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brucebocchi · 6 months

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Winter 2024 anime roundup, Pt. 1: Ongoing/returning shows and the trash heap

hey y'all, this is also up on my ko-fi! it's free to read both here and there, but i'm struggling financially rn so i could appreciate if you'd throw a few bucks my way if you liked it!

I wasn't expecting to watch nearly this much anime in just the past three months, but life completely failed at getting in the way. So here's everything I either watched or tried to watch for the Winter 2024 season, and a short review for each.

I'm not going to bother with trying to rank them, so instead they're sorted by category, as follows:

Continuing series from Fall 2023

Returning series

What I dropped

Mixed reactions

On hold

New series that are actually good

With this first entry, I'll be covering the first three, with the back half arriving in another couple of days. As with the 2023 rankings, the OP for each show is linked in the corresponding title.

Here we go.

Ongoing shows:

The Apothecary Diaries

Looking back at my 2023 rankings, I think my placement of The Apothecary Diaries’ first cour at #11 may have belied how much I love this show and believe it to truly be one of last year’s greats. If anything, it was hampered by its status as an ongoing show making it incomplete by nature, and I worried myself over the possibility of recency bias taking over my top ten (Frieren is in the same boat, so its top overall ranking should really highlight how damn good it is). Make no mistake, though: The Apothecary Diaries fucking rocks, and it continues to fucking rock.

It’s largely more of the same, and that’s what you would want from another cour of this show. At the same time, though, more and more is uncovered about Maomao’s background and Jinshi’s status as the proverbial camera continues to pull back and the mysteries adorning the edges of the frame become clearer. I got a sense at the end of the Fall 2023 cour that the show was moving on from its episodic nature into something more serial and plot-driven, and I was mostly right: While several episodes of the Winter cour still revolve around various mysteries of the week, they all start to converge before you even realize it. It’s the same flywheel-effect approach to plot development that Kaguya-sama did so well: While so many of the events seem like one-off curiosities in the moment, these almost-imperceptible movements eventually barrel forward into an unexpected but perfectly logical momentum. The show teases out several plot threads that may not seem relevant at first, and it trusts you to be patient enough to see them play out.

I’m not at all exaggerating when I say that, along with the next entry on this list, The Apothecary Diaries is one of the best anime of the past five years. I had a feeling that this could end up being the case as 2023 came to a close, but I’m sure of it now. Watch this show.

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Last year’s best anime continues apace into 2024 as we get an honest-to-goodness story arc: Frieren, who has been around too long to bother taking any magical governing bodies seriously, needs a certified mage in her party order to continue on the journey north. She decides to take the necessary exam to be certified as a First-Class Mage, a rarefied status in this world, and has Fern tag along to do the same in order to double their chances.

And it’s still incredible! Great action, brilliant animation, wonderful character moments, and a beautiful score. It is still the top-rated anime ever on MyAnimeList, and by a significant margin. I’m not sure I agree, necessarily, but I can say with all sincerity that this has been a perfect season of television and my Fridays now feel empty without it.

That’s all I’ve got on this one. What else do you want from me? I’ve already written nearly 2000 words about this show alone since it premiered. You’re asking me for more? I’ll kill you.

Shangri-La Frontier

If the low placement on my 2023 list was any indication, I was pretty fed up with Shangri-La Frontier by the end of its first cour, and the first couple episodes of 2024 being little more than plot set-up had me teetering on the edge of dropping it entirely. But I’ll be damned if it didn’t reel me back in once shit actually started happening and the plot really began to move forward.

Well, for a bit, at least. The height of the series so far has been the Wethermon arc, in which Sunraku teams up with his fellow shit-gamers, Pencilgon and Katzo, as they vie to be the first to take down a notoriously difficult unique boss. As the fight plays out, we get to see the feeling-out process of a tough action-RPG boss, rife with attack pattern memorization, skill timing, and buff stacking as the margin for error grows ever thinner. As always, the animation is on point, the soundtrack rules, and the action sequences are exhilarating.

But my major gripe with the series remains: There’s hardly any actual story here, even after 25 episodes. There are broad gestures towards a larger plot (“the truth of this world,” as the NPCs call it), but they are too vague to even resemble anything enticing. Everything in between the major fights is just set dressing, and there’s a lot of in between. There’s decent stuff in there, to be fair; the adorable rabbit NPCs are always a delight, and I love the commitment to depicting our top-level gamers as smug, preening shitheels. These are long walks for short drinks of water, though, and much of the main cast isn’t likable enough to make the downtime tolerable, to the point where watching the many set-up episodes feels like more of a grind than the actual grinding in the show. Even in the best fight sequences I still had moments where I found myself yelling “STOP TALKING ALREADY” at the screen. Internal monologues are a constant in battle shonen, I know, but if there’s any demographic whose internal monologues I want to hear the least, it’s gamers.

I kept watching this show despite myself, and six months later I’m still not sure how much I actually enjoy it. I haven’t seen any of the lousy VRMMO anime that people favorably compare it to, so at least it isn’t Sword Art Online. Yay, I guess? Yet here I am, still plugging away at a show I can’t strongly recommend to a lot of people. Shangri-La Frontier has turned me into a Steam reviewer.

Undead Unluck

The stakes continue to rise exponentially in one of last year’s more underrated shonen hits (or it would’ve been a hit if Disney gave a fuck about marketing the anime on its own platforms). The Union neutralizes a threat, gains a new Roundtable member, and then shit hits the fan.

The scope of this series goes into absolutely buckwild directions, and all I will say is that “Kimi no Todoke predicting the future” was not a piece of worldbuilding I would have ever expected. But at the same time, it never loses focus on the human element, which only gets more poignant as it goes on. There’s a really beautiful message in the last arc about how people can live on through the memories of others, well past their bodies dying, which hits nice and hard considering this season aired at the same time as Frieren.

This is a show that I tended to watch sporadically (because I just plain forget to open Hulu just to watch one show every week), and I would say that it was the ideal way to watch it, except the pacing issues from the first cour only got worse during a monumentally consequential sequence in the middle of the second. There was an episode that had, I shit you not, 90 seconds of new content in the first seven minutes of runtime, and at the exact point in the series where you’re salivating for something, anything new. In a season where so much goes on in just 24 episodes, I’m baffled that they felt the need to pad the runtime so much.

That’s the worst of it, though, and the momentum fortunately builds up from there and barrels downhill until the end. The story becomes incredibly meta, which was a very ballsy move for a Shonen Jump series that was still relatively early into its run. The gamble pays off, though, and the debut season ends on several incredibly strong episodes, and now I want more. I’ll be hopping on the manga soon.

It also struck me towards the end of the season just how goddamn cute everyone looks. For all of the spraying blood and grim marching towards Armageddon, it says a lot that I still wanna pinch everyone’s fat little cheeks.

Returning shows:

The Dangers in My Heart, season 2

The first season was absent in my 2023 rankings but I decided to pick it up while the second was still airing, and I’m so glad I did: The Dangers in My Heart is an almost-too-precious middle school romance that is endlessly endearing and bluntly honest (if a little exploitative) about what middle schoolers are actually like, warts and all. Insecurities are amplified, they struggle to figure out their identities, and mental and physical development run on different schedules from one kid to the next. And amidst all this raging hormonal nonsense, we have ourselves a lovely little romance story.

Kyotaro has (mostly) kicked his chuuni tendencies and realized that he’s madly in love with the beautiful, cheery Anna. He’s as aware as anyone of what a mismatched couple they’d be, though, and continues to self-sabotage any progress in the name of maintaining her good social standing. To pile onto his loner’s perspective of middle school politics, Kyotaro also gets a front-row seat to Anna’s part-time work as a model-slash-actress and he wonders if an underdeveloped shrimp like him should be seen anywhere near someone so obviously more mature. At the same time, though, he’s a growing boy, and we see lovely moments of progress as Kyotaro takes initiative both for her sake and to achieve what he wants. To both ameliorate and complicate these situations, Anna reciprocates his feelings towards her, and we creep ever closer towards what we want to see, in increasingly awkward and precious fashion.

So much of this anime is just gorgeous. Even setting aside the visuals and music (which are on point at all times), there are really lovely themes in here about insecurity, teenage perceptions of maturity, and self acceptance. On top of all of that, though, this is just a delightful slice-of-life romance story. You can probably guess where we’ve ended up by the end of the second season, but it’s the getting there that makes it all worth it. The manga is still running (and I plan to pick it up), so there’s clearly plenty more of the story to tell, but if this is where the anime ends, it ended perfectly.

Holy shit, though, did the first season really air at the same time as Skip and Loafer and Insomniacs After School? Dentists must have made a mint that season because every single one of these shows is so unrelentingly sweet that my teeth start to itch. Not that I’m complaining.

Mashle: Magic and Muscles, season 2

I honestly think I might’ve been too hard on Mashle in my 2023 rankings. I gave up on it a few episodes in when it’d initially aired, but I eventually came back to finish out the season and ended up having a pretty good time. I’ll cop to having forgotten that latter part when I mapped out those rankings, but that enjoyment quickly came back to me when I picked up season 2... even if the season begins with a ton of table setting.

Plenty of battle shonen take time to find their voice, both in manga and anime, and Mashle really seemed to hit its stride fairly quickly into the second season. Mash Burnedead’s lack of magical quality is no longer a secret, and now magical society has to find a way to deal with it, so the series’ initial stakes are raised and Mash HAS to become a top-level sorcerer lest he lose his life. Also, the bad guys are back. Unfortunately, just as I started to genuinely appreciate the ensemble cast, most of Mash’s friends took a backseat to the larger plot (Lemon is nowhere to be seen almost all season) as the villains raise the stakes with increasingly JoJo-esque magic abilities. There’s still plenty to like, though, and some of the new characters help. Props for having an openly nonbinary character play a major role.

The music is a real highlight here; a surprising amount of hip-hop paints the backdrops during dialogue, and any show with an OP by Creepy Nuts will immediately grab my attention. "Bling-Bang-Bang-Born" actually turned into a bona fide hit single, much like Oshi no Ko's "Idol" and Jujutsu Kaisen's "SPECIALZ," and I'd say it's well earned (seriously, it fucks, please click the link above). The animation has also started to really pick up where it felt like it kept falling short in the first season as well, and I found myself looking forward to action sequences more as the season went on.

And hey, it might’ve taken 21 episodes to get there, but I finally laughed at a cream puff gag!

Urusei Yatsura (2022), season 2

I really don’t have much to say other than it’s more Urusei Yatsura, and that’s just swell. We continue the modern adaptation of the classic gag manga as the OG anime babe and her piece-of-shit “darling” get caught up in yet more bizarre hijinks. Despite the 48-episode run being touted as an “Urusei Yatsura all-stars” cherry-pick from Rumiko Takahashi’s 34-volume opus, not all of the segments hit on the same level, but the stories that last entire or even multiple episodes have been killer. Lum and Ataru, despite their myriad flaws, genuinely do care for one another, and this series is at its best when those feelings get to shine through. Takahashi remains a legend for her expert balancing of comedy and heart, and while this particular adaptation doesn’t have the built-in benefit of 300+ chapters of familiarity, those moments still feel earned.

It’s Urusei Yatsura. It’s a classic for a reason. Watch it.

Dropped:

Gushing Over Magical Girls (dropped after one episode)

For the TL;DR version, consult the image above.

All I’d heard about this show going in was that the manga it’s based on was good and that there would be boobs. I wish I’d known more than that before watching, though, because if I’d known that said boobs would belong to middle schoolers, I wouldn’t have bothered with even the one episode I did end up watching.

I was drawn in by the initial premise, too: The protagonist, the conspicuously-named Utena (who looks enough like Bernadetta from Fire Emblem that I was immediately endeared to her), is an enormous fan of the magical girls who keep her city safe, so when an adorable maho shoujo mascot approaches her with an offer, she immediately takes him up on it. As her sinister-looking (and unnecessarily revealing) costume suggests, though, Utena doesn’t get to live out her magical girl dreams; she actually got roped into—and blackmailed into keeping—a role as a villainess. The magical girl team she idolizes quickly finds her, and to stave off their assault, Utena is forced to summon a monster to bind them. As they continue to struggle and squeal, Utena goes further with it by ripping their clothes and spanking their bare bottoms red, because it turns out that she’s actually into this stuff, sexually. The title, it turns out, is a double entendre.

Credit where it’s due for a clever concept: On paper, this is really goddamn funny! My issue is with the execution: I don’t really care to see someone’s sexual awakening if it involves repeated violations of consent, and much less so if I have to see nudity of ostensible middle schoolers (Japanese middle schools are the equivalent of seventh through ninth grade, meaning these girls are 15 at most). After 100 Girlfriends, I thought I could handle whatever trashy bullshit any anime could throw my way, but the longer I chewed on Gushing’s premiere, the worse it sat with me. I have no intentions of playing morality police here, but I can’t bring myself to watch any more of this than I already have.

Early teenage sexuality is a very difficult subject matter to handle delicately, especially in a comedy milieu, and I can levy plenty of criticisms on that matter towards series I otherwise enjoyed, like Call of the Night and the aforementioned Dangers in My Heart. And although there appear to be some coming-of-age elements here, Gushing doesn’t seem interested in handling it without being exploitative. Maybe it gets better, but I don’t plan to find out for myself.

I just feel like it’s a shame that in a season with some actual halfway decent LGBT representation, the breakout yuri hit is about middle schoolers performing dubiously-consensual BDSM on each other. And maybe that speaks to something for some sapphic viewers, and I have no intention of speaking over them, but I do know that this isn’t for me. I would’ve gone fucking feral over this show when I was like 13, but I haven’t been a 13-year-old boy for a long, long time.

I may not have a leg to stand on here as someone who watches Mushoku Tensei (and frankly, that one’s on strike two with me), but I have to put my foot down somewhere. For me, that “somewhere” is borderline pornography involving 13-15 year olds. I try to meet media where it is, even the squicky stuff, but I cannot put myself at the level Gushing Over Magical Girls sets for itself.

Sasaki and Peeps (dropped after eight episodes)

This show is frustrating to even process postmortem. After a mildly intriguing hour-long premiere that introduced a whole lot of concurrent concepts, Sasaki and Peeps somehow managed to not only continue heaping new ideas onto the pile, but also fumble every single one of them in a way that wasn’t even entertaining to watch.

Sasaki, a lonely 40-something salaryman of modest means, decides that instead of living vicariously through adorable animal photos on social media, he should pull the trigger and get a pet of his own. He settles on a reasonably-priced and suitably adorable fat little Java sparrow, who as it turns out speaks human language and is actually named Piercarlo the Starsage (Sasaki settles on calling him Pii-chan, or Peeps in English). The bird was reincarnated from another world, where he is able to take Sasaki at will, and the man realizes he can use the other world’s relative dearth of technology to his advantage and sets up an interdimensional trade full time so he can make coin on his own watch and help Peeps try the delicious beef he heard is the best food in Sasaki’s world. To the latter end, he also invests in a restaurant. Peeps also helps teach him magic, which Sasaki is forced to use in a pinch in the real world. He is quickly found out and gets roped into a secret government bureau of psychics, because the agent who caught him using ice magic decides he’d be a perfect complement to her water powers (think Kanne and Lawine from Frieren, but stupider). Sasaki now has to balance these multiple lives, which hardly ever interact with one another, as the stakes rise in Peeps’ world in the form of palace intrigue and in Sasaki’s world in the form of a growing threat of evil psychics or something. Also, there’s magical girls, because why the fuck not at this point.

