#this whole section of the episode felt so off | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

simp-ly-writes · 6 days

Text

The Comment Section (pt.5)

─────── · · A Social Media AU Fic

Pairing: Spencer Agnew x gn!Reader

─ · · SUMMARY: You and Spencer get invited to another convention and host a panel; the fans are ecstatic and you have never felt so high, so happy and truly carefree in your life that makes you do things you would have no considered doing...

─ · · TAGS: SPOILERS IN TAGS!! gender-neutral pronouns, angst, social media au, suggestive themes, attempt at comedy, alcohol consumption, slowburn, light swearing, kissing, fluff, mutual pinning, friends that act like lovers, friends/lovers.

─ · · MASTERLIST | TAGLIST REQUEST | PART FOUR | PART 4.5 | PART SIX

─ · · A/N: will they... won't they...

─────── · ·

🔔 angelagiovanagiarratana, just added to their story, check it out!

─────── · ·

Much Time Later...

🔔 CreatorCon just posted, check it out!

─────── · ·

Liked by spennser, ianhecox, (name)s_username and others

CreatorCon please give a warm welcome to our newest additions to this years panel roster: (name) and Spencer Agnew from Smosh! 🎉

View all 1,577 comments

username99 not to be the grammer police or anything but you should also put (name)'s last name if you are putting Spencer's down since they are both not married 😬

↳ username01 shhh let them join the ✨ delusions ✨ ↳ username84 grammAr not grammer* ↳ username99 shut up 😘

username32 please bring back Brennan Lee Mulligan again!! I am on my hands and knees begging you, please!!!

username22 spencer helping (name) up the stairs and (name) holding the door for them afterwards is just so sweet 🥹

username48 hopefully the V.I.P passes actually work this time around

↳ CreaterCon we are so sorry to hear this, please send us a direct message to let us know what we can do to further improve your experience. ↳ username48 fix your shit. ❤️

username10 what is going on?? what about the Theorists panel, does anyone know where that got moved to?? I can't find any info on the websites or socials 😭

username50 love the line up (so far!) would like to see even more members of the Smosh family though. But I am really looking forward to this!!

username43 those crowd questions about to go crazy, too bad though they will probs limit their personal life stuff.

username19 they about to make a whole 1000+ people crowd third wheel, now that is talent 👏👏👏

smosh thank you for having them both for the weekend, us parents need a break every now and then

↳ smoshpit yes, please take them for us. PLEASE 🙏 ↳ ianhecox (but seriously don't actually, they make us a lot of money) ↳ smoshgames wait, why am i just finding this out now 😭 ↳ username67 for once i am actually fine with company account commenting, what is going on?!?!?

(name)s_username so excited to attend, thank you for having me and my "husband" 🤣

username71 OMG after last years PAX and CreatorClash events I am SOOO READY FOR THESE TWO AGAIN. ORGANIZERS ARE IN THE KNOW ABOUT (NAME) AND SPENCER, (YOURSHIPNAME) FOREVERRRRR!!!!!!!

spennser we are never escaping the allegations...

↳ (name)s_username never 🤣 ↳ username44 (yourshipname) actually addressing (yourshipname) directly?? never thought i would live to see the day! ↳ username01 we take this as them admitting feelings... right... right? ↳ username39 touch grass.

username29 Does anyone know what they are willing to sign or if they are signing stuff this year??

─────── · ·

🔔 SmoshCast just uploaded! Turn off notifications here.

─────── · ·

What is the best movie? (definitively)

Smosh Cast ✓ [Subscribed] Like 128k | Dislike | ... 582K subscribers 488k views 2 days ago #7 on trending (name) and Spencer debate the greatest form of every media. from movies to tv shows, video games and music; listeners are in for a wild ride.

2,222 Comments

username56 2 days ago Really missing Amanda and Shayne doing the weekly episodes, but I guess I can survive on (name) and Spencer... username77 2 days ago Why is nobody talking about how outstandingly (name) preformed in their movie?!?! I just watched it this weekend and was floored by their preformance. I'm surprised it didn't get any further mention in the videos! ▼ 199 replies ↳ username62 2 days ago I am shocked that a youtuber, nevertheless a comedian could portray such range and subtle expressions- it was beautiful even with what little screen time they had in comparison to others. They took away every scene they were in! ↳ username88 1 day ago I really hope they receive recognition, I really think (name) could make it mainstream. I mean, their connections alone from starring in this but be crazy. ↳ username19 1 day ago Im a selfish fan I will admit, I wouldn't want them to leave Smosh for other projects. In all honesty I could not image not having them in front of or in the background of Smosh videos. I mean could you even think of how Spencer would react?? They are stuck to each other like glue. ↳ username33 1 day ago they both are adults, i'm sure they could work something out. (name) shouldn't be held back from becoming something greater (even though they are great now!) because of the "kinda" relationships they are in. ↳ username20 1 day ago I think time will tell us the answers. But I really hope that (name) considers all their options... username01 2 days ago I have been living for all these play fighting and argument videos of the two of them. Like they have chemistry, a degree of hate for one another in some ways (but like healthy silly hate)- i'm pulling out my hair more and more as to why they won't just kiss already!! username67 2 days ago Okay but (name)'s take are 100% based. homebro/girl knows what they are speaking about and never missed ▼ 31 replies ↳ username72 1 day ago Yeah but I think Spencer's take was more well rounded especially in the TV Shows argument. ↳ username22 1 day ago Couples Therapist Here, I just like how they can argue so civilly with one another and really show active listening with one another. Take the eye-contact, small head nods, and inclined seating with restating what they said and expanding upon it. Its beautiful really plus they both know a lot about their field so that helps too I guess. ↳ username88 1 day ago OMG please make a full video break down of one of their videos together, it would do really well!! ↳ username10 1 day ago Yes, Please!! username27 12 hours ago Okay, but we all known that the best video game is Purble Place. username50 30 minutes ago I can't wait to hear from you both in person, have it marked on my calendar!! username91 1 hour ago cringe. username43 5 hours ago Okay but now I need tier lists on them together. Video Concept #1: (name) and Spencer rank every time they almost fell in love and the one time/multiple times they really did. ▼ 10 replies ↳ username66 1 hour ago Officially am deceased XD ↳ username21 1 hour ago Video Concept #2: (name) and Spencer rank every hangout that was actually a date username74 30 minutes ago why am I crying when the video ended?? Like I want whatever this is.

─────── · ·

🔔 (name)s_username just posted, check it out!

─────── · ·

Liked by spennser, co_mill, anthonypadilla and others

(name)s_username it was awesome meeting everyone, same time next year? 😄❤️

View all 2,334 comments

CreatorCon let's make it a date? 😉

↳ (name)s_username noooo, not again! 😩 🏃‍♂️💨 ↳ username41 bwahahahhahahah!!! ↳ chickenshopdate oi!! 💢😡 ↳ (name)s_username ummm, now this is awkward... 😬

username88 was not long enough, i could listen to the two of you speak all day. defiantly worth the money!!

tomeybones i don't think florescent lighting was anyones light but you shine beautifully in it!

username48 glen powell's character should have gotten back with you at the end of the movie, you both had better chemistry!! Its giving La La Land all over again 😭

co_mill wished we could have made it but great work bestie, you killed it up there!! ❤️❤️

↳ (name)s_username aww thank u! would have loved having you there too ❤️❤️

username40 okay google, play "can't help but falling in love with you." move out of the way spenser, if you don't want them- i'll glady take (name)!

spennser good job fellow "spouse" 👍

↳ (name)s_username yes, you as well, "spouse" 👍 ↳ username01 okay, but this is just straight up cruel 😭

anthonypadilla i didn't see anything appear in the news so good work team!

damien_haas so as I was stuck in the signing booths you both were playing with paper airplanes and arm wrestleing?? What fairness is this?? /sarcastic positive

username71 OMG how did I just discover you now and miss a chance of meeting you?!?!?

username60 please tell me that there's a sequel coming out, I refuse to accept that you didn't re-marry him in the film 😭

phatchance excuse me but I know these two people packing out a 2000 person panel and they are the coolest ❤️

username31 I was too scared to ask anything because you both are just such pretty people like holy crap I love you both so much, you all mean the world to me and thank you so much for the hug. I am never washing the coat now

↳ username77 so that went progressively down hill lol

username12 Day 1.4 million of asking, just get together, or fuck, or something, anything but this (or breaking up for that matter) with Spencer. Like get it together.

─────── · ·

🔔 spennser, just added to their story, check it out!

─────── · ·

🔔 alex_tran's story is no longer available.

─────── · ·

🔔 (name)s_username's story is no longer available.

─────── · ·

🔔 SmoshPit just uploaded! Turn off notifications here.

─────── · ·

Sneaking into Concerts??? (Two Truths, One Lie)

Smosh Pit ✓ [Subscribed] Like 79k | Dislike | ... 8.29M subscribers 370k views 1 weeks ago

7,889 Comments

username31 1 week ago I know I sound like a broken record but it feels weird not having Spencer or (name) in front of camera for once. I got so used to them always being part of the cast like Courtney or Ian. ▼ 10 replies ↳ username29 1 week ago I think around the 12 minute mark, Courtney said something about them both calling in sick. ↳ username73 1 week ago I mean... did you see their stories with one another last night? They both were properly wasted LMAO ↳ username90 30 minutes ago (name) is such a cute drunk, just complimenting and flirting with everyone until Spencer asks them to shut up or hugs them. Damien and Alex really had their work cut out for them hahahha! ↳ username20 4 hours ago Okay but external videos also show they dancing together and grabbing waters its so wholesome that even when heavily drunk they are constantly thinking about one another username88 1 day ago Would have never thought Anthony would have been the one to sneak into a festival! username28 12 hours ago Did anyone manage to catch (name)'s or alex's story last night or was I just seeing things before it got taken down?? ▼ 301 replies ↳ username90 30 minutes ago OMG YES! I threw my phone in shock!! Should've taken a screenshot I am kicking myself rn. ↳ username01 30 minutes ago I. am. not. okay. physically and emotionally after this. username55 4 days ago HAHHAHA "sick." hmmm sure (name) and spencer, sure...

─────── · ·

🔔 (Yourshipname) Updates just uploaded!

─────── · ·

"Drunk Minds Speak A Sober Heart:" A (yourshipname) Edit

(Yourshipname) Updates [Subscribe] Like | Dislike | ... 1.12K subscribers 499k views 1 week ago #2 on trending click to expand

14,119 Comments

⚲ Pinned by Creator (yourshipname)updates ✓ 1 week ago I will take this video down if requested by either (name) or Spencer but for now... MWAHAHHAHA they have kissed with photo evidence!! ▼ 173 replies ↳ username97 1 hour ago I think I have just ascended. This is truly one of the best days of my life. Take this all your non-believers and haters!!! Amazing edit BTW! ↳ username11 1 week ago I don't think they are going to bring it up anywhere but a small victory is a victory nonetheless. I see this as a mission success boys!! ↳ username01 1 week ago I am happier for them and their still non-relationship than my own long term one hahahhaa ↳ username27 12 hours ago I am in disbelief, I never thought they would. I don't care if they were both hella drunk, they actually kissed?!?!? Like I don't know how to process this information. ↳ username13 12 hours ago fwehd0dfygdkospfhjhgf ↳ username44 just now eloquently said. username23 1 week ago 12 years of pining for one drunk kiss, I'll take it gosh darn it! username90 4 days ago Am currently re-watching all the edits and past moments while having this picture on the side monitor. I am living in a peak moment rn. username80 2 days ago I called my mom to tell her about this and she cheered as well. usernmae32 just now (name) just confirmed on their twitter that them, spencer and the rest of the smosh crew are all going to the oscars! ▼ 4 replies ↳ username13 just now Yes!!! LETS FREAKING GOOOOO!!!! username60 4 days ago This will go down as one of the greatest love stories in the history of the internet; i need movies, more fanfiction, music, and more fanart!! username78 10 hours ago happy for them, truly.

─────── · ·

─ · · A/N: 😉

─ · · TAGLIST: @lisiliely @missflufffanfics @little-stitious-studios @thejourneyneverendsx @sibsteria

131 notes · View notes

dailyadventureprompts · 11 months

Text

Homebrew Mechanic: Meaningful Research

Being careful about when you deliver information to your party is one of the most difficult challenges a dungeonmaster may face, a balancing act that we constantly have to tweak as it affects the pacing of our campaigns.

That said, unlike a novel or movie or videogame where the writers can carefully mete out exposition at just the right time, we dungeonmasters have to deal with the fact that at any time (though usually not without prompting) our players are going to want answers about what's ACTUALLY going on, and they're going to take steps to find out.

To that end I'm going to offer up a few solutions to a problem I've seen pop up time and time again, where the heroes have gone to all the trouble to get themselves into a great repository of knowledge and end up rolling what seems like endless knowledge checks to find out what they probably already know. This has been largely inspired by my own experience but may have been influenced by watching what felt like several episodes worth of the critical role gang hitting the books and getting nothing in return.

I've got a whole write up on loredumps, and the best way to dripfeed information to the party, but this post is specifically for the point where a party has gained access to a supposed repository of lore and are then left twiddling their thumbs while the dm decides how much of the metaplot they're going to parcel out.

When the party gets to the library you need to ask yourself: Is the information there to be found?

No, I don't want them to know yet: Welcome them into the library and then save everyone some time by saying that after a few days of searching it’s become obvious the answers they seek aren’t here. Most vitally, you then either need to give them a new lead on where the information might be found, or present the development of another plot thread (new or old) so they can jump on something else without losing momentum.

No, I want them to have to work for it: your players have suddenly given you a free “insert plothook here” opportunity. Send them in whichever direction you like, so long as they have to overcome great challenge to get there. This is technically just kicking the can down the road, but you can use that time to have important plot/character beats happen.

Yes, but I don’t want to give away the whole picture just yet: The great thing about libraries is that they’re full of books, which are written by people, who are famously bad at keeping their facts straight. Today we live in a world of objective or at least peer reviewed information but the facts in any texts your party are going to stumble across are going to be distorted by bias. This gives you the chance to give them the awnsers they want mixed in with a bunch of red herrings and misdirections. ( See the section below for ideas)

Yes, they just need to dig for it: This is the option to pick if you're willing to give your party information upfront while at the same time making it SEEM like they're overcoming the odds . Consider having an encounter, or using my minigame system to represent their efforts at looking for needles in the lithographic haystack. Failure at this system results in one of the previous two options ( mixed information, or the need to go elsewhere), where as success gets them the info dump they so clearly crave.

The Art of obscuring knowledge AKA Plato’s allegory of the cave, but in reverse

One of the handiest tools in learning to deliver the right information at the right time is a sort of “slow release exposition” where you wrap a fragment lore the party vitally needs to know in a coating of irrelevant information, which forces them to conjecture on possibilities and draw their own conclusions. Once they have two or more pieces on the same subject they can begin to compare and contrast, forming an understanding that is merely the shadow of the truth but strong enough to operate off of.

As someone who majored in history let me share some of my favourite ways I’ve had to dig for information, in the hopes that you’ll be able to use it to function your players.

A highly personal record in the relevant information is interpreted through a personal lens to the point where they can only see the information in question

Important information cameos in the background of an unrelated historical account

The information can only be inferred from dry as hell accounts or census information. Cross reference with accounts of major historical events to get a better picture, but everything we need to know has been flattened into datapoints useful to the bureaucracy and needs to be re-extrapolated.

The original work was lost, and we only have this work alluding to it. Bonus points if the existent work is notably parodying the original, or is an attempt to discredit it.

Part of a larger chain of correspondence, referring to something the writers both experienced first hand and so had no reason to describe in detail.

The storage medium (scroll, tablet, arcane data crystal) is damaged in some way, leading to only bits of information being known.

Original witnesses Didn’t have the words to describe the thing or events in question and so used references from their own environment and culture. Alternatively, they had specific words but those have been bastardized by rough translations.

Tremendously based towards a historical figure/ideology/religion to the point that all facts in the piece are questionable. Bonus points if its part of a treatise on an observably untrue fact IE the flatness of earth

#homebrew mechanic #d&d mechanics #research #tableskills #tabletop inspiration #dm tip #dm advice #exposition

478 notes · View notes

theabigailthorn · 1 year

Note

In the kindest way possible, I miss when your videos had more solid conclusions. I've been a fan of your content for years and it even got me interested in philosophy as a whole, but the past two videos especially have felt like they were building up to a powerful conclusion like many of your videos in the past have had, only to turn into a Nebula promotion before it feels like you've actually come to the thesis.

