlassen. Genau das sagt sie ihm jetzt auch: Du kannst jetzt nicht wieder verschwinden. Aber Adam ist entschlossen zu gehen, sagt, er weiß gar nicht, warum er überhaupt wiedergekommen ist. Und dann greift sie ganz tief in die Trickkiste und appeliert an seine Gefühle zu ihr: Wenn man etwas sehr liebt, dann kommt man zurück. Und du liebst mich doch, wir lieben uns doch. Wir brauchen uns doch, ich brauche dich doch. Und klar, Adam liebt Heide. Auf irgendeine Weise, auf eine für ihn schwierige Weise, aber er liebt sie, er hat sie lieb: das sagt er ihr dann auch. Nur gehen muss er trotzdem.

Insofern: Nein, ich denke Heide meint hier ganz alleine sich selbst.

Aber: Wir, die wir diesen ganzen Film gesehen haben, wir, die wir auch alle anderen gesehen haben, wir die wir wissen, dass Adam das Tauschgesuch von Leos Kollegen sofort angenommen hat, als er es gesehen hat, wir, die wir wissen, dass er Leo vermisst hat – wir wissen, dass Heide nicht der Grund gewesen ist, warum Adam zurückgekommen ist. Wir wissen, dass Adam erst zu ihr gegangen ist, nachdem Leo es ihm gesagt hat. Womit natürlich nicht gesagt ist, dass er nicht früher oder später trotzdem zu ihr gegangen wäre und auch nicht, dass er nicht auch sie ein bisschen vermisst hat vielleicht, sie nicht lieb hat, wie gesagt. Aber seine Priorität war nicht sie. Seine Priorität war Leo.

Deswegen ist es meiner Meinung nach so: Heide bezieht den Satz auf sich, der Film bezieht ihn ganz klar auf Adam und Leo.

Ich weiß gar nicht, warum ich überhaupt zurückgekommen bin. Hard Cut auf den letzen Frame. Wenn man etwas liebt, dann kommt man zurück.

[catlady48]

The scrapped Avengers 5 script that was cowritten by Waldron was seemingly posted online and he was not done ruining Loki (at least the show version). Not sure if it's actually the real script or a hoax, but I still wanted to inform people about it, because it's bad. The entire thing is a mess. It's basically a copy of Infinity War as in the main villains (several versions of Kang) need the plotdevices to do catastrophic damage and basically everybody dies. Really, almost everybody gets killed off. He also involves almost every character that's currently alive in the MCU in this script, so they each barely get any screentime and no personality whatsoever. I haven't actually read the thing so I can't say how much time he had to ruin the characters, but it's Waldron so I'm assuming he still managed to do that somehow.

As for what he did to Loki specifically, apparently one of the Kangs drains him of his powers and presumably killed him (again). This is going to disappoint a lot of people who, despite the ways Loki as a character has been ruined by the show, still hoped that the ending would lead to them doing something cool with his new position and powers and/or would lead to him reuniting with Thor. Neither of this happens and I think even the show fans would be disappointed by them ruining the so-called "perfect ending to his character arc." Guess it was just a new way to kill him off and rub it in our faces after all. It's Infinity War all over again. He would've gotten ruined for nothing.

So glad this script got scrapped, even though I have zero faith in the Russo's considering they were the ones who thought of IW in the first place. I do think they will do somewhat better than Waldron since they can at least do action scenes. Even so, this is another warning not to get your hopes up that the MCU will not ruin Loki in some way or another in the upcoming movies.

[kanohivolitakk]

You know, I find the difference between how the fandom treats Nidhiki and how the fandom treats Tuyet rather fascinating.

Because both of them are traitorous Toa Mangai who betrayed their team (and thus the ideal of Toa) for their own selfish gains. Both are characters who can be read either sympathetically or as completely selfish and vile characters. And lastly both are mean to represent the different ways a toa can fall to the dark side by having their vices and flaws win over their virtues.

Yet despite of those similarities, I have noticed people tend to be far more sympathetic to Nidhiki than Tuyet. People tend to give Nidhiki far more sympathetic towards his circumstances, minimize his flaws and outright wish he had been redeemed. While with Tuyet is at best seen as an interesting and somewhat complex villain, or at worst as a tyrannical lunatic.

It is easy to chalk this dichotomy up to Nidhiki being canonically more sympathetic than Tuyet, but I don't think that's necessarily the case. If we go by Greg's own commentary, his intention was other way around. For Greg Nidhiki was a selfish opportunist with few sympathetic traits, while Tuyet was someone who took her noble goals too far. Greg also has stated multiple times Tuyet is not evil, but rather insane (something that has it's own can of worms but thats neither here or there)

As such, we can easily think the dichotomy is either misogynistic doublestandards of sympathizing with a male villain while demonizing a female one in spite of the latter being less heinous, or yet another case of fans disagreeing with Greg. And while either of those conclusions are understandable, I think to simplify it would be rather dismissive and disingenous. As I do tink there are a few reasons why this is at play beyond misogynistic doublestandards or fans disagreeing with Greg for the fiftieth time.