If you actually managed to process all that and went “wow, that’s a lot, I wonder how they can tie all that together,” it brings me no pleasure to report that Sasaki and Peeps completely fails at that task. This is a work of fiction with entirely too many ideas, to the point where it feels like it has no ideas. There’s a saying in football that a team with two quarterbacks is a team with no quarterback, and Sasaki and Peeps has, like, six on its depth chart. You ever hear a band that managed to cram multiple genres in the same song and you get whiplash every time it switches up? Those are bands with a lot of influences, but no identity or vision to call their own, and that is Sasaki and Peeps to me: It is the Twenty One Pilots of anime. A lot of shit got thrown at the wall, and none of it stuck: This show, conceptually, is shit-stained drywall with a pile of turds adorning the moulding.

For a show about a 40-year-old man, it gave me serious pause that there was not a single named adult woman in any of the episodes I watched, and I grew even more frustrated waiting for one to show up. Sasaki’s partner, Hoshizaki, seems to be a driven, professional young woman, but it turns out she’s a 16 year old high school student, for some reason. The daughter of the viscount doing business with Sasaki is a young girl who likes to tag along with him, and Sasaki’s neighbor is a latchkey high school girl who may or may not have a yandere-ish fixation on him. The magical girl we meet is also definitely a kid. The female psychics they face off against don’t appear to be older than teenagers, though the one who appears to grow fond of him turns out to be several hundred years old, which especially gave me pause because we all know that unfortunate trope and the type of person who hides behind it. Before progressing any further, I found out that the light novel series upon which this show is based was written by someone with the pen name “Buncololi,” which told me the rest of what I needed to know.

That part made me increasingly uncomfortable, and I became less and less convinced that this show was capable of sticking the landing as it continued to pile on new, contrived ideas. This was a waste of an excellent voice cast, but more than that, a waste of time.

Tales of Wedding Rings (dropped after nine episodes)

I can’t believe how much goddamn isekai I ended up watching this season. That Tales of Wedding Rings wasn’t the worst one (see above) was a minor miracle, because boy howdy was this one a dud.

Satou is just a normal high school boy, blah blah blah, his childhood friend he’s in love with is actually a princess from another world and she has to go back to fulfill a political marriage, he follows her into the portal to pull a Benjamin Braddock. But then, gasp, the palace is under attack, so the princess (her native name is Krystal, but growing up in Japan she was known as Hime, which means… princess) instead decides to marry Satou, bestowing upon him her kingdom’s ring, which gives him powers that he uses to fight back the demons. It turns out that her ring enables him to use one elemental affinity out of five, so of course now Satou has to collect the rings held by the other four kingdoms in order to become the Ring King and save the world, and to do so he has to also marry each corresponding princess.

This is basically Tolkien’s Rings of Power but as a harem isekai with bonus nudity. What I saw of the season was basically a MacGuffin hunt that had waifus of various fantasy races attached. Fine character designs for each, to be fair, but it wasn’t enough to keep me interested. It’s funny on paper that (to paraphrase Geoff Thew) our protagonist’s power level scales with the size of his harem, but Tales didn’t do enough to make me actually care what was happening. And I wanted to! There were elf titties and I didn’t care. That’s criminal.

What makes Tales especially difficult to watch is that this show is fuck ugly. The color palette is muddy and unappealing, everyone looks uncannily shiny, and there’s a smudgy Vaseline filter over everything. The action sequences are uninspiring, the animation is lousy, and every character looks terribly off-model unless they’re naked. Watch the OP I linked if you don't believe me; that's the best of it. The aural element isn’t much better; ecchi scenes are punctuated by a Cinemax-caliber smooth jazz score that I pray was chosen ironically, and most of the show’s humor consists of “an old guy is screeching.” And if you’re wasting Shigeru Chiba’s talents on that one lousy joke, you’ve fucked up catastrophically.

What completely pushed me out of wanting to see any more of this show, though, was how hard it doubled down on the worst elements of harem anime by having Protag-kun be a wishy-washy little ninny even though he’s openly declared his love for and is literally married to Hime/Krystal. And I wanted to care about her; the narrative made me want to care about her, and her jealousy of the other princesses is warranted, but alas, the harem demands bodies. To his credit, Satou recognizes her mixed emotions and makes extra time for her to make it clear that she’s forever number one in his heart, but every single time their shared romance and emotions actually push them towards consummating their (all caps for emphasis) MARRIAGE, the show goes Rent-a-Girlfriend on us and finds a cheap excuse to ruin the moment. No thanks, I’m out. Nothing else about this show is good enough to make me wade through that shit.

Honestly, the only thing that had me coming back after my Persona 3-induced hiatus was that I wanted to see the dragon girl, and that alone was almost worth it, but there really isn’t much of a draw otherwise. There were better isekai, better romances, better fantasy settings, and even better uncensored harem shenanigans this season. I might pick this back up as the second season approaches, but I’m not in any hurry.

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immaturityofthomasastruc · 1 year

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IOTA Reviews: Migration

You know, for a while, I thought Luka was one of the smartest characters in the show, and the fact that he's hightailing it out of Paris in this episode only continues to prove my point.

Let's get into the thirteenth episode of Miraculous Ladybug's fifth season: Migration

We start off with Marinette running over to the Liberty (with her friends laughing behind her back like the supportive people they are) and tries to talk with Luka about her relationship with Adrien once they're in private. Luka is pretty supportive, and it's a nice scene. Marinette then bumps into Adrien, who also wants to talk with Luka, and while the two try to get unstuck, we get a nice visual of Luka seeing the two as Ladybug and Cat Noir, which is there to remind the audience that he's known who both of them are ever since “Wishmaker”.

Adrien then talks to Luka about how he's worried something is keeping Marinette from being honest about her feelings. Luka gives him some advice on how just because he doesn't know everything about Marinette, it doesn't make her feelings for him less valid, and vice versa.

After Adrien leaves, we get an appearance from everyone's favorite deadbeat dad, Jagged Stone. He asks Luka how he can be a better father like he didn't miss years of child support, but all Luka really says is that he needs to spend time with his damn family. Of course, what I like about this scene is that it avoids the usual narrative pitfall of trying to say that Jagged and Anarka, Luka's mom, should get back together, and instead shows Jagged developing feelings for his agent, Penny.

Speaking of, after Jagged leaves, Penny comes in to come to Luka for advice. Okay, is Luka just the Dr. Phil of this show's universe? Penny talks to Luka about her sudden feelings for Jagged Stone.

Penny: No, I don't know why I'm in love with your father. He's disorganized, childish, selfish, and musically speaking, he's no David Bowie. Truth be told, your dad's a walking disaster. So why do I love him?

Luka: Does he make you happy, Penny?

Penny: Yeah. I just can't figure out why!

It's almost like this show will randomly pair people up at the drop of a hat. But hey, at least Luka hasn't asked if Kagami is single yet.

Before Penny leaves, Bob Roth, Jagged's producer, demands to know where he is, as he needs to record a new album. Bob learns that Jagged had children with Anarka (ignoring the potential scandal it could create), so Anarka promptly throws him out of the boat in a scene that I'm pretty sure is meant to be a reference to that one running gag from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

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Either way, Jazz's scream was funnier.

Kitty Section then practices their latest song about how you don't have to be rich, because even the songs in this show aren't exactly subtle with their messages. Bob somehow gets back on the Liberty completely dry, and offers the band a contract.

Bob: How would you like to sign a contract with me?

Luka: Actually, Bob, you already offered to sign us... Marinette: And you never followed up. Did you forget?

Bob: Huh? Uh... of course! I remember! I was just waiting for the right reason—uh, I mean, the right time! I was waiting for the right time to have you guys sign the contract!

My God, even the characters in this show want to forget it used to have good episodes.

Anarka throws Bob off again, where she and Luka talk about how everyone deserves a second chance and that change is possible.

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Yeah, funny how that message almost never came up with Chloe, Lila, and Felix last season, isn't it? And given that they're going to use Bob as an example of this lesson, I don't think it's going to be a positive one. So right after Luka generously decided to give Bob a second chance, Bob offers them a new contract to sign... and as soon as he does, he screws them all over thanks to a lot of fine print they didn't stop to read.

Ivan: He can fire us whenever he wants?

Bob: Yep, and I just did, by the way.

Rose: The name Kitty Section belongs to him?!

Bob: Yep. It’s ugly, but it’s mine. Marinette: He owns everything you’ve made and will make over the next thousand years!? Bob: Gotta cover all bases.

Zoe: Marinette's costumes, the music video Nino shot, the website Mylene runs...

Bob: All mine!

Adrien: And you can’t even start another band together?

Bob: Course not, that’d be unfair competition! EVERYTHING belongs to me! Everything you are, everything you say, everything that’s in your hearts belongs to me!

See, kids? This is why you should never trust bad people. It doesn't matter if they say they want to improve. They just want to trick you and ruin your life, so if you're ever wronged by anyone, that person is never able to redeem themselves, especially if they're rich. As we all know, rich people are far worse than insane supervillains who want to rewrite reality. Just ask the biggest monster in the show, Chloe Bourgeois.

So yeah, Luka's optimism being taken advantage of is enough to attract the attention of Monarch, who attempts to akumatize him into Silencer again. Monarch realizes that Luka knows Ladybug and Cat Noir's identities (why he didn't think to look into it, given Viperion's powers, is left unanswered), and angrily smashes his guitar to free himself of Monarch's influence.

So not only did he stop himself from getting akumatized, he's also one step closer to becoming a true rock star.

Somehow, Bob thinks only keeping Luka on board would mean he wouldn't hate him, but Luka isn't buying it. Bob is shocked that Luka wouldn't want to work for an asshole like him as Luka tears the contract in half, but Bob has backups. Monarch decides to settle on Bob instead, akumatizing him into Gold Record.

Gold Record's design is... okay. It's still better than Sole Destroyer, and it's definitely better than Moolak. The gold coloring looks nice, and the euro symbol on the record is a nice visual. His powers are pretty much just a combination of Pixelator, the Collector, and Truth's powers, transforming people into records who sing their true feelings while using the Horse Miraculous' Voyage to throw the records into space. Nothing too original there, but it's a good metaphor for sleazy music producers, and it works for this story.

Rose and Anarka are the first of Gold Record's victims, and in a hurry, Luka lets Adrien know he knows he's Cat Noir, giving him a place to hide. Just as Juleka is hit by Gold Record, Ladybug and Cat Noir arrive on the scene. While Cat Noir holds off Gold Record, Ladybug tries to come up with a plan.

Ladybug summons her Lucky Charm, getting a knitting needle. She realizes her plan will need to involve using Luka as bait. Luka is forced to reveal that he knows who Ladybug and Cat Noir are, and what will happen if Gold Record gets him, setting up a tough choice that will force Ladybug to rethink her plan... and then the next scene happens, where Luka lets himself get hit, where Ladybug manages send Gold Record's record flying with a makeshift bow and arrow created from the knitting needle and a nearby fiddle, which Cat Noir immediately Cataclysms.

Ladybug de-evilizes the Akuma, uses Miraculous Ladybug to fix the damage, and gives Bob Roth a Magical Charm that even he knows is useless at this point. Ladybug and Cat Noir decide to call it a day and let Anarka throw Bob Roth out again.

Luka reveals that he knows Ladybug and Cat Noir's identities (because once again, sharing that information with your friends is totally fine for some reason), and that he can't stay in Paris. After revealing that he had Fang eat all of Bob's contracts so Luka isn't bound by them anymore, Jagged offers to take Luka around the world to finally make up for years of absence while Luka makes Juleka the new leader of Kitty Section. And so the episode ends with the Couffaine family sharing a hug while Luka gives one last look to his friends Marinette and Adrien.

This episode was just average, all things considered. The plot and the lesson it was setting out to teach, while not terrible, felt a little tacked on. It was if the writers were trying to acknowledge the stuff that happened with Chloe and wanted to show an example of redemption arc done right in the case of Jagged. It falls flat because once again, more focus is given to showing how easy it is to be screwed over trusting someone than showing the benefits to trusting someone, especially since Bob is already an outlandish villain we already have a lot of reasons to hate.

I'm also mixed on the handling of Luka here. While I'm glad Marinette isn't being forced to learn a lesson here, I don't get why Luka had to be the one to be taken advantage of. He's already aware of how easy it is for Monarch to learn his secrets, so it feels weird that he lets himself and his friends get taken advantage of so easily. Outside of the scene with Ladybug's Lucky Charm, I don't get why he needed to tell the others the stuff he knew. I can sort of see why he'd tell Adrien, but why would he think telling his friends he knows who Ladybug and Cat Noir are wouldn't endanger them too?

Speaking of that, despite being established for almost an entire season, we really don't see enough of Marinette and Adrien reacting to Luka revealing that he knows who they are. Marinette only gets a few lines, and Adrien doesn't even get to say anything. While I am glad that Marinette and Adrien aren't dominating the plot for once, it feels weird that we don't get to see their reactions to something so shocking, especially with how often the identity rule has been enforced.

On the other hand, the writing is still handled a lot better than usual. I like how Monarch chooses to change his strategy to focus on Luka halfway through the episode, and the idea of the risk using Luka for Ladybug's plan brings is an interesting one, even if they don't really go anywhere with it. The running gag with Bob constantly getting thrown off the Liberty is a funny one, and it proves you can actually write slapstick that doesn't involve humiliating Marinette. Who knew?

As a whole, while I think this is the best episode of the season so far, this episode still has its fair share of problems.

THE BIGGEST IDIOT OF THE EPISODE IS... LUKA

Not counting the time Marinette got the award in my review of the Shanghai Special, we have the first character this season to get the Biggest Idiot Award twice. For someone who is usually smarter than the other characters, Luka made quite a few bad choices this episode. He decided to trust Bob Roth after he screwed him and his friends over in “Silencer”, he didn't think to read the contract he was offered, and after being endangered by what Monarch knows now, he decided to tell his friends and family that he knows who Ladybug and Cat Noir are, potentially putting them all in danger too. Yeah, the next few episodes will probably just ignore it, but there's always a chance Monarch could try another Optigami, even if he doesn't have the Peacock Miraculous anymore.

And with that, I'm officially done with the first half of Season 5. What do I think of it? Well, I think Immortan Joe said it best:

youtube

Yeah, this season was pretty boring, all things considered. To be perfectly honest, I struggled here more than I did last season because I wasn't sure what to say about half of the episodes I watched. There was almost nothing of substance these past thirteen episodes, and I could barely say anything other than “this episode is okay” or “this episode is bad”. Whenever I had ideas, they were usually extensions to things I've already talked about, like the Marinette angst, the historical and cultural inaccuracies, and the villains genuinely being incompetent. If you showed someone a few episodes of Season 1 and this season, outside of Monarch's new appearance, it'd be pretty hard for them to tell the difference.

But hey, maybe things will pick up in the second half of the season. Hell, maybe the next episode will be even better than this one, and... huh. Does anyone else hear an ominous whistling in the background?