It saddens me because I think you're very good at strong ending arguments, and without even realizing it (before now) I had associated your videos with leaving off on a sort of mic-drop moment that always made me very excited and empowered. Of course, this is only my opinion, and your videos are your own and I'm incredibly happy for your play and your work on Nebula, I just can't help but notice it feels like something's missing now.

I have a lot of feelings about this feedback

Firstly, Philosophy Tube is very deliberately explorative, not conclusive. The point is to give people the concepts they need so they can go away and apply them themselves, not to tell anyone what to think. So I consciously resist firm intellectual conclusions when I'm writing because I think they risk terminating people's thought processes.

Secondly, I've been running my own experiments and I've noticed that a tiny minority of people always say this no matter how explicitly I state the conclusion. On the most recent episode I forced myself to state it very clearly - even called the final section of the video 'Conclusions' - which suggests to me that what you're after is emotional catharsis rather than intellectual resolution. When you talk about feeling "excited and empowered" those are emotional states rather than the state of having learned a new thing. And that's fine, some videos need to end on an emotional beat! But not all do or can. If I made every single one do that it would start to feel artificial. Certain ones like Identity need it, but just like not every theatre show needs a curtain call not every Philosophy Tube video needs to end on a wham line. Sometimes we're learning and we're in educationmode.

Thirdly, I would argue the most recent one ends on a note of emotional ambivalence (very deliberately so!) because that's the whole point: it's not meant to wrap everything up in a neat bow and tell you how to feel, it's supposed to present this multifaceted problem and encourage you to work through your own thoughts and feelings on it. And that is a kind of emotional conclusion in its own right, albeit a deliberately unsatisfying one.

730 notes · View notes

dangerliesbeforeyou · 28 days

Text

ok so ive been rewatching psychoville and saw on the wikipedia that there were a bunch of websites made for the series (they were all written by reece and steve btw) which i've been looking through cos they are genuinely SO fucking funny & also just amazingly creative lol!

anyway i know people in the fandom probs already know about this (since the show came out literally 15 years ago pfft) but i thought i'd share some of my fav bits (but honestly would just recommend just checking them out if you haven't i have been crying with laughter for literally hours lol)

i will say that a lot of the media (videos, games, etc) no longer work on the archived sites rip but i'm sure people have uploaded some of the stuff (vids especially) to yt or other places lol

so a) i love that we get some background stuff on jelly and 2) 'captain CRACKERS' bernie clifton's dressing room reference question mark ??????? (ofc bcdr was AFTER this but i know love the idea that mr jelly trained under len pfft)

what that red raw stump do though 👀 (sorry pfffft)

mr jolly's website wasn't that interesting soz tho i did like him comparing being a doctor to being a clown lol

the comment about fag bears did make me wheeze i'm afraid lol i also loved the blurry photos of lomax's commodities lol (kinda reminded me of the bit in tlog w/ that terrible old photographer guy lol)

when i tell you i DIED with laughter at the 'now known as hull' bit like u just know reece wrote that bit pfft

not really a funny thing but this poem written by david honestly kinda breaks my heart lol... i think it also a lot of additional context to david's guilt when he thought he'd killed his father(faver) because perhaps he felt guilty about NOT feeling guilty you get me? like, it felt to me that when maureen told david it was SHE who killed her husband, it didn't feel like he was mad at her for doing it, but more that she kept the fact from him. it's about... the mutual oedipus-coded obsession with one another that couldn't even be destroyed in death and in this essay i will....

ghoul_lass23 is just like me but about tumblr lol fr

nothing feels more cursed than the phrases 'the river minge has burst its banks', 'crying creamy tears' and 'fleshy rapunzel' (which i've just noticed they misspelt lol... don't think that was intentional lol?) so if i had to read this so do you <3

the way that i kinda wish this actually existed tho pfft... also, it does kinda remind me of that video where jenny nicholson talked about that insane reality show 'opposite worlds' lol

'cross between seven and glee' is honestly sending me pfft

also on this part there was a script from stinkfinger (which is a show mentioned on the show) which sounded suspiciously like a reference to tlc lol

the less said about swastknickers the better

(will say i did nearly piss myself laughing at the nazi section of the hoity toity website lol which wasn't a sentence i thought i'd type today lol)

i just love these kinds of jokes pfft

also the whole biography sections of each of the pantomime cast are fab lol tho i AM kinda pissed they made debbie from yeovil and yet didn't give her a west country accent lol!!! (i guess they thought it'd be a bit much w/ joy being bristolian but i'm still mad about it lol)

also i know people have probably already pointed this out but i do find it funny that brian in the in9 episode last night of the proms is a closeted gay guy who likes watching drag was probably a reference to brian in this show that was a drag queen like... is anything these guys do NOT a reference??? u know those gaylor fans who obsessively look for clues in her songs about her apparent secret sexuality? all i'm saying is that i think they'd really like the extended reece shearsmith & steve pemberton universe pfft

all three of these made me cry with laughter lol

ohh this is interesting lol so obviously they suspected that some people might be all 'um why didn't the sprinklers go off during the fire at ravenhill? plot hole much!' so they wrote this into one of the websites so they could be like SEE! WE'RE ONE STEP AHEAD OF YOU DUMBASSES lol

both the jeremy kyle reference (remember when that was a thing? yikes... my mum used to watch his show CONSTANTLY...) and nurse kenshington's thoughts on david and maureen are interesting lol.. also there's a reference to the serial killer top trumps in this bit lol! (do people still play top trumps?? man i LOVED top trumps lol...)

the entire sunnyvale care home section is so fucking funny (both the website AND in the show lol mrs wren/mrs ladybird face is unironically probably my favourite character on the entire show) these were just some of my fav gags lol...

ok but why is this the SECOND reference to a guy punching a child who was apparently looking at his dick lol!??!! did this happen to one of you ??!!?!? reece did you punch a child ??!???!?!??

&&&& that's it lol

there were a few websites i didn't spend long on or generally weren't that interesting (coughmidgetgemscough) but honestly? i was really captivated with just how funny and well put together all these sites were! you can tell they had a lot of fun making it and i'm sure fans at the time LOVED being able to have this semi-interactive element of the show lol

there was just something so wonderfully late 00's about these websites lol i genuinely don't think i've laughed this much at anything in literal months and all of this is just solidifies that psychoville is a criminally under-appreciated masterpiece lol

#psychoville #reece shearsmith #steve pemberton #there are too many characters mentioned here to list lol #honestly more people need to watch this show it's just great lol #anyway i hope that some of y'all have a laugh reading some of these even if ur not familiar with the show lol!

56 notes · View notes

buddie911abc · 3 months

Text

Let's talk about this moment-the moment before Eddie tells Buck that he has arranged for him to be Chris's guardian. (This is one possible interpretation of what is happening here, and it is how I read the start of the scene. If they make Eddie's coming out canon and depending on how they label the character, I hope we get to see if this interpretation is correct. This is a gay-coded reading of Eddie, one in which he is aware of his sexuality, but is for whatever reason suppressing it.)

At the beginning of the scene, Eddie sits on the edge of the hospital bed, waiting for Buck to come back. It is implied that off camera, Buck is taking care of getting him discharged. It isn't a long shot, so you have to be paying attention to the screen to see it. My interpretation is that Eddie is lost in his thoughts, thinking about what he is going to say to Buck.

I'm reading a lot in this small shot. I think there is some fear in his facial expression, but there is some sadness as well. Eddie knows he is about to confess to something that happened over a year ago. He knows that confessing it is going to bring up more questions. He's preparing himself to try to deflect those questions, but he knows, at this moment, that he might not be able to deflect them. He knows that this one admission may force him to admit his feelings for Buck, and once that bell has been rung, there is no going back. He's about to admit to something that he is afraid will cost him their friendship. Eddie knows he doesn't have to tell Buck about the Will, but if he doesn't, then Buck will continue to be...Buck. He will continue to think of himself as expendable. Eddie would rather risk the friendship than see Buck do something that would take him out of this world. All of these things, I think, have been going through Eddie's head that whole morning, and at the start of the scene, he is lost in those thoughts and has to snap himself back to reality quick when Buck comes back into the room.

Looking at the scene from that perspective makes the rest of the scene so much more emotional to me. And the scene does play out with some of those questions coming up. Buck does ask why it took him a year to tell him about the Will. He does ask why tell him now? I've talked about how Eddie deflected that question in the comment section of various posts I've read, and I still see it the same way. Eddie simply did not answer the whole question. He confessed to why he was telling him the truth (So Buck would know that he isn't expendable) but not to why he did it or why he kept it a secret in the first place. (The fact that Eddie felt he had to hide it points to motives related to something else he is hiding. There really is no good reason for keeping it a secret.) And Buck, the guy who never saw his self-worth, was so distracted by the answer that he did get that he never realized that Eddie didn't answer the rest of the question.

youtube

The scene ended with Eddie telling Buck that he was wrong. I can't even imagine how the rest of the conversation went. At first, I thought Eddie got away with this because he deflected by using one of Buck's trigger pressure points, but then I realized this was actually the last episode of season four.

We now know that the creators/writers wanted to begin the process of taking Buddie canon in season four. It didn't work out, but if it had, season five could have started with an entirely different arc that stemmed from the fact that Eddie wasn't able to deflect why he made these choices. If Buck had been faced with the revelation that Eddie had feelings for him, he may have looked closer at his own reaction to Eddie being shot. (I talk a lot about possible interpretations of the show, but the way Buck reacted in that scene will always come across as love to me, and even Eddie in those scenes showed feelings. i.e. reaching his hand toward Buck, asking Buck if he was hurt when he was the one bleeding out.)

So... Thoughts? Anyone?

#911 abc #buddie #oliver stark #ryan guzman #evan buckley #eddie diaz #Youtube

114 notes · View notes

brucebocchi · 2 months

Text

Spring 2024 anime, Pt. 2: Mixed bags and the gems

hey! i also post this on my ko-fi! this is very much a labor of love, so if you liked what i wrote consider throwing a few bucks my way! also you can find part 1 right here! thanks!

Yes, hello, I'm still here. Between work and AI: The Somnium Files -nirvanA Initiative-, I was struggling to find the time to get this out, but here we are! Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go actually watch some anime again.

As always, the OP for each show is linked in the title. Watch them! There were some damn good ones this season.

Let's-a go:

Mixed Bags

Astro Note

I’m going to kick off this section by first stating that on the whole, I’m much higher on the anime in this section this season than I was last time: Nothing that I watched this season disappointed me nearly as much as Metallic Rouge or The Witch and the Beast, nor bored me to tears like The Unwanted Undead Adventurer. This truly is a collection of mixed bags; anime that I found enjoyable or interesting but still left me wanting in one way or another. “Good But Could Have Been Great” is too unwieldy anyway.

Astro Note was eye-catching from the jump: This is very clearly an homage to Rumiko Takahashi’s beloved romcom Maison Ikkoku, with character designs by Carole & Tuesday’s Eisaku Kubonouchi. The colors are soft and bright, everyone looks unique and has a wide variety of hilarious facial expressions, and the OP is a fun time right out of the gate. You come for the lovely visuals and Takahashi homage, and you stay for, uh, not much else.

Takumi, a down-on-his-luck young chef, answers a job posting at a boarding house that promises its residents breakfast every day. It turns out that Mira, the odd but beautiful new landlady, is a dogshit cook and tried to attract a new one with a plagiarized job posting. Takumi doesn’t really care because she’s, like, really pretty, so he takes the job and moves in. He’s soon beset by a cast of wacky characters that includes an enigmatic unemployed salaryman and his precocious son, an indie idol who looks like a hard-drinking Futaba Sakura in her downtime, a nosy neighbor, and a rich, handsome romantic rival. We’re already approaching Maison Ikkoku territory.

Shortly after moving in, Takumi believes he overhears Mira saying that she’s a widow, which would firmly plant Astro Note’s flag right in Ikkoku’s turf, but it turns out that Mira is in fact an alien from the planet Wid, meaning she is of the Wido race (this is as good of a localization as you can ask for; in the original Japanese he heard “miboujin,” not knowing that she’s from the planet Mibou). So we’ve got some Urusei Yasura sprinkled in for good measure. Her adorable poodle, voiced by Junichi Suwabe (Sukuna himself!) is from the same planet and helping her find a MacGuffin, hidden by the previous owner, that would help her take over as queen. There’s also some blossoming romance!

The alien stuff made for an interesting wrinkle, and it went a long way toward characterizing Mira as an endearingly odd but curious woman, but it often played out in wacky hijinks caused by alien spies, which felt like a designated make-the-plot-happen button more often than not. It paid off splendidly in the last couple of episodes, and I loved how all of the flashbacks of Mira’s mother looked like grainy Showa-era space operas, but getting there took a lot of “oh no, chase that Thing!” sequences. I found myself tuning out on those until they finally became plot relevant.

The central romance was fine, if a little underbaked, but what kept me watching Astro Note was the smaller moments with the ensemble characters. There were moments with both Wakabayashi the salaryman and his son Ren that slapped the apathy right off my face, and a side plot with Takumi and a person from his past was incredibly sweet. I did also love the massive turn the plot took in the last couple episodes, to the point where I found myself almost wishing that the show up to that point was different.

And that’s Astro Note in a nutshell: A lot of good pieces mixed with some filler, weird pacing, and an overall uneven experience in a nice-looking package. A fun little distraction but nothing entirely memorable. If I can give this show one major positive, it’s that watching it finally convinced me to read Maison Ikkoku, and for that I will forever be grateful. Read Maison Ikkoku.

Go! Go! Loser Ranger

I keep running notes for everything I’m watching as the season rolls on, and sometimes I’ll indulge in other reviewers’ early takes and jot down some insights that might spark from hearing outside perspectives. During Gigguk’s opening remarks on Go! Go! Loser Ranger in his early Spring season roundup, I made a note that the easiest way to summarize this show for a western audience is “basically The Boys but with the Power Rangers instead of The Seven.” And then he said pretty much the exact same thing five seconds later. I just want the record to show that.

Indeed, this is a sentai series with some spice. 13 years ago, the invading forces of evil were soundly defeated by the Dragon Keepers, a real-life sentai squad. In the present day, the Dragon Keepers now sit atop a massive organization protecting earth, and also dominating the entertainment industry: Every week, they hold an exhibition match against the remaining rank-and-file footsoldiers, skull-faced shapeshifters known as Dusters. In order to keep their lives, the Dusters were forced to give up their freedom and serve as the farcical Putty Patrol for what is ultimately a pro wrestling show. Sick of being a jobber and effectively a slave, one of the Dusters, known simply as Fighter D, decides the best way to destroy the Dragon Keepers and free his brethren is to do so from within: He’ll morph into a human shape, join their Rangers program as a cadet, and personally slay each of the five Keepers.

Fighter D is quickly found out, though. One of the recruiters, the lovely but mercurial Yumeko, isn’t nearly as dumb as he thought, but she fortunately has the same aim and quickly puts him to work trying to steal the Keepers’ insanely powerful weapons, the Divine Artifacts. He’s also found by the Dragon Keepers and manages to escape, though badly wounded. He’s found in a cave by Yumeko’s hanger-on, the upstart Ranger cadet Hibiki, whose family was badly fragmented by an unknown monster. While he still believes in the Keepers and shares their ostensible goal of protecting humanity, he believes that there needs to be major changes and agrees to let D impersonate him to infiltrate the Rangers. He’s soon embroiled in a prolonged examination trial against higher-ranked Rangers that soon turns into a fight to the death, made only more deadly by the inclusion of a female Duster and the same monster that killed Hibiki’s parents and paralyzed his sister.

Yes, that’s a lot, and everything up until that last sentence was just in the first four episodes. I’ve said repeatedly that I’m willing to be patient with introductory seasons for action-oriented shonen series, because those do usually take a minute to start cooking, but the first season of Loser Ranger is bizarrely paced. The first four episodes were an intriguing introduction, but they might have served better as a movie to kick off the season, because the overwhelming majority of the remaining eight episodes were pretty much just a bunch of people fighting in a fucking parking garage. I was under the impression that the first season was going to be 24 or so episodes, for some reason, so I was willing to be patient with it.

Maybe I should've been patient enough to wait until the second season, because I found myself getting whiplash between fascination and utter boredom. I still don’t know if I even like this show. There are so many moving parts, and many of them are fascinating, but to get bombarded with them so early and so often, only to then keep most of them in the background in favor of way too many new characters fighting in, again, a goddamned parking garage, frustrates me in increasing measure the more I write about it. I really wanted to like this show more than I did.

