#we let ruby make mistakes and we have characters who are actually gay and actually trans

[artificialkids-2k23-official]

liking rwby despite some... questionable writing decisions and despite roosterteeth is like still liking a disney movie despite disney does that make sense

Oh no anon you are mistaken. I do not like RWBY. I hate RWBY. I divorced RWBY three years ago when I realized that the entire premise of their plot is "Ruby is right and morality is determined by proximity to her" and that opened my eyes to the SCORES of other bad writing choices they've made prior. Just I got custody of the cast in the divorce so those are my characters now.

I also just have a lot of merch leftover from before the divorce that I hang onto because I do still love those characters so much.

[mandareeboo]

SU Music Rankings

Bc I can and I wanna start some Disk Horse rip. These are all in order of preference, with explanations, etc. It’s a long bitch. That said, I’m not counting little short jingles or small joke songs like Little Butler. This is the meat and potatoes of SU music- just under 30 songs. I might do the rest if people like my takes lol.

I scored it mostly on three bases- how dear it was to my heart, how much/often I relisten to it, and also what it means to the plot. That said, little fun songs don’t automatically go farther down than big, plot-heavy songs either! It’s a strange little balance.

Special Note: I don’t dislike any of this music! I love SU and that includes its bumps and glitches. I just pick favorite children lol.

1.) Change

Was there ever a more Steven moment than when he wiped the blood off his face and kissed it into sparkles? I think not. 

If “Be Wherever You Are” is an ode to young Steven, then this is teen Steven’s. Talking about change, and how much and how little it can do. How he holds his arms up for Spinel to hug him, so trusting. How he seems able to just. Break into soft tears at will, and not to be manipulative- it’s just his kind nature. The warmth in his voice. Fuck yesssss.

2.) Change Your Mind

This song is only fifty five seconds and it’s EVERYTHING to me. It really felt like someone was speaking the words I’d always held deep inside of me, unsure of how to say. It feels like a goodbye to someone who never really loved me. 

As much as I enjoyed Future, if this was the finale of SU, I would’ve been perfectly okay with that.

3.) Drift Away

This song gave me legitimate shivers the first time I heard it, and it still haunts me to this day. Spinel stayed, and waited, and all she got was a transmission thousands of years later. Fuck.

4.) Here We Are In The Future

THE MOVIE IS SU AS ITS BEST AND I WON’T BE SWAYED ON IT. Steven being a teen who loves his weird family but is growing just a bit sarcastic to their drama. The adorable love he and Connie share. His slow realization that he will always be working, always have things to do, is both somber and real. The Crystal Gems won’t be safe with one epic battle. They’ll be safe with years of hard work and love. HIS LITTLE HANDSHAKE WITH AMETHYST.

This is a helluva bop and a great way to summarize the main character’s backstories.

5.) Let’s Only Think About Love

Did ya’ll know that Zach Callison killed his throat with that last note? He gave his all for this performance in a vocal range he no longer comfortably do and by god did it SHINE. The FLAIR. The FORESHADOWING. All of the Gems all being awkward about Rose and Steven trying to bring them to the present. Peridot having a mini-existential crisis in a cute yellow dress. I love Zach Callison’s normal singing voice but man is that a fucking bop. Nothing will ever beat it.

6.) Here Comes A Thought

This bad boy helped me out a LOT with some mental issues I was dealing with in high school. I was unmedicated, unsupervised, and full of anxiety. I’d have break downs when I tried to speak about certain things. I couldn’t function. This song inspired me. It helped me feel okay with my intrusive thoughts.

And the episode! -chef’s kiss-. Once again bringing up the morally gray area of training child soldiers. Connie expanding her social group. Steven’s trauma hauling ass in that second half. The ANIMATION. Stevonnie’s gorgeous singing voice. GOD yes.

7.) It’s Over Isn’t It?

Just barely squeaking above Stronger Than You, this ballad is everything gorgeous. The whole episode is. I think Mr. Greg stands in the top five of my episodes for the entire show. It even got nominated!

There’s just so much about this song that I love. The gentle melancholy of Pearl’s voice. How the crew had to redo the shots for this bit bc Deedee went so fucking hard. The hard cuts between Pearl, remembering the love of her life, and Steven, who has begun to feel like he took her away. I’d recommend this song to anyone, regardless of what they do or don’t know about SU, simply bc it tugs so many heartstrings of love, loss, and responsibility.

8.) Stronger Than You

Did you realize this episode aired SEVEN years ago? This bitch was what got me into SU! Hearing about Ruby and Sapphire made my little gay heart so happy inside, and then getting a whole song confirming that they were a couple, that their love powered the strongest Gem on the team? Aaaaaaaaa

To this DAY I get excited when I hear Estelle start singing. This song is timeless. This song will live in media history. God I fucking love this song.

9.) Other Friends

I’m not the biggest musical person, so I hadn’t heard of Sarah Stiles before her casting as Spinel, but JESUS CHRIST the lady went hard. She went SO fucking hard. Sarah Stiles started on 100 and somehow just kept CLIMBING. You can just hear the sheer manic energy building in her voice, the anger and resentment. 10/10 Sarah Stiles is a queen.

10.) Independent Together

This made the list entirely bc the crew was like “you’re gonna get a himbo ass Steven-Greg fusion singing with Opal while Garnet flies across the moon on Lion while floating” and I am forever thankful to them for it

11.) Who We Are

Bismuth deserved more songs. ‘Nuff said.

12.) Peace and Love (On the Planet Earth)

It Could’ve been Great is EASILY one of my favorite s2 episodes. I love the entire concept of this song. Of Steven making music to reflect how much Earth means to him and his family. Of him teaching Peridot some self-care. Also Peridot’s singing voice is really cute and squeaky. 

I know it’s silly, but I would’ve really enjoyed a flip around of this in Future! Like Peridot reminding Steven how much he loves music, that he needs to take time to relax for himself, maybe with a new verse or just a remix of the original song!

13.) Something Entirely New

I watched this episode as it aired, and I legitimately almost cried. I love Charlyne Yi’s voice so much ya’ll- her raspy, not perfect singing voice against Sapphire’s deep soothing lull is great.

And to have Ruby and Sapphire’s meeting be the way it was- for Ruby to bemoan Sapphire losing Homeworld, to being stuck with a single Ruby, while Sapphire is a noble who has always been taught everyone in her “caste” is vitally important (and has, in her own mind, taken that to mean every Gem, as she should) and how they come together and make each other happy. Good shit good shit.

14.) I’m Just a Comet

The fact that Greg’s music career never really blasted off pisses me off to this day bc Tom Scharpling’s voice is fucking BUTTER. Also the song really feels like a jab at his parents now that we know the kind of dynamic he had growing up. “This life in the stars if all I’ve ever known” is definitely him wiping away their existence after reminding them (and himself) the things they used to say about him.

15.) Do It For Her

This episode. This fucking episode. This episode got me permanently hooked on SU. I’d just binged season 1 and was kinda meh about it overall after the bop of Stronger Than You. “Oh,” I thought to myself, foolishly, “I’ll probably just casually watch this from time to time.”

