#this has been in my drafts since everything in december but it remains relevant.

[vulpinesaint]

btw if you care about aspec people the best thing that you can do besides openly saying that you care about aspec people is to not reblog posts that are obviously just baiting outrage. you do not have to engage with things. if you see something that an aspec person says that you think is stupid that's fine. people are stupid sometimes. but then let's think down the line of reasoning that's going to inevitably follow where your harmless thought of "this person is a little too blue hair and pronouns social justice warrior/self centered/oblivious" gets turned into "this person is an idiot and it's because they're aspec" which gets turned into "awesome! an opportunity to make fun of aspecs!". not to get all slippery slope about it but a lot of you have too much faith in random people having good intentions. when there's a repeated history of people taking any fucking chance they can get to hate aspec people then maybe we can let the screenshot of this one person being stupid pass on by

[seakittens]

Retconning Tachibana Makoto: A Heavier MakoRin

So this is probably the rough draft of a larger essay I plan on doing to explore what’s happened to Makoto’s character since the end of the TV series. Both Haruka and Makoto have received several character tweaks, starting in Staring Days and carried into Bonds and the Free novelization. While some of the tweaks made to Haruka in Starting Days were  awkward, I think Makoto has suffered the worst from  the changes. I refer to these changes as retcons since they affect the canon we already know (High Speed, Free and Eternal Summer) and alter our perception of various events and motivations. It remains to be seen how much they will affect future material since massive character development in Eternal Summer would render much of these changes moot. But they do affect how one understands characters, particularly their relationships with one another.

For this first dive, I will be focusing on the Makoto/Rin relationship since it is my favorite Makoto relationship and I feel that the retcon has affected it more than any other. That said, even Makoto/Haruka has been affected by these changes.

Please note that as I am very attached to MakoRin, this essay will get negative because MakoRin has not fared well under Makoto’s new handlers at KyoAni. I have done my best to maintain balance so this isn’t nothing but a miserable mess, but this is your warning. Also spoilers for Promises and the Free novelization.

Of all the things KyoAni has done, the critical changes they have made to the Makoto/Rin relationship hurt me the most. Because even with all my salt toward Starting Days all but ignoring Rin, it hadn't damaged Style 5. The Free novel actively damages MakoRin, turning Rin into a  constant source of anxiety for Makoto instead of a friend he wants  to help. 

Novel!Makoto is obsessed with Haruka and only Haruka and barely has an interest in the rest of Iwatobi, as seen in pretty much any scene that involves Rei or Nagisa and Makoto. It’s an ugly change that messes with so many things I enjoyed about Makoto. Especially him being friends with the group because they gave him courage. Novel!Makoto has no courage (yet) and dreams of a world where he doesn't have to deal with Haruka facing the harshness of reality. One where Haruka  will be the same forever. Where nothing will change for them. Even at the end of the novel, Makoto only accepts Rin's place in Haruka's life and Haruka's own future path as inevitable. But I wouldn't say it feels particularly  positive from his POV. This overall change in Makoto's character inadvertently (?) casts shade on crucial MakoRin moments in season one, making the phone call from Episode 2 more about Haruka's needs than Makoto reaching out to Rin. While Novel!Makoto understands Rin’s value to Haruka, he is terrified of losing the life he’s always known with Haruka, as seen in his dream at the start o the novel, where Haruka and Rin are leaving him behind in the water. Rin is a force that frightens Novel!Makoto, to the point that he  dreams of a world where Rin hasn’t changed their lives, where Rin and Haruka don’t meet at the train station that December day. 

Whereas initial interpretation of the MakoRin relationship in Free lent itself to seeing Makoto as worried about both Haruka and Makoto, Novel!Makoto clearly prioritizes Haruka and feels lost around Rin. As much as Novel!Makoto still wants Rin to be  happy, as seen in an added  scene of Makoto hearing Rin laugh with Ai, he does not think that he (and by extension, Haruka) can be part of that yet. Again, a lot of Novel!Makoto’s issues with Rin  revolve around fear. And while we’ve always known that Makoto had his fears, the novel takes this to another  level. Rin is best kept at a distance.