The production values are seemingly all over the place too. The OP is another Tatsuya Kitani banger, the voice cast is deep and talented (especially for the English dub, holy hell), the puppet outros are a hoot, and the animation is mostly fine. I’m rarely one to complain about CGI in anime (the ED for this show is entirely 3DCG and it fucks), but a lot of it in Loser Ranger, especially as an obvious means of cheaping out on having to hand-draw and -animate the Dragon Keepers’ slightly-elaborate costumes, is baffling. You could make a generous case for it representing them as larger-than-life personalities, but in execution it’s just kind of uncanny. The show looks and sounds fine overall, but little things like that just take me out of it.

I’m going to withhold judgment until the second season, but for now I can’t say I’m too impressed by the debut. Maybe just watch the first four episodes and put a pin in it until season 2 drops.

Jellyfish Can’t Swim in the Night

I’m beginning to worry that Metallic Rouge’s catastrophic narrative failure may have permanently made me nervous about any original anime to follow. It’s an unfair comparison to make, especially considering it aired at the same time as the bombastically audacious Bang Brave Bang Bravern, which I consider one of the best of the year so far and even one of the better anime to air so far this decade. At the same time, though, the millisecond I start to suspect that an original anime is losing its footing, as soon as the one synapse fires that tells me that this show may not be able to stick the landing, I start to get cynical. The good news is that Jellyfish Can’t Swim in the Night isn’t even in the same time zone as Rouge’s disappointment. The bad news is that it still never fully lived up to what it could have been.

Right from the jump, this felt like Doga Kobo flexing in between seasons of Oshi no Ko with yet another gorgeous showbiz anime. The debut episode is one of the best I’ve seen in some time; an immaculately animated and brilliantly storyboarded mission statement showcasing the self-doubting illustrator Mahiru and the disgraced ex-idol Kano meeting and finding new inspiration in one another’s work (if you’ve been reading Beat & Motion, this may sound familiar, except they’re both high school girls). It was a masterclass in depicting powerful self-expression and the spark of a truly fateful encounter. What followed was also pretty good, but...

Mahiru and Kano band together (pun intended) to form the multimedia collective JELEE, also enlisting social-outcast musical prodigy (and Kano stan) Mei, and NEET VTuber Kiui along the way. We see a lot of the nitty-gritty of trying to get a new act off the ground, as well as the reality that any new artist or creator nowadays is, ultimately, at the mercy of the internet. It was a treat to watch these four all come together, as was seeing the emotional bonds they forge with one another while also navigating their own personal issues, but it frequently came at the expense of an actual plot. That sort of thing is fine, I do love me some good slice-of-life, but I feel like the show planned on something a bit grander. While we’re focused on so many of these really lovely moments of character growth and interpersonal drama, everything about JELEE’s ascent, y’know, the main plot, just kind of happens, and before you know it everything turns out okay and the season’s over. It really felt like the writers had a big plan but ended up just laying down the tracks while the train was already in motion.

As mentioned, I’m not nearly as down on the anime in the “Mixed Bags” section this season as I was three months ago, but just thinking about how the plot sagged around the middle and rushed towards its ending leaves me frustrated. Unlike JELEE itself, Jellyfish Can’t Swim in the Night feels like less than the sum of its parts. This show feels like an unfinished jigsaw puzzle; what you can make out of the image is gorgeous, yet not only was it never completed, but someone clearly put a few of the pieces together wrong as well. There are plenty of themes in the story and character writing that could have blossomed into something amazing, like impostor syndrome, finding community and identity through fandom, young sapphic love, gender identity, and so many more, and it may have been possible to resolve at least a couple of these in 12 episodes, but Jellyfish seemed either incapable of or uninterested in actually getting there beyond a few vague overtures.

I know I sound harsh here and I didn’t mean for this review to be mostly complaints; I did very much like this show, but I wanted so badly to love it. And it probably isn’t entirely fair of me to grade this show based on what it could have been instead of what it is, but so much was plainly left on the table that I’m not really left with another choice. I still recommend it much more strongly than anything else I've put in the Mixed Bags section so far this year, but be forewarned that you may be let down. This is a pretty goddamn good anime that could’ve been pretty goddamn incredible, but it just couldn’t get there.

Mysterious Disappearances

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I know what I’m about. If a new series rotates around a protagonist who looks like that, I’ll at least give it an episode or two.

Sumireko is a former child-prodigy novelist, now in her late 20s working at a bookstore with the sharp-tongued Ren, as she continues to fail at getting published again. On the eve of her 28th birthday, Sumireko accidentally takes home a book that was droplifted in the store, and shortly after reading it aloud she finds herself reverted into the body of a child. Suddenly struck by inspiration once again, she disappears from work for the next week, furiously typing away at her next novel. Ren manages to find her and tells her that she’s under a curse: The book is an otherworldly object known as a Curiosity, and its power can be deadly to those who use it. Though Sumireko is desperate to hang on to her newly-regained youth, Ren manages to smooth-talk her into changing back and handing over the book. Now aware of an extradimensional threat to daily life, Sumireko teams up with Ren and his little sister Oto to track down and neutralize more Curiosities before they cause widespread havoc.

This series is alright, if questionable in a lot of areas. I recognize that I’m not entirely the target audience; while I love a good supernatural mystery, each of these Curiosities is rooted in East Asian mythology and contemporary urban legends, very few of which I was familiar with going in. To those on that side of the world (or to Westerners with that specific special interest), I’m sure it hits different, but I got lost on a couple of occasions. Mysterious Disappearances also runs into the same pacing issues that I found with The Witch and the Beast last season, where the plot structure is effectively episodic, but each mystery can last a few episodes at a time, so if you’re not particularly invested in the subject at hand, you’re SOL for another week or two.

This show also just plain doesn’t look very good. The animation is nothing impressive and there’s something off-putting about the overall look that I can’t quite put my finger on. It looks retro in ways that probably weren’t intentional, like a 20-year-old digipaint anime that was upscaled from 480p. The audio element is great, at least; the music, sound design, and cast are all fantastic (between her turn as Sumireko in this one and her supporting roles in Reincarnated as the 7th Prince and Kaiju No. 8, Fairouz Ai has put in great work this season), and that’s a good thing because this one isn’t a looker.

If you couldn’t already tell from how the main character looks, Mysterious Disappearances is undoubtedly horny as hell, but often distractingly so. I do have to praise Sumireko’s design to an extent; for a large-chested anime lady, she at least hews closer to how a tall woman with somewhat appropriately large breasts would actually be built and how her clothes would actually fit. She looks like a more realistically-proportioned Nami. There’s no shortage of anime characters with gigantic boobs, but few that make me actually go “oh, this woman definitely has back problems.” There are a lot of slow-tilting shots up female characters’ legs towards their chests to the point where I tuned the dialogue out because I couldn’t believe they just kept on doing it. I skimmed through the manga, and though there is far more semi-gratuitous nudity as compared to the anime, I still somehow found the latter much more distracting with its attempts at fanservice. I also don’t really care for how the “camera” looks at Oto and her middle school classmates either; I found myself just getting nervous whenever a scene focused on them.

For its problems, there’s at least a series of solid emotional cores here. Similar to Sumireko’s desire to regain her youthful creativity, the wielders-slash-victims of these Curiosities are largely vulnerable individuals who are trying to make the best of their lives in spite of past traumas like bullying, neglect, and disability. All serious issues, no doubt, and the story tries to handle them as well as possible, but once you see through the pattern of “awful thing is happening, we get to know the character, then we learn their tragic backstory and there’s a tearful resolution while we move closer to advancing the overall plot,” it can feel a little cloying in the long run. Not that those resolutions can’t be potent; I really liked the endings of the stories of the missing hairdresser and the rogue VTuber, but as a plot formula it can ring hollow.

Mysterious Disappearances is a fine if unspectacular series of supernatural mysteries with an okay overarching plot, and your mileage may vary depending on your existing knowledge of East Asian occult and superstition. It’s also not that fun to actually look at, even if you happen to be into tall redheads with huge racks. Uh, not that I would know.

The Gems

Girls Band Cry

When Bocchi the Rock! made its unexpectedly earth-shattering landfall a couple years ago, it was inundated with a deluge of comparisons to the previous landmark girls-in-a-band anime, K-On!. It felt a bit trite at the time, and feels even more so in retrospect; each show is its own thing and they both stand on their own merits. And now here’s my dumb ass, reviewing a new girls-in-a-band anime, desperately trying not to compare it to Bocchi.

It’s really not a fair comparison either way; the focus being on an all-girls rock band is really the only thing they have in common. Rather than Hitori “Bocchi” Gotoh, a perpetually-anxious recluse looking to join a band so she won’t have to get a real job after high school, we have Nina Iseri, who is… difficult. Nina has just moved to Tokyo after running away from home, but her train arrived too late for her to get her apartment key, and to make matters worse, her phone’s dead. While charging at a local coffee shop, she finds out that Momoka, the now-former frontwoman of her favorite band, is playing on a nearby street. After some ups and downs, they decide to form a band together, and butt heads more than a couple times.

Along the way, they recruit more members, each with their own issues: Subaru, the drummer, is struggling with the expectations placed on her by her grandmother to become an actress, Tomo, the keyboardist, is exacting and a little too opinionated to keep a steady role in a band, and Rupa, the bassist, is a soft-spoken foreigner who remains a cheerful enigma despite losing her parents. And Nina and Momoka are both flat-out stubborn in ways that do not mesh well with one another. There are a lot of yelling matches and many angry tears shed as the band Togenashi Togeari comes together: yes, the “Cry” in the title isn’t just for style points.

I will say that it’s refreshing that Girls Band Cry does not sugarcoat what an absolute pain in the ass Nina can be when she’s dug in: She ran away from home because she’s utterly convinced of her own righteousness, and it’s your damn problem if you think otherwise. She is avoidant and oppositional-defiant, and everyone else just has to deal with it. She may not pick her hills well, but by God will she die on them. Props for having a protagonist this openly messy and unpleasant. Plenty of musicians, or really anyone working in a group for that matter, can be abrasive and stubborn, and TogeToge’s growing pains are a necessary element of their development as a band.

I know the bar isn’t very high for 3D computer-generated anime when it doesn’t come from Studio Orange, but this is easily one of the best-looking 3DCG anime I’ve ever seen. Between this and Trigun Stampede, I’m blown away at how expressive characters can be in CG, and how they react to what’s around them in real-time more consistently than you’d see in most 2D animation. Speaking of which, Girls Band Cry isn’t entirely in 3D; much of the OP as well as several flashbacks and background characters are hand-drawn, and they look so goddamn good that I’m almost left wondering what could’ve been. Not that I’m disappointed in the slightest; when the 3D animation hits, it REALLY hits in gorgeous synaesthetic waves that so perfectly depict an intersection of sound, light, and emotion. Hell, even the transition cards are huge eye catchers. Not everything looks brilliant all the time; the pets in particular are uncannily low-res and almost look like they got plucked out of KamiKatsu.

Of course, this is a band show, so the audio element has to be on point as well, and I’d say Girls Band Cry is up to snuff. The anime is part of a larger multimedia project, and the entire main cast consists of audition winners performing under mononyms, and they knock it out of the damn park; they’re pretty goddamn great for supposed newcomers. The music is a blast as well, not just in performance scenes but in the background as well. Togenashi Togeari already existed in the zeitgeist as a virtual band before this show went to air, so they already had a small discography out there before the show went to air and I’m looking forward to digging into it.

Infamously, this show isn’t particularly easy to watch. Not in the thematic sense, but literally: You cannot legally watch it in English anywhere in the West. Despite its popularity, Girls Band Cry was never picked up by any Anglosphere-based streaming platforms, for whatever reason, and the only official English subtitles out there are from an Indonesian streamer. So, much like the days of VHS trading and the early internet, we’re forced to rely on community translations. Far be it from me to encourage piracy (lol), but if you can find a good fansub, Girls Band Cry is very much worth your while. Pinkies up, motherfuckers.

Kaiju No. 8

I don’t watch Demon Slayer or My Hero Academia, so this was my designated Shonen Jump action show of the season, and it came with a ton of buzz: The way I see it, if I can pick up a volume of the manga at Target, the inevitable anime adaptation is gonna be a big deal. I’ve not read Kaiju No. 8 yet, but I’d say the anime lives up to a good amount of the hype.

Japan has had to handle a constant threat of kaiju for many decades now, and as a child the way-too-aptly-named Kafka Hibino made a promise to his best friend Mina that they would both grow up to lead the Japan Anti-Kaiju Defense Force in charge of eliminating the threat. A couple decades later, she’s a national hero as a captain in the Force, while Kafka is in the private sector at age 32, cleaning up the enormous corpses and viscera Mina and her division leave behind. He hasn’t given up on his dreams, by any stretch; Kafka has failed every single enlistment application he’s submitted since he came of age, but he just keeps on trying.

Kafka and his work kohai, the upstart JAKDF hopeful Reno, manage to survive a kaiju attack at the end of a shift with minor injuries, but when they’re in the hospital, a potato-sized flying kaiju shoves itself down Kafka’s throat, causing him to transform into a kaiju. Fortunately, he’s able to change back to his human form just in time to pass the first round of Defense Force exams, with Reno warning him not to let anyone in on his secret during practical exams.

Kafka is pathetically weak in his human form and is repeatedly shown up by the daughter of the Defense Force’s director general, the young hotshot Kikoru (Fairouz Ai once again), but he manages to save her life when a training exercise goes haywire and forces him to transform and share his secret with her. Reno and Kikoru get in, no problem, while Kafka manages to squeak in as a cadet. Of course, without exposing his little-big kaiju secret, Kafka can’t do much to help in terms of actual combat, but he does frequently act as an unofficial tactician in directing his squadmates on the battlefield and, in a very smart writing decision, applying his professional knowledge of kaiju anatomy to help them identify and target weaknesses.

And from there we get a whole lot of early military training and bonding, and not just with Kafka, Reno, Kikoru, and their division’s vice-commander, the giggly Hoshina: There’s also, uh, Man-Bun! And Muscles! And Shark Teeth! And the Token Women! You know, those guys. Yeah, this is ostensibly an ensemble cast, as any good battle shonen should be, but I really didn’t get much from anyone outside the main few characters other than identifying features. I’m sure we’ll get more out of them in subsequent seasons but I have little to work off of right now.

The main three are great, though: Kafka definitely has shonen protag brain even at his age, but he’s still necessary representation for schlubby guys in their 30s who still have hopes and dreams (we exist and our stories matter), and for as serious and focused as Reno likes to think he is, he makes a great tsukkomi whenever Kafka starts acting up. Kikoru is already an icon as well; she’s basically Asuka Langley Sohryu for the zoomer generation. I feel a little weird about the fact that she’s literally half Kafka’s age and still acts kinda tsundere around him, but this is a shonen at the end of the day.

I have some small nagging issues with the story here and there, but nothing that outright ruins the show for me. Like plenty of others, I’m far more fascinated with the ins and outs of how Japanese society adapted to living with kaiju threats outside of just military preparation and response; Kafka’s initial job in kaiju cleanup was actually really neat and I’d have loved it just as much (and possibly more) if the series had just focused on that. I want some damn world building! I also am not crazy about the focus on the Defense Force’s powerscaling in the form of “Unleashed Combat Power,” but I also just plain don’t care about powerscaling to begin with. Wasn’t the entire point of power levels in Dragon Ball Z that it’s pointless to define someone’s fighting spirit by a number? Maybe they drop it later.

This show looks pretty darn good! Production IG clearly put its A-team on this one; the character animation is cartoonishly bouncy and expressive in ways we rarely see outside of Trigger productions, and the big-ass kaiju are all mercifully in outstanding 2D (though I wouldn’t complain about CG; the OP is entirely in 3D and looks exceptional). The silliness of the animation really came through in one of the funniest scenes in any anime I watched this season. Some of the textures can look a little distractingly muddy at times, but hey, these are big ugly monsters we’re looking at. Make those bastards ugly.

On a certain level, I can appreciate the effort put into this show to try to make it a crossover success; the manga is popular and kaiju films remain one of Japan’s greatest cultural exports. Streaming new episodes on the fetid corpse of Twitter was certainly a decision. I can also appreciate wanting to load up the soundtrack with popular Western artists; my problem is that they went with acts I actively avoid like YUNGBLUD (with writing by Imagine Dragons!) and OneRepublic. Suffice to say, I don’t care for the OP and ED on a musical level, but I know that I’m coming at this with a conscious bias. I’m sure they’re hits over in Japan, and for all I know there are music fans over there with the same tastes and disposition as me who think that some Japanese acts I learned about through anime like, say, Bump of Chicken or Queen Bee, are “coworker music” or whatever. I’ll live.

