#we NEED to shoehorn in fan faves. WHY

[eerna]

i’m just as worried for s&b season 2 fumbling the bag with the stellar cast but i’m loving the daytime ketterdam drone shot in the trailer since we only saw it at night time last season (don’t know what’s up with wylan and the butterfly and inej fighting someone in shu garb)

Yeeeesssss same, I paused the trailer right away to try and find familiar aspects of the city djdnsn. I can tell you right now what it's about. The Crows will be somehow involved in the fighting in Ravka. It's the dumbest idea ever. It was already difficult to believe their involvment in KoS, and now it's even worse. WHY. THEY DON'T SAVE THE WORLD. THE CROWS AREN'T SAVING THE WORLD. THEY AREN'T HERE FOR EPIC BATTLES BETWEEN GODS. THEY COMMIT CRIMES FOR MONEY AND BECOME BETTER PEOPLE THROUGH IT.

[doodlegirl1998]

Yeah another ask...I love make them.

Anyway, on the new chapter of "fuck you Izu" written by Hori. Not only we have AM paying a homage to bk- a pos who told Izu to kill himself and nothing happened to HIM- but is also the pos who caled Nana pathetic IN AM'S FACE.

Also....AM has 0 reasons to care or pay homage to class A1. Bet he has no idea clas A1 corned Izu in that way, with bk having fun.

But may point here is....AM and Izu know shit about each other! Its freaking bizarre, AM cant be his mentor, but also can even know how was Izu's past at all...

I like dadmight as much as the next guy and I can see AM caring for Izu(he did more than Inko) but damn....those two never had a real talk?

Not saying AM needed to tell everything

Am:So Izu it all start when my mom birth me!

But the important stuff as quirkless, as well being as how bk is detrimental to Izu's mental state and more should have been discussed.

Does Izu even knows his fav color?

(I know some people would make the joke "har har Izu is a creepy fan" which I hate it)

Does AM even knows izu's fav color?

Hi @mikeellee 👋,

Totally agree with this. Hori has underdeveloped AM's bond with Izu and with everyone else to the point where AM doing a homage to Class 1A as a whole comes out of left field despite how nice of a sentiment it is.

And seriously, logically speaking, why the fuck have All Might do a homage to Bkg? Bkg acts abusive to Izuku daily, quirkest, openly admits to having bullied Izuku (and still does, let's be real here.) Add on the open disrespect of Nana, AM's mother figure, and all the other holders of One for All... AM should hate this kid. But Hori can not allow anyone to rightfully hate his fave, SMH.

On to your next point, AM is one of the best adults in Izuku's life and yet Hori doesn't allow him or Izuku to confide in each other outside of plot related OFA meetings (which Bkg is also shoehorned into 😒.)

Why isn't Izuku confiding in AM about Bkg?

Why isn't AM telling Izuku more about his own quirkness orgins, being orphaned, his mentorship with Nana?

All these things would SHOW more closeness, and SHOULD happen, yet Hori doesn't do this. Despite Izuku being the MC and AM being THE main mentor figure, Hori seemingly hates them both. They deserve better.

[marvel-starwarsfangirl]

"Ahsoka" Review

Lars and Eman were perfect as Thrawn and Ezra. They are those characters and I will not take criticism. More of my thoughts below.

Overall, I give this show an 7.5/10. I enjoyed it more than Mando S3, BoBF, and Obi-Wan Kenobi, but not as much as Andor or the first 2 seasons of Mando. As a Rebels fan, I was overjoyed to see my fave characters like Hera and Sabine return. Just seeing them warmed my heart. When Thrawn showed up, my heart leaped out of my chest. I could not believe that I was seeing Mitth'raw'nuruodo himself in live-action.

Okay, I'm just going to put my Thrawn takes out there (please do not come after me. This is my opinion and I respect anyone who disagrees):

I love Canon Book Thrawn so much. I admire him. I relate to him. I love him. Thrawn in the Canon books is amazing. I enjoy his relationships with Thalias, Eli, and Ar'alani. I love how he mentors Che'ri and Eli. I love that he seeks to protect his people. I love how he is an art nerd and has the craziest plans.

But in "Ahsoka," every time he said "long, live the empire," I wanted to toss my screen. I understand he was closer to his Legends counterpart and I am still excited to see where his character goes I just miss his canon book version.

That being said, I LOVED Lars as Thrawn. There is no doubt in my mind that he IS Thrawn. Voice aside, everything from his mannerisms to composure was perfect. I can't picture anyone else in this role nor do I want anyone else. Lars is able to capture Thrawn's subtle expressions so perfectly and I had a blast watching him every time when he was on screen.

Moving on

Of the new characters, Baylan Skoll was my favorite. Ray Stevenson portrayed him with such grace and elegance. He was mysterious and much welcomed addition to Star Wars. I thought his philosophy was unique and I appreciated that he wasn't an all-out bad guy. I do hope they continue his story and not drop it completely. Rest in peace Ray.

Honestly, I felt that Shin wasn't explored enough for me to really enjoy her. I think she is interesting and there's a lot of potential regarding her inner conflict. I hope season 2 really delves into that. Why did she join Baylon? What power does she seek?

Morgan and the Nightsisters were just really cool to me. The magic they utilized was awesome and the rise of the zombie troopers was spooky.

Also, the music! The Kiners really popped off. I genuinely loved the end credits theme so much. That and the integration of themes were great.

However, I am not a fan of Sabine being force-sensitive. It doesn't make sense in my opinion. It was never hinted at in Rebels and her relationship with Ahsoka feels kinda shoehorned in. I wish we saw what led to her becoming Ahsoka's apprentice. Sabine is already a cool character. Why does she need the force?

Ahsoka in the earlier episodes also was kinda bland. But after episode 5, she felt more like herself. I get that she's not going to be the same as her younger self, but she always had a warmth to her, even when she was serious and I missed that. Rosario still killed it though. I really enjoyed episode 5 with the Clone Wars live-action representation. I know some people really want that but I think it should stay animated.

The lore with the new galaxy was also really cool. It opens the doors to so much storytelling and I love the impact it will have on our heroes. It seems that the Nightsisters and the Mortis gods came from there.

Action was cool, I miss my space husbands, Mon Mothma was cool, and I do think they should stop using the dome for many shots.

Overall, a fun time and I'm excited for what comes next.

[lovecolibri]

When first I read the article about introducing lucy I was ok unnecessary because we ha already 45 characters, but she'll last 3 episodes, exactly like lena, after the episode we have arielle that does interviews left and right like she was a character present from seasons, and teasing a b/l finale. Journalists that talk about feelings towards lucy, he met her 3 seconds ago?Can't wait to see buck living with taykay while spends his days drooling all over lucy.

Also just had one thought after sending in that ask. She was eager to shoehorn this woman into the front and ruin a beloved character in the process. She trampled all over buck. I get that this is going somewhere and I'm desperately hopeful the explanation is good enough for people to feel a little better. But K is K and the interviews she gave were a mix of homophobic gaslighting and adoration for A. Again, SO very bizarre

Yeah I was ready for this new lady to push on Buck's recklessness (which she apparently will do too I guess? Who knows. They gave like 700 interviews) and for something to go wrong on a call and that be the trigger to get Bobby involved like he did with Eddie and the street fighting and sending Eddie to therapy, and then she would be gone when Eddie came back. Instead we got....this mess.

Also, did we all just...forget about Ravi? The man who was Buck's partner? So they aren't actually down two people? This just seems SO deeply unnecessary. In case we've forgotten, season 3 had a net total of ZERO love interests for Buck OR Eddie and guess what? The season was amazing even without the relationship drama for them! Who would have thought?! I wonder what happened in season 4? (Hint, Tim put a certain co-showrunner in charge 🙃)

I think this storyline has potential to give us some interesting things and end in an interesting place, but that doesn't change the fact that the staring point is bad and didn't need to happen like this. And you’re right, they have SO many characters (but not enough, because the ONLY reason we had so many tay kay scenes in 5a is because they didn’t have enough cast and she was cheaper, haven’t you heard? 🙄), and so much going on with Eddie and Maddie and Chim and them all healing and coming back to work, and they have characters we already know but haven’t gotten this much screen time and development for! So WHY bring on yet another new side character when the major complaint from the general audience about 5a, was that there wasn’t enough focus on the main characters that the casual viewers tune in every week to see? Here’s hoping the general audience being upset about all the article pushing this new character AND having her dragging their fan fave Golden Child down with her will inspire some...scene shuffling like the did with 5x09 after the abysmal response to Ghost Stories from the GA which was still rated nearly a whole point higher than 5x11. Which is a shame because unlike Ghost Stories that only had the opening, and a few Karen and Chim moments to save the episode, 5x11 was an absolute banger except for the cheating part. And that? That drug the ENTIRE episode down for a lot of fans. Let’s hope Eddie’s breakdown can manage to salvage the day for 5x13!

[critical-thinking-is-mandatory]

Why are adrien stans so insecure? Adrien isn’t a focus for literally a handful of episodes and they start writing essays freaking out about it and having breakdowns over it??? I feel like that says something about how truly insignficant Adrien is to the actual plot that his stans think people will forget him if he’s not constantly on screen lmao. It’s just so bizarre to see grown ass adults upset that other characters are getting episodes when Adrien has had the whole show bent around his gross whims.

I don't think they ever really understood that Adrien isn't the main character. It's happened almost every time we introduce a ~smexy~ male character, whether he's a mild antagonist like Draco Malfoy, deuteragonist like Zuko or poorly executed villain ala Kylo Ren.

If there's just some dude in a story (especially if he's white, or the fandom characterises him as white in Zuko's case) no matter how minor or major his role is, people are gonna squeal and squawk about how he "deserves more screentime" and "oh what a poor traumatised uwu baby boy" and "oh I wish we could ~get it on~ he's so ~smexy~".

Adrien's been given the second most important role in the entire story, and that's still not enough for his cult. He's shoehorned into plots and episodes that don't need him there at all (there's a tweet by the crew admitting this very fact somewhere, I'll try and find it) and when he is necessary to the plot, it's usually as a glorified toddler.

Like, Adrien’s effect on the story is so minimal that if he’s missing for 0.5 seconds people wail and cry and throw tantrums because?? Their fave who’s in every episode isn’t constantly in the spotlight?? Idk.

Adrien already gets everything. He’s the creators’ pet AND he’s the ~sexy~ love interest AND he’s the ~cool bad boy~ AND his dad is the supervillain AND he’s got a ~tragic backstory~ AND he’s rich AND he’s got hordes of fans in and out of the show AND everything always goes his way AND he gets everything he wants. Like, his groupies are so obsessed with Adrien (who is pixels btw aka NOT REAL and will never love chatnoirfan4eva#1xoxoxo because he. Is. Not. Real.) that they’ve removed themselves from the show completely. I always joke about if we’re watching the same show but we’re not.

Adrien groupies have built their own alternate version of the show where Adrien’s some neglected plot-element who never has any lines and who Marinette is constantly abusing and taking for granted, and who the narrative and the creators hate.

I hate this word but it’s the only one I can think of that fits, but it really feels like Adrien’s “fan club” has developed a severe case of unhealthy parasocial relationships. Except instead of a random celebrity or the k-pop boy of the moment it’s…a collection of pixels. I honestly don’t think that anything could fix this except perhaps dumping them out in the bush with no access to television or the internet. They can learn how to braid grass and tell each other’s fortunes or something. The best way to fix an addiction is to cut it off cold-turkey and you better believe none of the stans are gonna do it willingly.

I would hope that they’d grow out of it, but looking at the state of the fandom, and the way people are obsessed with h@rry snotter after all this time, it doesn’t look likely :/

[non-sequitura]

Non-sequitura Disney in-depth analysis (after making a tier list)

Warning: SUPER longform. If you don’t know a movie well, you should skip the summary. I tried to be light on spoilers, but they’re there.

I went chronologically from favorite to least favorite. So S tier is, in order from fave to least fave, The Incredibles, WALL-E, then Zootopia.

S tier (Something I consider high quality AND a movie I greatly enjoy. I would love more Disney movies be like this.)

The Incredibles - one of my favorite movies of all time, possibly THE favorite. Rockin social commentary, epic action scenes, memorable characters, not a minute of screentime wasted, great take on the Fantastic Four, hilarious parts for both adults and children, an interesting villain, etc. 

WALL-E - I love how social commentary was done here. Also skies above, what a beautiful love story. Really blazed a trail in non-verbal storytelling (especially given it was an animated kids film!) Robot animations are particularly delightful. 