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anotheruserwithnoname · 1 year

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Star Trek SNW finally settles decades-old canon issues (spoiler commentary for S02E03)

(Image credit: Startrek.com)

I say spoiler right in the headline, and I mean it. Read no further if you have yet to see Star Trek: Strange New World’s latest episode, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. (The image above is a publicity image and is also in the trailer, so it’s not really a spoiler.)

The TL;DR is: one single line of dialogue fixed nearly 30 years of canon issues. I am not exaggerating. More under the break. And this will be a long one:

To “cross the streams” a moment, it is undeniable canon (not shipping wishful thinking) that not only did the Eleventh Doctor in Doctor Who have feelings for Clara Oswald, he even considered her not his companion, but his girlfriend. That was made undeniable canon in a couple lines in “Deep Breath” when the Twelfth Doctor said “Clara, I’m not your boyfriend,” Clara replied, “I never thought you were.” and Twelve said “I never said it was your mistake.” That was in stark fact. One line of canon dialogue confirmed what many speculated and the show hinted at. This is separate from what came after, any retcons later writers did, and all that.

Well, one line of dialogue from a guest character in last night’s episode of Strange New Worlds put into canon something I and many others have felt not only about SNW, but the current breed of Trek shows and indeed there were signs of this going back to both Star Trek DS9 and Star Trek Voyager in the 1990s.

The Romulan time agent, Sera, played by Adelaide Kane who some may remember from playing Mary Queen of Scots in Reign, states that the Eugenics war involving Khan was supposed to happen in 1992, but was delayed 30 years due to temporal wars and other interference from the future. (To be precise she’s likely referring to Khan’s birth since he was in his 30s or 40s by the 1990s, the time TOS established the Eugenics Wars took place; here he’s a kid - possibly even a Canadian kid! The war itself is still some years away.)

That explains a lot. Why since DS9 the Eugenics Wars were redated to the mid-21st century. Why SNW’s pilot episode last year confirmed the Eugenics Wars were part of WW3, not a separate conflict. Why the Voyager episode where they go back to Earth on 1996 featured no mention of the Eugenics Wars. Why Kirk and everyone else already knows the name Noonien-Singh (even if La’an hadn’t introduced herself by name to “Prime” Kirk at the end, he would have seen her testimony about being Khan’s descendant at Una’s trial. There is no way in this timeline that Kirk, Spock or anyone else would not recognize Khan’s name instantly when the events of Space Seed happen. Heck, even the fact the SNW Enterprise doesn’t match up with the 1960s designs that were also featured in TNG, DS9 and Star Trek: Enterprise. Or even stuff like people like Uhura knowing who T’Pring was years before they were supposedly first introduced to her in “Amok Time”. It even gives wiggle room for the fact this time-travel episode actually breaks canon with the time-travel-based episodes of Picard Season 2! (Laris would have known about Sera and stopped her, right? Sean at TrekCulture had a gripe about this in his Youtube review)

Sera basically admitted that because of people farting around with time and the temporal wars (recall that it was strongly implied in Enterprise that the Romulans were involved if not responsible for that) that the timeline has been changed.

It can’t be denied anymore and it’s such a liberating thing. Now, SNW is free to truly tell reimagined stories (like the retelling of Balance of Terror last season, albeit that was another alternate timeline), to make T’Pring a vital character and build her, to accelerate the Spock-Chapel romance that was only hinted at in TOS. To truly let Paul Wesley develop his own version of Kirk, not to mention Ethan Peck’s Spock and whoever next plays McCoy (you know they will bring him in eventually and if SNW avoids the fate of Prodigy and lasts a few years, they’re going to have to start getting lined up for a new TOS-era series). Hell, the door is now open for Kirk and La’an to establish a “prime-era” romance - imagine a retelling of Space Seed with La’an in the picture (or at least Kirk remembering her).

This will be a hot take for some. But my rebuttal comes from Doctor Who: “Time can be rewritten.” Finally, nearly 30 years after what was thought to be an erroneous dating of the Eugenics Wars in a throwaway line in an episode of DS9 (I believe the producers even said it was a goof back then), and 22 years of people griping about how the prequel series were not lining up with what came before, either esthetically or storyline-wise (Enterprise, Discovery, SNW, and Picard S2 to a degree), we have a firm, canonical explanation. People will still gripe about politics, general quality, casting, whatever, of shows - that’s a separate argument - but at least in terms of canon, this has changed everything. In a good way.

I only wish they hadn’t killed off Sera. I got very strong Sela vibes from her (Sela/Sera? Coincidence?) and I would have liked to see her become a recurring nemesis. Then again, as I just said, time can be rewritten.

#star trek: strange new worlds #tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow #star trek: strange new worlds spoilers

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richincolor · 21 days

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Book Review: The Blonde Dies First

Title: The Blonde Dies First

Author: Joelle Wellington

Genres: Thriller/Horror

Pages: 336

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers

Review Copy: ARC by publisher

Availability: Available now

Summary: A group of friends fight to choose their own fates in this trope-savvy, self-referential young adult thriller from the acclaimed author of Their Vicious Games , about a demonic force that acts according to horror movie rules in the spirit of the Scream movies.

Devon is always being left behind by her genius twin sister, Drew. At this point, it’s a fact of life. But Devon has one last plan before Drew leaves for college a whole year early—The Best Summer Ever. After committing to the bit a little too much, the twins and their chaotic circle of friends learn why you don’t ever mess with a Ouija board if you want to actually survive the Best Summer Ever, and soon find themselves being hunted down by…a demon?

But while there’s no mistaking the creeping, venomous figure is not from around here, their method doesn’t feel very demonic at all. In fact, it’s downright human—going after them in typical slasher movie kill order. And that means Devon, the blonde, is up first and her decade-long crush, Yaya, is the Final Girl who must kill or be killed to end the cycle.

Devon has never liked playing by anyone else’s rules though, not even a demon’s, and the longer this goes on, the more she feels Drew and Yaya slipping away from her even as she tries to help them all survive. Can they use their horror movie knowledge to flip the script and become the hunters instead of the hunted? Or will their best summer ever be their last?

Review: If you read Joelle Wellington’s first book, Their Vicious Games, you know that she can do thriller extremely well. Now with her sophomore novel, she cranks up the thriller aspect, throws in some supernatural horror and takes the reader on an even more intense journey. Once the action of the story gets moving, it is fast-paced all the way to the end. Amidst all of this action is a story that focuses on friendship and sisterhood.

Even though she feels betrayed by her twin sister who graduated high school early, Devon tries to make amends by creating a list of things to do before her sister leaves for college. The problem - they don’t really have much in common anymore so Devon makes a list based on the activities they used to do. It all falls apart after they play with a Ouija board at a party and now their friends are being hunted by a demon. Luckily the demon doesn’t seem to be too particular about its kills, so if it can’t have one of the friend’s group, it will take someone near them that “somewhat” fits the bill. This is where the novel gave me the giggles because the group of friends realize they are playing out the plot of a horror novel so they develop a plan to defeat the demon. Like all plans this one falls apart, which as an avid reader I knew was going to happen because I was only about a third of the way of the book but what I loved was how all of it played out, especially because it came through a very cool plot twist. And if you’ve read any of my reviews before you know I love a plot twist that I didn’t see coming.

While the thriller of the story was fun, the heart of the novel is the relationship between Devon and Drew. At the beginning of the novel, while Devon is trying to make amends with her sister, the relationship between the two is antagonistic. Devon feels like she doesn’t know her sister anymore since they attend separate schools and is a bit insecure about herself due to being compared to her sister. It is a complicated dynamic and one that many of us could relate to - anyone with sisters would. The horror plot they find themselves in brings them together in a way they haven’t been in a while and through the events they learn more about each other and an appreciation for each other. While the novel is told through Devon’s POV, Drew is such a strong character that she almost feels like a protagonist as well. Both grow through the novel as they learn to open up and trust each other.

The Blonde Dies First is a fun ride of a book and because you get so drawn into the story, it’s a fast read. With school starting and all the stresses that come with it, Wellington’s newest book is a perfect book when you need a break.

#book review #young adult books #weneeddiversebooks #thriller

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racefortheironthrone · 1 year

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Why is that every Mayor of NYC, regardless of party, becomes some variety of a--hole? Are there examples of non-a--hole NYC mayors?

This seems a bit facile to me, and overlooks the nuances of a lot of NYC history. So let's look through the last fifty years of mayors and see whether it's actually true that they all become an asshole.

John Lindsay (1966-1973):

Like a lot of mayors in this period, Lindsay's main problem was NYC's long-term economic and demographic decline and the knock-on effects on the city's finances and resulting conflicts over public spending. To give him credit, while Lindsay did start the process of borrowing from Peter (the capital budget) to pay Paul (current expenses) and taking on debt to cover the hole in the capital budget, he also tried to deal with the problem by lobbying the state legislature to let him raise taxes and thus increase revenues.

That being said, the hate that Lindsay got as mayor, and he got a lot, didn't come from balanced-budget advocates. It came from white people in the outer boroughs who hated the fact that Lindsay tried to desegregate the city by pushing scatter-site public housing, that he backed a civilian complaint review board, and was otherwise viewed as being too sympathetic to black people, Latinos, and hippies.

Verdict: not an asshole. Fuck the haters.

Abe Beame (1974-1977):

The first (observant) Jewish mayor of NYC, Beame was a man tortured by the contradictions between his desire to maintain NYC's social democratic traditions and the awful economic situation he inherited. Beame became mayor during the 1973-1975 recession, which was at the time the worst since the Great Depression, and pretty much immediately had to deal with the NYC Fiscal Crisis, and was also mayor during the 1977 Blackout because clearly the Fates just fucking hated this guy.

If Lindsay was hated by white people for being too friendly with black people, Beame brought white people and black people together in their hatred of him for his public sector layoffs, his wage freezes, and his cuts to public spending. And while it's true that Beame absolutey adopted the logic of austerity and should be criticized for that, it should also be remembered that he was dealing with a well-organized and highly politicized capital strike that was backed up at the Federal level by the Ford Administration.

Verdict: kind of an asshole, but largely because he got mugged by Wall Street and the White House.

Ed Koch (1978-1989):

I think Ed Koch is the first person so far on this list that I'd call a genuine asshole (albeit a popular asshole for much of his career, hence his three terms). Starting with the fact that he got his start as a crusading left-wing politician in the Village and then abandoned his principles to run as a "law and order" candidate in the 1977 mayoral election, Koch had a long track record of running to the right whenever it benefited him personally, no matter who it hurt.

So what's on Koch's list? Well, we've got more budgetary austerity for working people while hiring thousands of more cops, starting the process of handing over the city to the developers, his opportunistic support for the death penalty, the massive corruption scandals in the Transportation and Parking departments, ettc.

However, I think the single biggest black mark on Koch's record is his abysmal handling of the AIDS crisis. Despite being a (closeted) member of the LGBT+ community, or perhaps because of it, Koch was both inactive and silent on the epidemic for years. Not only did the city spend almost no resources to deal with AIDS in the crucial early years, but a lot of ugly shit happened in NYC public hospitals that mayoral intervention could have put a stop to - but Koch did nothing.

There is a good reason why, if you talk to surviving ACT-UP members today about Ed Koch, they will spit at the mention of his name.

Verdict: asshole.

David Dinkins (1990-1993):

New York City's first black mayor, Dinkins reminds me a lot of John Lindsay, in the sense that his detractors were overwhelmingly motivated by racial animus refracted through the lens of policing. The fact that crime rates in NYC began to drop significantly during his tenure as mayor (well before Guiliani), or that he massively expanded the police force - none of that matters because he tried to make the Civilian Compliant Review Board legitimately civilian and independent of the NYPD.

That was enough to touch off a massive, and openly racist, police riot at City Hall, which Guiliani happily attended to stoke the flames of resentment against a black mayor who dared to tell the NYPD what to do.

Verdict: not an asshole. Fuck the haters.

Rudy Guiliani (1994-2001):

In the wake of the 2020 election, a lot of columnists wrote breast-pounding op-eds, asking themselves what went wrong that America's Mayor had seemingly lost his mind in service to the Trump campaign.

As someone who grew up in Guiliani's New York, let me state with confidence: he was always a fascist loon, he just used to be better at it. Having ridden a wave of racist law-and-order politics to victory, Guiliani took personal credit for the decline in crime rates that was taking place nationally - to the point where he actually fired Bill Bratton for being more popular than him - and established the "Broken Windows" policy that would give rise to "Stop and Frisk."

Guiliani's alliance with the NYPD was based on the understanding that he would vocally take the NYPD's side in any police shooting or brutality case no matter how blatantly unjustified and depraved it might have been, whether that was the shootings of Amadou Diallo or Patrick Dorismond or Gidone Busch, the torture of Abner Louima, the racial profiling of the plainsclothes Street Crime Unit, and on and on.

And then there's the fact that, having made the frankly insane decision to place the Office of Emergency Management headquarters at the World Trade Center (this after the 1993 bombing), Guiliani took a frankly unwarranted level of press adulation at a time of national trauma and used it to try to illegally install himself as the unelected mayor of New York City.

Verdict: fascist asshole.

Michael Bloomberg (2002-2013):

More genteel and a better administrator than his predecessor, Bloomberg nevertheless pursued a raft of policies that were largely harmful to NYC. His housing and economic development strategies were designed to market NYC as a "luxury good" to the world's economic elite - seriously, read up on the history of the Hudson Yards development - to the detriment of affordability, beginning the process of gentrification that has left much of this city unaffordable to the majority of residents.

The main thing that makes Michael Bloomberg an asshole is his record on policing, where he doubled down on the "stop and frisk" strategies of Rudy Guiliani, going to the absolute wall in defense of them even when the courts began to knock them down as blatantly racially discriminatory. Then add to that his creation of a massive surveillance state aimed at NYC's Muslim population.

He routinely used his wealth to bribe would-be critics into silence, and then strong-armed the City Council into letting him run for a third term.

And there's the fact that he still owes me $200.

Verdict: plutocrat asshole. Where's my money, Michael? Where's my fucking money?

Bill De Blasio (2014-2021):

I've gone on record as saying that Bill De Blasio's first term was actually remarkable for progressive policy accomplishments, from establishing universal pre-K to raising the city's minimum wage to capping rents to ending stop-and-frisk, and so on and so forth.

That being said, there were two forces in New York politics that he was never able to deal with: the first was the rampant hostility of the NYPD (I was never much impressed by De Blasio's failure to stand up to the NYPD; say whatever else you will about David Dinkins, but he didn't mince words when thousands of drunk cops screaming the N-word invaded City Hall), and the second was the constant and malicious obstruction of supposedly Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo on every single conceivable political and policy issue.

However, at some point very soon after his re-election in 2017, he just lost interest in being mayor of New York City. He still turned up for work, but even his political allies could tell that he had mentally checked out. If you're going to seek the job, you gotta do the job.

Verdict: not an asshole for four years, then an asshole for four years.

Eric Adams (2021-now):

Terrible on every conceivable aspect of public policy, but especially policing (because he's an ex-cop who ran on law-and-order politics and then found that didn't stop people carrying out random shootings) and housing (because he's an absentee slumlord who keeps getting fined for rats in his buildings).

Believes in crystal magic.

Verdict: asshole, possibly crazy?