Kaiju No. 8, at the end of the day, is another battle shonen with guns and big monsters, but sometimes that’s all you need. I’ll be coming back for the next season.

Train to the End of the World

Spring 2024 was a banner season for girls anime. From the veteran director/writer duo that gave us cult hits like Squid Girl, Shirobako, and Prison School (and individual credits on a laundry list of classic and cult-favorite anime across the board) comes an original anime that’s not quite Cute Girls Doing Cute Things, nor Cute Girls Doing Amazing Things, but Cute Girls Being Fucking Weirdos in a Weird World.

7G technology has arrived in Japan and immediately wreaked unknowable chaos. Geography, flora, and fauna have all warped beyond recognition, and in the town of Agano, every human above a certain age has become a talking animal. Shizuru, a still-human high school girl, has been looking for her best friend Youka ever since they got in a fight two years ago and the latter ran off, just before the 7G cataclysm. She finds out that Youka has been spotted in Ikebukuro, and with the help of a babbling train conductor who managed to briefly turn lucid, learns to operate a two-car commuter train to get the hell out of dodge. Just before Shizuru leaves, train stocked with Agano’s famous goya melons, she’s joined by her classmates: The soft-spoken Nadeko, the temperamental bookworm Akira, and the rambunctious gyaru Reimi. Youka’s dog, Pochi, also joins for morale purposes. Along the way, they see just how warped Japan has become, with locals in the various towns ranging from mushroom people to zombies to Lilliputians to characters from their favorite anime, and more.

Try as I might, a summary does not do Train to the End of the World justice; this show is as offbeat as offbeat gets. It makes no bones about how flat-out weird it wants to get and actively revels in it. It’s not really interested in making the girls into a new generation of moe icons either; they are unabashed weirdos, in the ways that really only high school girls can be, and they handle the bizarre situations foisted upon them in similar fashion. They get into arguments about dumb shit, hurl insults at strangers, and occasionally just talk about poop. The writing in this series is fascinating, and it really shouldn’t come as a surprise coming from someone who also has script-writing credits for classics like Cowboy Bebop and Ranma ½ on her resume. The dialogue is punchy and comes at a breakneck pace in ways that you really only get in original anime like ODDTAXI.

Train to the End of the World is an incredible dichotomy unto itself because it clearly comes from a very literate way of thinking but has a blast being really goddamn stupid sometimes, in the best ways. It draws on a lot of inspirations of the epics of yore, gleefully cites the western literary canon, and ponders the future of the human race, and then has the girls negotiate their release from a Gulliver’s Travels situation by threatening to flood a park with urine. It is at once Homer and Homer Simpson. This show is funny in ways that are hard to articulate; comedy is so intrinsic to the show that it only has so many laugh-out-loud moments, but much more often I found myself shaking my head and remarking “this show is fucking hilarious.”

As a complete story, Train to the End of the World isn’t exactly generation-defining, but that’s perfectly fine. It’s an experience more than anything. It has really nice character moments and some heartwarming stuff in there, but I was mostly there for the weird shit. The ending was just okay, but I didn’t feel any poorer for having seen it; I’ll dive right into the cliche and say that it wasn’t about the destination but rather the journey. I had an absolute blast for the whole ride.

Now that I’ve made you read all of this, I’m going to go ahead and admit that I haven’t seen Squid Girl, Shirobako, or Prison School, but I kind of have to now, because I was bowled over by this show. This series revels in surrealism, so your mileage may vary, but it’s at the very least worth checking out. It may not have a lasting impact outside of some similar cult favoritism, but this was still my personal favorite new anime of the season.

Wind Breaker

A few weeks into the Spring season I felt like I was missing something. I gave Wind Breaker a shot and I realized about halfway into the first episode that what I was missing was just some dope-ass fisticuffs.

Haruka is a bit of a delinquent. His hair and eyes are heterochromic, and because he’s judged so harshly for his looks, he decided to lean into it and become the nogoodnik everyone thinks he is. He’s moved to a new town to join the local high school Furin, where he hears he’ll have to fight his way to the top, but as soon as he arrives in town he sees a young woman being harassed by a group of creeps. He takes them out on his own and in return receives a free lunch from the cafe she runs despite his protestations. After she teases him more than a little (his ass is NOT used to positive attention), the creeps return with more goons in tow, and Haruka is backed up by his new classmates. To his surprise, the locals shower the Furin boys with praise, and he then learns that Furin’s gang, Bofurin, exists solely to protect the town from outside threats. And Haruka thinks that is the coolest shit ever.

From there, Haruka gets to meet more of the Bofurin boys, and because of his standoffish personality, rebuffs their praises from the fight. Again, his ass is NOT used to positive attention. We get to learn the hierarchy of Bofurin, and it’s not exactly as Haruka expected: This is not a might-makes-right dogpile at all; it is a structured organization that protects its own and puts its community first. Soon enough, though, they happen upon one of their middle schoolers being hassled by a neighboring gang, and they organize a tournament on hostile ground to resolve their differences.

I am an absolute goddamn sucker for the “delinquent with a heart of gold” archetype, and Haruka is just a big ol’ tsundere from the opening minutes, so Wind Breaker hit like fucking catnip for me. For a show about gangs of delinquents, this could actually be a good example of positive masculinity if you look at it in a certain light. It’s very heavy-handed with the message that nobody can achieve greatness on their own and that surrounding yourself with the right people can change your life for the better. It’s not a rare theme in Japanese media by any means (it’s a central theme of the Persona series as well as another ultra-popular shonen series I’ve been reading in secret), but I really appreciate it being delivered through the lens of channeling brute strength and fighting prowess specifically to protect the vulnerable.

At the end of the day, though, it’s really just about guys bein’ dudes.

The production values on this are phenomenal and I have to commend CloverWorks for turning in yet another banger. The cast is deep and plenty talented (there’s a lot of Jujutsu Kaisen in there, and it should surprise nobody that the goofy, silver-haired leader of Bofurin is voiced by Yuichi Nakamura). The animation, shot composition, fight choreography, and lighting effects are all absolutely gorgeous, and it’s clear that they see this as a potential franchise. At least, I would certainly hope so, because what we actually got from the first season left me a little hungry. The tournament arc was juicy, and it went a lot longer toward introducing the ensemble cast than the two other action shows I just talked about, but it lasted about an episode too long for a 13-episode season, and the ending came at an awkward time. I was left wanting, but what I want is a second season, so I guess it did its job.

The issues with pacing and the weirdly-timed ending meant that Wind Breaker was a bit of a fence case for me between this section and the last, but my memories of watching it are almost uniformly positive, so into The Gems it goes. This show rocks. Dudes rock.

#anime reviews

62 notes · View notes

blitzyisfine · 6 months

Text

STOLITZ FIC RECS

Lift your hips for me, love by AjWriter

“You look pretty tense,” Blitzø murmured. “How about I help you out there?” He gently pushed Stolas back onto the pillows. And Stolas just looked back at him with wide eyes, a blush hot on his cheeks, and Blitzø noticed he was shaking. Honest-to-Lucifer quaking. Blitzø pulled away quickly and called out, “Cut!”

Or Blitzø and Stolas meet on porn set (slow burn but they're having sex the whole time)

Stolas figuring out his sex life and starting to film pornos. Blitzø just wants Stolas to know what he’s getting into, so obviously they have to have sex off set which turns into love and dating.

Pre Episode 5 by DaniDrawz

Basically the things that took place right before episode 5 happened

This is actually a comic but it’s hosted on ao3! A look at Stolas and Blitzø’s BSDM heavy sex with an emphasis in consent.

Far From Heaven by Novaeris

After their disastrous first date, Blitzo and Stolas struggle to pick themselves back up again in the aftermath. It takes many small steps before they can finally be honest, with themselves and with each other.

Blitzo learns to tell the truth. And Stolas learns that, sometimes, things aren’t as hopeless as they appear.

A study of Blitzo and a study of Stolas as they fall apart and then come back together after ep 7.

Major hurf/comfort set after the events of Ozzie’s. Blitzø and Stolas are both spiraling and we get a look into their feelings. Eventually they communicate and make up sex ensues.

The Mating Habits of Imps by AjWriter

Stolas knelt so he was hidden between the bookshelves and took another sharp-eyed glance around him before he gently tugged the much-too-thin book from its shelf. He felt the fire red blush stain his feathers as he read the title again.

The Mating Habits of Imps

Sweet Lucifer! How had he not thought to look in this section before?

Surely, there must be literature on how to please his imp. After all, it was only right that he should become educated. With how attentive his Blitzy was in the bedroom, Stolas wanted to at least return the favor with the same fervor.

No other reason.

Or Stolas finds a book called The Mating Habits of Imps and decides to try some of the tips out on Blitz.

I saved the best for last. This is so far my favorite fic I’ve read! It fills in all of the little gaps in Stolas and Blitzø’s relationship and includes parts of the sinstagram posts. A canon-compliant and gut-wrenching story of Stolitz fucking and falling in love.

#please please read the mating habits of imps #and all of the rest these are my top fics atm #stolitz #fic rec #stolas goetia #blitzo #helluva boss #my ramblings

67 notes · View notes

twig-tea · 8 months

Note

Lately I’ve been feeling like Thai bl is truly all over the place with so many shows airing at once and some of the best ones flying under the radar while discourse is focused on a couple of the big messy ones. I think you’re the only person I know who is actually watching ALL of them and has been here for the whole evolution of the genre, so I’m curious what stands out to you about this current moment. Do the shows feel different to you? Is the way fandom is interacting with them changing? And what are your current favs?

I ended up writing a thesis, sorry friend lol To be fair to me there are 3 questions in there, all of them meaty! I've done my best to give a sense of where I'm at with Thai BL and how it feels like it's changed over time.

Caveating all of this: I am just one fan who I'm sure has had specific experiences that will colour my opinion, also a lot of this is just vibes so I'm open to being told I've forgotten something major or misremembered what it was like! If you are reading this and your opinion or experience is different please share, with stuff like this I'm always interested in hearing about differing opinions because the fandom experience will depend at least partly on where you hang out. For years, my main fandom space for BL was the YouTube comments section (RIP me).

Overall feel

Honestly, things overall don't feel all that different to me in Thai BL in particular, even though I'm about to talk about a lot of changes and ways it actuallyd does feel very different below lol And after reflecting about it, I think it's because these things still feel very much in flux, in a way that they've felt in flux this entire time. Producers are still figuring out the best funding and distribution models and merch models to make money; creators are still calibrating how queer these shows can be and still be popular; actors are still figuring out how to do BGP (business gay performances) without having fans interfere in their private lives off the clock. Writers are still trying to figure out how to write 12-episode arcs that don't drag in the middle or fumble the ending (which is also not new). The tension between established ships, fan expectations, and genre requirements has honestly been there almost the whole time, though the reverberations of missteps is louder now because of the larger fanbase that is (comparatively) more plugged in to live viewing. The core question in BL has always been 'how do we make this marketable', and that unsurprisingly hasn't changed, though the answer to that question has over time, if that makes sense?

Shows

Do the shows feel different? As a whole, I'd say yes. The biggest differences are of course total quantity and overall quality, but the actual distribution of % of shows that have high(er) production values (i.e. quality) feels close to the same--it was close to 50/50 in the late 2010s and now is maybe more like 40/60 with a higher percentage coming from more smaller production companies. But the numbers we're talking about are something like 15 shows in e.g. 2018 and something more like 50 shows in 2023 (being vague because there are shows that people could argue over whether they should count). The quality overall has increased, even the pulps look better, sound better, and tend to feel a little bit more put together than the pulps of even 2020 (please note that these are all relative qualifiers, most of these shows are still not objectively good). 2020 in particular was a watershed moment for high production value BLs; we get colorists and special effects artists, and sometimes decent sound production now!

There has also been an improvement in terms of what is depicted and how certain subject matter is treated very generally, though I think that's still in flux. Things like evil ex girlfriends are less common than they were and the women in BL are more likely (in general, still not always) to be treated as realized characters. We've gotten more and better femme representation in ensemble shows, and the "gay for you" trope is much less common. Consent is now considered sexy and is much more common than it was; non-consent as "sexy" has eroded and is much less common. Things that used to happen in almost every BL now happen in a much lower percentage. I also feel a little bit less worried about some of the actors on pulp sets because there is more general scrutiny about things like minor actors, intimacy coordination, BGP (business gay performance) expectations, and sexual exploitation. Overall, show recommendations these days come with fewer caveats.

The assumption that if you worked with someone on a BL once you would stay with them as an established pairing was surprisingly early in BL; I don't know if it's just because there were a few shows that had side pairings then get main shows, so the actors did work together on a few shows in a row, which made them feel established, or whether it's because the BGP started early to build hype both before and after shows aired, or whether audiences just made homophobic assumptions about how if two actors had chemistry they had to be gay for each other, and otherwise nobody would want to "play gay" more than once, or would want to have to kiss too many other men....in any case, there were huge scandals and blow-ups around this in BL on even the earliest shows, and some early shows were snubbed because of the pairing alone. Similarly, it was established very early in BL (i.e. 2016-17) that an unhappy ending for a pair would result in your show being panned; cheating was also a guaranteed flop in BL circles (though some ensemble shows that had gay relationships in them such as Friend Zone did fine with cheating plots and unhappy endings). Overall it feels like some things were only depicted in early Thai BL and creators have avoided them since due to the audience reception at the time. I will say, generally, that there have now been enough examples of people in a "branded pair" moving on to a new pair or multiple shows, that it feels less like a death knell to a BL career if one of the actors says they no longer wanted to make BLs, or if they switched companies.

I pay a lot of attention to queerness in BL, and that has changed a little bit too, though not in the way I expected. I had been expecting a more clear and steady trajectory in BL, but we've instead had real swings, and I've realized there will just always be shows that feel more or less actually gay or queer than others, and that's ok. Early Thai shows really spoiled us for good queer content, GayOK Bangkok and Diary of Tootsies are still shows by which i measure what we get now, and both of those are from 2016. I would say that more "mainstream" BL (i.e. by one of the major production companies) hit what turned out to be queer saturation around 2020 and that's where I was most surprised not see a more clear trajectory; rather than things getting more queer from there, I'd say a greater percentage of shows overall feel more queer, but we haven't (and I now suspect won't) reach the queerness we had in Thai tv in 2016. That being said, my secret running list of things I want to see in BL gets shorter every year as entries get crossed off, so I would say the range of queer experience is slowly getting captured as more content continues to be made by a wider range of production houses (PrEP being mentioned in a mainstream show is my white whale).

I know some people assume that shows are higher heat now overall, but I don't think that's true. I do think Thai television producers and directors have overalll gotten better at capturing sensuality, and acting workshops have improved chemistry-building overall too. But from what I can tell the ratio of high head and low heat content is still pretty similar to what it's always been, maybe slightly higher (e.g. at a quick glance I'd guesstimate 30% of shows had a sex scene in 2018 vs 40% in 2023).

Fandom

The main differences in fandom from the really early days and now are the ways we, as international fans, are able to engage with each other, with thai audiences at the same time, and with content creators, and the entitlement that comes with that. In the 2010s we were almost always watching after Thai airing, with either fansubs or, later, official subs, trailing online releases by days or weeks, which themselves may have trailed the Thailand airing date by days or weeks or sometimes even months. That became less true around 2019ish, and especially in 2020 when I think Thai producers were desperate to reach audiences during the start of the pandemic (and when audiences were desperate for something to distract us from what was happening in real life).

As a fan in the mid-late 2010s, watching something was either unofficial via a fansubber, or you were wading through hundreds of Thai comments to find anyone else writing about the shows in English. Now, it's actually rare we don't have immediate international distribution, though it may be paid. If the subs are not up at the same time as the official upload, even on free sites, fans get furious. It's a bit surreal to see people complain about waiting a few hours for subtitles, especially on YouTube, when we sometimes waited months for a series to finish being subbed (not to say people didn't complain back then too, because they sure did! But there were fewer international fans overall, and it wasn't an expectation that there would be subs, so fewer people complained when it happened). This meant that a lot of people only watched shows when they were complete, and people were not watching with any kind of synchronicity.