Zootopia - another social message delivered excellently and entertainingly. I love Judy and her persistence, I love the expressiveness of the faces and the epic city setting. I love Judy and Nick's banter. This movie deserves to be remembered longer than it has been so far. Admittedly, not one of my fave villains, which makes it my least favorite of the Ss. 

A tier (either super high quality or something I greatly enjoy and deem of at least reasonably good quality)

Mulan - this movie did everything right. Truly feminist protagonist, an icon for strong Asian women, fairly culturally accurate (tho Mushu confuses me), GORGEOUS and iconic music. Lets a relatively natural romance develop. I frickin love the action scenes, I love the emporer. Sadly, this movie just didn't lodge its way in my heart as well as Pixar did. Pixar just has some magic, yo. 

Cinderella - my gosh what an underrated protagonist. Her family straight-up abuses her and she never loses sight of her goals for a better life. Iconic visuals helped bring Disney out of bankruptcy. A gorgeous alto singing voice. 

Wreck-it Ralph - alright alright ppl don’t crucify me for this. I honestly can’t think of much wrong with this movie. Vanellope and Ralph’s vitriolic best buds relationship is adorable, her forgiveness of him is heartwarming and (relatively) deserved, rockin’ Owl City song, epic visuals that mix together bc of all the different games. ALSO ONE OF THE BEST DISNEY VILLAINS NO CAP. One of the only twist villains I like. And we stan the romantic pairing. 

Tangled - I’ve talked about this a lot, but Rapunzel deserved the whole world after what she’s gone through. That being said, Gothel is not some shallow monster she needs to escape from, but an intelligent, well-defined monster with backstory. I could totally see this story happening if the world of Tangled existed. Epic love story, hilarious dialogue. Music is… good but much of it is less memorable to me. Visuals are good but not quite at the level/creativity of many other disney films. 

The Lion King - they really put Hamlet in Africa and pulled it off lol. But in all seriousness, no one took the premise of this film seriously at the time and it became sooo iconic. I love Scar and his eventual downfall, I love how Simba grows emotionally, I love the sad moments that don’t overpower the overall feeling of light goofiness. And music so memorable it was one of the first Disney musicals. 

Coco - not a super unique story premise. But an incredible culture to explore with such creativity and sensitivity. I love the themes of death not being the worst and music being so central to the story. Twist/twist villain was memorable and not expected. And yeah, it did make me cry, so props there. 

Ratatouille - the most recently watched of these films for me. This movie is soooo unique! Back when Pixar was truly super out there with their concepts. Super Parisian visuals and soundtrack. It somehow starts goofy (THE OLD LADY TRIES TO KILL REMY WITH A SHOTGUN WHILE WEARING A GAS MASK) but really drives home the message that you can truly do what you want regardless of who you are. Colette can get it. And the monologue by Ego at the end is one of my favorites in film. 

Frozen - Anna is one of my favorite Disney protagonists. She’s so resilient and loyal. Elsa ain’t bad either but she experiences… less character development. The film is a tad too pleased with its own self-awareness for my taste, but there’s no denying how iconic the music and visuals were. 

Inside Out - Alright, this movie hits home for me bc I tried to run away after moving. A super thoughtful, heartfelt depiction of (potentially depression? imo) with great moments of humor. Riley’s inner world is so creative and lovely. Also realistic depictions of Minnesota/California culture. 

Tarzan - Jane! is! smart! and! adorable! Her scientific curiosity makes her very endearing. it’s so cute to see her and Tarzan learn from each other. Also Tarzan’s “found mother” is epic. Solid score. Solid film all around. To quote Lily Orchard, “This film is what Pocahontas tried to be.” 

B tier (one of my favorites but has a few significant flaws that bring it down (or not quite as memorable to me, but consider good quality))

Peter Pan - Haven’t seen it in a hot sec, but I remember being super charmed by this as a kid. Just going out, having incredible adventures, and returning to a warm home at the end of the day. Tinker Bell is hilarious and beautifully drawn. Gets major negative points for the depiction of Native Americans tho. 

Big Hero 6 - I was super charmed by the protagonist, his family/friends, and the setting. The plot/villain’s motivations are a bit of a mess, though. 

Princess and the Frog - This movie has so much flavor to it! The visuals/music are lovely and unique. Tiana is incredible but it’s kinda annoying how EVERYONE keeps trying to shoehorn her into romance. The thing is, her goals are entirely reasonable. Focus on her restaurant, then look to settle down. But they’re like “nooo you’re ignoring the important things in life” smh. Also, epic villain, woohoo! The movie dragged significantly for me when they were in the bayou. Charlotte is delightful. 

Winnie the Pooh - don’t remember it super well, but I think it was charming and occasionally dark, which is an addictive concoction. 

The Little Mermaid - MAN ppl roast Ariel way more than she deserves. Visually, it was… fine. idk. This movie is good. I don’t have much else to say about it. 

Snow White - the one that started it all. Visually, super impressive. Musically, lovely. I find the romance a bit… off. Well, more than a bit. What is it with Disney and kissing sleeping people? 

Alice in Wonderland - a nerdy acid trip. Right up my alley! I also like films where ppl go on incredible adventures and return to the status quo, but THEY changed bc of it. Epic. SUUUUPER creative visual interpretation of Carroll’s book. Brave - gosh I loooove films where a parent and child learn to understand each other. Never got why ppl hated this movie so much. The Scottish flavor is present and fun. Merida made one mistake and made it up. The arrow scene is iconic. 

Cars - a fun ride! (hahaha puns.) We love seeing Paul Newman as a car. 

B-minus tier? (same as B, but problematic, or weaker story-wise.)

Hunchback - man… settings-wise, this film might be my favorite. I also love Esmeralda and Quasimodo as characters and as a duo (though the sexualized depiction of Romani ppl is not epic.) I also don’t find the discrimination against Esmeralda/Quasimodo jarring bc it matches the time period. Frollo is super interesting as a villain. The gargoyles are… def not necessary. Basically, this film doesn’t know what it’s doing with tone. 

Sleeping Beauty - Aurora was my favorite when I was younger because I thought she was the prettiest, and that still defines how i feel about this, basically. Visually lovely - everything is kind of elongated and gothic. Maleficent is spiteful and epic. I have no issue with the fluffier parts of the movie, like the music or the fairies. RIP for lack of consent being a plot point, though. 

Hercules - Megara is incredible. one of the only Disney “princesses” who acts like an adult and has cynicism as a major part of her personality. I love her and Herc’s progression where she learns to trust him (yes, he is genuinely that sincere, it’s not a front.) Muses are unique, whoever came up with them was high on something and I’m living for it. I just think the plot itself was somewhat unrealistic/ weirdly-paced. There are some memorable songs, some less-than-memorable songs. Art style is cool but I’m personally not a fan. EXTREMELY inaccurate depictions of the original Greek gods. 

C tier (entertaining, but I don't consider it a great movie)

Bolt - I watched this like 11 years ago. It was fun! A cool concept about those put on a pedestal learning their worth even without celebrity boosting them up. Animation was… fine I think. not super memorable to me. 

Frozen 2 - They really took any scrap of character development Elsa had in the first movie, threw it in the garbage and set it on fire. Anna deserved so much better. Songs are bombastic and impressive, have the occasional interesting lyric, but are really weirdly placed and none are quite as iconic as the first movie’s (except Aurora, she does great work here. Also the song Anna sings after she thinks Elsa died.) 

Not a big fan of the vaguely homeopathic theme. Not a big fan of Olaf’s WEIRD character development. Not a big fan of the suuuuuper awkward dialogue and the animations that imply not only that Kristoff is into his reindeer but that Elsa and Anna are into each other (if you’re questioning if they did that, yes, they did, I can find screenshots of some really weird expressions/moments. THIS IS NOT THE TIME TO PANDER TO YOUR WEIRD FANS, DISNEY.) 

The voice actors did great work, the animators did great work (look at the details on their clothes! Look at how Elsa’s posture changes to be more confident! look at how they're animated while they're singing!) Some weird costume/makeup choices that make Elsa look like an aging starlet, but she also has some gorgeous moments so eh. It’s a wash for me. 

They really did not know what to do with Kristoff this movie, huh. The only thing that happened to him was singing a cheesy 90s ballad and marrying Anna, both of which were admittedly epic. Also, the trolls got 0 appearances despite being literally psychic. Probably could have helped with a lot. I'm not a huge fan of lore/worldbuilding, and thee was a lot of it here. Overall neutral on it. 

Also a big theme in this movie I don’t love - **** TANGIBLE CONSEQUENCES TO OUR ACTIONS!!! The danger is Elsa’s death, the elements, colonialism, and Arendelle literally being destroyed. None of those end up playing out, so I was left at the end going “this film had literally no stakes.” 

Monsters U - same as above - entertaining at the time! Not super memorable. The ppl we were supposed to dislike kept switching. Doesn’t really match the canon of Monsters Inc (I thought they were supposed to have known each other since childhood so why did they meet in college?) 

Cars 3 - so apparently, everyone HATED this movie! Fun! I never watched Cars 2 (yes watched Cars 1 if you haven’t been paying attention to this list), but I didn’t think this movie was bad at all. Well-acted, some fun chase scenes, the scene where Lightning fails at driving in the simulation is genuinely hilarious, and some interesting perspectives on teachers getting the spotlight for their skills for once. 

Incredibles 2 - I liked this film at first, but then it was… just okay in retrospect. I love me some good family dynamics. The plot here makes not a lot of sense. THEY BUILT UP THE UNDERMINER FOR NOTHING AND THEN FORGOT ABOUT HIM. I was surprised by the villain swap, but it happened so last minute I never really understood their motivations even after they explained them. Tried to tackle waaaay too many messages. 

D tier (I didn't enjoy these or consider them mediocre)

Finding Dory - Maybe I should have put this higher? Like C tier at least. Ah well. Wasn’t a huge fan of the body/physical comedy (not my thing), but it was entertaining and awww finding family is heartwarming. 

Finding Nemo - I remember nothing about this movie. 

E tier (this film has significant problems)

Beauty and the Beast - *sigh*… I want to love this movie. The score is gorgeous. Visually, they could have made it more distinctly Rococo-era France but didn’t (why?) The voice actors did good work and I think Paige O’Hara is SUPER underrated here. 

The Beast is emotionally manipulative with an awful temper that (for MOST of the movie. He doesn’t change.) That’s the main reason this is in E tier. This movie shaped so many generations of people thinking they can change the behavior of someone who treats them badly through the power of love. But you can’t. She learns to “love” the beast under coercion. It’s not Stockholm syndrome - it’s a trashy romance novel. Big fan of Gaston as a villain. He’s an archetype ppl can recognize and it’s so satisfying to hate him.

F tier (I think this film actively harms the industry and would rather it not have been made. Both the one in E tier could be considered harmful to the industry, but I think they had significant enough artistic accomplishments to scrape above that. I'm also generally a fan of "lack of censorship bc it's better to teach what not to do.")

Pocahontas - this movie took real historical events and romanticized them AND sexualized one of the only Native princesses they’ve had. Boo. Nothing wrong with animation!Pocahontas as a character, it’s just people put her in a story that doesn’t represent history well at all (and these historical events, unlike those in say, 14th-century Germany, had super relevant effects on people alive today.) And they portrayed the Native Americans and colonial settlers as equally in the wrong. (though I like Governor Radcliffe as a potential villain and love the line “see how I glitter.” I can’t NOT laugh when I hear it.) Lovely music, though. Nice animation, but the colors are weirdly… muted? 

Bad Garbage (I don't wish this film had never been made, but I wish I never had to see it.)

Planes - this movie was ridiculous. I remember not much about it except that I kinda hated it and that it was super cheesy with tension one could see right through that immediately resolved itself via one twist or another. 