Now, this isn't to say the novel does the same to Rin. I would say that Rin still cares deeply about Makoto and views him as his friend. As we know from S1, Rin has always cared about Makoto, even worrying about him swimming at the beach. The novel doesn’t change that. But it's harder to say that it's always gone both ways with Makoto. In fact, even in existing canon, Makoto seems oblivious to the concept that Rin can prioritize him (despite things like Rin setting up Makoto’s birthday). This is something that is actually addressed in ES, especially the new material in Promises. Makoto is genuinely surprised by Rin's interest in his future, believing that he is low priority compared to Haruka. He expects Rin to view him as  peripheral to Haruka, as Makoto views Rin as peripheral to Haruka. This is a sentence I hate to write, but every Makoto POV in the novel confirms this. Makoto’s focus is Haruka and only Haruka. He’s simply too scared to step out of his comfort zone.

Also, this isn't to say Makoto doesn't change. The whole point of Makoto's arc in Eternal Summer is his character development. And I think it's clear that Makoto is, on a whole, more at ease with Rin after S1, responding to silly calls to help with a kitten or even calling him to ask about a relay. I know many have pointed to how easily Makoto and Rin seem to communicate with one another via phone, unlike the rest of the cast. But I think now, knowing what I know about Makoto, that those conversations are primarily about joint team stuff and not so much casual conversation. 

I don't think Makoto’s entire character development regarding Rin comes until near the end of the season, when he calls Rin to ask for help with Haruka. In this moment, especially in the new scene in Promises, Makoto is showing that sees Rin as a positive force in his and Haruka's lives, that he trusts that Rin can do something he cannot do and he's all right with that. It’s all right if Rin takes Haruka out of Makoto’s life because Haruka  is following that path without even realizing it. It’s what Haruka was meant to do. This  is a huge scene for Makoto and for MakoRin. And I think it's vital to their relationship development, given this new take on Makoto via the novel.

This isn't to say that this Makoto retcon is wrong necessarily. There's nothing wrong with making a character messier than he appeared. It's nice to see a Makoto who isn't the pure angel fandom portrays him as. This new take on Makoto shows him to be a bit more selfish, more wary and more insular. He’s just  as afraid of change as Haruka, just less aware of it. He can be friendly but Haruka will always come first. We started to see more of this, with Makoto’s behavior in Starting Days. And the assumed knowledge that despite his growing friendship with the Iwatobi Middle School team, Makoto abandoned them when Haruka quit the team. Overal, this is a more complicated take on Makoto than what was originally presented.

But it also means that MakoRin fandom can no longer hold onto its long-held claim that MakoRin understand each other better than anyone else in the show. They clearly don't, at least not on Makoto's side. I do believe Rin understands Makoto more. I think Rin, to an extent, does harbor some jealousy at how Makoto can connect with Haruka in ways he cannot due to their long friendship. But I also think Rin is more actively aware of those feelings and therefore they don't cripple him as Makoto's do because Makoto actively represses them. It makes their relationship complicated and messy in some ways. Which again, is not necessarily bad. It's just not what made me fall in love with MakoRin. And I do believe that by the end of ES, they are in a position where they could have a strong and meaningful relationship because they do bring out the rarest sides in each other. Makoto just needs to be more honest with Rin and with himself about his feelings so they can finally move past this unspoken wedge between them and see each other for who they truly are. Makoto is no angel and Rin is no untouchable god force who exists only to throw everything into chaos.

I suppose I just miss the pureness and fluff of MakoRin when Free originally ended. It didn't have all these messy parts. It was just two friends who really cared about each other.  Now, it's a bit more one-sided on Rin's part. And while depth and dimensions are nice, sometimes you just want something cute.

I do hope the ES novel addresses Makoto's changing relationship with Rin in more depth since it's such a massive focus of the Free novel. I doubt Take Yoru Marks will. But I think this is important to hear in Makoto's own words how things have changed since S1. Maybe then KyoAni can give meaning to this retcon of Makoto’s character.

I also wish KyoAni would stop confusing character development with angst in Makoto's case. Giving Makoto more angst doesn't really improve his character. The same goes for Sousuke.