With international fans moving into simultaneous watching with Thai audiences, we suddenly had the chance to talk about shows as they were airing and affect the conversations about them and even, sometimes, the decisions. Folks seem to have differing opinions about what makes a BL, and what makes a BL good, and they are vocal about when a show doesn't meet their standard. This has always been true, but the strong opinions have more of an effect on the discourse when they're expressed in real-time to the show being aired. Also, when we have literally 3x the number of Thai shows being aired (nevermind other countries which have also increased), it seems so much more egregious to me to complain if a single show doesn't meet your particular taste. Just go watch something else! That was less possible in 2016, but now nobody has any excuse lol Please note here that I'm not saying shows should not be criticized. But when you have one loud faction saying shows should have nothing but innocent kisses if any skinship at all and showing more is distasteful and possibly homophobic, and another faction saying a show should be panned if they don't have at least one sex scene and if there is no good kiss it's homophobic, I don't know where that leaves content creators but I see the tension and how it sometimes results in my least favourite tropes like "blushing maiden" even after a couple has canonically had sex. These factions have always existed in BL fandom, this is not new, they just both seem particularly silly now with so much content to choose from.

The shows that get attention and the shows that get snubbed feel the same too, in all honesty. You can ask yourself the following questions:

Is the show a little slower paced?

Are the story beats less melodramatic?

Do its characters feel more human?

Do they feel more queer?

Is it a comedy?

Is there any risk of an unhappy ending?

Do people not think one of the lead actors is hot?

Do people ship one of the lead actors with someone who isn't his costar?

Do people have to do anything other than go to YouTube to watch it?

If the answer is yes to any of those questions, and especially to the last one, fewer people will be watching, even if the show is good. That's always been true. [Shows I'm thinking about when I say that: Make it Right, He's Coming to Me, My Ride, You're My Sky, Oxygen (though the sides in this one are also at fault), YYY, Something in my Room, Ghost Host Ghost House, Dear Doctor I'm Coming for Soul, Cooking Crush.] All this is to say, there have always been shows that have been ignored, though I agree with you OP that with more shows airing, more are being ignored at any given time.

The other thing is that when a show is good, it doesn't necessarily invite discourse. The messes are often what encourage people to dig in, fill in gaps, linger in the adrenaline. The part that does feel different is also related to the increase in genre BLs; genre stuff in general tends to get more attention in fandom spaces, and the way people are functioning as fans feels different in that they're bringing the way they interact with genre content to BL as BL has started having larger and better funded genre content. I'm thinking about those early genre BLs like He She It, My Dream, Love Poison, Golden Blood, So Much In Love, Why R U....we started getting genre shows in BL in I think 2017 and basically had 1-2 a year until 2020ish and then it increased from there; and the ones that had funding and decent distribution got engagement until they started going off the rails, and then they had even more engagement and then fell off. I don't think it's a coincidence that the shows last year that got people to write meta were La Pluie, Be My Favorite, and I Feel You Linger in the Air. When a show is building a world, there's more to say and interrogate about it, and when a genre show fails, it can fail more spectacularly than a regular romance story. The most popular BL shows used to all be straight-up BL bubble romances, but I think genre shows really started to take over a greater percentage of the popular spots in 2022 and 2023. Again, the main difference here is that there used to be 1-2 stand-out shows per year, and now there are closer to 6+ per year, and as we got more stand-out shows the variety of what type of show stood out as popular has expanded. I do think the overall percentage of shows that are more standard romance plots has reduced, partly because Thai production companies are running out of popular y-novels to adapt. So I'm anticipating we'll continue to get more genre content going forward, and maybe a higher percentage of original works too.

Shows I'm Enjoying Right Now

Right now, the Thai shows airing that I'm watching are:

Cooking Crush

Dead Friend Forever

Cherry Magic Thailand

City of Stars

The Sign

Playboyy

PitBabe

7 Days before Valentine

For Him

Of those, I'd currently most recommend Cooking Crush as a generic BL recommendation. Dead Friend Forever is very good, but is not a romance and is difficult for some to watch (there are a lot of dark themes in addition to the gore and scary bits).

Cooking Crush is doing so many things I love. I've written about the way it's set up its major conflict to be amongst the friend group here, and way the show is depicting communication between the two main characters and how they improve their communication with one another as they get closer here. Two of my biggest BL pet peeves are a conflict for the sake of a dramatic penultimate episode that ignores or retcons a character's growth or the building of trust that a couple has already gone through in the series, so the fact that this show is working so hard to establish strong communication between its leads and then setting up the significant drama to actually about friendship rather than romance is something I cannot overstate my excitement about. To tie this back into what I wrote above, this reminds me of Diary of Tootsies and I mean that in the best possible way.

Dead Friend Foreever is, like I mentioned above, not a romance; it's a slasher horror melodrama with a very well established mystery, an ensemble cast of mostly hateable characters (which I admit isn't usually my thing, but since they're likely all going to die as a result of the genre they're in I'm finding that more tolerable than usual, and there is at least one character I like). DFF did a great job of structuring the story for the ultimate payoff of information reveals. There are a lot of shows that have been messing with non-linear storytelling recently, Cooking Crush being one of the ones that actually does this poorly in my opinion, but Dead Friend Forever effectively uses non-linear storytelling so that we find out important pieces of information about particular characters at a time when that information will have the most emotional impact on what is happening in the "present" of the storyline. Every time there is a reveal, it informs what we've already seen, recontextualizes it, and means we understand some of the character motivations and actions differently from when we saw them the first time. I mentioned above that there are dark themes in this show; one of the things that I really like about this show is that the impact of class is not glossed over, and that the consequences of these events feel very real for the characters; people do terrible things in this show, but these actions are not treated lightly by the show itself.

You'd think these two shows would have nothing in common, but there are things that they share that put them both in my top category. Generally, in both of these shows, the character arcs are clear and logical; when a character does something, even if I don't like the action itself, I can understand exactly why they that and can see how it matches where they are in their arc at the time. The shows show change in characters as a result of what they experience, and the relationships in this show really matter. When characters start acting in ways that feel out of character or against their own arc because they have to in order to drive the plot forward, I struggle to remain invested; that's not happening with either of these shows. Both of these shows also treat serious topics with seriousness, and consequences for actions are real and felt by the characters in the show (and if someone gets away with something, the show is clear that this is not just). Nothing has happened that hasn't been signalled or implied earlier. Both shows also have clear class consciousness and represent the disparity caused by classism in a critical/harsh light.

Whew! I think I got to everything you asked. Thanks again for the extremely interesting question!

#ask game #bl meta #long post #typed so that I can stop thinking it #fandom meta #multi bl #thank you for the ask!

140 notes · View notes

thatscarletflycatcher · 3 months

Text

In view of North and South Weekly reaching chapter 4 and Mr. Hale's revelation to Margaret, and how it often puzzles readers, I offer you an article Angus Easson wrote on the subject. He discusses both its role in the text, the historical characters it references, and Dickens' involvement (plus some comments from Charlotte Brontë).

There's spoilers in the article, of course.

I quote specifically this section because I think it is of particular interest:

"Subsequently, problems of length caused by faulty casting-off by the printers, Bradbury and Evans, and by Mrs Gaskell's intransigence in failing to compress this very episode in proof, though Dickens understood himself to have required it of her and thought (mistakenly) she had agreed -these problems make it difficult to assess Dickens's real reaction, but it seems he was uncertain and indeed somewhat disturbed by the implications of a strong religious interest in the novel. His initial comments on this portion of the manuscript, before any difficulties arose, clearly show him shying away from doctrinal controversy: at this point, he felt, the story 'seems to me to flag unmanageably … is on a difficult and dangerous subject',' and he advised the fusing together of what what would otherwise be two episodes. Later, once serialization had begun, faced this episode, he wrote more desperately to Mrs Gaskell that this "is the place where we agreed that there should be a great condensations and considerable compression' and he recommends her (the pressure of less permissive verbs lies behind 'recommend') to 'make the scene between Margaret and her father relative to his leaving the church... as short as you can find it in your heart to make it'. Yet we should also remember that Dickens had by now read in manuscript at least to the end of ch. 22 ('A Blow and its Consequences') and could well have been puzzled by the attention given to Hale's motives when they play so little subsequent part in the action."

I think it is reasonable to assume that Gaskell would have developed this line of the novel more, if she hadn't met with such resistance from Dickens, though I'm not 100% it'd be in the direction Easson proposes. It is interesting to consider that both Mary Barton and Ruth, two much more heavily religious texts, specially the latter, were not published first as serializations, but as whole books through an editorial house.

#Elizabeth Gaskell #North and South #North and South Weekly

39 notes · View notes

worseforwarren · 2 months

Text

i think the whole motel part of lis2 was my favourite section of the entire game. there were so many emotions in that one night they spent together there. leaving brody, how they felt knowing they had the warmth of an actual bed and bath, watching tv together with their new pet, sean watching their last christmas together as a family, dancing on the bed and to top it off, daniel finding out that sean lied and his dad was dead the entire trip. i’ve seen people say it felt rushed but to me, it felt like their entire trip as a whole. going so quickly from highs to lows like how in the first episode, the entire family was playing court over a chock-o-crisp to esteban shot and them having to leave the only home they’ve ever known. it really represented the entire game in just a single segment

#life is strange #lis #life is strange 2 #lis2 #lis2 sean #lis2 daniel

28 notes · View notes

nukitan · 5 months

Text

Okay so as much as I dislike conflating Pokémon and Digimon, (they’re two shows that just so happen to be in the same genre and I think the comparisons should stop there. The bad faith ones anyway), how great the new Pokémon anime is has made me think about something.

Basically, I feel like Horizons has a lot of elements that I would love to see in a modern season of Digimon and I think the Digimon anime could take a page from their playbook. Which is funny since up until now I’ve always said the reverse.

Full rant bellow the cut to spare your time lines if you don’t want to read my rambles.

I split them into section going into Digimon first and then Pokémon if you want to skip around and don’t care about the other franchise. BUT, I will say that the point of this essay is that Pokémon Horizons is good, the first three seasons of Digimon are good and if you like one you should watch the other.

Anyway.

First I’m going to go into my history with Digimon and what I liked about the classic seasons and what I don’t like so much about the newer ones.

Basically, I love Digimon. Been hyper fixating on it off and on for twenty+ years. I’ve seen every season, subbed and dubbed multiple times, I’ve played a good chunk of the games, I play the TCG, ect.

Something that drew me to the Digimon anime over AniPoke, was the characters and the plot. In the early seasons Digimon tackled lots of difficult issues like divorce, adoption, death, loss, depression, among other things. But still kept a light hearted, feel good air. The characters felt deep and multi-faceted (At least in the sub), and I dare say are better written than some characters from some adult oriented anime out there. And they had cute monsters that evolved into bigger monsters and fought baddie monsters, what wasn’t there to love? The first three or so seasons did a fantastic job juggling characters, plot, cool creature fights, and cute and funny moments between the members of the cast. It never really felt like a commercial compared to contemporaries. It felt like the writers were creating something with soul, it was a story first and ad second. It felt like it had love.

Adventure, 02, and Tamers are my favorites. Bellow are some characters and their arcs I really enjoyed from those seasons, skip if don’t want spoilers.

I love Taichi’s arc of being reckless, and being one track minded to the point where he put all his friends in harms way and Yamato tries to act like this calm and cool lancer type but he’s actually the group heart and sensitive the way they bounce off each other and have conflicts throughout the series is just fantastic.

Ken in 02 and his whole arc of getting over the death of his brother and accepting the consequences of his actions as the Digimon Kaiser. And the way he slowly warms up to the group is so cute. I legit cried when I watched some of his episodes post kaiser as an adult.

Tamers as a whole is an extensional horror trip. Juri’s whole thing with her depression after the death of Leomon, how it related back to her trauma after losing her mom when she was younger, and the way the D-Reaper took advantage of that- I honestly don’t know how this was slipped into a kids show from the early 2000s.

A lot of these shows that started in the 90s and early 2000s were pledged with the “Glorified 20-25 minute toy ad” problem, and Digimon didn’t really seem to have that issue to me. It felt like the creators were putting the story and characters first, and an ad second or third.

The early seasons of Digimon felt like a celebration of childhood and was something that could be enjoyable to kids of all ages and adults alike. I don’t at all get that feeling that I’m watching a baby show when I watch early Digimon. It presents things in simple terms that kids could understand without talking down to its audience. It’s great.

And then the later seasons happened and Digimon forgot what made it great and lost its soul…

Xros wars was where the ball really seemed to drop in my opinion. Sure it still had the epic Kaiju fights but… that’s about it. Gone were the intense character moments and interesting plots. All we had was the special little marry sue of a boy Taiki who could do nothing wrong besides not “TURNING HIS BACK ON SOMEONE uwu”. And there was no overcoming adversity like in the earlier seasons, Taiki would just epically throw his Xros loader into the air and scream away his problems with a “DIGi-XROS!” (Sorry Taiki fans I can’t conceal my venom for this man)

And the monsters were just disappointing too. Like they were clunky and just looked like… toys.

It felt like Digimon had lost what made it tick and started to more closely resemble what I didn’t like about AniPoke, a toy commercial with a sanitized feel.

This continued for the next couple of seasons, only really picking up again in Appmon, but while Appmon is good and had it’s moments (I love the story with Yujin. He and Haru are totally roommates, cousins even), it still doesn’t compare to the heart the first three to five seasons had, imo.

Tri felt like a soulless nostalgia cash grab. Last Kizuna was good, it gave me hope for the anime again just to crush it all away with The Beginning.

I won’t get started on Adventure 2020 or we’ll be here all day. Needless to say it spat in the face of the show it was paying homage to.

Ghost Game got my hopes up, but then the last episode just took a dump on the rest of the show. It was fun, Kiyoshiro and Jellymon specifically were the stars of the show and GulusGammamon was interesting… until he wasn’t. It was fun, had a lot of potential with its horror feel, and was the closest to classic Digimon the modern seasons had been in awhile… at first anyway. It really shat the bed. And my problem with it don’t really relate to it being episodic in nature or anything, that can be done well. The characters just didn’t feel consistent (Especially Ruli) and it didn’t deliver on any of the plot intrigue it tried to stir up.

BUT! Ghost Game at least had… a little bit of heart. It felt like the creators knew their Digimon lore and did a fantastic job incorporating it into the monster of the week. I could really feel the love there.

Also on a side note, I am not just the Digimon equivalent to Gen-Oner, hating on things that are new and fetishizing the old. In fact, before I rewatched all of the seasons around 2020, I didn’t really care for the Adventure or Tamers. But my opinions did a total flip watching everything as an adult.

So, for a quick collection of thoughts before we move on to Pokémon:

What I like in a Digimon season:

1. Good characters with arcs that tackle bigger issues in a way kids can still understand and relate to without feel like they’re being talked down to.

2. Cute moments between members of the cast and their creatures.

3. Fights that feel like they mean something and aren’t just there for cool flashy effects.

4. A feeling of love and care for the franchise that goes beyond just trying to sell me toys and games.

Things I don’t like:

-OP mcs that solve every problem with the gimmick of the given seasons

-Flat, inconsistent characters that don’t feel like they have any agency or reason for doing what they’re doing besides that fact that they do indeed have Digimon.

-Pointless fights that are just there for no other reason than just to show a cool fight

-“BUY ALL OUR GAMES AND TOYS AT YOUR LOCAL HOBBY SHOP”

Okay now Pokémon.

Just like with Digimon here’s a little background with my history with the Pokémon anime

I’ve watched the original Pokémon anime up to Diamond and Pearl as a kid and I watched some of SM and most of Journey’s as an adult, but I’ve never really been big on anipoke.

Like at best it just felt like a cute show I could turn my brain off for and just vibe.

At worst it felt like a hyper sanitized toy/game commercial (Not blaming it, that was the anime’s main purpose after all).

Out of curiosity, I watched the new series. As much as I liked Ash, I really felt like he overstayed his welcome and they should have gotten rid of him and moved on ages ago since it felt like by DP there was nothing interesting to do with the character. The Pokémon world is huge and intresting, there was so much they could have done but Ash kind of felt like he bogged it down and stunted the anime’s growth past a point.

So yeah,I got excited when they finally pulled the plug and focused on a new set of characters so I gave Horizons a watch.

And I love it! It’s got heart, characters with development, a little bit of plot, and it’s cute? Like I was dumbfounded by the fact that a Pokemon anime, that I previously wrote off as just being a glorified ad, could be so good???