Haven’t seen tier: Recess, A Bug’s Life, A Goofy Movie, DuckTakes Movie, Lilo and Stitch, Pinocchio (actually i have seen this but I remember nothing about it), The Nightmare before Christmas, Toy Stories 1, 2, and 3, Up, 101 Dalmatians, The Great Mouse Detective, Cars 2, Moana, The Good Dinosaur, Pete’s Dragon, Fantasia, Peter Pan Return to Neverland, Fantasia 2000, The Black Cauldron (read the book, though!), Bambi (or I did and remember nothing about it), The Rescuersm, The Rescuers Down Under, Planes Fire and Rescue, Bambi 2, The Fox & the Found, Oliver and Company, Atlantis, Treasure Planet (I want to, though), Piglet’s Big Movie, The Jungle Book, the Emporer’s New Groove, The Jungle Book 2, Chicken Little, Brother Bear, The Three Caballeros, Pooh’s Heffalump Movie, Dumbo, The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, Aladdin (seen parts but never the whole thing), Strange Magic, The Sword in the Stone, James and the Giant Peach, Frankenweenie, Lady and the Tramp, Ralph Breaks the Internet, Doug’s 1st Movie, Monsters Inc. (want to, though), Meet the Robinsons, Dinosaur, The Aristocats, Robin Hood, The Tigger Movie, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, that pooh movie at the end without the title on it

-11/21/20

[bigskydreaming]

The number of fics where Dick’s brothers moan and groan about having to suffer his presence vs the number of fics where Dick’s brothers are genuinely happy to see him and even look forward to his presence.

The latter gets soundly defeated, lol.

Can’t stop won’t stop harping on this until more people start asking themselves why their depicted versions of Dick’s brothers are so put-upon having to ‘deal with’ the insufferable presence of someone who often in the same stories still doesn’t hesitate to show up and be there for whatever his family (slash the plot) needs from him.

Everyone has character biases and preferences, but when your character biases leaking through to your characters without in-text explanation or even logic, like, end up making your own preferred characters look like inexplicably ungrateful assholes, aren’t you doing your own hard work put into writing your fics a huge disservice?

I’m just saying, even if Dick isn’t your favorite, take some time to put yourself in his brothers’ heads and ask what they might like about him and spending time with him and thereby potentially find reasons to enjoy writing him spending time with them, instead of just viewing him as an unavoidable burden you’re saddled with so you settle for treating him like a plot device rather than a character in his own right - you might surprise yourself with how much easier and more enjoyable it becomes to write his inclusion in stories.

Characters whose sole narrative purpose is to advance or facilitate a plot in some way rather than to exist in their own right are ALWAYS boring to both read AND write. If your default tendency is to shoehorn Dick into the story as a plot device, its almost inevitable he’s going to be boring or unenjoyable to write, and thus it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. So...try taking a step back, and even if he’s not your fave, spend a little more time than usual trying to view things from his POV or from his brothers’ viewing him in a favorable light rather than your first instinct......and see if maybe you surprise yourself with your results.

I mean, everyone knows I’m not the biggest fan of Bruce and other certain characters, and this is exactly what I do when writing them, that leads to me writing them in ways that still tend to be well-received by more ardent fans of those characters - there is ALWAYS something worthwhile to be found in writing a character, sometimes you just have to hunt a little harder to find it, but that still begins and ends with viewing them as a CHARACTER themselves, with their own wants, feelings and hurts, rather just as something you’re stuck with, an obstacle or at best a plot device. If you’re going to invest a lot of time and effort into fic-writing, its only helping yourself to work your mindset around viewing even less-liked characters as characters with their own lives rather than accessories to others.....because we all ultimately are here to write characters....not accessories.

There’s only so much you can do to make an accessory sound interesting, after all.

[him-e]

Not that GRRM is in any way exempt from sexist writing, but I think D&D’s fundamental issue is that they got the game of thrones vs the war for the dawn the wrong way round. I’m fairly sure book!Dany embracing ‘fire and blood’ is not going to mean good things for the people of KL, but she’s ultimately not bad. I could see her being ripped apart by it and *then* doing everything she can to save the realm in penance. But bc they wanted Cersei as final boss we got this shit instead.

D&D’s fundamental issue is that they got the game of thrones vs the war for the dawn the wrong way round

yeah I know this is the general consensus right now, even among people who recognize the echo of George’s writing here and there—that they got things in the wrong order for shock value or because they desperately wanted to shoehorn the game of thrones back into the narrative as the final climax. But I guess I’ll have to play the devil’s advocate on this, because I do wonder if GRRM isn’t going to pull the ultimate subversion on us. 

No, I don’t think the Others’ threat will be dealt with in a single chapter or won’t matter or will be framed in a way that makes the cosmic threat secondary to the game of thrones. However, imo it’s completely POSSIBLE that A Dream Of Spring will be structured in a similar way as GoT8—first half is the war for the dawn, second and final half is dealing with the ashes and with human evil again (possibly, in the form of Euron Greyjoy who, by then, will have aligned himself with Cersei and acquired a dragon via Dragonbinder / awoken the Drowned God / stolen some eldritch power from the defeated Great Other—remember he’s set to literally kill gods and become one himself?).

But I think we shouldn’t knee-jerk rule out the possibility that this latter half will ALSO deal with Dany’s descent into tragedy and it will happen AFTER she did all the appropriate heroic stunts in the war for the dawn, similar to how it is in the show, just… much more nuanced and better written, as usual. It’s too big of a character trajectory to be solely D&D’s work. It cuts too deep not to be Martin’s, imo. I mean, so far D&D’s changes to the story have been aimed to simplify things, dumb down fan faves’ unpleasant traits (see: Tyrion), play tropes straight, and normalize complex, potentially unsavory narratives into more cliched storytelling. Why would they intentionally go for an anticlimax like this, complicating everything, when they could have just made a final season that wraps the game of thrones up in its first episodes and then steadily progresses towards its natural climax, the war for the dawn, if that’s what happens in the books? Why would they go for Dany going full MacBeth when they could have her sacrifice her life to defeat the White Walkers, as everyone keeps repeating will be her destiny in the books? That’s a great story. It’s shocking enough and heartbreaking enough to the casual audience. IT’S THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE. Why would these lazy storytellers reject the path of least resistance?

As far as I’m concerned, I’ve read every possible version of “Dany will have a dark phase and fight to death F!Aegon and maybe accidentally pulverize King’s Landing but then she’ll redeem herself in the war for the dawn and die a hero”, and the more I think about it, the more it sounds like a fanfiction now. A wonderful fanfiction that someone should DEFINITELY write, ESPECIALLY NOW, but still–it sounds like wanting to have your cake and eat it. There’s literally zero subversion in this narrative. It plays safe. It only has fake edges. GRRM said the ending is bittersweet, but this isn’t bittersweet, it’s… stereotypically triumphant, though obviously beautiful and meaningful. I used to believe it SO HARD MYSELF, like I believed all the wonderful meta and spec I’ve read in the last years. But now I have to wonder. 

The problem since season 5 has been that we’re looking at the show and saying that it’s butchering book arcs and getting it all wrong and upside down when we have no fucking clue what these books will be about. We thought we did, we made up incredibly detailed scenarios about them, but no one here is George RR Martin and nobody is really capable of writing and thinking the way he does, for better or worse, so acting like our well-established theories are canon is… idk, kind of arrogant, imo.

Like take Jaime’s arc for example. The book fandom always thought that dying with Cersei and fighting in the war for the dawn would be mutually exclusive, because the WftD is supposed to be the final climax, so how can Jaime be alive to be in it if he’s ALSO meant to fulfill the whole murder-suicide schtick with Cersei? And yet the show made it possible because the WftD isn’t the final chapter of the story. Same goes for all the characters who survive the WftD. We all assumed the WftD would be the endgame point for these characters’ arcs, but what if it isn’t? What if Martin has MORE, and crucial, character development in store for them AFTER it?

Look, I’m not trying to get d&d off the hook—I’m mad at them like everyone else is right now—nor I’m saying that TWOW/ADOS will play EXACTLY like this, and I’m sure that whatever happens in the books Martin will write it out in a nuanced way. That the show’s problem has always been in the execution is nothing new. But if there’s even a 2% chance that these naked plot points will happen in the books too, I need to consider it, and brace myself for it. 

Because at the end of the day, the heart of Asoiaf is neither the game of thrones NOR the war against the Others, it’s the human heart at conflict with itself. So there’s literally zero guarantee that the WftD “has” to be the final climax. There would, if asoiaf were a more traditional narrative.

BUT IT ISN’T.

As a final note, I recommend taking a look at this Twitter threat I’ve recently read which summarizes my own thoughts very well.

[ilosttrackofthings]

me: *desperately tries to think of not-so-obvious ships* lol. how about: daisy/robbie, daisy/fitz, jemma/vijay? bonus: skyeward and reylo because it's me hehehe

daisy/robbie

A+: OTPA: I love itB: It’s really cuteC: Not a bad shipD: I’m neutral on itE: I don’t really like itF: NOTPN/A: I don’t know the ship well enough

They’re ... okay, I guess? At the start of s4 I was very against this ship because Daisy needs time to heal after s3. But the writers shockingly did a decent job laying groundwork without forcing them to be more than they should. That said, my biggest emotional response to them is still that old hesitation. They were cute enough, but there wasn’t really anything there for me to care about.

daisy/fitz

A+: OTPA: I love itB: It’s really cuteC: Not a bad shipD: I’m neutral on itE: I don’t really like itF: NOTPN/A: I don’t know the ship well enough

*adele plays in the distance* These two are SO PERFECT for each other. Did you see s2? How they both were broken and had to rebuild themselves while surrounded by people who could never understand? And he had that cute crush on her for the first few episodes of s1! I ate that up! But no, no. We can’t have nice things on aos. (If you wondered why I was shocked they did an okay job with robbie/daisy, this is why.)

jemma/vijay

A+: OTPA: I love itB: It’s really cuteC: Not a bad shipD: I’m neutral on itE: I don’t really like itF: NOTPN/A: I don’t know the ship well enough

I know at least a couple people are gonna be shocked by this rating but the show really wasted Vijay. He literally only exists so that they’ll have to use the Rider to kill Aida at the end and maybe to remind us that Jemma does care about people after how they did her wrong in the s3 finale. (But probably just the first one, since Jemma has zero chance to care during the Framework arc.) At least Will got to be a character, Vijay was little more than a glorified extra, and that makes it really tough to ship him at all meaningfully with anyone, no matter how shippy his first episode was.

skye/ward

A+: OTPA: I love itB: It’s really cuteC: Not a bad shipD: I’m neutral on itE: I don’t really like itF: NOTPN/A: I don’t know the ship well enough

I vaguely ship this? Sometimes? I definitely like how this ship affects both of them, but it’s more of a “moving them forward” kind of shipping. Like Ted/Robin from HIMYM (except I can actually enjoy skye/ward to an extent), it makes them the people they need to be so they can find happiness elsewhere. But I wouldn’t have been unhappy if it had been the show’s endgame.

rey/kylo ren

A+: OTPA: I love itB: It’s really cuteC: Not a bad shipD: I’m neutral on itE: I don’t really like itF: NOTPN/A: I don’t know the ship well enough

Sorry, hon. But I think it might just be Star Wars? I never cared about Han/Leia until the PTBs had the gall to break them up in TFA and while I do ship Anakin/Padme, they’re built in, you know? It’d be like saying you don’t want your fave character’s parents to be together. Plus that tragic ending set from the start. That is my jam. But aside from that I’m just not a fan of really anything in TLJ. (Except the crystal foxes. They can stay.) I think there could’ve been a way to build them up that would’ve put them on the Han/Leia level for me, but that wasn’t it. Also, not that I don’t love me some shoehorned romance, but how have I not seen anyone complain that we get a female-led SW trilogy and her main conflict has veered off into a romance? It’s just not what I watch Star Wars for.

send me a ship and I’ll rate it

[regalpotato]

Even if you’re not a hardcore Ponds/River fan (which I am), 7b is objectively terrible. The writing is sooooooooo awful. But I think it did help me move on from 11 (this was my first real-time dw regeneration, and 11 will always be my fave, so I was really worried I wouldn’t be able to cope) because I knew Moffat needed a serious shake up. That’s the only silver lining I have. Seriously, it’s the worst.

7b actually almost made me stop watching Doctor Who

Incoming rant: sorry not sorry

And this is coming from someone who has watched every episode live since it rebooted in 2005. Well, actually, ‘Hide’ is the only episode I didn’t watch live (I can’t even remember why but it was probably because I was getting fed up with 7b).

It’s OBVIOUS that 7b was written for River and the Ponds but shit got turned around and Moffat couldn’t be bothered to think of a new plotline so shoehorned Cl*ra in. 

Trenzalore (both the TNOTD - I fucking hate TNOTD - and the Xmas special) would have worked so much better with Amy and River. 

And do NOT even get me started on the weird Cl*ra/Eleven vibe going on in 7b. It was uneccessary and disrespectful and I just…I fucking hate 7b with a passion. 