Like three days later Sworn to the Sword aired and that was it. I was hooked! Pearl’s gentle training song turning darker and darker, Connie’s accompaniment from nervous to determined to fully into such a toxic mindset. The fact that SU had the BALLS to discuss the repercussions of training child soldiers, now and later. This episode was everything to me, STILL is everything to me.

Six years and well over 100 fanfics written later, I think it’s safe to say this show swallowed me whole and never let go.

16.) System/Boot.pearl_final(3)

I debated putting this on the list because it’s not anything crazy important, just a way to show things are Wrong, but I had to do it entirely bc Pearl is so damn SALTY.

Like telling us about the Gems makes sense, she felt like she was given a duty, but she went so damn petty. WHY is that Ruby alone. Gross. This Amethyst is a trash dump. Wtf are you people.

17.) Full Disclosure

This episode really feels like a turning point for SU. Before, the show had its dark moments- but now we’re in the thick of it, and it’s not going away. Full Disclosure felt like an rebuff to the idea of returning to any normal we’d established in season 1. Gems are actually a giant species now. Gems tried to kill us now. There’s this Yellow Diamond bitch who got namedropped. Something about a Cluster. 

The song itself is BALLER, with its ingenious use of Steven’s ringtone and photos as he tries to decide whether to clue in Connie on all this nonsense. Meanwhile we, the audience, already know damn well Connie about to yeet some common sense into him.

18.) What’s the Use of Feeling Blue?

I’mma admit it- I’m a Yellow Diamond stan. I’ve always loved her- her anger, her poise, her hardworking nature. I actively argued against the “Yellow Shattered Pink” theories back in the day. But, man, when this arc leaked? I got so overexcited I was too jittery to watch it for like two days. It’s easily my favorite arc of the series. The sheer alien nature of the zoo, the Famethyst, and absolutely Patti Lupone’s beautiful ballad. Goddamn. Yellow singing to Blue to try and help her regain her old status, the warble in her voice as she reminds Blue she misses Pink too, the movement of the bubbles as she talks about attack. It gives me shivers to this day. FUCK.

19.) Tower of Mistakes

This is, fun fact, that only SU song I have completely memorized. The story itself is kinda funny! See, we lost internet at my house for a solid 5 to 6 months when these episodes aired, so I only got a very brief window to view them all. But this was the first Amethyst song in a long while, and I didn’t want to forget it! So I keep replaying it in my head for ages. And that’s still definitely a thing.

Anyway will never not be sad that this entire song was about making it up to Garnet for Amethyst’s perceived slights with Sugilite (which was a two-way road), only for Garnet to pressure her into fusion later when pissed and never discuss it again bc Garnet probably never thought twice about it and Amethyst has the emotional openness of a clam that’s just been told its ugly. Helluva way to make someone feel like shit, G. Helluva way to bottle that shit, Ames.

20.) On the Run

I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a million times: Amethyst! Needed! More! Songs! 

The dichotomy between Steven’s play and Amethyst’s honest desire to run away from home is so well-done, especially when you consider a lot of Steven and Amethyst’s actions are playing together. The song is also near and dear to me simply bc it’s my favorite Amethyst episode to exist (well, maybe second to What’s Your Problem, but not by much). Moments like these are all the proof I need that they were right to fuse first.

21.) Be Wherever You Are

This tune really just feels like an ode to who Steven was as a kid. Trapped on an island with no way home, and he’s just happy to be with his friends. The stars are beautiful and not oppressive. Also that one animatic with Lars and the Off Colors playing in the Homeworld Kindergarten to this music was iconic and made this song get stuck in my head for a solid month.

22.) Familiar

I ADORE how the crew use bright neon colors to show how alien Homeworld can be. And Steven recognizing that the Diamonds treat him how the CGs used to, and how prepared he is to “fix” a broken family. It’s a soft, gentle tune about melancholy. Also the Pebbles are beautiful.

23.) Let Me Drive My Van Into Your Heart

Such a cute little love ballad, but every time I listen to it now I just imagine the heart attack Rose must’ve had at the line “And if we look out of place/Well, baby, that's okay/I'll drive us into outer space.” like there’s a Vietnam war flashback if I ever heard one

24.) What Can I Do?

I’m kind of neutral on this one? Rose and Greg both have great voices, but the song itself lacks many lyrics. I think it was definitely a good way to show Rose’s flaws in thinking.

Also, I’m shocked they managed cram that much vaguely sexual innuendo into two minutes, followed by how Not Hetereo that dance between Rose and Pearl was, and not get their asses chewed by it. You go guys.

25.) Cookie Cat

I love a lot of the vibes this song has. The lyrics are so damn prophetic, but they also sound like the kind of weird 90s commercials I grew up on. It’s been like two decades since I saw the Shirley Temple commercial but I’ll be damned if I don’t remember “Animals crackers in my soup! Monkey and rabbits loop-de-loop.”

26.) Giant Woman

I am. NOT the biggest fan of Steven’s original singing voice. I feel bad saying that, since it was just Zach Callison as a kid, but he never jived well with me for some reason. So I wouldn’t listen to this on the fly. 

The song itself is still really good though, with all sorts of fun animation of Amethyst and Pearl being bitchy to each other. It’s a bit sad in hindsight to see tiny Steven trying to get his moms to get along. Ahh, season 1.

27.) Strong in the Real Way

This song has SUCH a strong start. Pearl reflecting on Sugilite’s problems, but the show making sure to show us that Pearl’s lack of enthusiasm towards her also lends itself to jealousy as well as just general malaise. How much she cares about Steven, and wants him to grow up strong. 

And then Steven just kinda. Ruins it? I appreciate his enthusiasm for tryna bulk up but to take what was starting as such a rich, personal song and broadcasting it to random strangers just makes me a bit sad. Almost a bit angry on her behalf?

28.) That Distant Shore

I KNOW this is gonna create some discourse, but I’m just not the biggest Lapis stan. I love her voice. I love the visuals of the song. And I get why she felt afraid and needed to flee.

But Lapis never got to take responsibility for her own actions. And, in the end, the song feels hollow to me- because we all know she’ll never talk to anyone about it, know she’ll burst back in and destroy the barn, and no one will ever question it. I like Lapis a lot, but I feel like her arc never was fully finished. She never got help. She never learned to feel safe.

29.) Dear Old Dad

I’ve yet to meet a single human being who likes this episode tbh. There’s some great discussion about what kind of parent Greg is from it, and what kind of dynamic he has with the Gems that he felt he had to fake an injury to hang out with his son. Honestly the first half was fine and dandy. It’s just that then they Greg just went out of his way to drag Steven away from missions and such. It never jived well with his character before or after.

Also, is it just me, or does Zach himself sound like he hates the song as he sings it? There’s no passion or heart in his voice. It sounds like they told him to read off cue cards and he did. Tom Scharpling’s best attempts didn’t save this one for being a skipper. But the episode, unfortunately, isn’t, so it gets a spot on here.