#history #u.s history #nyc history #nyc #mayor of new york #eric adams

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syrena-del-mar · 11 months

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Only Friends, Sizzling or Fizzling?: Overall Series Review

I quite literally have so many thoughts on Only Friends that I don’t know when I’ll be able to put them fully into words. So this is going to be a disjointed list of my running thoughts.

This means that the following will be filled with spoilers. So if you haven't caught up, and don't appreciate spoilers, read with caution.

How the friend group came out: I will say, I went into the show wishing the friend group would be destroyed with people going their own ways or at least the couples… Instead, we got Boston ostracized from the group with him meekly extending an invite for the rest of the group to meet him next new year in New York. Now, I’m not fully on the Boston-did-no-wrong boat, because I do think several of the things he did warranted apologies, but I also agree that he deserved just as many apologies back. I really wish the show had either gone the direction of everyone begrudgingly reconciling, the friend group completely destroyed, or at the very least truly acknowledging how they all hurt each other. But as much as the ostracizing of Boston left me with a bitter taste in my mouth, I guess the outcome mirrored reality. Friends band together when they all feel wronged and Boston had self-sabotaged his relationship with all of them.

Boston and Nick: I’ve seen some murmurs about Nick was hypocritical about saying that Boston doesn’t have to change but still leaving him, but I wholeheartedly disagree. Nick loved Boston, knew how Boston was, but also let himself be taken by his own fantasies of a monogamous relationship. He even acknowledges to Sand that Boston was being fair with him... which I still think this is debatable, because I strongly believe Boston and Nick needed a whole conversation about non-monogamy long before Boston started making out with Boeing. I'm actually relatively happy that Nick and Boston didn't end up together, for both their sakes. Nick wanted and needed that monogamy from Boston, he realized that he would never get that from Boston. He may love Boston for who he is, but that doesn't mean that his love can overcome that need for monogamy. Meanwhile Boston doesn't want to be monogamous, even if he does want to be Nick's boyfriend. This was never going to be solved even with all the power of love. They had different needs and Nick wasn't willing to put himself through that pain of understanding Boston but neglecting his own needs, so he let him go. Now, my issue lies in the execution of getting to that point. Since the beginning of the last quarter of the show, Boston and Nick got incredibly sidelined. As a result, their story development suffered for it. I think we were lucky if we even saw them for about 5 minutes after episode 9, it almost felt as if the show didn't know how to reconciliate their story once Boston was out of the friend group. I don't think P'Jojo was intentionally going out to villainize Boston's non-monogamous preference (assumingly, based on his other works) and I don't think that fans are reading it as so are being deaf/illiterate, but rather the vagueness due to the lack of story-telling time that Boston's arc had really fed into it. Also, maybe it was just me, but the sense of time in the story felt incredibly confusing when watching these last couple of episodes. So Boston's admittance of self-sabotaging his relationships, asking to be Nick's boyfriend, then making out with Boeing feels like it all occurred with 72 hours; it gave me whiplash and made me disappointed.

Sand and Ray: Out of everyone, I'm the most satisfied with their outcome and journey to it, but even then I still have a little criticisms. First off, let me get the airplane out of the room: Boeing. I'm in the boat (unironically) that Boeing should have been introduced much sooner and have been utilized more to create the suspense of potential rift between Sand and Ray. Or even more development of Sand and Boeing before SandRay got together, because I swear the emotional stakes lagged for me, because I'm not sure why Sand would have even been swayed by Boeing when he had just confessed to Ray that he couldn't live without him either. I understood why Sand was so hostile with Top, but I'm not sure I understood BoeingSand as well. So this whole cockfight just felt needless and an attempt at a last bit of messiness, because how underdeveloped it was. Now Sand and Ray, as individual characters, I only have minor qualms about. I wish we had learned more about Sand's dad and Ray's relationship with his father. From what I've seen, there's so much context that was left out behind Ray's backstory, that it would have been nice to explore even 5% of it. Now we kept hearing about Sand's dad, but it just felt like a lost plot point. I wish we really had time to delve into Ray struggling with his addiction and rehab. Aside from those minor complaints, I'm happy with where we left them and I hope they're able to go around festival-to-festival with a lot of love and success in their future.

Mew and Top: I have very little to talk about them, mostly because I skimmed through their scenes. Now this isn't because I think that Force and Book were bad in their scenes, because it was the exact opposite. They skeeved me out so incredibly much, that it was suffocating to watch their scenes. I wanted Mew to be more that a judgmental, holier-than-thou, character, especially when he stooped so low to revenge-porning Boston. I wanted him to acknowledge that he was just as nasty as he perceived Boston to be, but instead he always felt so sanctimonious and self-righteous that it was nauseating. With Top.... I wish we had gotten more towards his backstory with his fear of being alone due to the fire. It completely went over my head that the fire scene in the last episode was supposed to show that Top was finally able to handle his trauma better and that he was a better person because of Mew. His backstory was so little and came in just disjointed scenes, that I just made no connection and didn't come out of that scene with any emotion other than confusion. They came out of everything together... Not surprising. I have no comments neither positive nor negative towards that aspect.

Cheum and April: Cheum was as aggravating as Mew for me. Self-righteous and I swear she didn't like anyone in her friend group other than Mew, and even that feels questionable. She had literally no faith in Mew being a grown adult and kept pulling Top around when Mew was going through a breakdown. I felt no love from her when it came to Ray, so I always wondered if their friendship was solely out of convenience. Then the final blow was with how she dealt with the Atom x Boston situation. I completely understood her initial reaction of believing Atom and even confrontation, as a sibling, I would also deck a friend if they SA'd and were lording over my sibling's head a nude picture. But the moment that she knew Atom was lying and she just hugged him? Yeah.... I lost most of the little respect that I had for her. Pity points for that tiny apology that she gave to Boston, because she was the only one that did so, but definitely was not enough for the accusations that she brought against him. ALSO! Her absolutely shit-talking April's passion and work to her friends? That's not lack of communication between April and Cheum, that was just so backstabbing of her. April is a better woman than I will ever be, because I will never have the patience to deal with a girlfriend that thinks so lowly of my work. April, I wanted so much more of our indie-film queen. I wanted more out of her relationship with Cheum, especially with that truth-bomb that Ray spilled out. I wanted both of them to do the hard work of saving their relation other than just sweeping it under the rug. I wish we had seen so much of her!

P'Jojo and Vivienne: This is a tricky situation, so I'll be very brief on my thoughts, but I really hope these two never made it to Tumblr. Creators always getting involved with fandom spaces are always going to be difficult to navigate, this time around it seems that feelings were hurt and anger arose on both sides... Criticism of one's work will always be around and its more prominent the bigger the fandom is, which for most BLs, I think Only Friends was under a huge magnifying glass. It's nice to see staff interacting with fans about their work, but I do think there should be a line drawn. I'm not sure if their crossing of the line was for better or worse.

Final Thoughts: Anyways, this show will be missed because I did come out of the weekends enjoying the vast majority of it. I even have a couple of metas half-written, so maybe I'll get around to finishing those in the coming days. For a show that promised mess, it did deliver on that front, but I can't help but be sad that its coherence fizzled a bit towards the end. Maybe I'll come back to it in a year or two with a better appreciation of the vision, but for now... I'm mostly satisfied while also conflicted on what I think about the end. OH! And before I close this off... What the hell happened to the confessionals/talking head/asides? Why did we drop those off in the latter half?

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grits-galraisedinthesouth · 9 months

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The Truth about the Jeffrey Epstein John Does: What the media and "influencers" are getting wrong.

TECHNO FOG substack DEC 19, 2023

There is a certain level of difficulty in reporting on the Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell saga, much of it having to do with what the authorities haven’t revealed: the web of Epstein’s network (much of it still secret), the ties to intelligence (of which documentary evidence is still hidden from public view), the internal deliberations that went on at Main Justice in Washington, D.C. when Epstein got his sweetheart plea deal (again, not yet publicized).

Add to that the false media reports and blatantly inaccurate social media posts that spring up every time there’s any small development in any Epstein or Maxwell case.

Like today, for example.

The Daily Mail led the way, reporting that a federal judge “has ruled to unseal documents that would name 177 Does who are Epstein's friends, recruiters and victims within the coming weeks.” This was followed by a flurry of social media takes – especially on Twitter – promising there will be serious revelations from these records or claims that “177 Jeffrey Epstein high profile associates will be revealed in the new year.”

There’s a problem with that sensationalism: it’s inaccurate.

To explain what’s really going on, allow us to provide some context. Back in February of 2023, the Federal District Court Judge overseeing Virginia Giuffre v. Ghislaine Maxwell (the civil case brought against Maxwell by one of her victims) considered whether to publicly disclose the names of certain “John Does” that came up during the course of that litigation. The attorneys for Giuffre and Maxwell put together a list of 167 John Does and provided descriptive references for each, which would allow the Judge to determine which John Does should be unsealed and which ones should remain sealed.

At that time, we reviewed the list of John Does and assigned them various categories, including whether they were employees of Epstein, witnesses, or perpetrators; and whether their names were already known to the public. We were able to identify the most important alleged perpetrators and discussed the still-redacted facts surrounding their involvement with Epstein.

We also made clear that the majority of the John Does (approximately 100) had already been identified, whether through the media or court proceedings. Some had been interviewed by the media; their stories were already well known. We observed that many of the John Does were identified as not being involved in the more serious allegations against Epstein or Maxwell and that there were no “salacious” allegations against these individuals, some of whom were doctors or acquaintances of the victims. In some instances, the John Does were actual potential victims of Epstein or Maxwell.

And now for today’s developments.

The Judge has ordered the unsealing of names and materials relating to some – but not all – of the 167 John Does (not 177 as has been reported) identified in the list submitted to the Court. View the full order here.

As we clarified last February, the John Does who will be unsealed aren’t “Epstein’s List.” Their names were referenced in any number of ways during the civil case, whether through depositions, medical records (the names of doctors), or in witness lists exchanged between the parties. (To that we add a note of caution: witness lists can be very broad and not all witnesses are material or have even basic information.)

And again, many of the John Does were not alleged by the parties to have committed any wrongdoing. For example, John Doe 14 is referenced in one sealed court filing related to an effort by Maxwell to oppose answering deposition questions under seal. The “sealed material as to [John Doe 14] is not salacious.” He isn’t, as others have promised, a key figure in the Epstein/Maxwell crimes.

And that’s true for many of the other John Does. We’ve analyzed the prior John Doe lists and compared it to today’s order. Here’s the summary of our findings:

There are approximately 100 John Does who were previously identified. Some had been interviewed by the media. The names of others (including victims) had been discussed in Maxwell’s criminal trial. This includes victims and perpetrators.

Approximately 67 remain unidentified.

For 33 of the unknown John Does: the sealed material relating to them “is not salacious” or their name was in a search term or they were mentioned in a deposition. In the case of John Doe 88, “the only reference [of John Doe 88] is a deposition question in answer to which the deponent denied knowledge of the individual.”

Six of the unidentified John Does are victims whose names will not be released.

Six of the unidentified John Does were identified as either victim affiliates or alleged witnesses with connections to the victims. Their names and materials concerning them will be released.

The names, and materials relating to, a number of Epstein affiliates or former Epstein employees will be released. Records indicate - but do not guarantee - that the majority of these do not include salacious information.

The name and materials concerning John Doe 29 – a former Epstein employee – will be unsealed. The Judge described them as “a staff member possibly present at a time and place.” This might be an Epstein employee who was theorized by a witness to perhaps be present in a home when a victim was abused.

There are, however, John Does who may be significant. But that is a small number compared to the 167 John Does subject to the Judge’s order. We’ve summarized them below.

John Doe 58: An alleged witness, Epstein/Maxwell affiliate, and perpetrator. According to the Judge, “Doe 58's name and any identifying information shall remain sealed. Doe is a classic outsider, peripheral to the events at issue. Doe 58 is neither a victim nor associated with Epstein or Maxwell.”

As we previously noted about John Doe 58:

John Doe 86: An alleged Epstein affiliate. Counsel for Maxwell previously informed the Court that “Some material related to this individual is salacious.” Materials relating to John Doe 86 will be “unsealed in full.”

John Doe 94: Previously identified as “alleged victim affiliate; alleged perpetrator” who “is alleged to have engaged in serious wrongdoing.” Materials relating to John Doe 94 will be “unsealed in full.”

John Doe 108: Previously identified as an “alleged witness.” These materials may potentially be salacious.

John Doe 113: Previously identified as “alleged Epstein affiliate; alleged witness” who “is alleged to have engaged in serious wrongdoing.” The Judge ruled these materials should be unsealed in full, and stated the references to John Doe 113 “are all included in Rule 26 disclosures, search terms, and a hearsay statement that the name appears in Epstein’s address book.”

John Doe 114: Previously identified as an “alleged Epstein affiliate.” Their name is on an Epstein flight log. These materials will be unsealed.

And there you have it. I hate to break the disappointing news, but we’re here to report the truth. The unsealing of these records and the publication of these names won’t be what we’ve been promised.

This doesn’t mean that important information won’t be disclosed, or that new and noteworthy discoveries may not be unearthed about known and unknown perpetrators. We believe that still may be the case.

And we’ll provide the source documents when they’re released – which, depending on appeals, may be as soon as January 2, 2024.

#epstein didn't kill himself

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cboffshore · 9 months

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At long last: chapter 5 of If I Can Think (Of Something Clever) has arrived.

It's here! It's long! It almost crashed Docs multiple times! I had to quarantine it in its own document! Everything falls into line in this one, and if something happens next year and I end the series, I think this is a fitting end. (Although I do have ideas for #5. Not concrete ones, but they do exist.)

For everyone who's followed the development of this, AKA all my unhinged cackling into the void: thank you. Seriously. First and foremost, I wrote this for me, but you're all on the tier just under that. I'm glad it's resonated with you, and I cannot WAIT to hear what you think of this. I'll give it a few days so as not to spoil the experience, but expect some insider analysis and behind-the-scenes info at some point.

One last time: tag list (and little thank you notes to each member) below the cut.

@tornoleander and @basicallyjaywalker (obvs I've gotta thank you for letting me sit in on the VC for ch.2/3. absolute banger of a time. I hope you enjoy learning if your Landon predictions came true, and PLEASE send me commentary if you happen to do any this time, because that made my DAY.)

@aesthetickiwiiii (we don't talk too much, but it means SO MUCH that you're consistently excited for this! thank you for having my back.)

@abunnsburrow (it's been a hot minute since we've talked, but don't think I've forgotten about your Delara analysis! that definitely influenced some of what I did here.)

@chocotrain29 (tagging you on the off chance that your Tumblr has decided to cooperate again, but I'll still hit you up on Discord as backup - anyway, special thanks for being the very first OSSAS fanartist! I still get all teary when I think about opening that DM.)

@scarlett-writes (special thanks for helping me discuss the chess sequence - I don't think I actually used any of the ideas we came up with, but it was still super helpful.)

@knowledgequeenabc (us ninboomers gotta stick together, yeah? thanks for being here all along, and double thanks for letting me use your OSSAS review as a series blurb. now that I'm done writing for this for a while, I'm funneling my stray creative energy to you and your WIP of choice.)