Cl*ra being Twelve’s first companion would have been so much better than her being a transition companion.

I mean, Series 6 - the best series imo - ended with the Doctor GETTING MARRIED TO RIVER. 

I was SO DAMN HYPED FOR SERIES 7. 

And it was such a god damn disappointment? Like…I know it’s not the River Song show, or the River/Doctor being married show. But FUCKING COME ON. Stop using her as a damn plot device and just have her in a monster of the week episode because THEY’RE MARRIED and she joins in on their adventures sometimes. And that’s not just me being bitter that we didn’t get a fun adventure episode with River when the Doctor knew who she was. It’s just me expecting good goddamn writing from the show. 

Can we go back to Series 5 where River wasn’t a plot device outside of the Doctor not knowing who she was? Please and thank.

7b could have been fine, even with Cl*ra, if we’d seen things like a full episode of Rain Gods, and Cl*ra got to chill with River too. Would have made TNOTD even more heartbreaking (because there would be more of an emotional impact).

Sorry for the rant, probably not what you were expecting. I’m glad it helped you move on from Eleven though. I forget how hard regenerations are for people who didn’t grow up expecting it.

[otomeshistarlight-blog]

Trucking right along, guys! We’ll be done before you know it! 

51: If you were given a chance to make a request to Horikoshi, what would it be? I would request a full blown Todoroki centric arc. Like, Deku can fuck off for 100 chapters for all I care, I want to know this family’s history from front to back. What kind of environment was Endeavor raised in? Does that explain why he has such an obsessive goal of being number 1 or is it literally just a rivalry with All Might? Speaking of, did they go to school together? Tell me more. Was it an arranged marriage or did he meet his wife in a normal situation and fall in love with her? How was their relationship before the kids? Whats the deal with Dabi? Please just give me the Todoroki backstory in its entirety so I can die in peace.

52: Sing you to sleep? Jiro, no questions asked. I can’t wait for the anime to get to the culture festival so we can hear her angelic voice in action.

53: Cuddle with? Fat Gum! He looks super comfy! 

54: Too pure/innocent character? Probably Nejire tbh. Her curious naivety is cute but I worry for what the life of a pro hero would do to someone with that kind of personality.

55: Deserve better? Endeavor deserves better than to be judged armchair psychiatrists whose PHd was printed off from the same website where you can become an ordained minister. 

56: Wish to have a no tragic background? Dabi, probably. It remains to be seen what exactly the canon explanation is but I have a feeling its not gonna’ be pretty even if he’s not a Todoroki. 

57: Most likely to be a gentleman? My instincts tell me that Fat Gum is probably quite the gentleman in an almost backwoods kind of way. That is to say, he’s a hot blooded country bumpkin samurai with a heart of gold. Now, I’m basing that bit of characterization on the fan-translated manga which gave him some interesting verbal tics that seemed to imply he doesn’t speak the same way the kids from the big city do SO I’m quite interested to hear how he talks in the anime when we get to it in 2019.

58: Fave old/middle-aged character (30+)? I’m not saying Endeavor is old but he is approaching silver fox territory and I’m more than okay with that.

59: Fav Opening song? Odd Future, hands down. Gonna’ listen to it right now, thanks. 

60: Fave ending theme? The fantasy setting one. 

61: Fave voice actor? I’ve really gotta’ give Bakugou’s seiyuu credit for his performance. Not only all that growling and screaming, no doubt straining his vocal chords every week no matter how much training he’s had, but also for really selling that line when he was abducted by the villains.

62: Fave Character song? *sweats nervously* I ... I haven’t listened to any of the character songs ... Do they actually exist? 

63: Fave OST? Uh, what? 

64: Fave battle(s)? Without spoiling too much, I’ll just say that Deku vs. Bakugou round 2 is gonna’ be a great episode and I’m really looking forward to the hero vs. villain fight we’re ramping up to in the current episode. 

65: Most shocking plot twist/unexpected scene? Me subscribing to the Dabi-is-a-Todoroki theme. Ummm, not to get too spoilery but I think almost everything at the end of the Yakuza arc was pretty unexpected based on all that had happened up until that point.

66: Selfie with? I would love nothing more than to take a selfie with Bakugou’s grumpy ass. I know that might sound a little weird but I’m actually being completely serious. 

67: Study in a library with? I would like to make some lewd, sex-in-the-library related joke but knowing who I am as a person, I probably legitimately need the help so I’d probably be best off with Momo or Shoto.

68: Most underrated character? Probably Tokoyami. I’m damn close to stanning him and I demand more content of his edgy bird boy immediately.

69: Most overrated character? Present Mic. He’s really not all that and I don’t get this fascination with him.

70: If you desire to see one’s ending? Who would it be? I’m not entirely sure what this is asking but if you mean who do I want to see die, it’d be either Mineta or Aoyama.

71: Change Character design? I wouldn’t change any design because Horikoshi worked hard on these characters and it would be downright foolish of me to think that I knew better than him.

72: Looks like a cinnamon roll, but it is a cinnamon roll? Nejire tbh.

73: Cinnamon roll but would actually kill you? Toga.

74: Looks like would actually kill you, but it is a cinnamon roll? Bakugou.

75: Looks like would actually kill you, and would actually kill you. Endeavor lol

76: Over sexualized character? In canon or by the fandom? Because overall, I’d say that Horikoshi doesn’t sexualize his girls very often but as per usual the fandom goes hog wild on everything and there is absolutely nothing wrong with doing that to fictional characters.

77: Cook with? I bet Fat Gum knows how to cook and he could show me some pointers. It’d be fun to cook with Tamaki too, so he could show off his quirk at every turn. 

78: Funniest character? Honestly there is no character that sounds out to me as being particularly funny but my sense of humor is also severely warped so take that with a grain of salt. 

79: Best hardening quirk: Tetsutetsu/Kirishima? I’m gonna’ side with Kirishima on this one.

80: Whose penis would be painful to be fucked? (LOL) Am I answering questions written by a 12 year old? Just asking. So, I headcanon that Endeavor is pretty well endowed and the haters will have to literally tear that fat cock out of my cold, unresponsive hands.I also think Fat Gum is packing because the kanji in his name mean ‘thick’ and ‘full’ which, yeah, if you’re an unimaginative prude that just means they’re talking about his fat body but to me, an intellectual, all I’m seeing is dick. Incidentally, I think All Might is pretty big too (essentially all of the bara’s)  

81: Best Goth character? Tokoyami is the closest we’ve got.

82: Shop with? Endeavor because he has plenty of money to spend on me and he seems like the type who wouldn’t even spare the cheap shit a second glance which is a sentiment I appreciate as a boujee bitch. 

83: Fave OVA? There were only two so this isn’t even much of a choice, but I liked the zombie one.

84: Would you let Momo spoil you with her quirk? I would let literally anyone spoil me because I’m an attention starved materialist. 

85: Villain that you’d wish to be a hero? Eh, probably Gentle. Maybe if he’d been able to become a hero we could’ve avoided that shoehorned appearance of his in the middle of the culture festival. 

86: Needs to calm down? Honestly probably Inasa. He’s gonna’ be so damn loud in the anime ... but I can’t wait to see him anyway! 

And with that my friends, we have reached the end! Apparently we just weren’t able to come up with a few more questions to round us out at an even 100 which I’m quite thankful for which means that I can finally go to bed! orz Thanks for sticking around with me through these trying times, your patience is much appreciated! 

[hedgehog-goulash7]

Or? We're angry that a movie that should have been about Steve was somehow made more about Tony Stark. It shouldn't have been done that way.

Oops, there it is.

You just proved my point – all this “anti-Tony” crap is about nothing but sheer jealousy and dorks with their panties in a twist over screen time.

“Civil War” is CIVIL WAR – it was NEVER “about Steve.” The main story is and always has been about Steve and Tony. You can weep about that all you want, but go read the original comic series it’s based on (the movie is MUCH better, btw).

You don’t see Tony fans screeching and whining and wringing their hands because the Steve-Bucky story was shoehorned into “Civil War.” Because it can very fairly be said that it was. We’re not constantly kvetching that Bucky’s storyline sucked up valuable screen time from the Tony-Steve main story. Because, you know, it did.

But that is what’s known as a secondary or complimentary storyline. NO good movie has just one main story. The Steve-Bucky storyline was a secondary thread, a complicator; it was there as a NECESSARY contributor to the main conflict between Tony and Steve that split the Avengers. We get it and that’s why no one with any knowledge of screenwriting is complaining.

Cap3 was NEVER mainly a Steve-Bucky story – they had hoped and planned for “Civil War” from the beginning. The only factor they needed put in place was RDJ, and the Russos have clearly said that they had to go to him and convince him to be in the movie. In no way, shape or form did RDJ “insist on” being part of the movie or “force” his way into the movie, as we’ve all seen some dimwits say who obviously have no knowledge about how Hollywood works.

So if you’re going to bemoan cruel fate or blame anyone for not having your dream fanfiction-ish single-thread story about Steve and Bucky (which, again, would NEVER HAPPEN in a good movie), blame the Russos and the screenwriters and Kevin Feige, not RDJ. RDJ is not in charge of scripts and certainly not in charge of long-term story planning for the MCU. Also, RDJ thinks the world of Chris Evans (and vice versa) and they would NEVER think of trampling on each others’ toes or upstaging the other. (I.e. your fave loves RDJ wayyyy more than all of us put together, so smoke that for a while…)

Btw, I think the MCU’s main mistake was not just calling the movie “Avengers: Civil War” and instead calling it a “Captain America” movie. That was just bad branding.

[too-raph]

Dragons, yu yu hakusho!

Sorry this is late..!!

Dragonsthe first character i ever fell in love with:Ruffnut!! When the second movie came out, I saw all those gifs of her ogling Eret and I was sold :’Da character that i used to love/like, but now do not:potential spoilers, but what they revealed about Trader Johan in this new RTTE season makes him more unappealing to me when he was a fun character before,a ship that i used to love/like, but now do not:Used to be more into Ruffret than I am? I still prefer it to lots of other Ruff ships tho…my ultimate favorite character™:RUFFNUT FOR SURE My wonderful daughter, the best girl, who is allowed to be “ugly” and ridiculous and even gross,prettiest character:Still Heather, probably,also a lot of the dragons just have really cool designsmy most hated character:Viggo, and now Krogan, too. I am not a fan of villains, usually, they tend to have personalities that I find unappealing. Too competent, lolmy OTP:Don’t really have one?? my NOTP:Ruff/lout and Ruff/legs and especially Ruff/settling down, having children, and proceeding to lead a normal, boring, run-of-the-mill life(…really tho I do hate the idea of her having children like have you met her?? what part of her makes everyone think she would want to be a mother ever. and what part of her makes everyone think she’d be fine being a housewife. like holy shit. she’s not even the marriage type, imo.I really despise that, since she’s a girl, everyone shoehorns her into this kind of bullshit without even considering her personality./end rant that literally nobody asked for)favorite episode:I love any episode that showcases the twins caring about each other and being competent, oh man. Also ones where Snotlout does good things. Snotlout and the twins doing ridiculous stuff together is also Great ContentFree Scauldy was really good, too! A rare Ruffnut spotlight episode.saddest death:Has there ever been like…a dragon that stayed dead..? My memory is failing me haha. Ah, and Stoick of course…favorite season:This is difficult, bc I have trouble keeping episodes straight, aha,They all have their good and bad moments, imo. I’d probably have to rewatch the whole thing to give a better answer :’Dleast favorite season:^^^character that everyone else in the fandom loves, but i hate:I mean I don’t necessarily hate Hiccup or Astrid but to me they can be…pretty boring…my ‘you’re piece of trash, but you’re still a fave’ fave:Dagur, maybe? :’DThe twins and Snotlout also unfortunately probably qualify, lol. Love these problematic kidsmy ‘beautiful cinnamon roll who deserves better than this’ fave:I still want more focus on Barf and Belch…they are a good dragon…my ‘this ship is wrong, nasty, and makes me want to cleanse my soul, but i still love it’ ship:I mean, Ruffret isn’t exactly, reciprocated, but then, I don’t exactly ship it fully anyway, somy ‘they’re kind of cute, and i lowkey ship them, but i’m not too invested’ ship: Astrid/Heather