Overall, I regret this retcon more than anything else KyoAni has done since the series ended its TV run, and it has probably made me more bitter toward Free than I have been in the past. Because MakoRin was my fluffy joy. And now it's a lot more messy and I have to get used to that. I wish Makoto didn't have to suffer in KyoAni's struggle to make him more relevant. I hope to see things that will make me feel better about this change.

I will tackle what the Makoto retcon  means to the Makoto/Haruka and Makoto/Iwatobi relationships at a later date. 

I’ve been a long time since I did meta and I’m a little rusty so feel free to challenge where you may.

[andrewuttaro]

New Look Sabres: Midseason Thoughts

Happy New Year! The Buffalo Sabres game against the Florida Panthers tomorrow will be their 41st game. By my calculation that’s the halfway point of the season and I think my math skills are at least good enough for basic division. This landmark of the season had me thinking we ought to take a look at the season as whole here when we’re about halfway certain what it’s going to end up looking like. Yea, perhaps we can be a little more than halfway certain with our predictions at this point but just let me show off my basic math skills, ok? I initially started thinking about the grand scheme of things about this season back after the Sabres met the Leafs the first time at the start of December. True rivalry games like that always get me thinking. There is a lot more to digest about this season based on the first half than my most optimistic self would’ve thought in September. I remember predicting the Sabres would have a winning record in October like I was going out on a limb. The expectations clearly changed this season, early on two: like the first twenty odd something games it became clear the corner had finally been turned. There’s a lot to that and I will dive into some of the minutia of that in later thoughts but perhaps it’s wiser first to reflect. Before I started New Look Sabres I wrote hockey articles on and off for different outlets and even freelance like this. I have no writing degrees so my thoughts were encapsulated in slick declarative titles: 2013-2014 was the Dawn of the Tank, 2014-2015 was the War of the Tanks, 2015-2016 was the New Guard Rising, 2016-2017 was the lost season and 2017-2018 was… *shutters* … the trash season. Jack Eichel’s rookie year had its optimism as you can see but the seasons to follow showed the things wrong with the team needed fixing. Certainly not all those problems are fixed but what might this season be called? I feel that the first half of this season has already given us a pretty solid idea…

…2018-2019 is the Reclamation. The season the Sabres reclaimed not only relevance but the mantle of the minimum level of quality Sabres teams have had over the last forty nine years. Moreover, the Buffalo Sabres as a club reclaimed their fans: not just the diehards who look at draft rankings in January, the casual fans and the ones who just don’t want to be miserable watching hockey. The runner up name was the Found Money Season. That’s where my first thought starts. This team has turned a corner; they’re a playoff contender now. At least they acted like it in the first half. Expectations should remain there. Make the playoffs, please oh please make the playoffs; divisional or a more likely wildcard, just make it. Anything that happens beyond that is a gift; found money if you will. If the Sabres win a game there: excellent if they win a round, fantastic! If they get swept, okay whatever. I want to say this now not just to get ahead of crazy March and April sound bites but to remind us all not to sell the farm. The playoff race, the playoffs themselves and everything that comes before is a learning experience more than anything else. I would say some young guys on this team don’t know what the Stanley Cup playoffs are like but really it’s true with every member of the Sabres core including Jeff Skinner. Pominville is really your only guy who’s not a former Blue who can tell you about that. Bank points through the second half, make the playoffs and from there on out its whatever this season. No expectation past game 82 except learn. Learn what it means to be in the playoffs and play like it. The second half will be decisive if not for playoff positioning than simple team building. Not the roster building GMs do, no: Build Buffalo Sabres hockey. Learn it, and then teach us what it’s like. Playoffs are just proof of competitiveness, that’s all the Sabres need to prioritize right now on that front: growth in competitiveness.