#OSSAS tag #ninjago skybound #ninjago nya #ninjago nadakhan #ninjago fanfiction #lila speaks #december wip rambles

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waitmyturtles · 1 year

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Turtles Catches Up With Old GMMTV: Love of Siam, The Intersectionality of Expectations and Demands, and the Tentacles of Influence On the BL Genre Edition

[What’s going on here? After joining Tumblr and discovering Thai BLs through KinnPorsche in 2022, I began watching GMMTV’s new offerings -- and realized that I had a lot of history to catch up on, to appreciate the more recent works that I was delving into. From tropes to BL frameworks, what we’re watching now hails from somewhere, and I’m learning about Thai BL's history through what I’m calling the Old GMMTV Challenge (OGMMTVC). Starting with recommendations from @absolutebl on their post regarding how GMMTV is correcting for its mistakes with its shows today, I’ve made an expansive list to get me through a condensed history of essential/classic/significant Thai BLs produced by GMMTV and many other BL studios. My watchlist, pasted below, lists what I’ve watched and what’s upcoming, along with the reviews I’ve written so far. Today, in a long post, I cover the pre-BL film Love of Siam, and its tremendous influence on today's Thai television BL genre.]

As we recover from the first weekend of Only Friends...now for something a little different, ha.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that while I was on the chronological journey through my Old GMMTV Challenge watchlist, that I jacked up my watch schedule to roll back in time to add two pre-television-BL movies in Love of Siam (2007) and My Bromance (2014). My review of My Bromance will drop later this week, but I want to give more attention at the moment to Love of Siam, a seminal film for queer media in Thailand, and a definite influence and harbinger on the development of the future genre of television BL in Thailand after the film's release. Considering our beloved Thai BL auteurs who have been knowingly influenced by LoS: it's a must-add for the list.

Now that I've watched Love of Siam: while I know I'm reviewing it in my 2023 watch schedule out of order, I am tremendously glad that this review will sit on top of the enduring list as the first of the Old GMMTV Challenge syllabus, as I think it contains a number of themes that get explored in the future of television Thai BLs from 2014 on. As well, the film also opens a door into how Thai, pan-Asian, and international audiences of various demographics receive and have received the film over the last 16 years since the film's release.

Most importantly for this piece: I'd like to address Love of Siam in an intersectional analysis, specifically analyzing the film from the queer lens/perspective and the Asian lens/perspective. What I'd like to address about LoS is as follows:

1) A summary of the movie, why Love of Siam was remarkable when it was released, and a quick overview of who has been influenced by it in Thai BL auteur circles, 2) How the ending of the movie (spoiler alert) has been received and understood by specific audiences, 3) An intersectional overview of those potentially differing expectations and opinions, and what that intersection means for how the global television BL fandom watches and understands Thai television BLs today, 4) What we see today, theme-wise, by what works and artists I think were influenced by Love of Siam,

and other floating points as I come to them.

It was the inimitable @bengiyo who recommended -- nay, insisted -- that I watch Love of Siam, not only for the OGMMTVC syllabus, but also as a means of analyzing I Told Sunset About You by way of its story structure and resolution, which I'll get into in a few moments. (I actually had the very great pleasure of joining @bengiyo and @shortpplfedup, along with a few other clowns, to talk about ITSAY on an upcoming The Conversation podcast, in which Love of Siam came up as a topic -- thank you, Ben and NiNi, for the honor! I'll talk more about the conversation that took place in the podcast in a few moments.)

Love of Siam focuses on Mew and Tong, two young schoolboys who were separated by a family tragedy in Tong's family. After Tong's sister disappears and is presumed dead, Tong's father turns to alcoholism, and the family moves away. Tong's mother takes up the mantle of breadwinner and the glue that keeps the rest of the family together. When Mew and Tong reach high-school age, they reconnect in Bangkok's Siam Square mall. I'll try to not give too much more away, because there's a tremendous follow-up to Tong's sister's legacy within the film, but the movie is perhaps best known for its ending, in which Mew and Tong do not get together. The two had spent the film negotiating their attraction to each other in the face of the intervention of Tong's mother, who worked on keeping them apart, and reconnected with the help of a mutual friend in Ying, who originally had a crush on Mew before discovering he was gay. The ending echoes the common endings of the majority of queer media at the time, in which couples did not get together, and/or were forcibly separated, and/or were tragically eliminated. (Brokeback Mountain was released two years earlier in 2005, and André Aciman's original novel, Call Me By Your Name, comes out in the same year as LoS, in 2007.)

For broad cinematic context, Love of Siam was Thailand's entry in the 2009 Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film (now called Best International Film). To compare LoS to television BLs on the OGMMTVC list, only the Nadao Bangkok works (I Told Sunset About You, etc.) come at all close to the quality of LoS's filming. The acting, the cinematography, the pacing, and the story structure of this movie were all superb. I enjoyed every minute of it, despite the ending. (We had our first instance of Kob Songsit playing a father named Korn, which -- was it a coincidence that he did the same in KinnPorsche? Especially considering KinnPorsche's happy ending -- it's a high likelihood. More on this in a bit.)

The movie received a fair share of controversy upon its release, as it had been originally marketed as a love story between two heterosexual teen couples. The "surprise," as it were, of finding out that Mew and Tong were the main romantic protagonists, caught Thai audiences by surprise. The filmmakers reported that they were unaware of the modern extent, at that point, of Thailand's common homophobia, but @bengiyo also let me know that at the same time, fans of the film were devastated to not see Mew and Tong get together in the end. Despite the competing controversies, the film was the most successful film in Thailand in 2007.

It's well known that many of our favorite Thai television BL auteurs, like Backaof Noppharnach, Jojo Tichakorn, New Siwaj, and others, watched and were influenced by the film -- they've talked about it previously in interviews in Soonvijarn and other arenas. I haven't seen My Only 12%, but @bengiyo tells me that New Siwaj directly tackles Love of Siam in that series. I'll come back to talk more specific works by these auteurs, and how I think some of these auteurs responded to the influence of Love of Siam in their works, in a bit.

As I mentioned previously: the ending of Love of Siam is controversial. Tong's mother intervened with Mew to tell him to stay away from Tong. She equates Tong being with Mew romantically to "losing her son" (a notion that is repeated in the 2019 film, Dew), which she clearly doesn't want after losing her daughter. Tong's mother is later shown as seeming to accept Tong's sexuality -- but it's not clear if she will ever accept him being in an actual relationship. That's not addressed. Separately, Mew's and Tong's friend, Ying, gives up on her romantic hopes towards Mew to help Tong reconnect with Mew after their brief separation.

Ying helps Tong find a meaningful token of his past with Mew. After gifting him the token, Tong says to Mew:

"I can't be your boyfriend. But it doesn't mean that I don't love you."

And Mew, smiling, says: "Thank you."

The end of the movie shows Ying sobbing heavily among her group of friends, and Mew sitting and crying in a room, saying "thank you" once more.

Jumping ahead a bit: during my participation in The Conversation podcast, the topic came up of whether or not ITSAY was an "apology" for Love of Siam. I think this question is a great way to enter what I briefly want to analyze intersectionally by way of how various audiences can interpret LoS's ending.

In conversation with the wonderful @bengiyo and @so-much-yet-to-learn (thank you both!), I understand that international queer audiences were severely disappointed in LoS's ending, for obvious reason. There was a lot in this movie that seemed to otherwise indicate acceptance of queer relationships and queer love, including by Tong's mother. That a relationship itself could not be confirmed was painful to watch.

When I was watching this film, I knew that the ending wasn't going to be good -- I just didn't know how it would play out exactly. I've had this experience before, where I'm aware that an ending of a thing I'm watching is going to be questionable, and when I get to the actual ending, I'm like -- OHHHH. Wait. I get why this ending is the way it is. The last time I felt like that was when I watched 2gether. In 2G, the ending/lack of intimacy immediately gave me a holistic understanding of why the show performed so well in Asia.

I watch Asian shows first and foremost with an Asian lens -- because I am an Asian. (I'm also a cishet woman.) My expectations of media coming from Asia are different than the expectations of non-Asian audiences. Maybe even as a cishet Asian woman -- my expectations of Asian media might be different from other Asian demographics, like Thai or pan-Asian queer audiences.

Generally speaking, the ending of LoS did not surprise me in the least, especially for being a piece from 2007. When Mew said "thank you," I was like, yep. Of course this was going to be how the movie ended.

Going back to the point I made earlier about queer media, globally, of this moment in 2007 having expected bad endings -- we come to an intersectional interpretive crossroads for Love of Siam's ending. Queer audiences were disappointed to be let down. I'm going to guess that the majority of Asian audiences, like myself, had a less surprised reaction (although again, to @bengiyo's point, it seems like some Thai fans protested the ending).

Non-happy, open-ended, and/or "bad" endings proliferate more in Asian media than in Western media. I've written about this before in a Big Meta on pain and suffering in Asian dramas. As an Asian consumer of Asian media, I've been conditioned all of life to not expect for the best of the characters I'm watching. Many of the Indian movies from the 1940s, '50s, and '60s that my parents showed me in my childhood had sad or politically-driven endings. Love being yanked right away for the sake of a "moral" or "ethical" lesson -- I'm conditioned to expect it. Most memorably for me, when I was a young lass, my parents showed me and my siblings Chemmeen, a 1965 film about a married woman nursing a long-lived lost-love with a man outside of her marriage. They had been separated all of their lives for various social status reasons. At the end of the film, when they finally embraced, they are wiped out by a storm. After the "WTF, mom and dad?!" outbursts from me and my siblings, my parents simply said -- this is the moral of a story that was important when we were growing up. You don't fall in love with someone you are not supposed to fall in love with. (Probably the saddest ending I've ever experienced in Asian media is Yoshimura Akira's Shipwrecks. I recommend it highly, but it's a bruiser.) (And MANY THANKS to my dear friend and fellow desi-homey, @neuroticbookworm, for tracking down Chemmeen based only on my hazy childhood memories!)

I've talked at length with @neuroticbookworm about our instinctual expectations of Asian media and when Asian media either toes the line of predictability (sad endings) or when it pushes the paradigm to, for us, new results (happy endings). (And this is in spite of Bollywood, which of course often has happy endings, but even Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, one of the biggest Indian movies of all time, was laced with sadness.)

LoS did something different than the media I grew up with, which I appreciated in the film. It was subtle, but as @bengiyo noted to me -- it was there. A whiff of acceptance was in the movie. This was the Thai film industry's way of beginning to play around with queer acceptance. I personally think that while the ending statements of "thank you" were stark, they did not indicate anything by way of emotional conclusion for Mew. When I saw Mew crying during his last "thank you," and Ying bawling at the end of the movie -- I took from that their acceptance of the devastation of a socially and culturally-based decision that needed to be made by Tong and his family.

Mew and Tong could acknowledge their love to each other. But for 2007 Thai cinema, they could not go further than that. To flirt with the idea that a Thai family would, in fiction, accept a gay relationship, was likely too progressive. Censors, the government, even Thai audiences, all may have balked.

The intersectional crossroads of this decision are important for me to root myself in. On the one hand, there's the disappointment of Thai, pan-Asian, and international queer audiences that Mew and Tong could not come together.

(I want to note that specifically for Western/non-Asian audiences of all demographics, there is a reality that a DEMAND that Asian filmmakers create happy endings — like Mew and Tong coming together — might be coming from a colonialist point of view, one that may ignore or not consider common Asian media practices and cultures. I unfortunately see this often in shipper culture emanating from the West, and I'm heartened that some Thai content makers are beginning to call international fans out on it. I note down below that market expectations of these endings have certainly changed in today's age, but checking privileges upon demanding something specific of Asian content is something that is always worth doing.)

On the other hand, there are Thai and pan-Asian audiences that interpret Mew and Tong not coming together as a matter of timing (the market not being ready for a confirmed queer relationship on screen), and as well, a matter of expectation that what we'd HOPE for -- Mew and Tong being together -- could AND would not happen, because conversationally, that kind of happiness would be culturally and socially impossible both in art and in real life. For instance, for Mew and Tong to negotiate their relationship with their respective families, on screen, in 2007? Talking to their parents about how they could get together? Damn. I can't.... for that time period, I cannot imagine Asian media, Thai or otherwise, going there. To involve families talking about acceptance -- I don't believe the market, Asian-based audiences, and even international Asian-diaspora audiences being ready for that. (And that's not to say that people of my generation wouldn't have welcomed it. But, for instance -- my parents' generation would have been in protest for movies depicting that kind of conflict, resolution, and outcome playing out in any sort of positive way.)

Remember, again, this is 2007. Let's jump WAY ahead for a second -- to the now, when we can have a show like My School President in 2022. A show, like LoS, that depicts two high school boys navigating attraction and love. A show that actually features a high school band (Mew being a lead singer in a band is a main plot point of LoS). And a show that includes young men falling in love and navigating their families. And Gun and Tinn end up together.

How far we've come from 2007 to now. As I noted above, the expectations of audiences outside of queer circles among Asian and international audiences for positive endings have changed drastically. I haven't even watched MSP yet, but imagine if Gun and Tinn DIDN'T get together. Think about it for a moment. Even as someone who hasn't watched the show yet -- even I know how crazy that sounds, from what we've been habituated to expect out of Thai television BLs, since the rise of the genre from Love Sick in 2014 -- a full seven years after the release of LoS. Thai, pan-Asian, and international audiences of all demographics would have been up in arms.

We know now -- again, seven years after the release of LoS -- how seminal Love Sick was for Thai television BLs, in including the Phun x Noh storyline in the context of an ensemble drama. And now, I feel like I have even more context for how UTTERLY seminal the ending of Love Sick was -- for Phun and Noh to consciously decide to BE TOGETHER, and to end the show that way, in the face of the line of previous expectations that LoS had originally had to toe. It fills my heart that so much progress could have been made in such a short time. Seven years doesn't seem short. But this is where I often drop a comparative point -- that it took 50 years for gay marriage to be legalized in America. Change sometimes seems long, but in hindsight -- change can also happen fast in context.

I think the intersectional conclusion to this is that Thai filmmakers didn’t give up in pushing to experiment with positive endings in a genre — queer media — that didn’t commonly have them. By having Phun and Noh confirm their relationship in Love Sick; by having TeeFuse and FrameBook CELEBRATE their relationships in the early BL series, Make It Right/MIR 2 — these shows began to change an expectedly doomed paradigm of sadness and heartbreak. And — AMAZINGLY! — these early shows that took such risks found accepting audiences. And the market has since responded.

Now — with these shows also came the rise of toxic shipper culture and continued homophobia of actors who are actually out and gay. That’s the gray side to all of this. But Thai BL auteurs then and now still play in this sandbox. As akin to the legislation of gay marriage in America, the progress of LGBTQ+ acceptance in Thai media and Thai society is rocky. (Remember this: Barack Obama did not outright support gay marriage when he first ran for office. He was already president when he permanently changed his public tune.) But that road is continually being paved as audiences in Thailand and globally grow ever more accepting of equal rights for all. While queer audiences celebrate this with bells on — I also am beyond thrilled that Asian audiences can take away learnings about LGBTQ+ equality, especially in countries where homosexuality is banned (Malaysia), where same-sex marriage is legal (Taiwan), and in everywhere in between, where there may be outward social practices of acceptance and internal practices of continued familial or even social homophobia. The general consistency of moving the dial forward on Thai BL media showing equality is good for ALL audiences, no matter how you cut it.