Yu Yu Hakushothe first character i ever fell in love with:Kuwabara for sure, he’s been so lovely from day one, I’m gonna crya character that i used to love/like, but now do not:Don’t think there is one..? I don’t fall out of love with characters easily ahaa ship that i used to love/like, but now do not:also none?my ultimate favorite character™:Kazuma Kuwabara is on the fast track to becoming one of my absolute favorite characters of all time ngl. He’s just got such a big heart, and he’s so…genuinely good, and yet ridiculous and a bit rough, maybe a little dumb and a little “ugly”, but he never gives up and will do anything for people (and animals) he loves and Idk he’s just such a pure soul who proves you can achieve anything if you tryprettiest character:Botan and Shizuru!!Yomi, too. And both Kuramas, bc why would you be one pretty anime boy stereotype when you could be two pretty anime boy stereotypes.my most hated character:Toguro brothers, maybe? They made me so angry all the time.The older one was at least ridiculous but imo the younger was an ass for no reason

my OTP:I have so many feelings about Kuwameshi…they just…care about each other so much…my NOTP:Nothing really stands out but this one time I saw a fic that was Yusuke/Hiei/Kurama and completely left out Kuwabara and I felt personally insulted…also I really don’t think Toguro has ever deserved Genkai everfavorite episode:There are so many wonderful episodes bc I just really love this cast of characters BUT one that stands out is episode three, y’know, the one where Kuwabara has to keep from fighting and also study to bring his test score way up just so his friend can keep the job he needs and even tho ppl beat on Kuwabara he refuses to fight back or mess this up in any way and okay listen I’m crying againsaddest death:The second time Yusuke died really got to me, what with Kuwabara crying and begging him not to while remembering their first meetings and all,also when Kuwabara “died” and Yusuke was so devastated he released more power than he even knew he hadthe fact that both of these involve both of them feeling incredibly useless for not being able to save the other makes for added sadnessoh manfavorite season:There isn’t one that really stands out, I really enjoyed the series as a whole! Wasn’t bored once.least favorite season:My heart wants to say season four bc of the (relative) lack of Kuwabara, but even the way that was handled made sure he still had plenty of presence, and it didn’t feel like he was being tossed aside at all. Plus, we got really good Hiei, Kurama, and Yusuke content, not to mention the return of the best minor characters from the Dark Tournament, So ye, in the end I love season four just as much as the others, hahacharacter that everyone else in the fandom loves, but i hate:this doesn’t count at all but I didn’t understand why everyone apparently loved Kurama so much until I met himmy ‘you’re piece of trash, but you’re still a fave’ fave:Shishiwakamaru or Suzuki maybe? If they even count anymore, they seem pretty harmless when all is said and done..Hiei…? lolBui maybe?? He was my favorite on Toguro’s team, at least,my ‘beautiful cinnamon roll who deserves better than this’ fave:Mitarai…like I mean his canon storyline was actually really good but he definitely fits the first partmy ‘this ship is wrong, nasty, and makes me want to cleanse my soul, but i still love it’ ship:…Karasu/Bui?my ‘they’re kind of cute, and i lowkey ship them, but i’m not too invested’ ship:Jin/Touya is really good!!Botan/Shizuru too!!And Hiei/Kurama, of course. Oh, also Yusuke/Keiko, especially doubled up with Kuwameshi feat. polyamorous Yusuke,

[weekendwarriorblog]

WHAT TO WATCH THIS WEEKEND July 12, 2019  - SWORD OF TRUST, THE FAREWELL, SEA OF SHADOWS, STUBER, CRAWL

The 4thof July is over and we still have about six or seven weeks of the summer, but I’m particularly excited this weekend for two movies that aren’t the two wide releases but are movies that played at festivals that are currently among my favorite movies of the year.

I’ve been a Lynn Shelton fan ever since seeing Humpday at Sundance, and I’ve spoken to her many times for her most of her movies since, including one of my faves, Your Sister’s Sister. Shelton’s latest comedy SWORD OF TRUST (IFC Films), opening in New York this weekend and in L.A. on July 19, may replace Your Sister’s Sisteras my favorite movie of hers as she returns to improv-driven comedy filmmaking after spending years directing fantastic shows like Fresh off the Boatand G.L.O.W. In fact, the star of the latter show, Marc Marron, stars in the movie as Birmingham pawn shop owner Mel, holding the fort with his dopey assistant Nathaniel (Jon Bass). One day, life partners Mary and Cynthia (Michaela Watkins/Jillian Bell) show up with a Civil War sword that might help prove that the South won the war, not something that the liberal Mel or either woman believes but they realize they could probably sell the sword for a lot of money. That’s the set-up for a movie that’s so funny and moving as these four great actors interact and try to figure out what the truth is behind the sword and how to get the most money for it, while dealing with some really awful (and potentially dangerous) Southern racists.

Marron is just fantastic in this movie, worthy of an Independent Spirit award if nothing else, as he combines his cynical snarky humor with some truly moving moments, particularly when talking about his ex Deirdre (played by Shelton herself!) There are many great moments between the various castmates but none more than Bell and Bass discussing ghosts and flat earth theory – there’s something so adorable about their innocence even if their characters may sound like idiots.

I’ve seen the movie twice, and I enjoyed it both times, mainly due to the cast but also the way Shelton uses her “scriptment” way of filmmaking that she used to great success in earlier films like Your Sister’s Sister and Humpday.

Sword of Trust is a true joy, and it’s why independent filmmakers like Shelton are still so important in this day of big budget remakes, sequels and focus on franchises… which I honestly think she would kick ass directing as well. Maybe that will happen someday soon.

Rating: 8.5/10

(Also, I hope to have another interview with Shelton over at NextBestPicture sometime next week so look out for it.)

Another great film that premiered at Sundance is Lulu Wang’s THE FAREWELL (A24), and I actually wish I had a chance to see it a second time before writing about it… but honestly, this has been par for the course with A24 this year.  I actually saw a press screening of this for the BAMCInemaFestlast month but haven’t had a chance to see it since, which is a shame as it’s one of the year’s best movies.

It stars Crazy Rich Asians’ Awkwafina as Billi, a Chinese-American woman, struggling with her life in New York, when her parents tell her that her grandmother is dying and the entire family has planned to go to China under the guise of her brother getting married. The thing is that they haven’t told her grandmother that she’s dying, due to some odd family tradition, something that

This movie is not Crazy Rich Asians 2, by any means, as Awkwafina plays a very different role here, definitely one that’s lower key and not particularly comedic, although there’s still a good amount of situational humor. Still, at its core, it’s a really emotional family drama that keeps you invested in the lives of these characters in a way that doesn’t happen much with studio-based dramas.

I’ll be curious to see how well The Farewell does, because it’s very Chinese, mostly taking place in China in Chinese with subtitles. In some ways, it reminds me more of The Joy Luck Club in the way it looks at Chinese life and traditions, and it’s very different from some of the other Sundance breakouts like Late Night.

As someone who has lived in Chinatown for 26 years, I feel I’ve absorbed a lot of that culture through osmosis, so I can definitely relate to a lot of what Wang is exploring in this film. I’m not sure if A24 had this before Sundance (which I didn’t attend), but it’s certainly a gamble for the studio, one that I hope pays off.

Either way, Wang’s film is a must-see, and I’d be shocked if Awkwafina wasn’t in the Oscar discussions by year’s end, because she really delivers an unforgettable performance. I’m looking forward to watching it a few more times this year.

Rating: 9/10

Now, let’s get to the two wide releases, which I’ll also be covering in more detail over at The Beat, although I don’t have too much to say about them otherwise.

The pairing of Dave Bautista from Guardians of the Galaxy and Kumail Nanjiani from Silicon Valley in a straight-up buddy action-comedy seems like the type of high concept sell itself movie that could bring in the curious. That’s exactly what STUBER (20thCentury Fox) is right down to the title referring to Nanjiani’s character Stu, who, you guessed it, drives an Uber. You can read my review below, and you’ll see that it’s not particularly groundbreaking, and at times it’s also pretty bad… but these kinds of cheesy action-movies tend to do well since people just want to go to the movies to be entertained. I can’t say this is much better than the recent Men in Black International(featuring the voice of Nanjiani)… I guess it’s just not that original despite being based on an original script.

Mini-Review: It’s hard to completely fault Stuber for not trying very hard, as it was never meant to be anything more than a high concept buddy comedy pairing the odd couple of Dave Bautistaand Kumhail Nanjiani.

And that’s basically all that it delivers -- nothing more, nothing less.

Bautista is L.A. cop Vince Manning, who has been on the trail of a drug smuggler named Teijo (The Raid’s Iko Uwais). After Vince’s partner is killed, he’s sidelined and decides to use his time off to get much-needed eye surgery. It just so happens that he suddenly learns of Teijo’s whereabouts and being unable to see, he calls an Uber, an electric Nissa Leaf driven by a nerdy but genial guy named Stu (Nanjiani)… get it? STUBER.

That’s about the level of intelligence required to get through this movie, as Nanjiani’s Stu spends the entire making cracks and it’s obvious that this material is below him – his snarky humor not always connecting and his character not being nearly as lovable as his alien in Men in Black International.

The thing is that Bautista is only as good his material and the best this movie does for him is having him stumbling around blindly, doing pratfalls, and yelling at Nanjiani. It’s a weird and sometimes awkward relationship, as Nanjiani is constantly mouthing off to someone who could probably floor him with one blow. (At least that’s probably what would happen in reality.)

There are also some good fight sequences between Bautista and The Raid’s Iko Uwais that should sate most action fans, as well as a couple car chases, but nothing that groundbreaking. Canadian filmmaker Michael Dowse (Goon) does a fine job working with a bigger budget as a studio comedy director… but that’s not really saying much after making much more satisfying and personal smaller films.

Stu just wants to end this adventure and get to his friend Becca (Betty Gilpin from GLOW) who is in desperate need of “companionship” after a bad break-up. Honestly, the way this movie wastes Gilpin might be its biggest offense, using her merely as a sexual lure for Nanjiani’s character and playing a woman who clearly doesn’t have a clue. In some ways, it’s kind of sweet for Stu to want to hook up with his long-time friend and confess his true feelings, but I’m not sure I should have expected more from a movie that kills Karen Gillan (playing Vince’s previous partner) in the first ten minutes.

On top of that, it tries to shoehorn in a touching relationship between Vince and his daughter Nicole (the very good Natalie Morales) but it also feels awkward and obvious, much like the general conceit of the film.

Stuber ends up being so predictable and by the books, while also being kind of offensive to its own characters, you leave the movie wondering if it was worth it for the little bit of entertainment it provides.

Rating: 5.5/10

The other new movie in wide release this week is Alexandre Aja’s new horror film CRAWL (Paramount), produced by the great Sam Raimi, and starring Kaya Scodelarioand Barry Pepper, both from the “Maze Runner” franchise. It involves a Category 5 hurricane that leaves an area of the South underwater and a woman trapped in a flooded house with alligators. I generally like these types of movies, which are in the vein of shark movies like The Shallows and 45 Meters Down with people at threat from nature’s most dangerous creatures. In this case, it’s alligators. Sadly, Paramount isn’t confident enough in their movie to bother screening for most critics, so I won’t be able to see it until Friday, but look for my review over on The Beatprobably sometime Friday afternoon or evening.

LIMITED RELEASES

We had such a nice, easy weekend last week with not too many limited releases but that’s not the case this weekend, as all the smaller studios try to catch up after the holiday break. Fortunately or unfortunately I haven’t seen that many other movies besides the ones mentioned above and a few below.

Before we get to the usual releases, I want to draw attention to a special one-night only event from Trafalgar Releasing, actually the first of four this summer, and that is The Cure - Anniversary 1978-2018 Live in Hyde Park London. It’s pretty self-explanatory but basically, the British emo-rock band celebrated its 40thanniversary last year with a special concert. That concert was filmed and a film has been put together by long-time Cure videographer/collaborator Tim Pope.  This specialone-night-only event will screen WORLDWIDE on Thursday night, and if you’re a fan of the band you’ll want to check it out.