[cas-apologist]

i guess i’m really in my feelings today because here’s more long-winded nonsense....

i haven’t been in a tv show/movie ship fandom in a long time. not since sterek and with that i ended up quitting teen wolf in annoyance during the break between seasons 3b and 4. since then i’ve been bouncing around a few fandoms before being dragged into the pits of a bts obsession (it’s so nice down here!). so for years now i’ve been happily following a group of seven amazing artists who are genuinely thoughtful, kind, and caring men. if they make a mistake, if they end up hurting fans’ feelings by doing something disrespectful or insensitive, they apologize and learn from it. so going back into a tv show fandom where the TPTB are needlessly cruel to fans was a bit of a...cultural shock?

i had forgotten just how hurtful and insensitive the people behind a piece of media i enjoy can be. i followed teen wolf and saw the issues with queerbaiting re: sterek and bi!stiles. i saw the impact of words like bizzare, weird, and twisted had on fans. this was a show run by an openly gay man and it still treated fans of a m/m ship like shit. and then i fall back into watching supernatural and it’s all that toxicity i saw in this other fandom towards fans (who are the ones essentially keeping the show going!) x1000000. the fact that these writers, showrunners, and on many occasions actors in the show, can get away with manipulation and gaslighting fans is just....so depressing.

the main reason i’m rambling about this is because as i’ve been going through various spn blogs since i stumbled back into this fandom i saw a mention about how there’s that wide-spread notion of how asking about destiel is “disrespectful” to the actors (i believe someone said jensen said that type of statement before at a con or something, but i have no source for that). there was that same mind-set back in the TW fandom as well and it just reminds me of how carelessly cruel people are about LGBT+ people. why, exactly, are questions about a relationship between two people of the same sex disrespectful? do people not understand the implications of that mind-set? we know damn well that if people were asking jared questions about eileen or amelia or jess or freaking ruby or even rowena and sam’s relationship with them and their dynamic as characters together no one would be rushing to shut them up or trying to shield jared from those types of questions. no one would go around proclaiming that those types of questions are “disrespectful” to him. it’s only when it’s a non-het ship that people, even actors at times, start setting up ridiculous boundaries. i know sterek questions were often banned at TW cons, and i wouldn’t be surprised to hear that destiel ones were banned at SPN cons. i find it ironically sad that questions about non-het ships get banned at cons that, let’s be real, would not be going on if not for those fans of the queer ships. actors and these shows will make money off the fans of queer ships at these cons and then turn around and insult them by banning questions about the ship or worse, saying something rude or insensitive to a fan that manages to actually get up and ask a question about it. 

like guys....it is really NOT THAT HARD to give a generic answer about the topic of a non-canon queer ship that doesn’t belittle or antagonize fans of said ship. “i don’t personally see any romantic intent there and i don’t act those scenes with romantic interest nor do i play him/her as non-straight, but i love the XY dynamic and it’s always fun to shoot scenes with X! i may not see any romance undertones but if the fans like that, more power to them.” or “we writers aren’t writing XY scenes as romantic scenes but we love knowing that the fans are enjoying their dynamic! as of now we have no plans to make XY a canon relationship but never say never! it’s just not in the cards right now.” BOOM. you deny that it’s your intention to have it come off that way but you don’t insult the people who see it and enjoy it and you also give a glimmer of small hope that it could happen in the future. 

i know this is a long-ass post and probably all over the place but honestly it was just disheartening to be reminded of how easily shows will use fans of a queer ship to get ratings and attention and then turn around and tell them they’re being delusional for seeing it.

[lunavadash-creates]

Knifey’s curiosity mode: ON

Let’s begin with number 15 then 20, 21. 22, 23. And I would LOVE to know answers on numbers 24, 28, 29, 30, 50 and also 55, 56, 57, 58. If it’s not too much I also like questions number 62, 63, 66, 67, 71 (whatever it means), 81, 87, 88, 90, 93 and 98!

YES, I am really curious. I hope it’s still rather curiosity and not being nosey. I don’t want to push any boundaries. If you don’t want to or not have time for answering them please feel free to ignore them!

And yes, now you will spend years on answering to my asks. Mwahaha.

🔪

Ha! Thank you for those, lemme answer them! I'll hide them under this funny cut because I feel it's sooo long! 15. Favourite book you read as a school assignment Felix, Net and Nika and a gang of invisible people and Anne of Green Gables

20. prefered place to write My laptop or phone. I hate writing in notebooks!

21. obsession from childhood I still love animals and plush toys! Also Pokemons!

22. Role model To be honest I have never looked at people in that way. So I guess I don't really have a role model.

23. Strange habit I chew on my hair of play with it when I'm nervous or lost in thought :c it's also a bad habit!

24. Favourite crystal Does it include stones in general? Because my favourite one is Night of Cairo. If not then I love amethysts, sapphires and rubies. My grandpa gave me a box with 9 different crystals years ago, and amethyst is beautiful.

28. 5 songs to describe you Oh lord that one is difficult. Seasons by Dragonforce, The Game by Dragonforce, Castle of Glass by Linkin Park, We Don't Have To Dance by Andy Black and Demons by Imagine Dragons

29. Best way to bond with me Just talk. I'm always happy to talk with people. I like people who are not afraid to talk about their passions but also know how to listen. Like I'd prefer to talk about idk your favourite aliens than some weather small talk. I love sharing passions!

30.Places that you find sacred Forests. I go to the forests a few times a year and it's always a magical experience. I always go there very early (like 4am) and it's at the same so loud and so quiet. I love them.

50. What made you laugh the hardest you ever have. Honestly, it's not hard to make me laugh. There were many occasions when I was laughing so hard I thought I would pass out!

55. Favourite fairy-tale About how Mr. Twardowski made a deal with the Devil! In exchange for his soul, he forced the Devil to make the craziest stuff like building a perfect castle out of sand and such. And in the end, he decided that the Devil can take his soul but only in Rome! He thought that since he never planned to go to Italy he was safe but Devil then killed him in the inn called Rome.

56. Favourite tradition Huh... I don't know? I think I don't really have a favourite tradition

57. 3 biggest struggles you overcome I had 5 surgeries so let's count them all in

58. 4 talents you're proud of having Honesty I don't think I have that many? I like my writing and that's all.

62. 7 characters you relate to Gods so many?! I never actually related to any character (same with role models) because when I see a character I mostly think about how to change the story or what kind of s/o give them in my head. So honestly I don't think I can actually think of any character I can relate to.

63. 5 songs you would play in your club I'm blue by Eiffel 65, Dragostea din tei by O-Zone, We will rock you by Queen, Bohemian Rapsody by Freddie Mercury, Don't stop the music by Rihanna

66. Fawouire Flowers Lily of the valley! Honestly, I love all the flowers (purple the most and yellow the least) but generally, I love them all.

67. Good Luck Charms I have my necklace with 4 leaf clover i got from my parents for my 18 birthday. It's my biggest treasure, good luck charm and most important and valuable thing i own

71. Last favourite pattern I don't know? I don't really like Ogee pattern

81. Fireflies or lightning bugs I THOUGHT IT'S THE SAME THING WITH DIFFERENT NAME????? *break for googling stuff* THEY ARE THE SAME THING

87. Greatest fear Loneliness

88. Greatest wish For my parents and friends to be happy (yes Knfey, that includes you, I want you to be happy)

90. Luckiest Mistake Hmmm.... Honestly I don't know??? I don't remember having any?

93. NIcknames Oh well... Bordelmama or Fairy Gay Mother (esp by people I write rp with lol)

98.Favourite historical Era Muromachi!