They’ve found some kind of groove already this season but in the second half the Sabres need to lock down their style, their game, their groove and put it to the test in the playoffs against whoever they face. It seems cruel to use this phrase sometimes as a Sabres fan knowing what we’ve been through but we’re still in a building year. I am not going to be offended if Jason Botterill goes out and acquires a small piece or two but it better not be expensive and it better not be a rental. Reward these guys with a weapon that will be here a little while. Rental players you get for a playoff run or a season and a half rarely make the huge difference you want them to make. Reinforce the defense or shore up secondary scoring if you make a move. That’s how you’ll reward a Sabres team that turned it around this season. The Playoff window is just opening, the Stanley Cup window has not opened yet. Don’t buy a lot by selling futures when our focus is experience and growth as a team. So yes, reward them for what they’ve done with a cheaper move but don’t make the move that will be seen as demanding a deep run at the Cup. That rewarding the group is important in its own way. Maybe, although cheap wouldn’t be the word I use to describe it, that reward is signing Jeff Skinner since he wants to stay? Hmm.

My second thought I already touched on a little bit: it’s consistency. This Buffalo Sabres team is remarkably streaky and that’s fine when there’s enough wins in there to make it work but that’s not a habit of Stanley Cup teams. Consistently winning, or being damn close to it, requires not just one line action like we saw almost exclusively in December, but secondary scoring and a defensive core that contributes as well. Some of that you develop and call up in house but maybe, once again at a good price, you bring in a piece for the parts here that are not producing at all. My third point is a discussion of goaltending. The Carter Hutton-Linus Ullmark tandem has been top ten in this league in goals against and save percentage. Given where each of those guys is in their careers you expect a drop off at some point. That drop off has not come yet and any strategizing for it seems a little moot right now. That said, it would be good if Ullmark good get more starts in the second half. An 8-1-3 record in his 13 starts is safe enough a bet to trust him. Trust in him will build confidence and if he is the goalie of the future in Buffalo, which I truly believe he is, he needs that. Yea, he got pulled before the third in that one game, he’ll have his mistakes like any goalie does but I could not feel happier about the Sabres situation in net right now.

My fourth point: SIGN JEFF SKINNER! LOL, no that’s important but it’s not actually a midseason thought. No, I want to talk more generally about the season now; where we’ve been and where we’re going. The beginning of the season can really be thought of us as before and after Jeff Skinner got put on Eichel’s wing. After that 5-1 rout on the road against San Jose Phil Housley took a blender to the lineup and got some good results. Four wins came in the next eight games and then the next major phase of the Sabres season happened when everyone kicked into over gear and the ten game win streak hit. For three weeks the Sabres felt invincible beating teams like Tampa, Winnipeg and San Jose pulling in every Western New York Hockey fan that had since gotten tired of Sabres sorrows. The five game skid that followed the win streak wasn’t as bad as it felt and the wins came back although Buffalo is still in a post-win streak hangover from a standings perspective barely playing .500 hockey since the big one. From here on out the road map to the playoffs is simpler than seven years outside the playoffs might lead you to believe, at least until the end of January. It’s banking points, particularly in Western Canada before the bye week late in January, before suiting up for a stretch run in February and March that only sees two breaks of more than two days. The back half will be a crucible after the bye week and there will be teams, even ones not names Boston, Montreal or the Islanders, who will give you fits and make you work for that playoff berth we’ve all been dying for.

This blog is going to change a little bit in the second half of the season as well. Hopefully it won’t be a crucible to get through but I am making myself think harder for my comedic bits starting now. Instead of the burn book for all our reasons to hate divisional rivals in those games, each game against an Eastern Conference opponent will feature a bit on what facing them in the first round of the playoffs would mean. This will be understandably silly against some opponents like Ottawa and New Jersey but it should be fun. Some programming notes: seasons for this blog will revolve around the post season. The blog season ends when the Sabres are eliminated from contention for Lord Stanley’s Cup whether that be March *shutters* or early May. The blog season will formally end with a 2018-2019 Season retrospective followed by a break before the draft that may or may not see some kind of “Playoffs according to the Sabres” and or another Schedule breakdown depending on when that releases. If you care enough about the blog to read through that then thank you, I wish you had cared enough to drop me a comment or two going into this but I’m not bitter: it’s a super chill hockey blog, I don’t expect my writing here to attract deep thought. That said, deep thoughts appreciated.

Thanks for reading.

P.S. I want to signal boost the opinion that if the Sabres do not make the playoffs in 2019 then Phil Housley’s job should be at stake. A collapse great enough to ruin the 11 point lead on a playoff spot they had in November is already well in progress. Lots of hockey left but there’s the objective.