#there was.. so much they could've done with this movie

[altraviolet]

TFOne!

I enjoyed it! Spoilery thoughts under the cut.

The scenery was so artfully and beautifully done!

-The way Iacon was built, with buildings coming up from the ground and down from the 'sky,' was so pretty! Actually, it's not until just NOW that I'm realizing how that works. The buildings are basically stalactites and stalagmites underground- attached to the ceiling and floor of an unimaginably huge cave.

-The surface! A fantastic feeling of awe as the characters rode up to the surface to find the stars and the landscape and the colors. The changing/rippling surface was super intriguing and I think that some of the first canon descriptions of Cybertron included that element - constantly changing landscape - but, citation needed. The wildlife and the flora were so pretty. I personally would've loved to see more about that, but I know in a kid's movie we have to focus on other things xD

-The character designs themselves I'm not super in love with, but they're not bad, they're fine. It was fun to watch the background for familiar characters, and MY GOD the "Jazz gets doorwingies and they bounce" moment was SO CUTE! Loved that.

The writing was totally fine. We definitely get invested in the characters. It was very nice to see the friends -> enemies pipeline in action. The moment Sentinel Prime mentioned his dead fellow Primes I thought, "lol bet you killed them" and yeah. As each scene progresses, you can easily predict what's going to happen plot-wise. But, you know, kid's movie, lol. You have a pretty simple premise, a few characters, some good dynamics... yeah, it did a good job balancing all that. If it weren't a kid's movie, it could've cut back on the 'humorous' moments (or made them less slapsticky) and spent more time on other things, and still retained the positive elements :D

Some things TFOne did very well that I hope future offerings from the franchise adapt:

-focus on smaller group of characters (especially if in a movie. a comic or serialized show can support a larger cast)

-focus on NOT THE WAR. we've seen it. we've seen iiiiiit 😭 give us more 'day in the life.' mining, racing- these are all nice glimpses into previously established, normal things. TF is science fiction: leaning into the worldbuilding for Cybertronians will add soooo much to the storytelling

-no humans 🎉🎉🎉🎉 this is a personal preference of mine, of course, but I would much rather watch the robots interact with each other, and their culture and their world, than see them come to earth and do the "revealed to humans" thing for the 4000th time. also, the humans are usually so annoying. my god. let the robots be the human analogs- that is what sci fi is. we see ourselves in other worlds, etc etc.

Where do we go from here, story-wise?

A quick recap of the conflicts in TFOne:

-OP-D friendship turmoil

-Sentinel Prime('s lies) vs the reality of the world

-Cybertronians vs Quintessons

By the end this changes to:

-OP vs Meg, and by extension, Autobots vs Decepticons

(-Sentinel Prime is dead)

-Quintessons are still out there soooo...??

It's a natural segue to The (civil) War, but the external threat from the Quintessons still exists. It'd be interesting to see what a sequel did, addressing that. OP would be fighting two fronts... which would naturally push the Autobots to finally abandon Cybertron, which is what leads to Earth landings and meeting with humans. But the movie ends with Cybertron overflowing in energon: now it's even more appealing to the Quintessons.

idk man. I'd love to see a different solution to what we've seen before.

anyway, this is long enough. I do recommend seeing the movie, if you can. It's visually stunning and fun. I hope it does well so that Uncle Hasbro dumps more money into this kind of storytelling.

On a personal note, I saw this with the 2 friends I saw RoTB with last year, and afterwards, we posed in front of the giant poster stand thingy in the movie theater lobby. My friend held up a finger like ☝️ as in "one" as in TF One, lol, so now when I think of this movie it comes with that sign

TF☝️

[w3tn3t]

[2021 Mortal Kombat Movie AU]

I think Shang Tsung granted Bi-Han his immortality after he killed Hanzo & the Shirai Ryu, so this time Bi-Han adds one more thing to their agreement: his brother will also become immortal. (Kuai Liang is probably the only thing he feels something for)

He wants Kuai to fight beside him, but Kuai can't bear to see what his brother has become in action so Bi-Han convinces Shang Tsung to let him go and live his life, even if he's not happy about it. Bi-Han is capable and vicious enough to do whatever the sorcerer asks of him on his own.