I want to take a moment to talk about the clear and enduring influence that LoS had had on present-day Thai BLs. Like I said earlier, many of our favorite Thai BL auteurs have stated that they were influenced by LoS, and I want to just do a little nerdy comparative analysis out of admiration for those creators that I simp on.

As I wrote previously, I thought LoS was brilliantly written and filmed -- it was a gorgeous movie, even at a 2.5-hour run time. LoS was rooted in a few major themes (but there are more within the film) that I see cropping up in present-day Thai BLs.

The first is the use of religion and spirituality as a means of indicating cultural mores around queer acceptance. Tong's family is Catholic. Catholic imagery peppers the film -- most notably for me, towards the end of the movie, when Tong flops on his bed with a huge poster of the cross pasted on the wall above him. Like I wrote earlier, Tong's mother has said to Mew -- if you two get together, I will lose my son. Tong being in a queer relationship is clearly against the family's Catholic practices -- the cross hovers in Tong's most intimate space.

On the flip side, Mew's family is Buddhist, and clearly demonstrated as so. I would also argue that Tong's Catholic family benefits from Buddhist beliefs, in a reincarnation plot that includes Tong's sister. As we know from the many Thai BLs that incorporate depictions of Buddhist practices -- Buddhism does not generally speak to a condemnation of the LGBTQ+ community, although local expressions and practices may differ. He's Coming To Me, Until We Meet Again, and Big Dragon are three shows that, to me, include Buddhist frameworks most distinctly, but of course -- our beloved BL guys are going to temples all the time and making merit. Even Gay OK Bangkok has multiple temple scenes -- and that's an overtly queer, non-BL drama. A temple is often a common locale that we see our beloved queer couples able to be together safely, outside the privacy of a home.

The second theme of note emanating out of LoS is filial piety. When Tong says to Mew, "I can't be your boyfriend," part of what he's saying is -- I can't do this to my family. Filial piety is SUCH a presence in many BLs -- to me, most notably in I Told Sunset About You, as I reflect on Teh's hugely emotional reaction in giving up his university admission for Oh-aew, and the fall-out vis à vis his mother that results from that decision (and Oh-aew has his own filial piety storyline as well). (I want to note that the ITSAY links include a phenomenal reblog from @bengiyo that talks in part about how ITSAY speaks to LoS -- a must-read.) Part of the presumed danger of coming out in Thai BLs, to me, stems from not only fearing rejection of one's own sexuality by a character's family -- but in also disappointing one's family in the public and private Asian family construct, especially considering that we're witnessing mostly young men coming out, who carry their own load of gender-based expectations from their families.

This harkens back for me Thun's coming-out conversation with his mother in episode six of He's Coming To Me. In episode five, Thun asks, famously, on a rainy rooftop -- "I have this feeling, but I don't know what to call it" (which, I think, is an Aof callback to Tong asking Ying in LoS -- "what am I, Ying?"). In episode six, Thun, a young man who has already lost his father, clearly sits with concern that he might lose his mother. And, of course, Thun's mother comes back with the most empathetic response to a coming-out that I've ever seen in a Thai BL. Maybe Thun's mom is also a response to Tong's mom.

Finally, I want to go back to the theme and the idea of sad endings vs. happy endings. When I first began to get OBSESSED with Thai BLs was when I watched Bad Buddy for the first time. Bad Buddy, to me, encapsulated a feeling I had that what I was watching was DISTINCTLY, PROGRESSIVELY Asian by the many themes it included that I relate to as an Asian, from filial piety, to intergenerational trauma, to keeping secrets from family and friends, and so much more.

I think, for my interpretative stance at this point of the OGMMTVC, that it's clear that Aof Noppharnach has most commonly addressed themes and influences from LoS in his work (again acknowledging that New Siwaj did something similar in My Only 12%). I think I admire the endings of He's Coming To Me and Bad Buddy in particular because Aof did something that I think is really hard to pull off. As I said to @so-much-yet-to-learn, Aof pulled off not-necessarily-happy, open-ended resolutions to those two shows that hewed far more to real-life-level conclusions about queerness than overtly happy endings in the face of other tenuous influences, such as family rejections. At the end of He's Coming To Me, Thun is in love with a ghost that may be reborn at any point in time — Thun could lose Med without a moment’s notice. At the end of Bad Buddy, Pran and Pat are not out to their families and are separated by distance. But -- à la Love of Siam -- there are subtle indications that acceptance may be on the horizon on the part of Pran's and Pat's families.

To me, Aof negotiating these endings is just so brilliant, and hews authentically to the journey, to the path that Asian audiences, like myself, can once again relate to from the media we grew up with. If we as Asians grew up not expecting happy endings, how does that change our experience of watching shows that end happily now? By watching media with inconclusive or pointedly unhappy endings, Asian audiences are led to think that life is more complicated and gray than a happy ending would lead one to believe. From a queer lens — if the MAJORITY of queer media ends badly, then it seems that the underlying message is that the community ITSELF doesn’t DESERVE happiness. I will always appreciate the majority of Thai BLs changing this paradigm.

Many of Aof’s work sit in the middle of this, either by ending or by journey. Moonlight Chicken indicates a painful growth and acceptance process of internalized homophobia for Jim, the chicken rice vendor. Same for Phupha, from A Tale of Thousand Stars to Our Skyy 2. Pat and Pran are physically separated and mostly closeted. Thun is dating a ghost. Even Type and Man in Still 2gether are almost permanently separated by Type’s job. Aof doesn’t shy away from loose ends. He’s not giving devastation. He’s balancing, I think, the history of what was expected, with what real life often gives by way of what actually happens in imperfect situations.

And this isn’t entirely universal in Aof's works. In the two previously existent series that Aof "took over" in Kiss Me Again and 2gether: Pete and Kao are solid at the end of Dark Blue Kiss. Sarawat and Tine end nice and heaty in Still 2gether. But what I think is particularly brilliant about Aof’s overall oeuvre is that balance and appreciation he clearly has for art that questionable, open-ended endings gave to pieces back when he and I were younger folks. Aof doesn’t devastate us, or his characters. But he certainly makes all of us — his characters and his audiences — contemplate the meaning of our existences and our roles in society by way of the obstacles and inequities we all face, by the time a show of his is concluded. Those searing examinations are what I live for in his repertoire in particular, and they are what remind me the most about the Asian media I grew up with vis à vis Aof’s modern works.

I have to thank him for that. Maybe as an older viewer of Thai BLs (I'm close in age to Aof), I sometimes need a bridge to the robust happy endings that shows like Make It Right, Dark Blue Kiss, Still 2gether, and more have. Love of Siam reminded me of where we once stood. Aof's works are the bridge to a kind of 180-degree turn-of-perspective, towards a happiness in fiction that, as a child of Asian media, I never knew I could enjoy. And I'm glad, in today's age as I continue to robustly enjoy the genre that is Thai BL, that I can experience that kind of satisfaction in Thai art now.

[So all of this is happening while we're getting early into Only Friends, and Dangerous Romance premieres this week. The riches! So much going on!

Later this week, I'll publish a (hopefully short-ish) review of another film, My Bromance (2014) to talk about the Flukes and yaoi influences on BL. Then, FINALLY (!!!) will come my Manner of Death review, my A Tale of Thousand Stars rewatch review, my Lovely Writer review (LOVED THIS SHOW), and somewhere in-between, a non-OGMMTVC review of Jojo Tichakorn's The Warp Effect, which I'm HOUSING for the sake of Only Friends.

Hit list below! Hit me with feedback! (Tumblr's new web editor is jacking with this list below and not letting me strikethrough those shows that I've watched. For the most updated list, check this link right here.)

1) The Love of Siam (2007) (movie) 2) My Bromance (2014) (movie) (review coming) 3) Love Sick and Love Sick 2 (2014 and 2015) (review here) 4) Gay OK Bangkok Season 1 (2016) (a non-BL queer series directed by Jojo Tichakorn and written by Aof Noppharnach) (review here) 5) Make It Right (2016) (review here) 6) SOTUS (2016-2017) (review here) 7) Gay OK Bangkok Season 2 (2017) (a non-BL queer series directed by Jojo Tichakorn and written by Aof Noppharnach) (review here) 8) Make It Right 2 (2017) (review here) 9) Together With Me (2017) (review here) 10) SOTUS S/Our Skyy x SOTUS (2017-2018) (review here) 11) Love By Chance (2018) (review here) 12) Kiss Me Again: PeteKao cuts (2018) (no review) 13) He’s Coming To Me (2019) (review here) 14) Dark Blue Kiss (2019) and Our Skyy x Kiss Me Again (2018) (review here) 15) TharnType (2019-2020) (review here) 16) Senior Secret Love: Puppy Honey (OffGun BL cuts) (2016 and 2017) (no review) 17) Theory of Love (2019) (review here) 18) 3 Will Be Free (2019) (a non-BL and an important harbinger of things to come in 2019 and beyond re: Jojo Tichakorn pushing queer content in non-BLs) (review here) 19) Dew the Movie (2019) (review here) 20) Until We Meet Again (2019-2020) (review here) 21) 2gether (2020) and Still 2gether (2020) (review here) 22) I Told Sunset About You (2020) (review here) 23) YYY (2020, out of chronological order) (review here) 24) Manner of Death (2020-2021) (not a true BL, but a MaxTul queer/gay romance set within a genre-based show that likely influenced Not Me and KinnPorsche) (review coming) 25) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) (review here) 26) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For The Sake Of Rewatching Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (review coming) 27) Lovely Writer (2021) (review coming) 28) Last Twilight in Phuket (2021) (the mini-special before IPYTM) 29) I Promised You the Moon (2021) 30) Not Me (2021-2022) 31) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) (thesis here) 32) 55:15 Never Too Late (2021-2022) (not a BL, but a GMMTV drama that features a macro BL storyline about shipper culture and the BL industry) 33) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) and Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (2023) OGMMTVC Rewatch 34) Secret Crush On You (2022) [watching for Cheewin’s trajectory of studying queer joy from Make It Right (high school), to SCOY (college), to Bed Friend (working adults)] 35) KinnPorsche (2022) (tag here) 36) KinnPorsche (2022) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For The Sake of Re-Analyzing the KP Cultural Zeitgeist 37) The Eclipse (2022) (tag here) 38) GAP (2022-2023) (Thailand’s first GL) 39) My School President (2022-2023) and Our Skyy 2 x My School President (2023) 40) Moonlight Chicken (2023) (tag here) 41) Bed Friend (2023) (tag here) (Cheewin’s latest show, depicting a queer joy journey among working adults) 42) Be My Favorite (2023) (tag here) (I’m including this for BMF’s sophisticated commentary on Krist’s career past as a BL icon) 43) Only Friends (2023)]

#love of siam #the love of siam #love of siam meta #the love of siam meta #backaof noppharnach #new siwaj #bad buddy #he's coming to me #dark blue kiss #still 2gether #my school president #turtles catches up with old gmmtv #the old gmmtv challenge #ogmmtvc #turtles catches up with the essential bls #turtles catches up with thai bls

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alpaca-clouds · 11 months

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"All Characters Are Equally Important" Is Usually A Lie

There is another media thing I kinda wanted to talk about for a while and recently I came across this discussion again and I was like: "You know what? Now is the time."

See, when there is a media thing with a ton of characters, especially in TV, the creators will often claim that "all characters are equally important" and also "all characters are fair game for dying and bad things happening to them". But, okay, let's be honest here. This is pretty much always a lie.

While I never liked GoT (or the books) because of all the rape happening, I kinda had to put in that GIF because it was one of those examples. Even as someone not actively engaging with the fandom I stood there as the Red Wedding happened and rolled my eyes so heavily. Because there also was the claim that "all characters are fair game and everyone can die". It was fairly obvious, that this was a lie.

Because GOT had a lot of characters, yes, but it was fairly obvious who were the main characters and who were the side characters. And as such it was fairly likely that the main characters would survive at least till close to the end of the show (and the books). They could claim all they wanted that this was not the case. A lot of people called it out, and guess what? The characters who all those people named as the "main characters" did in fact survive till the last two episodes.

And while I also never at all got sucked into the LOST fandom, I recently had a lot of fun watching the Billiam reviews of the show. And apparently it was happening there, too. Where it became fairly clear fairly soon, who were the actually main characters, and who... well, was more easy to write bout of the show.

The thing that got me there, is with all the stuff happening with RIOT and LoL right now, there is this claim going around with Arcane, too. Especially regarding season 2, that will not be released before later next year. And sure, I get that for RIOT it is a marketing strategy and stuff to hype up the new season. What I do not get is, how people will argue that this is actually totally the case.

Like, look, especially with Arcane gaining importance in terms of the actual canon of the LoL verse, it is fairly safe that all champions are gonna survive in one form or another. Like characters such as Mel and Sevika can die, sure. But Caitlyn, Vi, Jinx, Viktor, Jayce, Heimerdinger? They totally are going to live. And be it just in a way of "Sure, they died. But don't worry, they got better."

And it is okay. It is okay that in a story with a lot of characters are more important than other characters. That in fact is just good storytelling. Because if you really were treating the characters all equal, it would be harder for whoever reads or watches your thing to get invested into the characters and kinda get really into the story. Because the main characters are the gate for the audience to enter the world through.

And sure, everyone who is active in fandom will tell you about this random background character they personally are obsessing over. But in general, yeah. People will focus on the main characters, which is totally fair. Because... Just logistically speaking, if you really were making 10+ characters equally important (or at times even 20+), you would be so held up with giving them all enough background and enough development, that the main plot would get lost.

Believe me, even as someone who somehow ends up writing stories with at times up to 30 characters... Even there I usually have more like 5-7 main characters, whose decisions drive the plot - and whose point of view is going to be the dominant one.

Yeah, alright, I get the frustration when your favorite character ends up being one of the side characters, who just do not get written out that much - or get killed just to hammer home how dangerous an antagonist is. But... It's just how it is. And, I mean... canon is just a suggestion ;)

So, yeah. My point is: Yeah, no, Caitlyn isn't going to die. Nor is Jinx. Or any other champion from the game. Not for real. There might be a fake out death, but... they will survive.

#writing #writing advice #marketing #riot games #league of legends #arcane #arcane season 2 #game of thrones #lost

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ecargmura · 2 years

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Buddy Daddies Episode 8 Review: Something Worth Protecting

This episode showed and told so much that it’s almost perfection in storytelling and development. I’m just dreading for what’s to come because of what was shown in the ending.

You can check out this review on my blog, but if you don't want to read it there, continue below.

The episode centers around Rei. We learn a lot more about the Suwa family as Shigeki, Rei’s father, wants Rei to return home and succeed the family business. The conflict between Rei and Shigeki is actually very interesting to watch. Shigeki only sees Rei as a tool for their dark world while Rei is a shadow that found light in Kazuki and Miri. Shigeki is unable to love while Rei is able to, albeit slowly.

The organization looks down on love and positive feelings in general, only to find them pointless. Rei’s mentor Satoru was once a man who held the organization’s ideals but found love; unfortunately, his lover was murdered. Rei is slowly walking his mentor’s path as he found something to protect as well—Kazuki and Miri. The action sequences between Rei and Satoru were amazing and well animated. I was amazed with how fluid it was, especially given that the two fight so similarly.