Thank you Knifey1 I had fun answering them! And you know I'm like an open book. I don't really hide much except from some of my ideas or such. But now I'm curious to ask you some! Would you let me? 👀 If yes then: 1,2,315,18,21,24,29,36,38,48,55,56,61,66,6786,88 :D Feel free to answer them dearest! Now I'll go to sleep so hopefully I can answer rest of your ask tomorrow. I have the last one request of yours to finish!

[soysaucecas]

oooh for the ask game 24, 30, and 44!

MAGPIE MY BELOVED HELLO

24. What are your favorite episodes?

The only episodes I've really watched are TMWWBK (which is my favorite episode and I'm certain would still be my favorite if I watched every single one because it has the only SPN character and the only SPN line), The French Mistake (which was funny enough but honestly in the Just Okay category for me, which makes me pretty sure I wouldn't enjoy actually watching SPN if this is one of the funniest/highest-rated eps), and Reading Is Fundamental (my best friend was watching it and asked me if I wanted to hop on Discord, I thought it might be fun to see Kevin's first introduction but instead this ep found the two of us taking like 90 minutes to get through it bc we kept pausing and screaming (derogatory) as the model minority stereotype jokes piled up and up and up... Unfortunately not a favorite even if we got Meg AND the "pull my finger" joke AND the "Sorry" shot). Other than TMWWBK, from clipping and transcript-reading, I like Wayward Sisters (who doesn't?), The Things We Left Behind (Claire!!!! Cas trying to be a dad! The diner scene aka my favorite destiel scene of all time bc being in love just looks so good on Cas! Also the parallels between Claire and Randy and teen Dean and the adults at that club in his story... woof.), Golden Time (Eileen gets to be HERE and be sad and loved and fight people with ghost powers and Cas gets to do a cool speech and a stabbing and do the Asian community a favor), and Lucifer Rising (just immensely sexy on all counts for Ruby, Sam, Cas, and myself). Also I am SO fond of Steve!Cas so I'll add Heaven Can't Wait even if I barely know anything about it.

30. What is an unpopular opinion or headcanon you have about the show?

Ooh okay hm I think. So I adore confession scene, but I don't think the "I cared about the whole world because of you" is like. The Objective Truth the way that most bloggers seem to take it. Cas was lobotomized tons of times before he met Dean, he was described as coming off the line with a crack in his chassis, he's always been the weird little angel who likes humanity too much! I don't think Dean came first, and although gay love was part of what helped Cas invent free will, he *Ruby voice* didn't need the feather to fly, Dumbo! I do think Cas believes what he says in the moment, but I also think he sorta... made himself believe it? This is probably just me deciding that cas-coding should go both ways, but like. I very much crush as a coping mechanism and I very much overascribe my actions to love because it simply seems more noble/poetic to do so. Being miserable because school is hard is cringefail but being miserable because of unrequited love is Good Shit. And I have been in unrequited love with my best friend for at least 7 years (probably 9 but I didn't realize it earlier) and if you asked I would 100% say that she taught me love and defined love for me and that she will be my first and last, but I also know that that is not entirely true; it's just the narrative that I like for myself. And I think that being in an Empty deal contingent on whether or not he LETS himself feel happy would lead Cas to do plenty of mental maneuvering, which I think involved intentional self-poor-little-meow-meow-ification via overascribing his choices and happiness to Dean (and I also think he'd already been doing that for a while just because of personal self-worth issues and because it's a nice narrative). I know as Cas's last Moment on the show it was probably written to be The Objective Truth, but I am perceiving him and I say no.

44. If you could write an episode of Supernatural, what would happen?

Oh scream okay! This is a fun one! I am going to start out with two ideas from other people:

1. Months ago Nate from the pocnatural discord had the idea of an episode from the "monster"'s perspective where the Winchesters are just clearly the antagonists while not doing anything different than they usually do. I think the idea was that all these supernatural beings live in a self-regulating community together and we have one Very Likable pov character who's a member of this community, but one of the newer members messes up one day and kills someone and the Winchesters come on a case and wreak havoc on this Very Much Functioning (there was going to be a whole rehab and reparations thing for the new member who messed up!) system and kill pov character and in the end you just HATE Sam and Dean for it.

2. It's hard to adapt anything from bad moon rising (aka my favorite spn fic) very well because the point of an Arab Winchesters season 1 rewrite is that it doesn't really work with the white characters we have now, but I think I could see a version of chapter 2 adapted as long as Haley (an Ojibwe hunter who lives in the area affected by what Sam and Dean are hunting) takes the lead. I'd especially like to see this section:

Dean laughs, a little disbelievingly. The question has never crossed his mind. “Do you like it?”

This gives Haley no pause at all. “Yeah,” she says. “I mean, it’s not really about killing monsters, though, for me. Or, it’s not always about killing monsters. It’s about community. Not violence. It’s a spiritual thing to build a home, you know?”

“Oh,” Dean says. He can’t think of anything else to say. It has never crossed his mind before that hunting could be compatible with a community.

I don't have any original episode ideas to add to the hunting discourse, so we're on to my ideas about character-driven eps. I think I would like to see a version of my sastiel possession fic (ty again for beta-ing that! you're a real one) as an ep around the time of 9.11 because Sam deserves to work through their trauma, but idk what the Dean plot should be for that. Another thing I would like very much is TFW drunk history storytime (so like. Tall Tales bass boosted), where for some reason they all need to go over what they were doing during Stanford era but each of them is telling someone else's story. It's gonna be either Sam->Dean->Cas->Sam or Dean->Sam->Cas->Dean. It starts out very funny (they all have terrible wigs and makeup in the flashbacks. Cas is Jimmy wearing a giant mask with googly eyes on it.) but as it goes on it gets increasingly sad how much these three don't really know each other.

In the Sam->Dean->Cas->Sam episode, Sam's telling of Dean's past veers wildly between "crushing pussy and killing things" and "feels like absolute shit all the time" and it's funny but Not Right and afterwards Dean goes "I didn't know you thought of me that way" and Sam says "... I am basically reading off the voicemails you left me back then" and Dean has to sit there and contend with the mythology he himself wrote for Sam to believe in. Dean->Cas provides the comedic beats for the episode as Dean awkwardly narrates Cas's Life As A Weird Little Guy who watches trees grow and heals babies and in the end Dean goes "so how did I do" and Cas is like "well actually I was either getting lobotomized or murdering people so like 3/10?" The moral of this plot line is that Dean is bi. Cas gives a fairly faithful retelling of Sam living her trans little life at Stanford and veering between trying to be Normal and being a total weirdgirl and feeling guilty and angry and happy and free. It becomes clear that Cas admires Sam a lot (but also feels like. guilt and some self-recrimination for not being that) for rebelling from their dad and exploring their queerness during a time Cas was still to his knowledge in total soldier mode, and Sam is having an a_good_soldier's Thesis 5 moment about how she failed the kid she used to be and how very sorry they are about all the things that happened to them, and Dean hates that this is the first he's hearing about so much of this but is also quite emo about the parts where Sam is struggling. The ep ends with them all in the same room not looking at each other and not knowing if they want to group hug or never talk again.