Another great film coming out Friday is SEA OF SHADOWS (National Geographic), the new doc from The Ivory Game’s Richard Ladkani, which won the Audience Award at Sundance. Executive produced by Leonardo Dicaprio’s Appian Way, it’s an amazing film that deals partially with trying to save an endangered species of whale, the vaquita porpoise in the Sea of Cortez where Mexican cartels, Chinese traffickers and local fisherman are using nets to try to capture the rare totoaba fish, whose swim bladder is worth of tens of thousands on the black market. It’s a complicated situation that involves government corruption and honest fisherman just trying to survive, while the cartel illegally mines the sea unconcerned with the fact that the vaquitas are dwindling at an alarming rate. Currently, there are only 15 left on the entire planet, all in the Sea of Cortez. Ladkani’s film follows a wide array of individuals: scientists, conservationists, journalists as well as the Earth League International, an amazing group of eco-mercenaries made up of intelligence and law enforcement using those methods to out the totaba cartels in that area of Mexico, as well as Sea Shephard, who are pulling the illegal fishing nets and trying to work with the Mexican Navy to stop the poachers.  Although the film’s multi-pronged attack on the subject might dilute some of the stories -- like the attempts to preserve the vaquita --  this is also not your typical DisneyNature film and definitely not for kids, although the scenes with the vaquitas show them to be beautiful animals with true intelligence and soul, which just makes their plight that much more heartbreaking. Then on top of that, you have this real-life thriller full of intrigue, conspiracies and corruption, just a terrific doc from Ladkani and NatGeo. It’s very obvious why it won the Audience Award at Sundance, and it will open in select cities and then hopefully expand wider similar to last year’s Oscar winner Free Solo.

Another interesting doc for those who wondered where those smartphones they’re looking at all hours of the day came from might want to check out Sarah Kerrush and Matt Maude’s doc GENERAL MAGIC (Gravitas Ventures), a doc about the company General Magic, made up former Apple employees from Silicon Valley who formed a brain trust in the early ‘90s to try to create the first PDAs I.e. palmtop computers, not “public displays of affection,” although there’s some of that in the movie, too. With amazing archival footage, it shows how these brilliant engineers and technicians came up with ideas while trying to bring the “Magic Hat” to market that would eventually become part of the iOS and Android systems we know and love. Some of the team also goes on to form the likes of eBay and other tech giants, so it’s amazing to watch these early days with reflections from those involved.  Apparently, General Magicalready played in a lot of places but it’s opening at the IFC Center this Friday.

Jesse Eisenberg stars in Riley (Faults) Stearns’ dark comedy THE ART OF SELF DEFENSE (Bleecker Street), playing a nerdy bookkeeper named Casey who is attacked on the street at night by a motorcycle gang. In order to protect himself, he decided to take karate lessons, where he meets the charismatic Sensei (Alessandro Nivola) whose tough training gives Casey confidence until he learns there’s a darker underpinning to the dojo.  I was generally mixed about the movie, because it had serious tonal issue where it was never as funny as it seems from the trailers, and then it gets dark… VERY dark. I did like Imogen Poots as a long-time teacher at the dojo, and like with many of Poots’ previous roles, I didn’t recognize her at all in the role, and frankly, I thought she was the best part of Stearns’ movie.  Bleecker Street plans to expand this fairly wide next weekend, so we’ll have to see how it does in limited release.

I’m not sure releasing Orson Oblowitz’s TRESPASSERS (IFC Midnight) so soon after Ari Aster’s MIdsommar was such a great idea, as it seems to be in the similar vein dealing with two couples with relationship issues who rent a house in the desert for a drug/sex romp. Angela Trimbur and Janel Parrish play long-time friends whose boyfriends (Zach Avery, Jonathan Howard) aren’t as friendly towards each other, but their night of debauchery is sidelined when a woman (Fairuza Balk) shows up claiming to be a neighbor with car trouble. As people start dying, they start realizing maybe she’s not what she seems. No, ya think?

Matt Aselton’s LYING AND STEALING (Vertical/DirecTV) stars Michael Costigan as art thief Ivan, who hopes to break free of his criminal life when he meets Elyse (Naomi Despres), a con woman and actress trying to escape her past. They team together for the perfect heist because one is LYING and one is STEALING… see how these high concept titles work, people who think Stuber is too high-brow? After a month-long run on DIRECTV, it will open in select theaters in New York and elsewhere Friday.

Jeanine and Catherine Butler’s doc American Heretics: The Politics of the Gospel (Abramorama) looks at a group of Oklahomans looking to bridge the divide between their communities, separated by religion, race and politics, showing how the area’s conservative Christian movement emerged.

Also opening in theaters is Aaron Lieber’s Bethany Hamilton: Unstoppable, which is about professional surfing world champion Bethany Hamilton, who survived a brutal shark attack in 2003, which was the basis for the 2011 film Soul Surfer, based on her book. The film covers Hamilton’s return to surfing while also trying to raise a toddler.

Opening at the Film Forum Wednesday is Richard Billingham’s debut feature, the British drama Ray & Liz  (KimStim), an autobiographical look at growing up in the Midlands in the working class. I haven’t seen this yet but I love the work of Ken Loach, which this definitely resembles.

Argentine filmmaker Benjamin Naishtat’s Rojo (1844 Entertainment /Distrib Films), winner of the Silver Shell Awards for Best Director and Actor at the San Sebastian Film Festival, which opens at the Quad Cinema and Film at Lincoln Center Friday and in L.A. at the Laemmle Royal on July 19. Set in Argentina during the Dirty War of the mid-‘70s, it follows a middle-age lawyer named Claudio, who is insulted by a stranger in a restaurant, which begins a night of secrets exacerbated by the arrival of a Chilean detective. It stars South and Central American actors Dario Grandinetti, Andrea Grigerio and Alfredo Castro.

Also this weekend, Tenzing Sonam and Ritu Sarin’s drama The Sweet Requiem (Juno Films), opening at the IFC Center in New York, looks at the refugee crisis  in the Himalayas with Tenzin Dolker making her acting debut as a 26-year-old Delhi exile who is reminded of when she was brought there by her father at the age of 8 in order to escape their Tibetan home.

From Bollywood and Reliance comes Vikas Bahl’s Super 30, based on the life of Indian mathematician Anand Kumar who comes from a poor family in Bihar but who puts together a group of 30 underprivileged but bright students for a program to help get them into the illustrious Indian Institutes of Technology.

Actor Joseph Cross from Big Little Lies makes his directorial debut with the musical rom-com Summer Night (Samuel Goldwyn Films), starring Victoria Justice, Lana Condor (To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before), Callen McAuliffe and other young bright stars will open in select cities Friday. It stars Ian Nelson and Ellar Coltrane (Boyhood) as Seth and Jameson, who are getting ready to perform with their band at The Alamo until they receive life-changing reality checks including news from Seth’s girlfriend (Analeigh Tipton) and Jameson has to choose between two girls (Justice and Elena Kampouris).  The film deals with a single night in the lives of this group of friends… so I guess it’s kind of like Scott Pilgrim vs. the World? Just check out the trailer and decide for yourself...

Lastly, opening in select cities Friday is Jasmin Mozaffari’s Firecrackers (GDE), starring Michaela Kurimsky and Karena Evan as teen friends trying to leave their small town, who run into problems.  

STREAMING AND CABLE

Anthony Mackie and Frank Grillo star in POINT BLANK, the remake of the French action-thriller of the same name, this one directed by the great Joe Lynch (Everly, Mayhem). It follows a similar storyline about an ER nurse named Paul (Mackie), whose pregnant wife is kidnapped and held as collateral forcing him to team with an injured career criminal under his care to get it back. I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I have confidence in the teaming of Lynch, Mackie and Grillo to do Fred Cavayé’s fantastic film justice.

More notably, Netflix is getting into a pattern of releasing two or three foreign films every couple weeks, and this week, we have three foreign films from different countries.

First up on Thursday is the Chinese dystopian film Cities of Last Things from WI Ding Ho starring Jack Kaoas a man who has extraordinary events happen to him across three different eras told in reverse chronological order.

From Spain comes 4 Latas (i.e. 4L), Gerardo Olivares’ road comedy starring Jean Renoand Hovik Keuchkerianas two friends who take a road trip from Spain to Mali to visit a dying friend with his estranged daughter (Susana Abaitua) along for the ride.

Also on Friday is Kidnapping Stella, Thomas Sieben’s German drama about a woman (Jella Haase) taken from the street for ransom and trying to derail her abductors’ plans. This one seems a lot like theGemma Arterton’s The Disappearance of Alice Creed, an amazing and underrated thriller that I loved.

REPERTORY

METROGRAPH (NYC):

While the new restoration of Takashi Miike’s Audition will continue through the week, this weekend sees the latest installment of The Academy at the Metrograph, on Saturday afternoon showing the Director’s Cut of Michael Wadleigh’s Woodstock to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the upstate New York music and arts festival.

Also, the series Secret Histories: The Films of Kevin Rafferty & Friends runs through the week showing five of Rafferty’s docs, but honestly, I know nothing about these films. I only know a little bit more about Italian maestro Pier Paolo Pasolini,whose series A Future Life Part 2 also runs through the remainder of the week.

This week’s Late Nites at Metrograph is Nagisa Oshima’s 1986 film Max Mon Amour, written by French screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière – whom you might remember, had a retrospective at MOMA recently. Playtime: Family Matinees is Niki Caro’s Wave Rider (2002), a fantastic Oscar-nominated film that I highly recommend seeing. Jack Hazan’s David Hockney film A Bigger Splash (1974) also continues as does Les Blank’s Tex-Mex music doc duo mentioned in last week’s column.

THE NEW BEVERLY  (L.A.):

Wednesday’s matinee is an IB Tech Print of the James Bond classic Goldfinger(1964), and apparently, this Bond series will continue through the month on Wednesday afternoons.  Weds. and Thurs. sees double features of Roger Corman’s The Secret Invasion  (1964) and James Garner’s Darby’s Rangers  (1968), while Friday and Sat. is a Jane Fonda double feature of  Cat Ballou  (1965) and The Chase (1966). Following last week’s KIDDEE MATINEE of The Love Bug, it’s followed up this weekend by Disney’s Herbie Rides Again  (1974). Tarantino’s own Django Unchained plays Friday night at midnight while Jane Fonda’s Barbarella (1968)plays Saturday night.The Sunday/Monday double features are Gunman’s Walk (1958)and They Came to Cordura  (1959), as the New Bev stays on its Western kick with  The Quick and the Dead (1995) screens in the Monday matinee. Tuesday’s Grindhouse double feature is 1970’s A Bullet for Pretty Boy, starring teen idol Fabian as Pretty Boy Floyd, with the 1969 screamer Horror House, starring Frankie Avalon.

EGYPTIAN THEATRE (LA):

This weekend begins on Thursday with a “Highballs and Screwballs” double feature of Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity (1944) and Howard Hawks’ 1941 film Balls of Fire, starring Barbara Stanwyk. Alfred Hitchcock’s classic Vertigo screens on Friday as does Herbert Blaché’s 1923 film The Untameable (on 8mm!) with live music. Saturday night’s “Tiki Night 2019” (celebrating the 60thanniversary of Hawaii becoming a state) is a double feature of Gidget Goes Hawaiian (1961)with Elvis Presley’s Paradise, Hawaiian Style  (1966). Sunday is a Jack Nicholson double feature of Roman Polanski’s Chinatown (1974)and its 1990 sequel The Two Jakes.  (Note: its sister theater theAERO seems to be taking a break until August.)

FILM FORUM (NYC):

Francesco Rossi’s Christ Stopped at Eboli (1979) returns for another week! Mikhail Kalatozov’s Cannes Palme D’or winning Russia-based The Cranes are Flying (1957) is also getting a one-week 2k restoration release. Elaine May’s A New Leaf and Mikey and Nicky continues through Thursday.

QUAD CINEMA (NYC):

The 4k restoration Director’s Cut of Daniel Vigne’s The Return of Martin Guerre  (1982), starring Gerard Depardieu (and written by that French writer Jean-Claude Carrière!), should continue at least through Thursday, as will 1984’s Before Stonewall.

MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE (NYC):

“See It Big! Action” series finally comes to a close with screenings of Kathryn Bigelow’s classic 1991 action movie Point Break (no relation to Point Blank) on Friday and Saturday. Next week begins a new family matinee program called “Summer Matinees: Fantastic Worlds.”

IFC CENTER (NYC)

The IFC Center is starting a new monthly program called “Artists Direct,” presented by former MOMI director David Schwartz and next Tuesday’s offering is a special screening of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s Jack Goes Boating from 2010 with some of the cast in person to play tribute to the late actor/filmmaker.

FILM OF LINCOLN CENTER (NYC):

On Friday, Film Linc begins a new series of free outdoor screenings on Governor’s Island beginning with Martin Scorsese’s 1985 comedy classic After Hours, one of my favorite movies and the very reason I moved to New York.

BAM CINEMATEK (NYC):

BAM is showing a double feature of Patrick Wang’s two-part 2018 independent film A Bread Factory on Sunday, July 13, a movie that has found a larger audience as arthouse theaters screen it.