And then after thinking about what I liked so much about it, that’s when the topic of this essay hit me: Horizons feels like it has everything I long for in a modern Digimon anime, almost as if they took a page out of classic Digimon’s book. Like I always heard throughout the years that “Digimon had the better anime Pokemon has the better games” But Horizons really turned that on its head.

Let’s revisit my criteria for what I liked about the classic Digimon seasons from the section above to show what I mean. (Light Spoilers for Horizons ahead, though I wont go into specifics)

1. Good characters with arcs that tackle bigger issues in a way kids can still understand and relate to without feel like they’re being talked down to.

Yep. Horizons has that. Like the early seasons of Digimon, Horizons doesn’t just use it’s human characters as a vehicle to show you all the monsters you could catch if you bought the next game from your local shop for the low low price of 60 USD, nope. There feels like theres care there.

While they aren’t fully developed yet, Liko and Dot especially show huge character growth in the first 50 episodes. They focus on their flaws and how the characters overcome them.

Liko is very indecisive at first. She’s socially awkward, she feels like shes just going with the flow, afraid to take that first step to find out what she really wants out of life. Then, she finally does, she makes the decision to follow Friede and the Rising Volttacklers to find her new horizons. It’s great. And she still has lots of growing she can do later both as a trainer and as a character. She’s fantastic for a lead.

I also like how they use Sprigatito’s evolution as stand in for Liko’s growth so far in the series. Early Digimon did that too with the Crests in Adventure and the Bio Merging in Tamers and I always really like monster partners evolving to reflect their human so much, it’s such a good narrative device!

Dot slowly being brought out of her shell by Liko and the others is just- chefs kiss. She goes from being a reclusive shut in to slowly taking interest in the things Liko and co are doing and develops meaningful relationships with them. Her care for her friends and want to be there for them makes her take the first step and is now traveling around Paldea with them! And they went about this in a very well paced way where she still isn’t just magically over all her awkwardness and shut in tendencies yet. She too still has so much room for interesting development later down the road.

The adult characters are interesting too, even though they haven’t really done much yet. They really perfected that found family group of misfits trope that I’m usually pretty sick of. I love them.

And Amethio and the other villains also feel like they’re more than just your cackling evil for evil sake type characters and I’m super excited to see what they do with them!

And as far as the tackling bigger issues point: Though its just conjecture and I might be over thinking things (Though others in the fandom have pointed this out too) there’s definitely the groundwork for it here.

Liko’s family is very hands off and distant. Liko goes away to boarding school at the start of the series, her parents work, and her grandma is a vagabond traveling the world and doesn’t often stay in one place for long.

Liko lacks solid connections and foundation in her life due to her family being so closed off emotionally, which would explains her going with the flow and being unsure of what she really wants to do. She’s lost with no guidance. And it’s not like her family doesn’t love each other, no. They just don’t want to express their feelings for fear of it bogging each other down. They want Liko to be free to do what her heart tells her, but they’re so worried about talking things out that they don’t realize how that freedom has hurt Liko and made her into an anxious mess. (They even kind of hint at this in the second opening)

But yeah, like others have said, I’m not sure if this is on purpose or if they were trying to write Liko’s family to be full of strong women and just kind of accidentally fell into making them all feel too independent and distant from one another. And it would be really cool for the show to go into Liko’s home life more… but I’m not sure it would be on brand for Pokemon to talk about something so heavy. But fingers crossed!

2. Cute moments between members of the cast and their creatures.

Yep! Horizons has got plenty of it. Right now all of the main cast has two Pokemon each and they’re really taking the time to show off each Pokemon and give them a lot of wholesome moments together and with their trainers.

The human character interactions are great too! I really like the blossoming friendship between Liko and Dot (They could be roommates guys!) and the growing rivalry between Friede and Amethio! It’s great!

3. Fights that feel like they mean something and aren’t just there for cool flashy effects.

The fights in Horizons are so cool and well choreographed, but they aren’t just there to look pretty, not at all!

A lot of the fights that take place in the first two arcs are learning experiences for Liko, Roy, and Dot. They learn new strategies, their Pokemon learn new moves, and in the arc that’s airing at the time of writing, they’re learning how to terrestialize too. The fights don’t seem to happen without purpose and always seem like they either teach the characters a lesson about proper ways to be a trainer and even sometimes help them grow as characters too.

And theres even a healthy amount of losses and wins under the character’s belts and they drive home the lesson of “You learn more from a defeat”. I like how heavily they relied on the more experienced Friede at the beginning and they got frustrated from their losses and used it as fuel to want to learn to stand on their own two feet.

The fights are great and don’t just feel like a kid mashing two toys together like some series with battle elements can.

4. A feeling of love and care for the franchise that goes beyond just trying to sell me toys and games.

This is a little harder to explain and is more like a feel than anything. But I can definitely feel an air of care in Horizons that I don’t really see from shows that feel like twenty-three minute ads. The characters and story don’t just feel like they’re trying to sell me something.

While they’re definitely leaning heavy on the Paldea setting right now, it doesn’t feel like a straight adaption of the games. They don’t really do the “creature of the day” or “character of the day” type episodes like I remember seeing in past iterations of Anipoke. Horizons doesn’t have those moments that I feel like the character is looking right at me and saying “Buy Buy Buy”

And, at least so far, there seems to be a love for Pokemon with the way the reference Pokédex entries like with Hatenna being sensitive to strong emotions or what not.

Like I said, this is really more of a personal criteria and some people can be more sensitive to this kind of thing than others. The closest thing I can compare it to is like when you’re eating a meal a loved one made for you versus something you got at a diner or fast food restaurant. You don’t know how to put your finger on it but you can just taste the love… it’s like that with Horizons to me.

So yeah!

If you’ve read this far, thanks for listening to me rant! I’ll try to wrap it up here.

Basically I just really like Horizons. It gives me that same feel as when I was rewatching the classic Digimon seasons a view years ago… And like the way Horizons fixed all of the problems I had with Anipoke as a kid and as an adult is awesome, it really feels like Pokemon Company is making an effort to listen to criticism and better the series… I just really hope the Digimon anime can do the same.

Oh and all of this is just my opinion, if I said something that you don’t agree with about Digimon or Pokémon, I meant no offense and I’m happy to hear your opinions too!

I just want to close this by saying…

Fans of early Digimon, go watch Pokemon Horizons! You wont regret it!

Fans of Horizons go watch (the sub) of the first three or so seasons of Digimon! If you like Horizons and didn’t really click with Ash era Anipoke I think you’ll really have a good time, it’s so good!

I think both series could use more love, so go out there and give them both a watch!

Okay I’ll shut up now, thanks for reading!

#dumb rant #I think too hard about kids anime from the 90s #i just have a lot of feelings #pokemon #pokemon horizons #anipoke #digimon #digimon adventure #digimon adventure 02 #digimon tamers #digimon anime #digimon xros wars #digimon universe appli monsters #digimon ghost game #digimon tri #digimon last evolution #digimon the beginning #media analysis #text post

31 notes · View notes

thedreamwraptwriter · 2 years

Text

Snap

Tenth Doctor x Reader; Eleventh Doctor x Reader; 14th Doctor x Reader (David Tennant Version)

Prompt: inspired by the song Snap by Rosa Linn. The Reader deals with the aftermath of being the Doctor’s companion and unrequited love. Also, with the announcement of David Tennant’s return, I had to include his “14th” Doctor in this as well!

Word Count: 5490

Warnings: brief mention of depression (nothing in detail)

Note: [Y/N] = Your Name; [D/N] = Dog’s Name. I apologize in advance about the Dalek section as I am not overly familiar with their history and am basing them/their lore off of the couple of episodes I’ve watched.

It's 4 AM

I can't turn my head off

Wishin' these memories would fade

They never do

I rolled over in bed, restless, unable to sleep. Visions of space, a smiling man, and a blue police box swirled in my head. It felt like a dream, one that was just out of reach, and yet so raw and real at the same time. It had been six months to the day that the Doctor, a time travelling alien from Galifrey, had left. Six months since he decided I’d never see him again. Six months.

The darkness outside reminded me of my own smallness in the universe. As a human, I was one of the most delicate species across the cosmos – and yet the Doctor somehow made me feel bigger than life. When I was with him, I was whole. We’d traveled all over the universe – from dangerous planets to places more beautiful than I could describe. The Tardis became my home. The Doctor became my life.

Flashback

“[Y/N]! Come this way,” the Doctor’s chipper voice rose over the crowd of people around us. I looked up from the tapestry I was admiring and locked eyes with the Doctor. He sported his brown trench coat and modern looking suit, standing out like a sore thumb amongst the busy medieval market. I smiled and made my way to him. He took my hand, the warmth spreading from my fingers right to my heart.

“I’d like to show you something,” he said, gently leading me through the throng of shoppers.

“Is it a famous historical figure?” I asked, jokingly.

“We already met one of those today! I can’t go around having you meet every important figure and confusing the history books,” the Doctor chuckled, looking over at me.

“Honestly, at this point I think we’ve done enough time travel to confuse every history book in the world,” I responded, only half-kidding.

The Doctor shrugged, laughing. His eyes crinkled and I smiled up at him fondly. How I loved him.

“Anyway, [Y/N], I wanted to show you this,” the Doctor helped me climb up a small embankment and pulled me to his side. I was so close to him I could hear his twin hearts beating in tandem.

“Oh my – Doctor this is beautiful!”

Before me was a huge field of wildflowers, surrounding the giant castle overlooking the kingdom. Flowers long gone in my day stood bright and tall in the morning sun. Pink, yellow, and blue hues rippled across the fields as the breeze blew so slightly. The castle, a massive and elegant building, stood solemnly in the distance. It was like a fairytale.

“Isn’t it just lovely?” the Doctor said.

“It looks like a storybook come to life!” I exclaimed. Though I had seen many incredible sights with the Doctor – from other planets to history-changing events, little things like this always made me pause in awe and admiration. The Doctor figured this out and now, every place or time we stopped in, he made a point of pausing with me to admire these views with me.

“A storybook with a beautiful princess,” said the Doctor, giving my shoulder a small squeeze. I blushed, looking away and trying to calm the nerves in my chest. I had to remind myself that no, he was not a human man, but an alien who was extremely old – romance was forbidden. Even then, I couldn’t stop the thundering in my chest.

End Flashback

Turns out people lied

They said, "Just snap your fingers"

As if it was really that easy for me to get over you

I just need time

Click. Click. Click.

I sat, absentmindedly typing away on my laptop. It was quiet in my office today. Most people were working from home, which left me with plenty of in-office tea. Though I enjoyed working at home too, that sometimes seemed to make my mind wander far too much, so I volunteered to come in more often than my colleagues. The job itself was fairly easy – a simple data entry job that consisted of me filling out spreadsheets and attending a meeting here and there.

Mundane.

Boring.

Normal.

I stopped typing for a moment, staring off into the distance. It had been a year since I’d seen the Doctor. My wonderful, incredible Doctor. It’s funny – even though I knew it was a year for me, for the Doctor, he could jump into any part of my life and it would seem like just a second. Time was so confusing now. Was a year really so long?

I went back to typing, hardly noticing what I was doing. I had gotten this job a couple months ago after my parents begged me to try to do something with my life. After the Doctor had dropped me off, I spiraled into a depression. I felt nothing and everything at the same time. It was paralyzing. I wallowed for months, unsure of how to continue. I’d just been traveling through space and time, for goodness’ sake! However, as life began to move on without me, I realized that I couldn’t sit in my flat all day with nothing to show for it. My friends carefully pulled me back out into the wider world again, treating me gently and acting like I’d just experienced the worst break up of my life. In fact, they had met the Doctor a few times. To allay suspicion, he introduced himself as my boyfriend (though that made my heart race just thinking about it) and now that he was no longer coming around, they assumed (rightly so) that we’d broken up. Pretty accurate, I suppose.

“You’ll be able to get over this hump,” said one of my friends on a particularly difficult night for me. “Life is full of mysteries and heartbreak, but I know you - you’re strong. And you have us.”

I was forever grateful to my friends for sticking by my side. It must have been odd – the Doctor had dropped me off during a time that was just a couple of months after he’d shown up in my life, so my friends probably thought I had fallen in too deep with a guy I’d known for a short time, even though to me, I’d known him for years. I smiled wryly. What a mess this was.

“Hey [Y/N]! Did you want to join us after work today for dinner?” one of my coworkers called from across the office, pulling me out of my reverie. “Boss said she’d pay!”

I thought about it for a moment. It had been months since I’d gone out, much less socialized with a large group of people. I suppose I was feeling brave today. I smiled at him. “Sure, why not.”

Trying to re-learn how to live a ‘normal’ human life was hard, but I was trying. Though I missed the Doctor more than life, I knew that my time as his companion was over. One step at a time.

Snapping one, two

Where are you?

You're still in my heart

Flashback

“You look incredible, [Y/N]! I think you’ll definitely fit in,” the Doctor said, nodding in approval. I looked down at the huge, puffy dress, wondering if the Doctor needed his eyes checked. A large, powdered wig perched atop my head like some massive vulture. The Tardis hummed in approval, and I felt even more ridiculous. If the Tardis approved, then I knew I looked positively ludicrous.

“Doctor, I know that this period of time involved this type of – fashion, but you don’t need to lie to me,” I grumbled, trying to keep the wig from toppling to the ground. “You can just tell me I look like an overstuffed cupcake.”

The Doctor laughed. “You’re too much! I’m being serious – I think you look perfect.”

I rolled my eyes. “While I appreciate you, I also refuse to believe you.”

The Doctor chuckled and walked over to me, poking my nose and smiling. “You always look perfect, sweetheart.”

“Stop buttering me up and let’s get a move on,” I said, crossly.

“As you wish,” he said, bowing and holding out his hand as we started towards the Tardis’s exit.

I took his hand, trying to balance the wig and giant dress, while also attempting to be graceful. We managed to get outside – the Tardis had parked in an alleyway in 18th century Paris. I saw ladies in very similar attire as me walking about in the main road, their giant wigs seemingly glued to their heads. I envied how smoothly they walked across the cobblestone streets.

“See, [Y/N]? You look like a French elite,” said the Doctor. “Told you that you look perfect.”

“Well they look lovely, but I – whoa!”

The heel of my shoe caught on a loose area of the cobblestone alley and I went tumbling. The wig, dress, and the many layers of undergarments went flying. The Doctor, caught off guard, came tumbling down next to me. We both hit the ground with a resounding oof.

Panting, I laid there a moment. The wind had been knocked out of me.

“D-Doctor are you o-okay?” I gasped.

I heard some grumbling and movement next to me. “Don’t worry, I’m good, it’s all okay,” he grunted. “I think your dress broke most of my fall, in fact.”

“Oh so now I’m just a pillow for when you fall over?”

“A very nice pillow, yes.”

I laughed, though it came out more as a pained grunt. Pretty sure I landed on my tailbone – that would be sore for a couple days for sure.

“Can you help your pillow up, please? I think I’ll change – era accurate fashion be damned for this trip,” I mumbled.

The Doctor jumped lightly to his feet. Surprising considering how far he’d fallen just moments ago. He held his hand out to me.

“Come on there, let’s get you changed up and then we can explore,” he said cheerily. “And I promise to never make you wear anything quite so… cupcake-like again.” He winked and I groaned.

“You never cease to amaze me,” I said, grabbing his hand and getting on my feet. The wig lay forgotten on the cobblestone street. “It’s like you know exactly how to make me feel better and worse at the same time!”

He smiled, kissing my forehead. “It’s the power of the Doctor!”

I smiled back at him. “A special power indeed.”

End Flashback

Snapping three, four

Don't need you here anymore

Get out of my heart

'Cause I might snap

It was a cold winter day. I was wrapped up like a little present against the cold. My puffy jacket, hat, and scarf were working overtime. My dog, a little corgi, shuffled ahead of me. I held on to her leash, keeping my hands shoved deep in my pockets. My parents had gotten her for me about two years ago, right after my first-year anniversary at my job. I was so excited – she was just the spark of joy I needed.

“Come on, [D/N]! I know you love the snow, but it’s freezing out here,” I said as she stopped to sniff another light post. “Let’s get ourselves home and warm, shall we?”

[D/N] looked up at me and wagged her tail. Though it was cold outside, my heart warmed me fully just looking at her little face.

“Ok, fine, you can sniff a little longer,” I laughed, giving her a little more lead of the leash.

[D/N] started to dig intensely in the snow, her face almost completely covered. I shook my head in amusement. Dogs were so silly sometimes.