Dean->Sam->Cas episode is similar but the storytelling dissolves a lot faster as it becomes clearer way faster how much their own emotions are getting in the way. Dean is upset that Sam could leave their family so easily and probably swing a normal life, Sam keeps wondering what it would be like to live millennia just KNOWING that you were right and good and clean, and Cas is gay and veering between fitting Dean's life into a larger Righteous Man narrative and just being very tender (and sad and angry) about Dean's pain. Episode ends in a rather cathartic shouting match where they all end up apologizing to each other for many things.

Oh also I would like to see Cassie again but I don't have an episode in mind there. Also would love to see Kaia adjusting to life in Sioux Falls and befriending the others and dealing with Bad Place trauma.

tysm for the questions sorry for taking so long!

(ask game)

[multimetaverse]

Jamie Johnson 5x08 Review

Tonight was one of the best, if not the best, Jamie Johnson eps so far. Dillon faced some of his toughest obstacles yet in his coming out journey and we got some sweet Delliot moments. Let’s dig in!

This British kids soccer show continues to make history. We saw some very nuanced and mature discussions between Dillon and Elliot about being gay and coming out; how often on tv do two gay kids actually discuss their sexualities?  Elliot gave Dillon some great advice and perhaps more importantly told Dillon that he was in fact brave and a winner on and off the pitch

You’d have to be daft to deny that Dillon and Elliot have crushes on each other after this ep. Seeing both Dillon and Elliot trying their best to look nice before meeting up with each other was cute and their handhold at the pitch was very sweet. Lots of soft smiles and longing glances and we even got a hug before Elliot left

Laquarn has confirmed that he’s not in any more S5 eps and doesn’t know if he’s back for the yet to be filmed S6. I can only hope he’ll come back. It would be a waste of great chemistry and an engaging character if Elliot was just meant to help Dillon with his sexuality before passing the torch to Ruby. He clearly left the door open for a future reunion when he told Dillon to call him when he was ready. Patrick confirmed in an interview today that he’ll be back for S6 and presumably Dillon will be playing for Foxborough or some other pro team. Being in a relationship would certainly be a good spur for Dillon to come out more publicly. And Elliot’s love of astronomy is a perfect set up for a date under the staahs

It’s true that the show has not really focused on ships in a big way; the most we’ve gotten was Boggy and Nancy and the low key Jack, Jamie, and Michelle triangle. But at the same time if Dillon can take Indira out and kiss Sienna then he should be able to date a boy he likes. It would be tragic if the closest Dillon gets to having a boyfriend or kissing a boy is Liam outing Dillon and claiming that Elliot was Dillon’s boyfriend and that he thought they were gonna kiss

And it’s a bit shady that Eric of all people is suddenly getting a female love interest out of nowhere. I just hope when the show eventually ends that it doesn’t turn out to be another Andi Mack where Cyrus was able to kiss a girl twice and go on dates with a girl and use the word girlfriend when none of that happened with a boy

Jamie Johnson really covered a lot tonight with Dillon. We had a very helpful run down of Dillon’s past with girls and the show carefully explains that Dillon never liked Sienna like that, he never wanted to kiss her, he never had a crush on anyone else like she thought, and he never liked Ruby as more than a friend (at least Duby shippers still have Alba and Liam for an Osborne-Simmonds ship). It wasn’t subtle but I think it was necessary to really drive home that Dillon is really gay and there’s no going back. And we got confirmation that Elliot was Dillon’s first crush, he’s obviously never beaten anyone up on this show and the way he phrases it makes clear that he’s never really thought about liking boys that way until very recently

And boy did this ep ever tackle homophobia. Graham Simmonds was seriously out of order this ep. He clearly didn’t want to believe Liam but Dillon using his aftershave already primed him to believe he was trying to impress someone, he just assumed it had been a girl. He really ran through the homophobe’s greatest hits collection: blaming Ruby’s gay parents, saying being gay was a choice, saying that being gay would end Dillon’s career, and disowning and kicking Dillon out for being gay. I suspect that quite a few of the parents watching JJ with their kids hold some of the same views or act the same way and this ep really holds up a mirror and reflects how ugly that kind of behaviour is. We also see Graham praising Dillon’s accomplishments and character right before Liam outs him which just exposes his hypocrisy even more. I do give the show credit for not shying away from Graham’s awfulness, it’s not going to be a quick change for him to suddenly accept Dillon and I’m excited to see his journey to atoning for his mistakes

Thankfully Mrs. Simmonds returned from her banishment to the shadow realm to tell Dillon she loved him and to tell him to return home. Shaun Duggan said he hoped this ep would be a lifeline for kids watching who may be living in homophobic homes (he also mentioned that CBBC rules don’t allow eps to allow on cliffhangers so he has to end an ep showing that the characters are at least physically okay)

It also challenges the audience, most of whom are probably young boys and men, as to whether they will suddenly stop liking Dillon just because he’s gay. It was a real gamble on the show’s part to have their fan favourite character and the effective second lead of the show come out as gay but it has the tremendous pay off of really making the audience question their assumptions and hopefully for some of them it will change their world views

Dillon and Elliot also discussed homophobia in sports. Dillon correctly notes that there aren’t any out players in the top professional teams. Shaun Duggan mentioned in a BBC interview that they like to bring on professional soccer players when they’re having the kids going through things but this time he wasn’t able to have anyone come on to help Dillon because there are no out players. So it falls to Jamie Johnson to basically create that reality themselves by telling Dillon’s story

Patrick Ward did a phenomenal job tonight and he really is the best of the kid actors. He’s mentioned in interviews that he did a lot of research by watching shows and movies with similar gay story lines. In particular his breakdown set to Behind Blue Eyes by the Who was very well done (and once again the show has great taste in music). And of course, Shaun Duggan did an amazing job writing this ep. He’s openly gay himself and that makes all the difference in bringing an authenticity and depth to this story line. On Andi Mack of the 5 textual gay eps only one, 3x11, was written by a gay man and not surprisingly that was the best written by far of those eps

We were 19 minutes into the ep before Jamie himself briefly showed up. And he was 5th in the credits tonight with Dillon and Elliot taking the number 1 and 2 spots. Actually this whole ep had a very small cast and only a few locations, it really helped focus this ep on Dillon. Having Dillon seek out Jamie is interesting in that they’ve been foils for each from the start. But also because it sends a message to have Jamie Johnson himself praise Dillon, it’s a way for the writers to speak directly to the audience through the title character

We’ll doubtless get some more development on Dillon’s story line in the rest of the season but they’ve done historic work so far. A lot of what we’ve seen so far: the depiction of homophobia, coming out to parents, and two gay kids discussing their sexualities has yet to happen anywhere on Disney. Hell this ep alone had more uses of the word gay than Disney has yet to have