UNITED PALACE (NYC):

The Washington Heights classic movie house is back with a special Sunday screening of James Stewarts’ Mr. Smith Goes to Washington  (1939).

ROXY CINEMA (NYC)

Wednesday and Sunday night, the Roxy will present 35mm screenings of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds (1963)

LANDMARK THEATRES NUART  (LA):

Friday night’s midnight offering is James Cameron’s Terminator 2: Judgment Dayfrom 1991.

[amorremanet]

“what am i writing” meme

Okay, so, @bizeke​ tagged me in a, “what are you writing right now” meme, and I’ve been trying to figure out how I wanted to answer it because, for once in my life, I don’t have a huge pile of WIPs. Like, I’m deliberately trying to rein myself in and refrain from letting the rabid plot-bunnies have their way with my brain to the point that I end up getting nothing done because I get overwhelmed by how many possibilities there are and how many ideas I have.

Let me tell you what: as a Ne-dom (ENTP), this is one of the worst punishments that I could ever imagine and I wouldn’t wish it on anybody, like, ever.

But I’m actually trying to stick to it, because it’s in the name of trying to focus on and do right by the project that is my main Thing right now, in basically all areas of life. Unfortunately for my desire for instant gratification, it’s going to be long. I mean, it’s a novel, so that’s part of the deal and one just has to suck it up and live with that, or just never write novels unless you can crank them out at a Stephen King-esque pace. Unfortunately for how much I like the community (and validation!) that comes built in with writing fan-things, it’s also original fic (which is also scary as fuck, but hey).

So, to get this part out of the way first: the “as yet untitled because I suck and titles are hard fml” project is a novel. It’s a superhero story with LGBTQ protags who are also largely neurodivergent, mentally ill, and/or otherwise disabled. The main story concerns a ragtag bunch of misfits — some of them super-powered mutants and some not — who come together in a new team and in just trying to do some good in the world for various reasons (and working together because they all realize that they can’t actually do that much on their own), they stumble into a bigger plot and wind up pitting themselves against a half-shadowy cabal of big deal neo-fascist supervillains (some mutants, and some not, though in their case, the non-mutants are generally treated like pets, rather than people and full team members).

ngl, the three biggest causes for this project were:

1. I needed a new project for my thesis because fuck this shit, I don’t wanna be in grad school anymore, and after having my project jerked around by practically everyone in my department at one point or another, the fanfic thing I settled on wasn’t working and I am really well and truly beyond fucking sick of grad school;

2. I had this one character in particular — the oft-mentioned mutant disaster, Sebastian — who I initially drew up for this game that my Sunday night tabletop group was playing last summer. The idea of there being mutant superheroes was similar, but Double Cross’s system is heavily inspired by the Parasite Eve series of video games, with a little bit from the novel that inspired them (by which I mean that the rule-book is pretty explicit about it; sure, they build on the world in their own ways to give players more options for their characters, and bring in some other influences, but they don’t hide that their primary source of inspiration is Parasite Eve).

Anyway, the Double Cross system relies a lot on character-driven drama and works it into the gameplay (one example is the “Lois” system, where you make up NPCs who help keep your character tethered to their sense of humanity, so they won’t get completely taken over by the shiny super-mitochondria that have gotten inside them and could make them turn into a monster). Additionally, I’ve been playing with my GM, Jake, since we were in high school, and I know that he likes having as much stuff to use against the characters as possible. I also know that it makes games with him more fun because he gets better ideas that way

(which is also why I knew damn well that the short, historical setting horror thing we did in January and February was going to be short, but still gave him a ten-page backstory for my French Jesuit priest that I could’ve backed up with sources for, “yes, this was actually a Thing in early to mid-17th century Paris” or, “yes, this was part of the process of becoming a Jesuit in that time period” had he asked for them)

Which, for Sebastian, meant that I started writing with the intent of it being three things

a brief apology note to Dr. Maeda (a scientist Jake borrowed from Parasite Eve because he’s a really fun character, whom Seb hadn’t really had an altercation with? But with his self-deprecating humor that almost no one else finds funny, Seb had accidentally made Dr. Maeda think that he’d offended him, and he wanted to apologize for that);

one letter to his older brother Max that would’ve been written while Seb was in rehab (which, in an idea that I straight up lifted from Augusten Burroughs’s memoir, Dry, had the prompt, “write to someone close to you and express your feelings about them and your relationship” and it had a lot of instances where Seb quoted something from Oscar Wilde’s De Profundis and somehow, whether fairly on himself or not, connected it to his and Max’s situation, in which he cast himself as a fuck-up on the level of Bosie Douglas. It also had a lot of snarky footnotes);

and one that he would’ve written to Max after the party’s first big adventure together (the major TL;DR point of which was, “ahahahaha, I was trying so hard to get my life together but oh no, shit, I fucked up and everything is terrible, you were right and I was wrong and now I can’t give you all the details of why you were right because the FBI says a lot of it’s classified but you were right and I fucked up and oh my god why” — just… with a lot of tangents and backstory and yet more snarky footnotes)

—but because I’m me, I quickly lost control of that idea.

I figured out the entire timeline of major events (largely but not entirely by hand, and in a few places, there is arguably too much detail, like how I know all of the classes that Seb took in undergrad, where it all fit into his substance abuse history, and exactly how that exacerbated his already Not Good mental health)

I did a lot of writing and a lot more revising and then more writing and then some research — like sketching out a list of TV Tropes that applied to Seb and his backstory, and by, “sketching” I mean that I listed them, and in most cases, I wrote up explanations for why he deserved the tropes or how I was trying to play with them

some of which were fairly brief (e.g., the explanation for his exact brand of being a Stepford Smiler is only 185 words, most of them actually being about how he made it to nearly 30 without having anyone suggest that he might be living with depression)

while others were kinda not (like, the 2,400-word explanation of why he got, “Angst, What Angst?” and “Conditioned to Accept Horror” on his list, which got listed together because they were part of the same larger problem and helped to fuel each other)

I went through multiple versions of all of those letters except the first one (and, in the case of the second, even made the drafts full-on “canon” things in their own right, documenting Seb’s ongoing attempts at paring a draft down enough to share in group therapy, because that was part of the in-universe conceit about why he was writing to Max in the first place)

I added other letters still (like, one to Pete that Seb was writing in rehab, with the in-universe prompt, “list 99 problems that you have that don’t have anything to do with your brother or his wife, because seriously? you’ve been going on about him so much, it’s starting to feel like you’re talking about shit with him in order to get out of talking about anything else in your life”; and one letter to Max that Seb wrote before his first overdose, which would have jossed his, “oh yeah, totally an accident, can I go back to class on Monday please” lie because it was explicitly a suicide note)

—and all up, by the time Jake decided that he was having trouble bringing things together into a larger game after the first adventure, I’d written about one order of words

”Order” here meaning, “a unit of word length measurement equivalent to the length of Harry Potter and The Order Of The Phoenix, i.e. 257,045 words”

—which I exceeded somewhat but not by enough to make too big a difference, not least since most of these drafts will not be making an appearance in the novel itself.

So, I was like, “Well, fuck. I did all of that and we’re not even going to keep playing that game? ……Screw this, I didn’t do all that work for fuck-all nothing, I’ve gotta find something else to do with Seb and his story”

This first necessitated going back to the drawing board, scrapping a lot of the stuff that was directly related to Parasite Eve or Double Cross, or finding a new way to reconfigure it so that it wasn’t just me lifting shit from either of them

Because I’m me, that led to more and more ideas coming up, which in turn pretty much guaranteed that…… okay, yes, Sebastian got to be a POV character first, because in all due fairness, he was here first and the story wouldn’t exist without him…… but he’s not quite, “the main character” in the same way that, say, Harry Potter is (nor would he really want to be)

And TL;DR: this whole thing started because I wanted to help my GM make my character suffer, only for him to drop the game, after which I didn’t want all the work I did to go to waste and be totally meaningless, so hey

and 3. ……Well, I mean. I had a lot of ideas that I kept trying to turn into fanficcy things, but at a certain point, I just had to admit that they would have gotten into, “unless you can show why this is a legit interpretation or development for these characters, it’s going to be OOC” territory

and after enough rounds of this, I gave up and went, “Okay, fuck it, FINE. Rather than try to shoehorn any of my pre-extant fictional faves into these ideas that they do not actually fit into, only for the sake of writing them as fic and getting more or less immediate Validation, I’m gonna go write my own story! With mutants! And canon LGBTQ characters! And canon neurodiversity! Because FUCK IT, that’s why!”

I guess that one could say that I finally hit, “fuck it.”

In universe, the mutant thing isn’t being treated as an oppression allegory in its own right (I say, definitely looking pointedly at the X-Men, but not exclusively at them, because in fairness, they are so not the only guilty parties here), and the issue of metahuman licensing isn’t being used as a metaphor for any example of governments illicitly keeping tabs on oppressed or marginalized people.

Like, there are still major flaws in the system and how it’s enacted on people because it’s the U.S. government, but the entire thing is treated more like taking driver’s ed and going to the DMV because the fact of the matter is that we are talking about people who have shit like super-strength, telepathy, and heat vision, and it’s fair for other citizens to want to make sure that they can control their powers, and that they know and agree to abide by certain laws about how they can and can’t use them

(e.g., yes, it is considered rape if you telepathically coerce someone into sex. Exactly what charges you’ll face vary from state to state, but it’s still rape, and unless there are some seriously extenuating circumstances — like, say, if you have two teenage telepathic mutants who didn’t know that they were mutants and thus couldn’t control their powers, so both of them have broken the law here, but unless there was some other kind of force or coercion involved, neither can be held criminally responsible — you will be prosecuted if you get caught.

Whether or not you get caught is another issue entirely, and it’s a huge mess for a lot of reasons, but in theory, this is how the law works.)

The novel I’m working on now is also going to be the first in a series of four or five — give or take “Dunk and Egg”-esque tie-in stories, mostly because I’m still a Ne-dom and, even without all the world-building being set in stone at present, I’m already attached to and intrigued by several characters and parts of my world that aren’t part of the “main” storyline

(which is, itself, already an ensemble cast production, just with focal/POV characters for each installment because otherwise, I would probably pull a GRRM, get overloaded by all of the different POVs and trying to balance them effectively, and then either die or be photographed running around in a giant hamster ball because I’m trying to run away from my problems that I created all by myself)…

…but also partly because it is annoyingly easier to find potential “legit” places to publish shorter works and get yourself “legitimately” established by putting out some of those first.

You lot get three guesses each as to why I find this annoying, the first two don’t count, and if you guess literally anything but some variation on, “But, Kassie! You’re in the exact same TL;DR club as GRRM! One of your more popular TW fics was a 23k vaguely stream of consciousness beast in which you committed the same literary sin that you bag on Marcel Proust about all the time, because almost nothing actually happened”?

……then I probably love you for having such faith in me, but you have way too much faith in me because… yeah, no. That’s pretty much it. The “legitimate” “grown-up” publishing world’s fondness for short stories annoys me entirely because I don’t like being brief, or cutting things out, or so on and so forth.

Shit, I’m having enough trouble in Pages right now today, because I decided that this one beat in one scene of the novel was getting too far into territory that is actually meant for the chapter right after it, so I’m trying to figure out where to cut it, so I can then relocate the dialogue to where it makes more sense. Trying to be succinct…… is not one of my strong suits, period.

To be fair? The novel… well. It wouldn’t be a Thing without my years in fandom and my immersion in fan culture. It just would not be possible without that part of my background.

On one hand, that’s due to how many ideas I wouldn’t have been exposed to without fandom discussing them in the different ways that we have, and how many things I wound up reading or watching because I saw that other people were enjoying them and I wanted to know what was up, and then all the criticism that I saw from fans of said things about issues of how stories and media are shaped by the sociopolitical structures that content creators live with

And on the other hand, it’s because my story is a literary pastiche that is not entirely a deconstruction of the genre, but rather a recombination of different tropes and pieces of the superhero genre, plus pieces from other genres because fuck the idea that genres can or should be strictly delineated and kept separate from each other at all times that’s why, where I acknowledge that there is little room to actually do anything that is “entirely new” — both in the sense that we’re all influenced, both consciously and not, by everything around us, so you can make the far-end argument that nothing is “purely” or “entirely new,” since that would require things to be made in a vacuum, and in the sense that… well. I mean.