Throughout the show, Rei is seen as a bit aloof and lazy, but the episode shows that the laziness is from the fact that he was a barely functioning adult when he ran away from home. Meeting Kazuki changed all that. This episode also showed Rei and Kazuki’s first meeting, which lead to Kazuki going into Rei’s house and caring for him by cleaning the garbage dump of his apartment, adding in bright furniture to liven up the atmosphere, bathing him, cutting his hair and feeding him a well balanced meal. I’m sure that Kazuki’s kindness melted Rei’s cold heart and why he behaves like he does now; Rei is someone who likes to be taken care of and he probably didn’t realize this until Kazuki, someone who likes caring of others, came into his life.

The heartfelt talk that the two had towards the end of the episode cemented how much they care for each other. Rei’s not an open person, but it’s obvious that Kazuki is dear to him—he’s the reason Rei became a functioning person after all. During the conversation with Rei and Shigeki, Rei defended Kazuki by saying that his bond with Kazuki isn’t pointless. I think this is a powerful statement. Remember that in Japan, people on casual terms usually address each other by their surnames. Kazuki and Rei are on first name basis with each other, signifying a close bond; also note that Rei is three years younger than Kazuki. If he was on casual terms, he would’ve just addressed Kazuki as Kurusu or Kurusu-san, but he doesn’t and Kazuki doesn’t mind at all. It might not mean much, but the fact that Rei referred to Kazuki as “Kazuki” in front of his father shows a lot in details.

Another subplot for this episode is Kazuki and Miri preparing a surprise birthday party for Rei. I think the way they used Kazuki and Miri’s screen time to give some background on Rei is creative. Miri is quite perceptive in this episode as she laments that Rei still has some sadness inside of him; she knows this because she has seen her mother behave the same way whenever she drinks. With how Miri behaved in episode 6, we can see that Miri is a lot more mature than she lets on. I like this side of Miri. It shows that while she’s still childlike and innocent, she’s mature and is maturing.

Ryo Ogino is a very creepy villain. He is someone who likes collecting dead target’s last words. I like how there’s strong buildup of him being the final villain or the penultimate one as he’s Rei’s opposite in every way. Ogino likes “concepts” while Rei was once a “concept” but grew into an actual human being. While I am scared for what’s to come, I’m anticipating the battle between Rei and Ogino because I know for a fact that Rei will never let anything bad happen to his real family.

Buddy Daddies episodes always end on wholesome notes, but this one ended on a scary note. Kyutaro gets a picture from Ogino who is requesting information about…Kazuki and Miri. Oh shit. No. No. NO! I predict Rei will finally let go of the shackles of his past and abuse to protect the two people he loves the most. This is only episode 8. There are 13 episodes for this show. Why are we walking the angst path this early? I pray nothing bad happens to Kazuki and Miri. I am clasping my hands as I dread for next Friday to come.

#buddy daddies #review #ecargmura #anime #anime review #winter 2023 anime #kazuki kurusu #rei suwa #miri unasaka #Ryo Ogino #Shigeki suwa #Satoru kaji #arum journal

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thedreadvampy · 1 year

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things that happened yesterday:

I was late to a meeting and hadn't done a piece of work that my boss asked me to prioritise because I've been really struggling to focus and get my shit in order lately so on several things on Tuesday I did that thing where you do half a task then get distracted then think you've finished the task. anyway I got in trouble about it

My boss snapped 'we're already doing that' when I suggested a raft of comms about some stats due in month and I'm like are we? cause I haven't heard shit about that and I usually. Plan and write those comms.

around 12, I very unsubtly asked my colleague who manages another team if I could "borrow her for a meeting" about "stuff" because I was about to cry and I wanted to go out of the office to do that. (She was very nice about it we sat outside and she gave me a big hug and we talked about why I was stressed and came up with an action plan)

unrelatedly my boss copied us in on an email chain where she reached out to a filmmaker she knows to make a video for us. in the email chain she repeatedly referred to really disliking last year's equivalent video (which my colleague and I made)

she also reviewed plans for our annual report where she repeatedly referenced how much she disliked the design of last year's (I also designed that)

Her antipathy towards the brand guidelines me and my colleague created just before she came in continues strong.

anyway today her only direct contact with me has been sending me a job listing for a role at another company. which I wouldn't mind (as she says, part of management is encouraging people's career progression) except:

it's at fucking Social Bite (iykyk, although in fairness she's been in the homelessness sector for about 6 minutes and doesn't know what a shitshow Social Bite is)

she's done literally nothing to help on a single one of my already-laid-out learning and development goals, including the specific task she was set to set up budget meetings with me every month.

we've never actually discussed my goals and objectives properly like, at all

like no I don't think she's trying to get rid of me but I'm a bit like uhhhhh maybe 'helping Ruth with her career' looks less like 'show Ruth other jobs' and more like 'fucking LISTEN TO RUTH when she tries to explain WHAT SHE NEEDS TO WORK PROPERLY HERE'

#red said

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cleolinda · 1 year

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Santal Blush (Tom Ford, 2011)

(tomford.com)

A textured fusion celebrating sandalwood, SANTAL BLUSH presents exotic spices enhanced with luxe ylang ylang, warm cinnamon, and sumptuous woods – seducing with a modern, second-skin warmth.

Notes: Sandalwood, cinnamon, cumin, fenugreek, carrot seed, jasmine, rose, ylang ylang, benzoin, agarwood, musk.

So I've told you some stories about wrangling really intense fragrances using my "Dab on three particles. No sudden movements. Do not look it in the eye" method. I did this with Chanel No. 5 and the aldehydes still gave me a panic attack; I did it with Not A Perfume and still got an instantaneous headache. I got some beautiful shape-shifting effects from Mitsouko and Coco Mademoiselle. Even at such low amounts, I am, in fact, getting what the perfume is meant to do.

Sometimes I don't. Santal Blush is the story of the time "just try one whole molecule" did not work.

Here's my clickbait read-more: The sixth time was the charm.

I do read reviews in advance to get an idea of how a perfume shows up on other users' skin—the notes, the olfactory textures, the opening and the eventual drydown. So I did know that Santal Blush is unusually subtle for a Tom Ford, a brand I associate with being expensive as fuck very strong. My only experience with the brand before this was trying Tobacco Vanille in a Sephora, which I loved so much that I kept the tester strip to scent my purse—my whole-ass purse, for a full week. It's not a timid brand.

So I try a dab of Santal Blush five times, and all I get is a witheringly dry Australian sandalwood with cinnamon. Like, I can feel this thing sucking the moisture out of the back of my throat, it's so dry. Within two or three hours, it was barely there—and reviews say it's supposed to really last on your skin. "It's creamy, it's floral, it's powdery." Fuck off, no it's not, I said, baffled. Where is the blush in this thing, conceptually? Why is it even called that?

Finally, I buckled down and slathered it on. And by "slather" I mean "a smear on the back of my hand the size of a quarter." A WHOOSH of floral came out, to my entire surprise—the classic [(rose-jasmine) + maybe (ylang-ylang and/or tuberose)] combination that you can see in the development of perfumes for a hundred years now. Just in the ones I've written about, you see it in the two Coco Mademoiselles, the No. 5 formulations, Mitsouko, the Samsaras, Hypnotic Poison, and even Tyrannosaurus Rex, somehow. And when I write about Jean Patou's Joy in the next few weeks, you're going to see it spotlighted there.

And this is a floral building block that's amazing with sandalwood; in Samsara last week, it merged with Mysore sandalwood in the old and Australian in the new. In Chanel No. 5 Eau Première (the variant I can stand), the ylang-sandalwood combination is gorgeous. And in Santal Blush, mingled with the heat of cinnamon, that floral compound is the blush. Imagine being shoved onstage, being mortified and unprepared and flushed—and then you discover that you actually like being there, you're maybe a born performer after all. Santal Blush isn't a loud or showy fragrance (on me, at least), but it's an interesting mix of vulnerable beauty turning into confidence.

So I tried it a seventh time, a big smear on my wrist. No floral. What.

An eighth time. Bigger smear. Wrist. No floral.

A NINTH time, the back of my hand. BOOOOOOSH. ~JASMINE

I cannot explain this. See, I often wear fragrance on the back of my hand because I type so much; if it's on my wrists, I'm just crushing perfume into my laptop. I know the back of the hand isn't a pulse point, but I get a nice waft of scent now and then while I'm working (alone, not bothering anyone). I would have thought that my wrists would have done more for the perfume, but no: Santal Blush only gets interesting on the back of my hand.

The sandalwood is still, however, dry as fuck. I even went and checked my sample of Nemat's Australian sandalwood oil—it has the same characteristic cedar-like pencil-shaving quality, but it also has a lovely citrus aspect, somehow, that keeps it from smelling actually scratchy. An even cheaper essential oil I had was lower quality, but still smoother than Santal Blush. What this tells me is that you don't end up a sandalwood fragrance THIS DRY unless you get up early in the morning and put some work into it.

I don't know why Tom Ford—or rather, perfumer Yann Vasnier—went this route, but Santal Blush is clearly leaning into the comparative dryness of Australian sandalwood, supporting it with the bark of a cinnamon stick, “sweaty” cumin, maple syrup-inflected fenugreek, and woody, earthy carrot seed. It even uses benzoin (a mild vanillic resin said have a touch of cinnamon) rather than a creamy or fruity vanilla. And this is the same variety of sandalwood (give or take some specific synthetics, probably) used in the new Samsara, mind you. That current formulation uses its floral building block—rose, jasmine, and its spicy, Juicy Fruit-y ylang-ylang—to offset the dryness of Santalum spicatum, and its green top notes give the perfume an airy, unexpected freshness. Back to Santal Blush—whatever components were actually used, Vasnier emphasizes (to my nose) jasmine and the spicy aspect of ylang rather than the creamy or fruity—no "bubblegum" note. As far as I can tell, everything in this fragrance has been engineered to be as arid as possible.

I'm not sure why, exactly. "Parched" is not really my association with blushing, unless the point is make the woody base so dry that the spicy floral really stands apart as a metaphorical rush of blood rising to the surface. If that's the case, then this perfume only works "correctly" on the back of my hand.

What do I get on my wrist, then?

The sandalwood

Not much

The cumin

When I was a teenager in the '90s and used a portable CD player with a headphone jack, I used to like to pull it halfway out; I'd have to turn the volume way up to hear it, but I'd get a somewhat muffled background layer of whichever song (mostly bass guitar, drums, and background vocals) that fascinated me. Putting this perfume on my wrist is like pulling the jack halfway out of Santal Blush. I don't get much cumin even considering that, but I can start to smell the idea of the human body beneath the blush.

Cumin is a real interesting note to throw in here, by the way. It's often used to give a note of "sweat" or "body musk," and I know this because people constantly complain about it on fragrance sites and forums. As Angela at Now Smell This writes,

Few notes in fragrance are as polarizing as cumin. Some people associate cumin with sweat or food, and even the tiniest hint of it will cause them to double-bag a perfume sample and take it to the garbage can in the backyard. Other people, including me, like the carnal edge cumin adds to a fragrance.

To elaborate a bit on the "carnal" idea, I've posted a story that I can't believe I just told about why you'd put a seemingly unpleasant "body musk" into a fragrance. Short version: it could simply remind you of being sweaty with someone—or it actually could prompt a physical sensation.

(Santal Blush is by no means the only fragrance to use cumin; "cooking spices" in perfume might be a post unto itself, if you want to get into the use of coriander, nutmeg, and caraway. The cumin-forward fragrances I see mentioned most often are Rochas Femme, Jean-Paul Gaultier's Le Mâle, and Alexander McQueen's Kingdom.)

I actually like cumin a lot as a cooking spice that I know mostly from Mexican food, although it's also used in curry, baharat, chili powder, other spice mixes across cuisines, and Traditional Chinese Medicine. But, to put it lightly, a lot of people do not care for it. Much as with oud (which is also in Santal Blush—"agarwood"), this might be a cultural—bias? Lack of appreciation? Or it might just be that it truly doesn't work with an individual's chemistry. (It seems to do fine with mine, albeit faintly here.) As the Fragrenza blog notes,

Cumin, however, is a unique spice due to its animal-like note, which imparts a sensual, strong, and persistent aroma to fragrance compositions. While the odor can sometimes resemble sweat, animal notes in perfumery are highly useful for their capacity to fix other components and enhance their scents. When used precisely and sparingly, cumin lends strength and character to fragrances.

At Côté Bougie, "5 unusual facts to know about the scent kamoun (cumin)":

The use of cumin goes back so far that it is even mentioned in the Old Testament and in various Greek writings. Its oldest trace of use has been dated to at least 5000 years ago and located in the Nile Valley region. It was present in the pharaonic tombs without doubt for its unique scent. In the Middle Ages, it was used as currency. And in ancient times, it was used as a pepper in cooking thanks to its very aromatic flavor. [...] Cumin has always been known for its powerful smell. It gives off a spicy, woody and aniseed scent. In the family of spicy fragrances, cumin brings a touch apart since it also diffuses an amber note.

Make new friends (I've got a licorice/anise post coming up soon) and keep the old (our pal amber), as they say. And benzoin would support the cumin to create an even more lasting, amber-y effect. The cultural history implied by cumin also underlines the (sigh) "exotic" quality. Fortunately, there's no orientalist storytelling around the name GUERLAIN; the "blush" is an olfactory effect, not a stereotype.

And the cumin, oud, and (unspecified) musk give that blush a human foundation, even though it comes out really lightly on me. It may be that Santal Blush has been recently reformulated for the cheaper, because older reviews speak of a much creamier, longer-lasting fragrance, and I can't get this to last more than 4-5 hours under the best conditions. I would like it to be less dry and more balanced, no matter how much a showcase it's meant to be for Australian sandalwood—like, "moist." I'm trying not to say "moist." Because I don't mean it that way, and now we're just all thinking about me saying it. Maybe I should be meaning it that way—Tom Ford, as a designer and a brand, is out here with fragrances called "Lost Cherry" and "Rose Prick." You wouldn't think I'd have to coax a Tom "Fucking Fabulous" Ford fragrance out onto the stage, but here we are. Maybe Tobacco Vanille will still have some razzle-dazzle by the time I get to it.

Perfume discussion masterpost

#perfume #perfume discussion #perfume: tom ford #note: sandalwood #note: cumin #long post

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arimiadev · 9 months

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2023 Year in Review

2023 has come and gone—it feels like it was just a week ago that my grandma was complaining that Thanksgiving and Christmas were too close together, and now it’s January. I spent the last 2 weeks of 2023 sick (I still am), which made it go by like a blur.

2022 was a fresh slate for me, with a new job, a new home, and new projects. 2023 was a year of finding a new rhythm—figuring out how I work best and molding my work time around that rather than trying to make myself go against the flow.

Working from home is truly a blessing and a curse. I do think that it has more positives than negatives (especially right now as I’m able to work while being sick and don’t have to take time off), but navigating around the negatives is tricky. The main problem I’ve faced, aside from lack of interaction with non-family, is that it’s harder for me to focus on work when I end up spending almost all of my awake hours at my desk, either for my fulltime job or for VN development or for relaxing.