I loved how extra the black and white boxing match cold open was. Not surprising that Dillon sees Mike as the supportive (and non homophobic) father figure he wishes Graham was

This was a big step backwards for Liam’s redemption arc tonight but at least at the end he didn’t seem to buying into his dad’s bullshit about them being the only men left in the house. Liam is by no means blameless but he’s also a victim of his dad’s emotional abuse and his pitting his sons against each other. That little meet up with Eric was interesting because they’re foils for each other in some ways and I’m curious to see what lies ahead for Liam and the U13 crew and for how Liam makes this up to Dillon

Looking Ahead:

Finally we get back to the real meat and potatoes of this show; online gaming! Looks like Mike is bored of gardening at the allotment and wants Jamie to get back into real soccer. We’ll see if Jamie makes into the online tournament

Again, not really sure why Eric suddenly needs Ayesha but we’re getting some Freddie anger over Eric choosing lasses over lads

Until next week Jamie Johnsoners

[popculturebuffet]

Jake Reviews Stuff: Steven Universe: The Answer

Happy pride everyone and naturally, it just wouldn’t feel like a celebration of pride in animation without one of the frontrunners of LBGTQ represintation in Children’s television, as well as quality in storytelling in general: Steven Universe.  Since your seeing this you probably know the gist but as my idol peter parker would say let’s do this one last time:  The story of Steven, a 14 year old, though he dosen’t look it, boy with a boundless amount of love, compassion and empathy,  lives in beach city with his borderline homeless dad , surrogate moms and surrogate until we find out they actually are kinda related sister: Garnet, a fusion of two gems in love and thus the sum total of both them and their feelings, Peal, an emotional but loving gem who grew from a servant to Rose’s right hand, sometimes lover, and confidant, and Amythest, a gem born long after the war that brought everyone else here who acts like a 20 something or teenager half the time. Steven soon finds himself fighting alongside themt o protect earth both from the monsters caused by the final battle of the war his mother fought to save earth from distruction and let her army live life how they choose, and the gem homeworld as it starts to take an intrest in earth again. And as the fight goes on Steven also starts to see just how flawed his family is and how much they haven’t moved on from his moms death and finds himself forced to help them past it while grappling with his mom’s terrible and complicated legacy, everyone expecitng him to basically be her, and what it means to be a  being that’s truly one of a kind.  I absolutley love the show: it’s not without flaws; Characters tend to be ingnored for seasons or episodes at a time,some arcs are really weirdly paced and the slice of life episodes can be jammed in the weirdest places. But the show’s strength: a devotion to having emotional resolution be even more important, and sometimes just as powerful animated and framed, than fighting, though the show’s fight scene’s are incredible, incredibly deep characters with fully fleshed out arcs and growth, and a love for tackling deep, heavy subjects through metaphor or even directly, taking on things such as gender identity, societal conformity, ptsd, grief, gender identity and many many more with grace and weight and helping kids with them in the process.  The show is also the frontrunner for LBGTQ+ representation in cartoons in the 2010′s. While other shows had bits nad pieces, series creator Rebecca Sugar was the one responsible for making Marcline and Princess Bubblegum ex-lovers and making it obvious as possible without saying it because standards were bullshit, Steven Unvierse decided to say fuck subtley and thus had PLENTY OF gay content: Garnet is a fusion of two women and the embodiment of their love and relationship, and when the two show up their very affectionate with one another to the point of bullcrap censorship in less tolerant countries such as india and russia, while Pearl out and out had a CENTURIES LONG romantic relationship with Steven’s mother who was explictly pansexual, and that’s just the main cast!  But I genuinely believe that it’s thanks to Steven Universe that children’s animation is as LBGTQ+ positive as it is now. SU wasn’t the first to have gay leads but it was one of the few kids shows with the balls and, at least in the us, network support to explictily have gay characters as some of the main cast, and I feel the show’s success softend execs at CN and other companies to let more representation too. Since SU”s airing, most CN shows have had gay content great and small, Nick has had gay parents and a bisexual lead, not to mention the korra ending kicking it all off, and Netflix has said hold my beer, having not only multiple gay main characters, but having the finale of she ra be built on a decleration of love between two women saving the universe and being the climax of the entire series.  Not that those crews likely still didn’t have to FIGHT for most of that, i’m not bilind and NOelle Stevenson has outright admitted she had to be sneaky about catradora for season 1 as to not get it shut down, but I feel SU”s sucess and Rebecca and crew’s own likely fights put the various studio goon’s reflector shields down and got more representation into children’s media. And that’s a wonderful thing.  So naturally the show was a lock for this month and for coverage here.. i’ts just given the show’s heavily seralized nature and the fact it dosen’t really have any long romantic story arcs. Sure ther’es plenty of romance, but it’s mostly either in the past or between an already married couple that’s also a person. The show’s arcs were more focused on worldbuilding and character building, which I do prefer and will be doing one in July.  But it did make it tricky to find an episode to spotlight the character I wanted to spotlight: Garnet Garnet is easily my faviorite character, with pearl a very close second: she has a great dynamic, is a decent if flawed mother and leader, and is also damn funny with her deadpanned reactions to things being utterly divine. As well as whatever the hell this is. 

The problem is I also wanted to spotlight the parts making up her: Ruby and Sapphire, their relationship etc as they themselves are fantastic and i’m 100% convinced were the inspriation for one mr mc skat kat and one paula abdul’s magnum opus in steven’s unvierse

The problem is most rupphire episodes are tangled in bigger arcs. They debuted at the end of the invasion arc, they had the baseball episdoe together shortly after another arc, and their wedding is tied up in the reveal rose was pink diamond and the reception is crashed by the climactic battle with Yellow and Blue that sets up the final arc of the whole series. But thankfully season two gave us The Answer to my problem.. ironically named the Answer, basically Garnet Year One as Garnet tells steven how she came to be, a story so beauitful they made a storybook out of it.. and it’s my honor to present it here after the cut. 

We open at the Barn... as a refresher at this point the Gems and Steven have been staying at Greg’s old family farm in order to have the  space and suplies to build a drill to stop the cluster from hatching and destroying earth, with Peridot reluctantly working with them. So as such Steven’s sleeping there when Garnet wakes her.. and in a notable departure for her it’s san’s shade, which shows her adorable excitment as she wakes Steven. Turns out it’s his birthday! And.. I don’t really begrudge the show for takin ga break for two episodes to celebrate it: besides being the only time steven went up a year, on screen, it was a nice break from the peridot/cluster storyline for a second, and this and the following episode are pretty great and both add a lot to the world as a whole. It’s why i don’t MIND when SU takes a break from the plot, as long as they do it for good reason. 