So Kuai spends centuries in different countries, doing different jobs, eventually settling down somewhere in America. Maybe he owns a farm, lol. Living in a remote location would help him go unnoticed on how he's not aging. All the while, Bi-Han keeps an eye on him from afar, getting rid of people who get too close to blowing Kuai's cover, not that he knows about it.

Anyway, after Cole escapes Bi-Han for the first time, Shang Tsung decides to play dirty and has Bi-Han bring Kuai Liang into the fold. He glamors a kombatant mark onto Kuai and has him run into Sonya while "escaping" Bi-Han. He joins her, Cole and Kano from there on. He strikes up a friendship with Sonya, but it's Cole he really hits it off with. Kuai was already doubting his mission but it's getting worse every moment.

They do the whole arcana thing, and the defenders are kind of put off when he "unlocks" his ice powers, but he's nothing like the creeping menace Bi-Han is so they write it off.

Kuai does his best to support Cole as he tries and fails to unlock his. Having lived so long without regular human contact, Kuai can come off as a bit intense, but he makes up for it with how earnest and genuine he is. (Cole might be starting to doubt his sexuality, a little.)

Kano still betrays the team but he runs into Kuai when he's about to destroy the relic that keeps up the force field. Kuai has a change of heart and attempts to stop Kano, but they destroy the relic anyways during their fight. Kano gives Kuai "a chance", to keep what happened to himself as long as he won't get in Kano's way again. Afraid of what the sorcerer will do, Kuai goes with Kano. He stands by Bi-Han's side before the defenders, to the tune of betrayed shouts. Sonya seems angriest while Cole is just disappointed.

The next time he's seen again is in the final scene with Bi-Han. Allison and Emily are still frozen, but the reason they aren't completely encased in a block of ice like Bi-Han might've done by himself is Kuai's coaxing. They can still be saved by design.

Hanzo's appearance was a bit funny imo, so I'd turn that into just him "possessing" Cole to a degree, or enhancing his abilities/guiding him like Sento does for Kenshi. Even with all that, Bi-Han gets Cole into a "say your last words" position. So Cole does a bit of a BotR speech that finally gives Kuai the push he needs and he turns on Bi-Han. He freezes Bi-Han solid but has to keep at it lest Bi-Han break free. He tells Cole to tend to his family, and that he'll deal with Bi-Han.

The defenders arrive, thaw Allison and Emily and get out of there, reluctantly leaving Kuai behind. The rest goes as normal.

After Shang Tsung is defeated, Bi-Han and Kuai go missing. The good ending is the brothers' lifespans becoming normal in the absence of Shang Tsung (if they were 30 they still have like 40 years to live), and Kuai taking steps to rehabilitate Bi-Han. Maybe his path crosses with Cole again, someday.

The sad ending is the brothers perishing immediately without Shang Tsung's magic, lol

(I wanted to make Kuai the Kitana to Cole's Lui Kang but the plot had a mind of its own, lol)

[worstloki]

saw someone on twitter say "one of the main characters in a loki show should have been thor odinson, not some random Sylvie or Mobius.

...... It's like a written law"

wdyt do you agree

I don't think it was necessary to make Thor a main character in a Loki show, the same way it WOULD be possible to throw together a Thor movie without having Loki be a main focus.

The issue comes in the quality of the narrative itself, and writing that if evidently without intention to care for (whichever) main character's importance will not work out. Neither the Loki series nor Thor 4 cared about the arc, motivations, history, or continuity of the titular characters beyond trying to make the media marketable.

Overall messaging can add a layer to the impact a story will have. Musical score can be a bonus way to control tone or tie a story together. Supporting cast can be vital to tell a good story. Prioritising their presence over anyone's (especially Loki's) characterisation is what the Loki series suffered from, not that other, original-adjacent characters were there.

[junebugdunes]

I hope the guilt hits you like a brick

[bunnihearted]

🧸♡ ⋆｡˚

[beepoid]

i don't need to be reminded that this game was originally headed by the kingdom hearts dude. luna going "i know you will" echoed the sora/kairi moment at the end of KH1 so loudly that i could tell it was him from a mile away.