Come on, I’m working in an established genre that has had several different voices and perspectives chime into it in various fashions since it first got started with the original Superman comics in 1938 (and even that is arguably not the start, since the origins of the genre go waaaay the fuck back, and almost no one writing about the genre critically likes to let it just be its own thing without bringing up precedents like Gilgamesh, Heracles, and the Scarlet Pimpernel), and even if I weren’t also bringing in things from outside the superhero genre, I would have no significant chance of doing something that hasn’t already been done at some point, by somebody, somewhere.

Moreover, uh. I get why the Ang Lee Hulk isn’t everyone’s taste, I do. It’s not my favorite anything but any means, but I enjoy parts of it. But that being said, there are, in the superhero genre, certain expectations that certain tropes and story or character elements will appear in some fashion, even if they’re being brutally deconstructed, and Ang Lee tried his best to weasel out of a lot of them because he didn’t want his movie to have the, “stigma” of being, “just a superhero movie.”

Which is a shame, because a lot of his ideas about how he wanted to interpret Bruce Banner as a character, interpret the dynamic between Bruce and the Hulk, and so on? Those actually could’ve been really fun…… but he didn’t want to make, “a superhero movie,” so he ignored the value of all the shit that he should’ve been using to actualize these ideas on the screen, and he had to essentially paste that stuff on like, “Fine, here’s your superhero bullshit, you fucking comic book nerds”

Which all sort of adds up to, “I mean, I’m trying to challenge or play with some of these genre staples — and some of the more optional ones, I’m doing away with because they’re common but not necessary and I think they’re not part of the stories I want to tell, or they’re very particular to certain mediums that are not the one I’m working in — but…… fuck, man, it’s still a superhero story. It’s not like you can’t tell superhero-influenced stories without these things, but if you’re telling a flat-out superhero story, then…… yeah, you kinda do need to at least acknowledge them, and if you don’t have some kind of appreciation for the genre, then why the fuck are you working in it”

(And this is a brief aside to point out that Ang Lee isn’t the only content creator who’s been called a genius and has been guilty of going all like, “fuck superhero stories, they’re just pointless stupid trashy kid stuff for babies, lmao” while also being involved in working on one.

The list is probably even longer than I know, but I feel especially obligated to point out that Heath Ledger had nothing but disdain for the entire superhero genre before playing the Joker in TDK, literally only agreed to do that because Christopher Nolan was involved and Batman Begins had been noticeably “higher-quality” by most people’s standards than the Joel Schumacher Batman movies and the then-extant X-Men movies, and really only seemed to have come around about the quality of certain stories that he read as character prep — like The Killing Joke, The Man Who Laughs, and Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth

—and frankly, he and Nolan both seem(ed) to see those stories [plus a handful of others, in Nolan’s case] as special exceptions were, “not like all the rest of the genre,” rather than seeing them as indications of what the entire genre can be capable of.

Which is not to say that I acknowledge the validity of any other non-Cesar Romero live-action Joker, because unless someone really wows me or they come up with an idea that Mark Hamill could do live-action and managed to talk him into it, that’s probably not going to happen, and both Nicholson and Leto can eat me because they were just awful as the Clown Prince of Crime. Awful in different ways, admittedly, but still. Just. AWFUL. Absolutely abysmal.

It’s also not to say that the superhero genre is entirely awesome, since… lmao, Sturgeon’s Law, people. 90% of everything is probably some kind of bullshit. It can be entertaining bullshit, sure, but it’s probably still some kind of bullshit.

What I am trying to say, though, is that the entire genre is not special for having a lot of bullshit in it, because frankly, EVERY GENRE has mostly a lot of bullshit in it, so holding the superhero genre to some special double standard is ridiculous and elitist, and no, we shouldn’t look at things like Watchmen, A Serious House on Serious Earth, or anything else you might want to put on a, “special exceptions” list as being separate from the genre that spawned them.

They’re superhero stories. Barring some examples like Watchmen that have characters that were new when they first came out, these stories literally have characters like Batman and Superman and Wonder Woman running around, having adventures and fighting bad guys. Being of an allegedly, “higher quality” than any random issue you pick off the rack on Wednesday does not mean that they aren’t superhero stories

—and I realize that most of the people reading this already probably kind of feel the same about the elitist nonsense that goes on regarding pretty much every example of genre fiction, except for like big-budget sci-fi and fantasy that either sticks to very conventional models, and/or is written and/or directed by someone we might call an Auteur™, like Ridley Scott, James Cameron, or Guillermo del Toro, or like GRRM would be called if he made movies

……but this tendency grinds my gears anyway because the fuck what even, people. All of the genre fiction that gets bagged on like this has an established history with enough examples to prove that they are is just as widely varied in content and “quality” as yet another movie about a cis white dude and a cis white lady who want to be together but they can’t because of Reasons Or Something, wow such innovation, very forbidden, etc. etc. obviously NO ONE has EVER told a story like this before in the entire history of human storytelling, ha ha ha, GAG)

But anyway, as I was saying. Pastiche or something.

Still, it’s not a deconstruction properly because as much as I love and am creatively indebted to some of them — with Watchmen on the, “it has problems but I overall love it even if I don’t always agree with what Alan and Dave had to say or how they said it” side, The Dark Knight Returns on the, “Frank Miller can go step on a rusty nail and get tetanus, what a douchebag” side,

Deadpool in general on the, “I mean, I respect that you have a vision of what kind of fourth wall-breaking self-aware hijinks you want to get up to, and I enjoy it sometimes, but on one hand? For all I don’t agree with everything that’s said in Wisecrack’s “Philosophy of Deadpool” video, I do think it’s fair to say that you guys often have a lot in common with hipsters, and that you have the potential to do cool shit like Cervantes did Don Quixote, but that you often don’t go as far as you could with it, which can sometimes be kinda disheartening. More importantly, though, your vision is cool and has a place at the table too, but it’s not MY vision, so you do your thing and I’m gonna do mine and if I ever do get published, I hope I can meet Gail Simone because I would just die” side

and several others falling at various points of somewhere in the middle and shit — uhhh? It’s just??? Like?

I just… don’t… really… want to write a massive deconstruction?

I mean. I enjoy reading some of them (or there are others like TDKReturns, where it’s less that I enjoy them and more that they’re important to the genre’s history but I hate them and the only reason I haven’t literally set fire to my copy of that book is that…… shit, man, that thing was expensive, and if I set it on fire, I’d have to either buy a new one or get a .cbr file for free, which would be illegal and I obviously do not condone it, nope, not at all, nudge wink ssssh)…

and I won’t deny that they’ve influenced how I approach the genre as both a reader and as a creator (I mean, ffs, I have a minor character who was literally inspired by a mix of Rorschach and my desire to petulantly piss off every fucking dudebro fanboy who reads Watchmen and doesn’t get that Rorschach is supposed to be seen as completely reprehensible. Yes, he’s a different kind of reprehensible from Eddie Blake and Adrian Veidt, but all of them are still pretty reprehensible, that’s kind of the fucking point. The only so-called “heroes” in Watchmen who accomplish anything of major historical significance are either completely reprehensible, or they’re Doctor Manhattan and so far removed from their former sense of humanity that they might as well be on a different existential plane entirely)

……but, for all I enjoy deconstructions, I don’t want to write one, personally.

And anyway, the original point to all of this is that my story wouldn’t exist as it does without fandom because, on one hand, I got exposed to pretty much all of this through/because of fandom, or while I was in fandom; and on the other, the way that fandom relies so much on envisioning new possibilities for characters and stories, and combining seemingly disparate elements into new shapes, and mashing up tropes and ideas that don’t seem to go together but finding a way to make it work…… like?

That’s shaped me so much as a writer, even outside of fandom, that I don’t know where to begin finding examples of it in action, because it’s just everywhere in my writing tbh. And I don’t think that it makes anything I’m doing, “new” as such, because I’m probably overly aware of what most of my different influences are and how they’ve influenced me in which ways and so on…… but I don’t need or want to completely reinvent the wheel, I just want to have fun making up my stories and maybe bringing in something that other people enjoy and can read without feeling like their time was wasted, y’know?

…also, I will totally admit to certain fandom mainstay tropes and idioms having different degrees of influence on my story, and to deliberately trying to work in phrases like, “to toe out of one’s shoes” that are almost exclusively found in fanfiction because…… uh, I know where I came from, and while I might have various problems with where I came from on a pretty much constant basis, I still love and respect where I came from, so why not use some of our idioms and popular tropes?

………also? I’m doing it because I want to, that’s why.

Just like how there was no actual NEED, as such, for me to make Yael and Elizabeth a deliberate middle-finger to Marvel and their penchant for baiting Cherik, and then screaming, “OH WAIT NOOOOOPE, NO HOMO, DON’T LET’S BE SILLY, CHILLAX YOU STUPID FANGIRLS!!!!” — like I could’ve had them in the story and the world without doing that…

…but I wanted to do that, so I’m gonna do that, and since I’m not violating any copyright or intellectual property laws because what I’m doing doesn’t rip off anything more than general concepts that Marvel has no exclusive or protected ownership of, and even if it did, what I’m doing would count as a commentary or satire and be protected by the First Amendment and the US Supreme Court, therefore no one can do shit about shit to stop me from having my two badass older lady lesbians who are, in fact, married and are co-headmistresses of their school for the exceptionally gifted. Nah nah nah nah nah nah, ha ha ha ha ha ha.

(……………I am a serious adult writer who takes her writing seriously. …also, I’m sorry, and I’m done now, and thank you for reading if you have, and if you got to this finishing point, please go help yourself to like…… a cookie. Or five. Or idk, any kind of treat you want, I don’t know you and I’m not your boss, so I can’t guess what your idea of a treat is much less tell you what to do. Okay, I’m done now, bye)

ETA: ……oh, and I guess that I tag whoever wants to do this themself, because I just spent a few hours writing it and I don’t wanna look at it anymore, not even to pass the meme on, so…… heeeey, free invite, you can do a meme just because you want to and then blame me

[driftbending]

soooooo 

season 7 was amazing!

like there are issues i have with certain plots they introduced, but those issues are more about how they were introduced rather than what was introduced bc i feel like a lot of plotlines are just rushed along w/little pacing so we can’t breathe or process it as well as we could have, but that’s what i’ve come to expect from this show so it’s not like it’s new or shocking to me

and i have to admit, i do feel rather, hmmm, smug? vindicated?, that the weird hesitation i felt re: the creator’s announcement pre-series came from a reasonable place & not me being a dick

(bc now that i look at what happened, from their announcement, to fandom reaction, to actual source material, i have to say that creators need to stop touting diversity in favor of good stories just to get attention and that fandom needs to stop holding diversity as the key reason to enjoy a show--then again, if that’s the guidelines ppl wanna follow, both creator and fan alike, then, y’know, fine, but when it comes to bite them in the ass, both groups shouldn’t be so shocked that it happened.

and i’m coming from a place of sympathy. bc i’m used to this--to being told “hey, watch our show, we have characters that are [insert flavor of diversity here]” only to watch said characters be ignored/hurt/used as tokens/etc, so i was definitely not feeling what fandom was feeling bc my brain was like “other creators have failed us before so let’s not give ‘em undue credit until we see the finished product?” but that’s just me, i suppose. i’m glad i waited until i watched the series to form an opinion, bc i didn’t expect anything since i knew the creators weren’t that good, but also bc even if they were that good, even if they did make the couple fandom wanted them to make, it would feel as shoehorned in there as ever and i’d honestly feel more annoyed that they’re like “here’s character a’s partner who loves him to the moon and back but who we felt no need to mention until now because it really wasn’t that important?” so for me, what they did with that relationship? was fine. and as for the other couple ppl are upset about? i’m just like--is it a wonder they didn’t make a mention of it before the series aired? lol the creators knew what info to drop and what not to drop now, didn’t they? 

altho, again, i felt that was all just par for the course w/this creative team. they have a lot of plot holes they brush over, how would this be any different? i suppose i’m as disappointed as fandom, but i’m also at the point where i’ve seen creators do this too many times to try to buy into it anymore, so i’m just [insert shrug emoji] about the whole thing.)

but, all that aside, i absolutely loved this season

i especially loved what they did with hunk and shiro!, veronica is my new fave character, and i enjoyed admiral sanda’s storyline (she frustrated me to no end, but i did love what they did with her character), altho i felt exhausted by the end of it bc i felt they kept upping the stakes beyond what was necessary--until they showed the very last plot point to set up s8 which made me go, oh! okay so that’s why they did that. good good.