“Right, I’m sure there’s something really interesting in there, but I think you should probably stop digging on public land,” I said, giving her leash a little tug.

Suddenly, [D/N] popped out of the snow, a book in her mouth.

“What’s that you have there?” I said, kneeling down and carefully taking it from her. She wagged her tail and smiled at me, proud of her find.

I looked at the cover. The Angel’s Kiss was embossed on the front.

“Huh, The Angel’s Kiss, eh? Looks like one of those weird romance novels,” I joked to [D/N]. “I suppose we can put it on that bench over there. Hopefully someone can find it again.”

“Excuse me! Excuse me I think you might have my book…”

A cheerful voice suddenly rang out in the quiet winter air. I turned around to see a very tall man walking up the path. His hair was brushed over to one side of his face and his bowtie was slightly askew.

“Oh, this romance novel is yours?” I asked, holding it up and fully facing him.

I noticed him do a double take, his face clouding over for a second, before the serene smile returned. “Ha, it’s no romance novel, but yes, it is mine. Well, kind of, I suppose,” said the stranger, reaching out for the book hurriedly. “But I can take it off your hands now.”

I was startled by his sudden reach and the book fell back into the snow. “Oh, what’s the rush? Perhaps it is a spicy romance novel,” I said, half-joking. The man looked at me again for a long moment, before saying quietly, “No it isn’t,” as he leaned down and picked the book up from the snow.

“Thank you very much,” he said, and quickly turned away back up the path.

As I watched him walk away my brow furrowed. He seemed so familiar to me. Though I didn’t remember ever seeing him before, there was something about him… I couldn’t quite put a finger on it.

I looked down at [D/N]. She sat patiently, looking at me. “Well, I suppose my imagination can get out of hand sometimes, can’t it?” I said. “Come on, little one, let’s go.”

As I turned away, back towards my flat, I heard a woman’s voice cry out “Doctor! Where have you been?”

The Doctor? No, surely not here, not now…

I whirled around. The man I’d just been speaking to was standing with two others now, a little farther down the path. A woman with red hair and a brown-haired man. The woman was tugging at the book I’d just handed back to him. Perhaps I’d misheard, maybe it was a mistake…

“Doctor, what’s wrong? It looks like you’ve just seen a ghost,” said the woman.

No, I hadn’t misheard. The familiarity, the odd comfort – it was the Doctor. Indeed, it wasn’t my Doctor, at least not as knew him, but it was still the Doctor. A rush of emotions hit me. I felt anger, sadness, pain, and hope all at the same time. Had he forgotten me? He didn’t seem to recognize me at all. And he had two new companions? When he’d left me, he swore he’d never take another person with him again – what was this hypocrisy? Was I not good enough?

I felt my legs begin to move without me. I wanted to sprint to him, to demand answers, to figure out what was going on. Why did he look so different? Why did he act like he didn’t know me – was this another one of his kind? No, he said there were no Time Lords left. My brain was spinning. Four years. Four years. And he chose to show up now. Right as I was starting to feel whole again.

“Doc –“ I began, but then, as though on cue, a massive gust of wind suddenly stirred up, causing the snow to dance into the sky and obscure my vision. I covered my eyes and quickly grabbed onto [D/N] to ensure she didn’t get lost in the gust.

The snow settled and there was no sign of the three figures. Still holding [D/N], I ran over to where they had been, hoping against hope I’d see one of them or the Tardis hidden amongst the bushes. Nothing. I blinked back tears, feeling an overwhelming sense of sadness and heaviness descend on my chest. I’d always wanted to see the Doctor again, but this felt wrong. He had new companions. He didn’t acknowledge me. He even looked completely different. The bubbling of emotions in my chest suddenly ripped through and I wailed in anguish. This feeling felt as fresh as the day he left me.

I'm writing a song

Said, "This is the last one"

How many last songs are left?

I'm losing count

Flashback

I was shaking with fear. The Doctor stood in front of me, his arms spread to protect me. I could see his body quivering just a bit, but his voice held steady as he tried to reason with the Daleks in front of us.

“You don’t want to do this,” he said. “She is innocent – “

“Exterminate.” Said the robotic voices, ignoring him.

“D-Doctor please, you need to g-go and save the others,” I whispered. “I can’t move and there are others who need you right now – please.”

“Don’t speak, [Y/N],” he commanded. I could hear the fire in his voice. “I will protect you.”

The Daleks had their blasters pointed at us, slowly closing in. I felt sick. This was all my fault. I had accompanied the Doctor on this mission to rescue some space travelers who had been captured by the Daleks. The Doctor tried to make me stay in the Tardis, but I insisted. Instead, all I’d done was gotten hurt and now the Doctor couldn’t continue with the rescue mission. I tried to stand but hissed in pain. A large gash on my leg prevented me from being able to move comfortably.

“Don’t move, [Y/N], I don’t need you to be more hurt than you already are,” said the Doctor, his voice stern. Almost angry, I thought.

I looked around wildly, wondering if somehow, I could help distract these beasts. We were pressed up against a wall, cornered. I felt the wall behind me. It was smooth metal. Hardly anything – wait! My hand hit a large bolt. It felt loose. I carefully began to untwist it, hoping to not draw attention to myself as the Doctor continued to speak to the Daleks.

Buy me a few more seconds, Doctor, I thought.

Bingo! The bolt came off in my hand. Summoning all my courage and strength, I chucked it hard at the Dalek closest to me. It hit the dome of the robotic and it short-circuited. The other Daleks were momentarily distracted, so I grabbed the Doctor’s hand and pushed myself to move as quickly as I could despite the searing pain in my leg.

“[Y/N]!” the Doctor yelped, surprised. “You’re brilliant.”

“I try to be,” I panted, concentrating on not falling as we made our escape. The Doctor grabbed me by the waist and half-dragged, half-carried me through the Dalek ship.

“Listen to me, [Y/N], I am going to get you back to the Tardis. Do you understand?” he said as we made our way back to the Time Lord’s ship. I nodded, weakly. On a normal day I’d protest, but with my leg and the mess I’d already caused, I accepted his judgement quickly.

We made it back to the Tardis in one piece. The Doctor quickly got me inside and sat me down against a wall. He then typed something into the ship’s main interface.

“Protective force field,” he said, without looking up.

After he was done, he quickly came over to me. He gently grabbed my chin, raising my eyes to meet his. “Listen to me, [Y/N],” he began, his voice the most serious I’d ever heard. “You need to stay here, you need to stay safe, and you will not leave the Tardis. Do you understand me?” I nodded; eyes wide. The Doctor was rarely this serious.

“Good.”

And with that, he left me there. The Tardis hummed nervously, and I did my best to patch my leg up as best I could. I hated sitting around while he was in danger, but I knew in this case I’d be nothing more than in the way.

It felt like ages, sitting in an empty Tardis, anxiously hoping the Doctor was going to come back to me in one piece. My mind started to race. What if the Doctor came back injured? I’d never treated him for any wounds before – would I know how to? What if…he didn’t come back? I’d only operated the Tardis a handful of times and wasn’t sure if I’d be able to escape. I pushed that dark thought out of my mind. He was the Doctor! Of course, he’d come back.

“Run!”

I jumped as the Tardis doors swung open and the Doctor plus four spacemen came tumbling inside. The Doctor was furiously scrambling to the controls, shouting commands, and telling everyone to hold on. The chaos outside the Tardis swiftly disappeared as the ship started to whirl and we were off.

The breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding was let out. The four spacemen huddled together, looking forlorn. I remembered the Doctor saying there had been eight.

“[Y/N], are you ok?” the Doctor was by my side, arm wrapped around my shoulders. “I’m so sorry you got hurt like this and I had to leave you. So sorry.”

He looked at my leg, which was still seeping blood from under the bandage I hastily wrapped around it. I smiled wryly at him. “Just a scratch.”

He shook his head and did not smile. I saw him gently touch my leg, though at this point the adrenaline that had been coursing through my veins was beginning to wane. The Tardis was getting darker and I felt my head start to fall to the side,

“[Y/N]? Hey! Stay awake, [Y/N]! Stay with me. Please, stay with me!”

I could hear the Doctor’s panicked voice but could not muster the strength to open my eyes again. I fell into a cloud of darkness, the world fading away.

***

I woke with a start. Disoriented, I looked around the room I was in, vision blurry. My mouth felt so dry, and my head was pounding.

“[Y/N]? [Y/N]! You’re awake, good god, you’re awake,” the Doctor’s voice burst through the haziness and once again he was by my side. “Sit up slowly now, you’ve been asleep for a while.”

“Sleep? What?” I mumbled, still trying to get my bearings. “Where am I? What’s going on?”

“We’re in the Tardis,” he said. “Your body has been recovering from that wound on your leg.”

I blinked a couple of times to get the Doctor into focus. His eyes were lined with worry and his hair was more tousled than usual. He looked haggard.

“You look terrible,” I murmured. The Doctor shook his head, giving me a weak smile as he handed me a glass of water.

“Happy to see you too,” he said quietly.

As I drank the water, the Doctor studied me intensely. His gaze burned my skin and I shifted uncomfortably under this scrutiny.

“Doctor?” I began with uncertainty. “What’s wrong?”

The Doctor looked away, running a hand through his hair. He seemed to be steeling his nerves. Was he going to berate me for how I caused a massive problem on the Dalek ship?

Suddenly he snapped his head back to me and smiled widely. “Nothing, nothing at all, [Y/N]. Just glad you’re feeling better. Your leg wound should be all healed up after I cleaned and treated it. Since we’re parked near your flat, I figured you could get some rest in your own room once you finish your water.”

Confused, I stared at him. Just moments ago he was incredibly somber and now he was acting as though nothing was wrong. I continued to sip my water, brow furrowed as I studied the Doctor. There was something up with him, but I decided not to press it for now.

About a half hour later, the Doctor asked me if I could stand. I did so, carefully, noticing that my leg didn’t pain me any longer, but I still favored it. I was definitely sore.

“So, how does the leg feel?” asked the Doctor. “Up to take a little walk?”

I groaned as I stretched. “Fine, a little walk. After I get some things from my flat I want you to take me to the nicest alien spa there is in the universe.”

The Doctor made a noncommittal noise and simply turned his back to me. “Come on, [Y/N], let’s go.”

He guided me out of the Tardis. We walked a short way to the entrance of my flat. The Doctor got us in using his sonic screwdriver as I’d left my keys in the kitchen. As we entered the flat, I could tell there was some energy in the air that I could not quite put my finger on. There was something the Doctor wasn’t telling me.

“Doctor,” I said, suddenly turning around and staring at him straight in the eye. “What are we doing? What’s going on?”

The Doctor avoided my gaze. “Can we please sit down in the living room to talk, [Y/N]?”

I frowned but obliged. As we sat down together, his hand resting gently on my knee, the Doctor looked me straight in the eyes and said, “[Y/N] you need to stay here now. This last trip I almost lost you, and I can’t lose another person.”

The words seemed to echo in the empty flat, bouncing off the walls and assaulting my ears.

“Sorry, did you say stay here? As in, you’ll leave and not come back for me?” I asked, trying to understand what he was telling me.

The Doctor looked down. I felt his hand squeeze my knee slightly.

“Yes. I promised myself that if one of my companions ever got hurt, or was close to getting terribly injured, I would never, ever, lead them to danger again,” he said. “And you, [Y/N], are the most important person in my life. Seeing you almost – seeing you pass out in my eyes I just – “

The Doctor’s voice hitched. Instinctively, you reached out to comfort him, but he stopped your hand, gently lowering it back down away from him. “I refuse to be the reason you get hurt. I do not deserve to have a companion. You will be my last, [Y/N]. I hope you know how special you are to me”

“N-no, don’t say this. You haven’t even asked me if this is what I want,” I choked out, tears welling in my eyes. “When we first met you said that we’d go everywhere together. You can’t just throw me away like trash.”

The Doctor shook his head vehemently. “You are a treasure, [Y/N]. A treasure worth protecting. A treasure worth keeping far away to protect.”

“Doctor no, I’m not delicate, I can help you – “

The Doctor stood up suddenly. He didn’t look at me in the eyes as he said, “Goodbye, [Y/N]. Please stay safe. And don’t wait for me.”

I grabbed for his hand, but he brushed it aside as he marched out toward the door of my flat.

“Stop! Doctor! DOCTOR!” I shouted, going after him. He paused for a moment in the entrance of my flat, and I hoped against hope he would stop. He turned to face me, a pained expression on his face. His mouth formed the words:

“I love you.”

And he was gone.

Since June twenty-second

My heart's been on fire

I've been spending my nights in the rain-

Tryna put it out

“Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday, dear [Y/N], happy birthday to you!”

I smiled, surrounded by my friends and family as they sang to me. My birthday hat sat askew atop my head and a modest cake sat in front of me, the birthday candles glowing.

“Go on, blow them out and make a wish,” said my mum.

I thought for a moment, then blew out the candles. Ten years older. How time flies.

“Well are you going to tell us what you wished for?” one of my friends asked, grinning.

Chuckling, I said what I repeated every year, “But then it wouldn’t be a real wish, would it?” My wish was silly – childish even, but I wished to see the Doctor one more time every year. At this point, it was a tradition I had to keep. The only soul who knew was [D/N] because she never judged.

My friends and family shared the evening together, laughing, joking, and enjoying each other’s company. I endured the usual teasing of ‘when are you going to get a man? You can’t just work forever!’ and my mum and dad joking (with a hint of truth) about how [D/N] would be their only grand-pup. I was used to it by now and it didn’t bother me anymore. Yes, I threw myself into my career. It paid off as I was doing quite well for myself. Unfortunately, my job didn’t really give me a lot of time for dates, but I did try. It just seemed I was very unlucky in the dating scene. Nothing ever worked out. They all simply didn’t fill a void that seemed to constantly be in my heart.

“You know, [Y/N], I have a new coworker who is super cute. I bet you guys would get along,” said one of my friends, whipping out her phone and showing me a picture. “Look he’s just your type!”

I laughed. “Oh come on, you know I don’t have time right now! Besides, [D/N] and I are doing just fine, the two of us. She’s my best partner!”

As the party started to wind down and people began to leave, I gave let everyone give one last pat to [D/N] on their way out. Her little tail still wagged furiously, though not as energetically when she was a pup. The grey around her muzzle was beginning to show more prominently, and I made sure to give her extra attention on days like today.

“Hey girl, don’t think I forgot about your birthday treat,” I said once we were alone. I went the pantry and pulled out a little cake-shaped dog treat. [D/N] snagged it happily and curled up in dog bed, happy to gnaw on the treat.

I smiled.

“I’ll be right back,” I said to her. “Enjoy!”

After tossing a few more things in my trash can, I tied up the full trash bag and I headed out of my flat. It was quiet outside. Peaceful. The summer bugs sang an evening song as I walked towards the trash receptacles in back of the complex. Street lamps illuminated my path. A man passed by me, his face obscured by the darkness.

“Good evening,” said the man.

“Evening,” I said back, without much thought.

“Headed anywhere special?” he asked.

Annoyed, I responded, “Yes, the trash. Isn’t that obvious from the trash bag in my hand?”

The man laughed. “You never change, [Y/N].”

“Sorry, do I know y –”

My breath caught in my throat and the trash bag dropped from my hands. The man stood under a street light, revealing his face to me.

“Doctor!” I exclaimed. I wanted to run to him, but I felt cemented to the spot. I was shocked. It was my Doctor, not the version I’d seen so many years ago. He looked almost identical to what I remembered, except that he was sporting a different color suit and looked a touch older.

“I – you, what are you doing here?” I fumbled over my words, not knowing what to say or how to feel.

“I need you, [Y/N]. One last adventure for us to share,” he said. “I’ll understand if you say ‘no’, of course, but I –”

I didn’t let the Doctor finish. I sprinted to him and wrapped my arms tightly around him. His familiar scent and warm embrace filling the empty space in my heart.

I heard him laugh, the wonderful sound giving me life. “I’ll take this as a yes.”

The familiar sound of the Tardis filled my ears and the Doctor, my Doctor, pulled me to his side once again.

“Allons-y!”

So I'm snapping one, two

Where are you?

You're still in my heart

#doctor who x reader #tenth doctor x reader #10th doctor x reader #eleventh doctor x reader #11th doctor x reader #fourteenth doctor x reader #14th doctor x reader #doctor who fanfiction #tenth doctor x you #tenth doctor fanfic #David Tennant is back!#fanfiction #fan fiction author #songfic #doctor who fanfic #the doctor #doctor who #david tennant

657 notes · View notes

dr-spencer-reids-queen · 5 months

Text

Nameless, Faceless: Final Part

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Female!Reader

Word Count: ~1.8k

Summary: Not even four hours after the case in Canada, you're thrown into another one. This time, without Hotch. You have a sinking feeling he's not just blowing you off to get some sleep. There's something wrong.