Firstly, while Nidhiki was meant to be unsympathetic and selfish, his hints of a tragic backstory™ kinda muddy that interesting. If Nidhiki was meant to be a selfish powerhungry jerk, why then tell the audience he had to survive his whole life in one of the harshest conditions in Matoran Universe. Knowing Nidhiki's upbringing in TK Peninsula, it makes his actions far more understandable and sympathetic than if we knew where he came on. Tuyet meanwhile has no backstory or mindset that explains her motivations and goals, beyond her viewing Toa as too weak-willed to protect matoran. As such, it is easy to read her as a totalitarian despot who wants to control others, than anything more.

Secondly, Nidhiki is far more likable than Tuyet in their respective backstory oneshots. Tuyet in MDOTT is largely characterized as rather curt, nononsenical and somewhat manipuative, making her hard to sympathize for the audience. Contrast this to Nidhiki in MDOTT and BOADH, who while flawed is given more likable traits. Nidhiki is shown to be witty, clever and a bit of a snarker, which make him more endearing to the audience in spite of his impulsivity and selfishness being clearly present. Paired with BOADH being largely from his POV (and thus, allowing us to see his perspective, reasonings and mentality), it just makes Nidhiki a far easier character to root for than Tuyet, who is presented as an antagonist in her story.

Lastly, Nidhiki is just a character most fans have more connection to due his importance in the overarching story. Nidhiki was an already established antagonist in a main story arc, who'se backstory was mysteriously intriguing before being later expanded on. Tuyet meanwhile is a serial exclusive character first introduced as a plotdevice corpse, who was given a backstory to explain who she was while beinng alive and later used because she presented many interestig opportunities and potential. As such, people are more likely to be interested in the character present in the main story than the one who mainly exists in supplemential material.

But yeah that's just my own two cents on this as a Nidhiki fan who likes both characters. There's also the way how Tuyet does far worse things than Nidhiki and has far steadfast morality, but I feel I have talked about those earlier so I digress.

[ineffable-suffering]

The F*cking Eccles Cakes

Forgive me for the rude swearing, but BOY, these pastries have been breaking my brain, just like so many things in S2, for weeks now.

Could they very well just be a completely random and unimportant thing/plotdevice (just like the Flaming Sword) we will never see again? Sure. Were they also extremely specifically and almost dramatically Chekov‘s-gun-ishly set up in S2E1? Yes. Which is exactly why my delusional self is frothing at the mouth over not being able to figure out what tHEIR DEAL IS-

Anyway, if someone knows, Do feel free to enlighten me. (Update: Hey, turns out someone does know, indeed! And that someone is @drconstellation who wrote this incredible meta about the theme of offerings in Season 2. And the Eccles cakes are part of it. Go read it!)

In the meantime, upon googling them, I did come across a fun little (possibly clue-y) piece of information, which is:

1793, anyone? the 1793? THE post-avoiding-being-guillotined-and-having-✨crêpes✨-for-lunch 1793? Again, might be pure coinkydinky, but it seems awfully like a hidden piece of easter egg shell to me!

[soldier-lodbrok]

Okay.

Slowly it becomes apparent the writers of that gacha game really are more out for money instead of any nice worldbuilding. I saw countless fanfics of kids with way less outdated sloppy plot"twists".

Also SE sucks in making many characters just plotdevices for others

[kimtiny]

I don't know if I am reading too much into things, but it honesty feels like that since season 3 they kind of altered Jenkins character a bit? Can't really explain it, but he is more..silly?

For as much he has a confirmed character, and not something that just changes on his plotdevice role.

I guess so? But to me it's that they focus him less on nisaac, so people feel less threatened by him? Ig

[clonehigh-takes]

Personally I don't think people talk enough about how tophers whole blackmailing thing was such a plot device. Like yeah sure he could have a repressed crush on abe but also it was the shows way of holding back Abe from Joan for just a little bit more time so something could mess it up. Clone high is supposed to be funny I guess and yeah it was honest about how it was portrayed but it came off as edgy and it was never talked about like ever they don't even mention what the blackmail was about later its such a dumb plotdevice!!!! That's not to say its out of character for topher he is terrible I like that about him and he probably does like Abe in a onesided weird way but I feel like the show could've just done something else while still showing how bad topher was?

real

[bethanydelleman]

Colonel Plotdevice wins, I ought to have known.

Sure Darcy and Elizabeth both like him, but he barely has a personality beyond kind of whiny gossip! There are so many better seconary men out there! HAVE YOU READ PERSUASION?!?!

Okay, follow up poll, same rules. You can pick income, house, and profession (10k and Pemberley if you so desire) you must marry a man, pick yourself a husband :

For these guys, imagine they are widowed or you met them before they got married if they are already paired. Or you got a clone or something. Also, feel free to adjust their age.

Persuasion has such a strong showing of secondary men. I tried to pick positive secondary characters or characters that people like generally.

[kanohivolitakk]

Had a realization that made me lose my mind (MAJOR BROTHERSHIP SPOILERS)

Man, Zokket and Cozzette are basically what Graphite and Saki could've been had Saki allowed to be more than a manpain plotdevice to Hiiro and Taiga.

no wonder I like Zokket as much as I do lol.

[kotzebue]

Playing with some rough #storyboard with my #plotdevice #storyboardnotebook #scene1 A little idea my friends @nztomlinson and @ecmattfight mulled around #storyboardart #storyboardartists #storyartist #sketchbook #brainstorm https://www.instagram.com/p/ByyOhZ5g5Rw/?igshid=jldl8fqas79b