IN a great callback steven asks if garent’s going to tell him she’s a fusion, as Jailbreak revealed the reason she hadn’t yet is she was saving it for his birthday, which is a good joke and a great callback. Garnet cheerfully tells him know but has clearly found a backup: While steven knows she’s a fusion now.. she never told him how she came to be and how ruby and sapphire met after all.  So we journey back about 5000 years to, as we’d learn much later with the pink diamond reveal, the start of the gem war. Earth was to be the next great colony, as we’d learn next season for pink diamond, but something was in the way: The rebel rose quartz and her brutal right hand pearl were causing tons of distruption, so the rest of the diamonds had come to snuff out the rebellion personally.  So that’s where Ruby and Sapphire came in. Sapphire is a higher class gem, and befiting her caste is a precog, with Sapphires brought in to tell the diamonds the future so they can either make sure it happens or change it’s course. Garnet neaturally has this ablility too but vastly improved to see multiple timelines. She’s proper and distant.  Ruby meanwhile is a shy, if more intellgent then her peers grunt soldier. Rubies as we learned here are basically made in groups to fuse. To homeworld, Fusion is simply a tactic to create a slightly stronger gem out of three other gems, and basically creates one giant person. In Contrast up to this point the series has shown fusion as something important to the crystal gems and requriing more work: It requires all parties to be in sync to even happen much less stay together, and requires an emotional connection; Freindship, romance, kinship... whatever it is it’s needed to hold the fusion together. It’s part of what MAKES garnet so impressive: Garnet is a permafusion, only unfusing either when her two halves are needed. or when thier personal conflict is so great they CAN’T stay fused. It also means due to said emotional resonance and combining the best traits of two gems rather than creating just one big gem, that the crystal fusions we’ve seen are vastly more powerful and versitale.. evne if they dont’ speak much because Rebecca made the mistake of getting big artist to do the role and apparently refused to just you know.. recast? It’s something that always baffled me. There’s no shortage of talented poc performers who can sing out there.  Anyways, that’s part of what makes this intresting: up till now, we’d only seen one form of fusion.. we hadn’t seen what homeworld thought of it and used it for, and to the show’s credit it was hinted back during the return arc when Jasper called fusion a “tactic for making weak gems stronger”, since as far as homeworld used it, that’s what it was and it’s a stark contrast to the crystal gems harder to maintain but much more intresting and unique fusions. 

We’ll get more into this later. The two front rubies argue about whose going to punch people whie our ruby just points out the obvious: Their just going to fuse into a really big ruby and punch together. This gets her shoved into sapphire, which despite not being her fault gets gasps and monocle pops from the gems around them. And it’s about time I dug into the episodes unique animation style: instead of the usual, only a handful of characters, the rubies, sapphire, and later rose and pearl, are animated normally and even then, at least for the first half, are brightly lit in their primary colors, while the rest of the gems present are just barely animated sytlistic shadows. It’s a really intresting choice and a clever way to save on budget, while still looking gorgeous. 

Sapphire, while refusing Ruby’s help getting up, is understanding if monotone, but as w’eve seen in the present, tha’ts mostly just a side effect from seeing where everything’s going, and likely the reason garnet’s own emotional process is much like that; Stoic but willing to emote when necessary. Sapphire however has a reason for brushing her ruby off: the reason she was called here.. Blue Diamond.  This is intresting as it’s not only the first time we HEARD of blue, as before this we only heard of Yellow, who’d make her proper debut at the end of this season, but the first time we saw a diamond in any way shape of form. Sure we had murals and such, but given the lack of info about the diamonds this early on it was impossible to tell whow as who and the only giveway there was more than was diamond was the symbols: the era 1 symbols in temples and at the arena showing all 4, hinting at pink, and the modern one shown in jailbreak that was a triforce. We do only see Blue in a hood, covered by her palquin and her voice done by Garnet, but it’s still the first tiem we’d see any of the diamonds in any onscreen form. The Garnet voice is also notcable as every other voice in the flashabck, including characters who aren’t either part of garnet or the same gem type as part of her, is normal.. it’s only blue Garnet does a voice for.. and a clever way of covering for the fact they likely hadn’t cast her voice actress yet. It’s also notable for the introduction of Blue Pearl, who silently stands by her Diamond teh whole time.. it’s weird thinking back to the fact that this was the first time we’d really SEEN other versions of our main cast: other rubies and another pearl. Sure we knew they were all part of one type or another with the obvious exception of garnet.. but this episode is notable, and weird to think about giiven how many variants we see as the series goes on, for being the FIRST time we see this on screen. 

Sapphire reveals that while she, and two of her rubies, will poof the rebllion will end here, and Blue is releaved to here this, thanks sapphire and dismisses her. As Garnet explains, Sapphire had no issue with this as she simply saw her life as one straight line: No choice no, option: Fate would just come as it may. Sapphire also muses to Our Ruby on the fact that she finds this planet a wonderful place for a colony.. and that she wishes she could’ve seen more of it. While Our Ruby says theirs more time, Sapphire, while appricating the sentiment gently shoots it down.  This little moment is interuptted however as Rose shouts out, signaling her and Pearl’s arrival. The battle has begun. And I do like the clever use of storytelling here.. not in presetnation but in what we’d learn muchhhh later with the big reveal: To a first time watcher, we just thought that it was only rose and pearl for story purposes or it was a small attack. After all the rest of the characters we’d seen were just shadows, so I, and I presume many others just assumed the rest were off screen or failing that this was just a small strike. As we’d learn once we got the full story of Pink Diamond becoming rose.. it was indeed JUST them, and only them at the time. it’s probably why in the future sapphire saw the rebellion ended her: Pink while powerful had to reign it in as not to be found out and pearl, while as we see her is already utterly badass and an ace with a sword as she mows down Quartz soldiers, is still one gem going up against a literal army.  Another noticable thing, that hints at when this takes place is the fact that when Rose takes down the fused rubies, poofing two of them and leaving ours to flump to the ground.. she uses her fists. At this point her iconic sword is well established and it’s assumed it was just left out for artistic purpose.. but since we meet who made it next season with Bismuth, it’s another clever hint this is before there was a proper army. Bismuth wasn’t a gem yet so Rose/Pink just had her natural strength and shield to protect her, which wasn’t nothing, but the sword probably made it far easier to hold back. 

And thus we come to the moment of truth: Pearl has come back and is about to mow down sapphire.. when Ruby realizes just waht Sapphire meant and waht she’s about to do and thus.. the future changed. Ruby tackles her out of the way. And Garnet is born. 

I absolutley love Garnet’s cotton candy design, both as a sensible evolution, as this is a garnet formed in a moment of passion and accidently versus the one we see in the present or even in flashbacks: a person formed by choice and love and thus having a more stable form. Naturally, Rose and Pearl are baffled by this.. and it’s even more understandable.. as the above mentioned pink diamond origin episode explained.. they had never SEEN this kind of fusion before. While i’m sure this isn’t the first time this happend in gem history, any others were likely killed as soon as it were over or went into hiding as we saw with the off colors. And Pink being sheltered and Pearl being created for her, probalby simply never thought of something like this existing. But they also realize this never before seen to them miracle is their cue to skidoo and book it out of there.  Naturally Blue is pissed and the court are disgusted as the two defuse and both have about the same reacation. 

Before Blue can murder Ruby for you know, doing her fucking job, Sapphire ttakes her by the hand and books it off the sky arena and the two plummet to earth  while ruby screams no a lot. The foundation of any good relationship. 

They float down to earth.. because she’s Mary Poppins Ya’ll. Ruby reveals why she’s upset: Because as she sees it, there’s dozens of her. She’s not WORTH this. Sapphire has no reaction because for the first time, she has no idea what the future brings, what it means and the future she saw was just shattered. She’s frozen. 