Warnings: canon violence, canon language, canon talk of death, methods of kill

Author’s Note: welcome to the first episode of season 5! i hope you enjoy this series just as much as i loved writing it! <3

I do not own anything from Criminal Minds. All credit goes to their respective owners. If there are any warnings that exceed the normal death/kills from the show, I will list them. If you’ve seen the show, then it’s the same level of angst unless otherwise stated.

They're all concerned about Spencer but even more concerned about Hotch and whether he's going to survive or not. They rush him to the same hospital that Hotch is in to keep them both in the same area. You've been by Hotch's side the whole time and he hasn't woken up yet. You rub your hands together nervously and look to the left of you to see your team fast-walk down the hallway.

"Hey, he's still not conscious."

"Are you sure it was Foyet?" Rossi asks.

"I felt his energy at Hotch's place. I saw what happened. Hotch lost a lot of blood but he's been stable since I arrived. I'm sorry I didn't tell you. I didn't want you to be distracted. Plus, he was checked in with Derek's credentials that he stole the last time we saw him."

"Did they catch him on the security camera?"

"I saw him drop Hotch off but the camera is only at the entrance. I got a feel of the direction he went in but I lost him right outside the parking lot. I don't know where he is."

"It doesn't make sense for him to have brought Hotch to the ER. We know Foyet gets off on power and control. Maybe what he wants is for Hotch to know his life was in his hands."

"He could do that without risking the hospital," Derek says.

"What happened to Spencer? I heard a gunshot go off over the phone. Is he okay?"

"He was shot in the knee," JJ explains. "He's here getting treatment."

You want nothing more than to go to him but if he's still in surgery or getting care, you don't want to interrupt that. Hotch groans as he comes out of his mini coma-like state.

"Agents, he's waking up," the doctor says. "Remember, he's weak. Don't push him."

"Where am I?" Hotch whispers.

"In the hospital."

"How did I get here?"

"Foyet drove you. Can you remember what happened?" you ask gently.

Hotch stays silent for a moment.

"What did he take?" Everyone looks at each other in confusion. "The Reaper always takes something from his victims. Do we know what he took?"

"There was a page missing from your day planner in the address section," you say. "The Bs."

"What did he leave?" he winces in pain.

"I don't know. I looked over your whole apartment. Nothing felt out of place."

"Where are my clothes?"

You grab the bag with his bloody clothes and other belongings and set them on his legs. You pull out the bloody shirt and open the bag for him to go through. He pulls out what looks like a wallet but is Derek's credentials. Folded inside is a picture of Hayley and Jack.

He's going after Hayley and Jack.

"Haley's maiden name is Brooks. I always listed her in the Bs in my personal information in case it fell into the wrong hands. He knows where they live," Hotch sighs.

"Don't worry, Hotch. We'll take care of it."

Everyone but Emily decides to leave the hospital in search of Hayley. You would have stayed behind but you're better in the field than by Hotch's side. Spencer is still getting treated so you have no business staying behind. JJ tries calling Hayley three times but she isn't answering.

"She's not answering."

Derek takes out his phone and calls Penelope.

"Garcia, I need FBI SWAT deployed to Hotch's old address."

"Oh, God, do you think he's going after Hayley and Jack?"

"I don't know. Just send a SWAT team. Tell them to wait for instructions. We're on our way."

"Consider them there."

"We need to be prepared for what we might find. Foyet kept Hotch alive. He wouldn't do that without a reason."

There's no time to speculate because Foyet could already be there murdering Hayley and Jack. When the team arrives at her house, SWAT is already there waiting. As soon as Derek gives the green light, SWAT members pile into the house with your team mixed in with them. Hayley is in the house, you can feel her. Foyet's energy is nowhere to be found which means you got to her before he could.

You walk upstairs with Derek and two other SWAT members. Hayley is in her room wearing yoga clothes, headphones are in her ears, and she is doing laundry. She turns to put clothes away and screams loudly from seeing a bunch of people in her house.

"Oh, my God!" she gasps.

"It's okay. It's okay," you calm her down.

"What are you all doing here?"

"We got her," Derek says to Emily who is on the phone with him.

"What's going on?"

"Is there anyone else in the house?" you ask.

"No, there's no one here."

"Where's Jack?"

"He's at a friend's house for a play date."

"We need to get him back here."

"Where's Aaron?"

"He's in the hospital."

"What?" she gasps.

"Hayley, call for Jack. Tell them I'm on the way to pick him up. I promise you we'll explain. Call for him right now. Text me the address," Derek says and leaves the room.

"Tell me what happened to Aaron," she says as she does what she's told.

"He was stabbed nine times presumably last night or early this morning. We know who did it and we're doing everything we can to try and find him. We think he's going after you and Jack next. I know this is a shock right now, but you need to pack a bag. You can't stay here right now. You two will be placed in the Witness Protection Program."

"Wait, are you serious right now?"

"Yes."

"Is this really necessary?"

"Yes."

"For how long?"

"I don't know," Rossi answers.

Hayley knows she needs to listen to your team right now so she starts to pack a very large bag knowing she isn't going to come back here for a while. Derek and Jack come back ten minutes later, and he has the biggest smile on his face.

"Mommy! They let me turn on the siren!"

"Wow, that's so great, baby! Did you have fun?" Hayley smiles through the pain.

"I'll help start a bag in Jack's room," JJ says and leaves.

"Okay. How many times did you run it? How many times?" Jack holds up three fingers and she chuckles. "Three?"

As soon as Hayley and Jack are packed up and ready to go, you take her to the hospital so she can talk to Hotch. Rossi already made some calls to other agents about placing them into protective custody, so those agents meet you at the hospital. Jack is waiting with one of the agents so Hayley can speak to her ex-husband alone.

It sucks knowing their situation (minus the whole Foyet thing) because they didn't divorce because they stopped loving each other. They divorced because loving each other hurt them too much.

While you let them talk, you go find Spencer who is on the other side of the hospital. You grab some jello for him on your way and you keep it hidden behind your back to surprise him. He is trying to find something on the TV to watch when you knock on his door.

"Hey," he smiles brightly and turns off the TV.

"I can't leave you alone, can I?"

"How's Hotch?"

"Physically? He's going to be okay. Emotionally? Not so much. We have to place Hayley and Jack in protective custody, so they're talking right now before they leave." You walk over to his bed and sit on the edge of it. You reach up and move some of his hair out of his eyes. "You need a haircut." Spencer laughs and grabs your hand while it's still on his cheek. He moves your palm to his mouth and he kisses the center of your hand. You rub his cheekbone with your thumb while looking into his eyes with so much love. "I bought you something."

You take the jello out from behind your back and his eyes light up.

"Thanks!" He eats a few bites happily. "Good news is that all I need are some crutches for a while."

"Don't worry, I'm going to take good care of you."

"I know," he smiles.

If he's going to go through all this trouble to incriminate you, the least he can do is stick around to watch your downfall. The block in which he left his last victim is sectioned off with yellow police tape even though there is a large crowd forming around the perimeter. Several officers are located on the outside to keep the public from barging in, and he squeezes himself through the crowd to get to the front.

If this is going to work, he needs to know what the police know so he knows how to proceed from here.

"Excuse me, officer? What's going on here?" he asks.

He's masked his real voice with a fake southern accent he's been working on for weeks.

"There's been a murder. Everything is fine, sir."

"Officer, I walk down this street every day and night. Am I safe? I live right down the block."

"Where?"

"Right there."

The man points to the apartment building on the corner of the street.

"Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?"

"No, sir."

The officer lifts the tape up so the man can step through so he's not stuck in the crowd. The officer doesn't take him to where the dead body is, but he wants some privacy from the onlookers.

"What's your name?"

The man doesn't hesitate to answer.

"Frank Livingston."

"What's a good phone number to reach you at?"

"619-555-0122."

"Where were you last night between the hours of ten and five in the morning?"

"Out here, unfortunately. I have a hard time sleeping ever since I had a stroke a few years ago. I decided to go for a walk to try and clear my head."

"Did you happen to see anything?"

"Well, let's see. I walked outside and had a cigarette." The man chuckles and pats his breast pocket where his pack of cigarettes is. "The dang things will kill ya but I can't seem to put it down." He chuckles. "Anyway, I was walkin' and I didn't know what time it was because I forgot my phone. I saw this car parked on the side of the road, and there was someone lyin' on the ground like they'd been hit. Seeing y'all here makes me think they might not have been hit after all."

"Anything else?" the officer asks and writes down everything he says.

"I saw someone leanin' against the car, but I didn't know what they were doing. The light isn't great out here. My eyes have gone bad since the stroke. It nearly took out my sight altogether. I'm not sure what they were doin' but I know I saw hair."

"Hair?"

"Long hair like a female's. I got out of there so fast like I was fearing for my life. You know females these days got everything goin' on. They carry all kinds of protective weapons on them. I didn't want to end up like that fella."

"Anything else you noticed?"

"Not that I can recall. Like I said, I got out of there quickly."

"Okay. If you can remember anything, please give me a call."

The officer hands over his business card with his contact information, and Frank takes it from him.

"Yes, sir, I will."

Frank walks away from the crime scene with the fake persona still on him. When he gets far enough away, he drops the innocent act with a smirk. He crumbles the officer's card and tosses it into a nearby trash can.

Follow my library blog @aqueenslibrary where I reblog all my stories, so you can put notifications on there without the extra stuff :)

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid fic #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid angst #spencer reid fluff #criminal minds #criminal minds fic #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds fanfic #criminal minds angst #criminal minds fluff #criminal minds series rewrite #criminal minds season 5

45 notes · View notes

bonzos-number-1-fan · 5 months

Text

TMAGP 15 Thoughts: Seasoned Hunters

What a fucking episode. No complaints at all. It's just solid gold all the way through and just like gold it's a dense so there is lots to dig in to, and not much point in a preamble.

Spoilers for episode 15, and all of TMA, below the cut.

I really like the introductory office drama portion of today's episode. It's not particularly enlightening, and there isn't anything new in it, but it sets the stage well. Yes, that was a pun. Alice reacted to the news as I knew she would, because she can't help herself. But other than that I really like the mention of Luke playing at The Glad. Magnus stuff always does a really good job of peppering in real places.

This incident was also incredibly short. However unlike last week's episode I think it utilised that time so much better. All of it was a slow build up to one event and was really just three scenes. Set up, hunt, conclusion. Simple and to the point but incredibly effective. Last week's episode felt like too big of an idea bent to fit too short of a time, while this weeks felt like a good story that was given the time it needed and no more or less. Really big fan of the whole thing.

The incident didn't have too much to really get into here. If I were live blogging you would've seen me say "Lady Mowbray?!?!" when the Caterer said "the really high-end stuff". I have been waiting for something aristocratic. The set up is a little cliché but I really like the subversion of Battle Royale instead of The Most Dangerous Game. It's not only an effective twist when the story is from the Caterer's PoV it's a much better insight into the characters were being introduced to. It also highlights something fairly interesting about TMP vs TMA. This incident is one of the most singular in terms of its representation of a TMA Entity but that expectation is somewhat subverted by having these characters hunt each other for another rather than all be hunted down. It wouldn't be out of place in TMA but it is taking a bit of a different approach.

Speaking of the characters though. Fuck Yeah. Lady Mowbray. Finally. I, and probably all of Statement Remains, have been waiting for her appearance since last October when some lucky folks got to meet her bodyguards as part of the ARG. I didn't have her pegged for a badass cannibal but here we are. She really surpassed my expectations. I love aristocratic monster people so I had high hopes and I am still pleasantly surprised.

Celia and Lady M's interaction is really great. I love that we're getting more and more evidence that Celia is clearly more than she's letting everyone else in on. I, obviously at this point, think she's from TMA's universe for a lot of reasons. Lady M not being able to place why she smells so wrong but picking up on her being out of place is just more evidence of that. Celia holding her ground and not taking any shit from Lady M is also incredible. She just listened to how she eats people, gets jumped scared by her, and then instantly tells her to fuck off by way of not giving her a name. She's really living up to the Ripley namesake and I love every second of it.

I will not soon forget that tiny little tease about Bouchard lore either. Actually cruel.

Luke and Alice at the bar wasn't a big moment but it's nice to see her interact with more than just her co-workers. Meeting Luke and he being seemingly normal was also nice, be a shame when he dies.

The final section was phenomenal. I really love it when these shows break format and what a format break it was. So first things first this was recorded on a tape recorder. Significant for likely obvious reasons but unlike the last time these showed up this one isn't an incidental placement like the Institute's one. It was being carried by the woman. We know Alice feels like she's been followed since that incident and this is likely related to it but I don't think it's related in the most obvious sense. There is a very obvious conclusion to draw from TMA knowledge but I feel like that might be folly here. It seems a little too obvious and a little too strained at the same time. The Institute and [Error] being so related to that and in this fashion I think would feel a bit forced, and so this feels more like a red herring to me. Something is going on with them but I don't think it's going to be that.

So Drowning Victim, as she is credited, is super intriguing for a million reasons. Continuing on from that prior thought it's quite possible that the tape recorder and Alice being in the same place is entirely coincidental. It's one of those things that feels like a scheme from TMA context but everything being linked feels too TMA to me for right now. But what she's saying is really interesting. Because with those tape recorders it sounds like a statement. It's not just random mumbling but a fairly coherent narrative. Or a recalling of prior events. Whether the Drowning Victim is the original PoV for that potential statement is hard to say. I doubt it but it would be possible. Another strong idea here is that it is linked to [Error] and her deal might be another archive. Instead of just collection and storage she could be able to force others to relive them through the statements. That's a TMA parallel I think would be a much stronger use of TMA's theme.

Outside of that Alice's interaction with her is so so well done. I think it's really important to show that Alice both has a heart and is able to stop with her attitude when it's really important. Getting to see that when push comes to shove she can step up is going to be something that'll come back around. We all know that everyone at the OIAR is in for a world of hurt and I think Alice is the person the fanbase has the biggest issue with in that sort of context so far. And her singing Nellie the Elephant for compression rate is sort of heart breaking to listen to. Just a really fantastic performance from Billie and people better be nicer to Alice after this. I better not hear her getting any shit for running away either. She gave CPR to a woman who basically attacked her, drowned in the middle of London, died, and then kept talking.

Also, quite note, this episode had five new voice actors in it.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Incident/CAT#R#DPHW Master Sheet

Klaus Watch: Wasn't expecting this to return so soon but here we are. This incident doesn't appear on Klaus but what does is this, CAT1RB2373-10072023-########. This has the accompanying note "Dame M" and a location "London, England".

DPHW Theory: 6451 is a pretty reasonable rating for this. Hunting mostly focused on the killing part of it. Some mental compulsion, seclusion, and obviously the predator/prey dynamic. The 1 in Weird is more evidence that 1 is the lowest rating with 0 being the highest. Nothing Weird in this one really.

CAT# Theory: CAT1 has a person in it.

I'm still debating whether to do a post on that theory because part of me does feel like it'd ruin other people's fun. Another part of me thinks that theories as prolific as that deserve to be scrutinised as intently as possible. Although there is a problem with that idea because my DPHW theory that has become the default does seem to be mine and I've not seen any cases of parallel thought on that one. The CAT theory has 10+ individuals all coming to roughly the same conclusion though and I'm not sure if that makes it more fair game or not. I, personally, welcome any challenges to my theories and I know some people who have posted the CAT theory do but that's not the same as them all holding that stance. It's not really possible to single anyone out either as it's not about any single person but the idea itself. IDK, give your thoughts on it.

This one does solidly fit into that theory though.

R# Theory: B sounds good to me. Although it's worth mentioning that there is a hyphen in this header between the rank and the DPHW.

Header talk: Hunt (Aristocratic) -/- Compulsion is interesting for two reasons. First off it being Hunt sort of precludes, secondly Compulsion is a strange filing for this IMO. There was an element of it but it was fairly minor and didn't seem like the thrust of the episode. The Caterer was compelled to be quiet but wasn't forced to hunt the rest of the brigade. He chose that when he realised what Lady M. was getting at.

#the magnus protocol #tmagp #tmagp theory #tmagp speculation #klaus = kl4-u5

41 notes · View notes