[mewkwota]

Opinions on Secret Level Mega Man?

If I have to be completely honest, I cannot say I have any real excitement for this iteration. Most of my past experiences with any film-based, streaming-service-based adaptation for any video games have not been good ones. And while creative freedom to make changes to a new adaptation is one thing, what I've come across so far feel like they miss the "core" of the source material, so it's as though I am not watching something from said series but something completely different with the same name.

Could I be too hard on a simple teaser? Maybe. But the last time I had huge hopes for something I liked, the people behind it seemed to think their changes were fixing problems that didn't exist.

Also I think that kid that may be the Mega Man in question looks like Lionsgate Pinocchio. It's giving too much "corporate-realistic" cartoon style that I'm not fond of.

[formulaheart]

hi guys twin size mattress by the front bottoms was written about sejanus and coriolanus and i wish things could've worked out in their favor

[anawrites3]

You know what really hurts me? That Peter Parker was created thanks to Dick Grayson and yet there is not one Nightwing movie, while Spiderman literally have 3 actors each with their own serie

[vulturevanity]

Your Equestria Girls rewrite sounds intriguing, look forward to the release of it. Surprised how you have Rainbow Dash as being one of the first to forgive Sunset (or at least wanting to give her another chance) while Pinkie's one of those harder to forgive Sunset. Given Rainbow's stubborn nature and Pinkie's forgiving nature, one would expect the roles to be reversed for their cases.

Oh boy. You see, I understand and very much appreciate the enthusiasm (because I have been rotating this AU in my head for years, there is none more enthusiastic about it than me), but the truth is I'm not actively planning on writing the whole thing beyond a big bullet list of how I'd rewrite the movie (which is sitting unfinished in my post drafts right now), perhaps developing some ideas further later, and maybe one or two scenes in comic format if I have the time and energy. So no fic, unfortunately, but the silver lining is that y'all can ask me about whatever parts of it you're curious about and I'll more than happily talk about it!

As for that particular character choice, it has a bit to do with their Elements and their history together. I'm stretching the timeline around a bit because time in MLP is weird, but in this AU Sunset crossed the mirror around 6 years before the events of the movie (2 portal cycles, treating a "moon" as a lunar month), and got to know the human 5 enough to call them her friends, though they weren't nearly as close to each other as their pony counterparts are. However, RD and Sunset initially bonded over similar taste in music and grew close fast. They both have big egos, but that just fed into their bond and they often got caught in a feedback loop of being dumb jocks together (and don't get me wrong, Sunset is really intelligent, but she's also... *gestures to the first movie* not very smart). They actually took guitar lessons together in this AU (since I'm also ditching Flash Sentry in this rewrite -- nothing against him, he's just script bloat).

And RD's stubbornness is precisely why she stuck with Sunset when the group broke up. While she considered both Sunset and Fluttershy close friends, Rarity, Pinkie and AJ weren't as close to them (RD and AJ butted heads more often than not, Sunset found Pinkie annoying and wasn't shy about voicing it, and Rarity simply didn't have that much in common with any of the others). So once Sunset's demeanor changed and she lashed out, the other three didn't have enough of a motivation to stick around someone so volatile, so the group split. RD stayed with the people she was the most loyal to.

[lord-rain-master]

just got home from watching nag ashwin's kalki 2898 ad and the only thing i have to say is that prabhas has never been this hot to me omg

AND i need to know how they made amitabh bachchan 8 ft tall PLEASE I NEED TO KNOW

[narryffdreaming]

Last night I watched don’t worry darling and thought of you 😅 I remember having long debates about the movie and how much I enjoyed reading your take on it. Miss having those chats! Hope you’re doing well x

ahhh <333 i miss that too! talking about movies is one of my fav things to do! im still here whenever you want to chat <33333

[death-rebirth-senshi]

Every time my mom watches Maleficent I think that I might have liked that movie more in isolation

[petalsandpurity]

i saw dune 2 last night and it is probably the first time i thought a sequel to a movie was better than the first ???????

[cryptidghost]

i need to see dune pt.2 again. just to feel it again. just to at least understand it.