I’ve had to mix things up, usually taking my laptop to other parts of the house or even working outside of home some days. Even if it’s only for a few hours, it helps reset the fatigue of being at my desk all day every day. It doesn’t always work, and one problem I ran into for most of the year was being unable to focus on writing. Art and scripting are more “mindless” for me, I can do them with a video or voice call in the background, but writing is something I’ve always struggled to concentrate on.

This year was my first year attempting NaNoWriMo, though a more casual version of it. A few other devs were also entering NaNoWriMo to work on their projects so I hopped on too. I wanted to use the hype of the event to push myself to focus on writing, and it worked! My goal was to hit 30k total words in the month across multiple projects—which is about what I write in half a year—and I hit it.

Projects

Canvas Menagerie continued to be my main project in 2023. I was able to release several new demo builds for the project, mainly redoing and improving artwork for the game. My art has been improving a lot the past couple of years which is a good and a bad thing—it’s good because I’m improving and it’s bad because it means I have to redo or edit older game art!

I was also able to finish writing Act 2, meaning that Canvas Menagerie is 2/3rds written! A lot of good progress was made on it this year and I hope to continue (and maybe finish?) that this year.

I also got a trailer for it by Hatoge, a fellow BL developer! It came out so nice…

youtube

My other main project for 2023 was Lost Lune, a project I started in 2022. It was meant to be a small-ish project for Winter VN Jam 2022, but I ran into some issues with the story structure.

Lost Lune is a story I like but have had a hard time figuring out how to put the world and characters into words. I have an understanding on how the plot progresses, but due to a few different reasons it’s been hard to actually write it. One reason has been the unconventional format for the story, with it flipping between the past and present in a linear way. The other reason I’ve had a hard time with it is the character personalities—Weiss, the main character, is much more forward, blunt, and promiscuous than characters I’ve written before. It’s also the darkest setting I’ve ever written in as it’s set in a post apocalypse.

Thanks to NaNoWriMo I was able to get over 9k more written for the story, leading to about half of the story currently being written. I’d like for the project to be finished this year, but it’s hard to say when.

A small project I worked on for Ludum Dare & Otome Jam this year was a short game featuring some of my oldest OCs, where you play as a witch returning home and helping her father’s delivery service. I wanted to make something more experimental than what I usually make and something just for me.

I ended up adding some extra features to it but never released the updated build, so maybe sometime in the future…

My last project for this year was Asphodelium, my Winter VN Jam 2023 entry. I’ve had a hard time describing it, but basically it’s a dark slice of life romance about the members of a disbanded adventurer’s guild after stopping a doomsday cult at the cost of killing their former leader who betrayed them. Hazel, the one who dealt the final blow, has had the hardest time moving on—until one day he’s approached by a man with the same face as their dead leader.

This was a story I got the idea for sometime in September and began writing on a whim in the middle of October and ended up writing a majority of in November for NaNoWriMo. I didn’t expect the script to get far but here I am, 40k words later…

I finished the script and most of the art in December but was unable to completely finish the game because I got sick before Christmas. Just another WIP to finish this year…

Articles

This year I didn’t make as many articles as in years prior, a trend that will probably go forward. I do still want to write articles on marketing and visual novel dev, but I feel like it’s a waste of time to rehash old topics or talk about social media algorithms and such.

One thing I started this year for articles was interviews with fellow developers, starting with my friend ingthing. I don’t want my articles to be just my own opinions, so I want to get more voices out there. In 2024 I want to do more interviews with other devs to share their views on development.

With a record high amount of games we had to judge for Spooktober VN Jam this year, I wrote up a post about my takeaways from the jam with some commentary from my fellow judges. I was blown away by the response the article received, with it being one of my top 3 articles of all time now.

My last blog post—I hesitate to call it an article—that I wrote in one frantic day somehow was my favorite of the year. After months of radio silence from Aniplex US about Mahoyo, the first TYPE-MOON (pure) visual novel to be released officially in English on Steam, I did a deep dive into why they had forsaken such easy money by refusing to market it. The end result? Well, we’ll probably never know why, but it’s clear that someone at Aniplex made the decision to not give a budget to their marketing teams for Mahoyo and instead let the fans market it themselves.

Art

This year was a bit sparse for full artworks, with a majority of them being for Canvas Menagerie. I got a lot more comfortable drawing his hair!

I also got more into Holostars EN this year with the introduction of the second half of Holostars Tempus, the Vanguard unit (but mainly Gavis Bettel). I was following Tempus from the beginning and was a big fan of Magni and Vesper, but Bettel won as my kamioshi. He’s also the only one in the snapshot above (for August) that’s fanart, as the rest are OCs.

Goals

2023 Goals:

Fully write Act 2 of Canvas Menagerie: Canvas Menagerie is currently split up into 3 acts, around 50k words long for each act. I was able to finish the first draft for Act 2 in October! It ended up being much shorter than I estimated, but that’s how things go sometimes.

Release demo for Lost Lune: …Well, this kinda happened but not really. I wanted to release a longer demo for Lost Lune as the current playable build is more like a teaser—it’s very short and only features 2 out of an estimated 20~ days. I did however end up reprogramming the playable build, changing the main character from a side sprite to being on screen with several other visual changes. I’m much happier with this direction for the game.

Write more consistent devlogs: This also didn’t really happen as my intention was to write an article a month, but with our physicals Kickstarter earlier this year, other things took higher priority. I also realized pretty early on in the year that I’m tired of writing about social media algorithms and want to write about more interesting game dev and marketing topics, like case studies and such.

Open a merch shop: This was the first goal I accomplished this year! It was also the easiest since it was already mostly set up. You can see the merch shop for my games here—I think it’s pretty cute.

2024 Goals:

Fully write Act 3 of Canvas Menagerie: Self-explanatory. I want to get to a first draft state for all of CM. I doubt I’ll be able to finish the game next year unless I get a whirlwind of inspiration as it still needs around 40-50k words, 25+ CGs, 5+ character sprites and more, but we’ll see how far I get.

Write more of Lost Lune: I was able to write over 10k this year for Lost Lune while working on other stuff and in 2024 I want to get close to finishing the script if not finishing it.

Release the full version & an artbook for Asphodelium: Due to getting sick at the end of December, I wasn’t able to fully release Asphodelium. It’s pretty close to being done so it shouldn’t take long to finish it. I also want to release a (digital) artbook for it, as I have a lot of design notes for the LI. It’s also been quite a while since I released an artbook so I want to try making one again.

Go to an out-of-town convention: All my life, I’ve only ever attended the anime conventions in the Memphis area. Despite Memphis being a big city, the conventions here…aren’t really ran by people who want to expand it or even really change anything, so for the past decade it’s been in stagnation. At Studio Élan we’re boothing at more conventions this year, and I want to help! I’m hoping to go to Offkai Expo this summer.

Share more VNs I like: Thanks to rejoining Tumblr in late 2022, I’ve become more acquainted with visual novel players over there and I want to talk more about visual novels that I play. There’s a lot of great games out there that people just don’t hear about, so I want to talk about VNs more.

I feel like in 2023 I was starting to find my “thing”—I really like talking about VNs and I want to share unheard of and underrepresented developers to others! I’ve become bored of making generic marketing articles but I’ve found joy in making posts in collaboration with other devs or sharing other VNs.

2024 is a bit of a scary year and has me rather nervous, but I hope we’ll all make it through it. I want to finish some of the stuff I’ve began and I want to share more lesser known visual novels.

I hope this year will be better for us all. Until next time!

— Arimia

#visual novel #my games #my art #Youtube

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washipink · 1 year

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Rain by Jocelyn Samara D Year 1: 2010-2011

erSo I recently found out that 1 year ago, a comic that was INCREDIBLY important to me as a trans middle schooler who went to catholic school had wrapped up. This year, I’ve decided I’m going to read through and review Rain by Jocelyn Samara, 1 year of the comic’s run at a time. First up: Year 1, which covers Chapter 1 (The New Girl) through Chapter 6 (Fallen Angel). I’ll be summarizing the story and characters for those unfamiliar, so feel free to follow along.

There’s a LONG-ASS post under that read more. If you have any experience with the comic or enjoy the post, please talk about it with me. It’ll be a good time.

Year 1 Summary

The star of the show is Rain, a transgender 17 year old girl who moved in with her Aunt Fara after her mother’s death. It starts on the first day of her senior year of high school, the first time she’s ever tried to pass as female in front of... anyone???

Based on some of the language used in the character bios, I should be very clear that this comic is from 2010 and written by a trans woman who is most likely older than most of my followers. There may be language used that you personally don’t agree with. I’m not a fan of being called transsexual myself, but there’s nothing wrong with saying it.

Anyway, the basic gist is that Rain passes EXCELLENTLY and attracts a lot of attention from her male classmates, much to her dismay.

But the men aren’t the only people with their eyes on Rain. Lesbian classmate, Maria and her fake boyfriend, Gavin make a bet of 5 United States Dollars out of who can talk to Rain first.

Here’s the rub: During Role, Gavin seems to recognize Rain’s last name. It’s the same as his childhood best friend, Ryan. Gavin and Maria then banter a little bit, jokingly saying “what if that IS Ryan? could ya believe that?”

Little do they know...

One thing about Rain is that its cast of characters is by no means infallible. Even characters that I came to love, like Maria, are kind of insensitive. Just about no one in this cast has ever MET a trans person in their lives prior to Rain. It’s very true to life in that way. You meet a lot of people that are ignorant or accidentally insensitive. And sometimes, they learn to stick up for you.

The realistic portrayal of how trans teens can be treated by other teens is one of my FAVORITE things about Rain.

Anyway, Gavin brings up Ryan Falherty to Rain, which causes her to panic and run away.

And Crash Directly into the fifth member of our main cast, RUDY!!!!

A rather gossipy gay boy that sees up Rain’s skirt and thinks she’s just a REALLY brave gay dude. He tells Gavin and Maria pretty much right away and Gavin does not take it well. The majority of Year 1 is spent on Gavin and Rain repairing their strained friendship after years apart from one another. That begins here, with Gavin confronting Rain about her identity.

Gavin’s super upset about the whole deal, but Maria and Rudy are some of Rain’s biggest shooters going forward. Even if they can ask a LOT of invasive questions.

If I’m being completely honest, there’s no MAJOR developments in Chapter 2. Fara gets a call from Rain’s older Sister about how their older Brother hasn’t talked to either of them in forever. This lays a few seeds for later events, but it is PRETTY unimportant for a while. There’s some really good emotional dialogue in it though.

In Chapter 3, Rudy’s meddling directly causes Rain and Gavin to reconcile. They have a discussion about how the reason she never told him was just that she was scared to lose her only friend.

MEANWHILE, in an attempt to make some actual friends, Fara reaches out to her neighbors and meets Ky(lie) and Heather Coven, a Gender Ambiguous Teen who goes to a different high school and her less approving older sister.

Kylie, also known as Ky, swaps gender presentations incredibly frequently, not really showing any bias for one or the other. So do not expect me to be consistent with their pronouns. Their gender is kinda messy. Almost like he’s some kind of... real person with a real life gender. Crazy.

Anyway, Fara invites them over and she and Heather get drunk, which means she can’t pick up Rain from the mall. Rain needs a place to sleep that night and Gavin invites her to stay with him.

This begins Chapter 4, in which Gavin and Rain realize that things may be different from when they were kids... but there’s a lot that hasn’t changed. Gavin remarks about how much more feminine Rain is than when she was a kid and how that’s WEIRD for him... but they end up playing a game from their childhood pretty much all night. It reminds them of all the good times and ignites within them the hope that they can have MORE good times going forward.

As an adult with friends I’ve had on-and-off relationships to, this speaks to me way more powerfully than ever before. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

The next day, during her hangover, Fara sees Rain’s older brother on an ad for a dating website with his new fiance.

And on the way back to her apartment, Rain meets Ky for the first time. Neither one of them is aware that the other one has ANY kind of Gender going on and they won’t be for quite some time.

The chapter ends with Aunt Fara telling Rain about what happened with Aiken.

Chapter 5 is a simple one, Popular prep girl, Emily is giving out invitations to a Halloween party for her “perfect senior year”

Everyone but Rudy gets one, which causes Maria to give Emily a talking to. She assures Maria that he wasn’t intentionally excluded and it definitely wasn’t because he’s the only openly gay student in the whole school.

Oh, also a dude beats Rudy up for that exact reason, earning Maria’s fury later on. Rain invites Ky to come with the rest of them to the party.

Like I said, pretty simple chapter.

The last chapter of year 1 is Chapter 6: Fallen Angel.

Everyone is showing off their Halloween costumes before they leave for the party. Rudy’s reads as a bit insensitive to rain, as he goes as.... a high school girl.

We’ve all heard this one, right? young queer person that wants to toy with their gender expression uses a Halloween costume as an excuse? It can hit different watching your friend do this when you’re a stealth trans person and especially when you’re one as self-conscious as Rain.

When they reach the address for the party, they find out that Emily... has an older Boyfriend. Like, a WAY older boyfriend. Who lets all these literal teenaged children drink at a party in HIS HOUSE.

also he’s dressed as the devil in case you needed any more signals he was BAD NEWS.

This sounds like a good time for an aside: Fara is on a date with someone she met online. He works at a manga translator and offers to get Rain a meeting with her favorite mangaka.

Meanwhile, at the party, Chase seems to recognize Rain from somewhere. What could this mean?

Anyway, remember how I mentioned the underage drinking? Yeah, Rudy is HELLA drunk. And the results are not pretty.

The whole school sees this and is... BAFFLED. Because of course, Rudy is gay. how could he kiss a girl? Did he do it because he was dressed as a girl? Was it the alcohol? was RAIN Gay? Who knows?

The chapter ends on Rain riding home in tears.

Thus ends the first year of Rain.

Art

Ok, let’s talk about the elephant in the room. This art is... not too impressive. Every character looks like they jumped out of a How to Draw Manga book and Rain’s design is VERY 2010. Backgrounds are infrequent and many panels feature just 2 characters next to each other against a flat color.

But I think that’s okay. While the visual design of Rain is not immaculate, it’s certainly passable. Samara had a story to tell and she didn’t let her art hold her back. She just took pen to paper and let it go. As the comic goes along, you can tell she’s trying different things and experimenting with drawing a variety of poses. That said, the art style never really changes at all during the comic’s run.

Pure Unfiltered Story Opinions

Rain was one of the first real queer stories I’d gotten a chance to read. At the ripe, young age of 12, every word of it was unreal to me. A girl like me made REAL friends in spite of it all and got to be who she was. And now, reading it again, it really holds up.

Rain has a depiction of queer friendships that’s very true to a lot of peoples’ lived experience. Not everyone GETS each other, but they try. Sometimes, they ask a stupid-ass question. Sometimes, you get into fights.

Also, sometimes people in your high school get prayed upon by creepy weirdos in their late 20s who think they can get easy tail from CHILDREN. (Trust, people. This gets addressed. This is NOT a fucking glorification and if anyone in the notes says it is, they’re blocked.)

I look forward to seeing where the comic goes from here and I hope you’re ready to take that journey with me.

#Rain Webcomic #Jocelyn Samara #lgbt comics #Transgender #Webcomic #Amy's Rain Review #Long Post #lgbtq #queer art

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