Jokes aside I really love that pun. Ruby worries and quickly scoops her up bridal carry style and quickly finds the two a cave. In the cave the two light that flame get that and Ruby continues to freak out over what happened,  upset with her self that she’s supposed to save sapphire.. with Sapphire gently reassuring her “you already did.”  It’s also intresting as it shows even garnet, or at least half of her, had to go through what peridot did.. it went down a bit easier since exile happened right away, but Ruby still had to shake off the homeworld conceived notion that she was WRONG for saving sapphire simply because it lost them the fight and got them fused and all that. It’s also a nice metaphor for someone whose been told, for a nightmarish rainbow assortment of bullshit resaons, that being gay is wrong only to discover they are and having to realize there’s nothing wrong with who they are. 

After a breif flash the two finally talk about their fusion, with Sapphire being suprised considering she figured fusion wasn’t anything like they experinced.. only for Ruby to chime in that sh’es RIGHT: Their fusion wasn’t anything like Ruby’s normal “me but bigger’ fusion.. they lost htemselves.. and both clearly enjoyed it, expressing it through having a third eye for ruby and more than one for sapphi 

We then get the utterly adorable musical number: “Something Entirely New”Which takes the so far mildly subtle “This is like two people who had sex with the oppsite gender for the first time “ metaphor.. and just makes it texual as the song basically screams of two people talking over an unfamiliar sexual experince, but in a cute, well done, and intentionally awkward way that’s still approraite for the kids. it’s a real beautiful song and also shows the burgoning couple bond on earth. This is important as a previous episode had garent and out and out say that love takes time and work, accurate and that love at first sight simply dosen’t exist.. and we also see she practices waht she preaches as the montage does show some time past and even before that the two genuiely bonded. Sure they FUSED on the spur of the moment.. but actually loving each other took time and bonding. 

As the song ends, the two dance romantically,deciding to be Garnet for good as we get some nice callbacks to jailbreak: the two hum the tune to stronger than you, now revealed to be their song and spin similarilty to the way they have when they’ve fused, a nice callback that also add’s weight to those previous moments.. and thus two become one and Garnet is reborn. 

Garnet narrates as her past self gets used to her strange new form.. and just as she does she falls down a ditch. Eh could’ve been worse. 

Garnet finds herself face to sword with Pearl. Pearl backs off a bit once she realizes who their dealing with, and Garnet panickedly offers to unfuse.. only for Rose to enter. Garnet narrates them as Rose Quartz and her terrifying renegade pearl. 

Truly a force to be reckoned with. Rose dosen’t care about her own feelings though “What you feel is bound to be more intresting” It’s a good moment both because Garnet , up to this point hasn’t had to think about what they are or how they feel.. but more notably... no one but the two gems makingthem up ever cared, not before they were garnet and after all the homeworld gems wanted was to kill her. We also get a great line from garnet: “Why am I sure that i’d rather be this than anything else and that i’d rather do this than anything else i’m supposed to do? “  Rose’s response.. to give a giant grin while saying welcome to earth. As Garnet continues to question things, Rose tells her to never question this, never question what you are... which is a damn good message for a kids show to give out. The metaphor is crystal clear: no matter where you are on that beautiful lbgtq+ rainbow: NEVER be ashamed of who you are, never question it.. just enjoy it. Be who your meant to be and love that person. It’s a damn good message and one badly needed in a medium that for way too fucking long was SCARED to tell messages like this: Of sponsors, of foreign markets, and of idiots like one million moms. it took people like rebecca and her crew to say “fuck that”, to say that queer kids NEED these kinds of stories to know they aren’t alone, they are beautiful how they are. They shoudln’t have to wait to find out what they are.. is okay. And that’s beautiful. 

As Rose Tells Garnet that she is the answer, and as we cut back to the present, Steven asks what the answer is. Garnet simply answers: Love. And we close on one great exchange Steven: I knew it Garnet; (wistfully) So did I. 

Final Thoughts: While I remembered the episode being good, hence part of the reason I choose it I forgot just HOW great this episode was, especially post reveal. The art direction is goregous, shot like a fairy tail and rightfully so since this episode is told as one, the story is heartwarming and erica and charlene really act their hearts out as ruby and sapphire while Estelle kills it as both present garnet narrating and past garnet, a garnet ENTIRELY diffrent from what we’ve seen but acted beautifully. It’s espcially noticable since unlike the other two lead gems, we obviously wouldn’t see more garnets like we would amythests and pearls, so unlike her contepraries estelle really didn’t get to flex her vocal range as much playing alternate versions as the seasons went on, with this being the closest she got.  The episode is beautiful, has a wonderful message, and is just utterly charming and is agian why I DON’T mind that every su episode dosen’t advance the plot: Sometimes it dosen’t need to. And even so this one ended up being WAY more important than I remembered, introducing blue diamond and turning out to be MASSIVELY important once the reveal kicked it: For it was Garnet, and the love dthat forged her that changed Pink’s direction. Before the rebellion was simply a way to stop the occupation of earth and would’ve been snuffed out if not for ruby’s actions.. but seeing garnet, seeing how earth and being free from homeworld’s restraints could positvely impact someone.. it changed rose. Besides bringing her and Pearl together, it also made her realize just what her rebellion could bring to people and what a gem could be and even more how precious her future home was. By forming in an act of Love, garnet changed the entire future of gemkind. By staying that way she did so once more. And that’s beautifully. overall an underated, even by me, little masterwork with once again a damn fine message.  We’ll get back to SU soon enough, as I plan to cover the series first full arc as we meet peridot, and see into the souls of our heroines. But first Pride isn’t over yet, and I have one last card on the table as we todd it up a bit with my first look at bojack horseman. Like this if you enjoyed it, comments subscirbe etc etc and don’t be afraid to comission a review for 3 bucks, and until we meet agian, later days. 

[psyga315]

Prelude

With Volume 7 just beyond the horizon, I figured to look back at my thoughts for Volume 5 and, through more cooled down eyes, boil down why I consider it to be the worst volume of RWBY. When I wrote my review of Volume 5, it was literally the night the episode premiered, so I was boiling. But now? I’m going to look through the review with fresher eyes and clarify what sort of problems I had with RWBY.

First, a bit of backstory. There was an interview made during the summer in between Volumes 4 & 5 that had the cast say what sort of themes one could expect for Volume 5. Among these were stuff like “building yourself back up again”, “shouting ‘we’re not done here!’”, “solving problems on your own”, and lastly, from Barbara herself, “Strength” and “Growth”. For someone who was just starting to realize why people were turned off by the darkness of Volume 3, this was uplifting to say the least…

Shorts

The Character Shorts kinda hyped the Volume, though they sunk in their own way. Weiss’s Character Short effectively foreshadowed her loss to Vernal. This tough and talented girl gets her ass stomped rather quickly and needed to be bailed out. Winter’s line about how she “won’t be around to save her” was foreshadowing to her not actually being in the season, but when I first heard it, I thought she meant “Hey, I’m going to die this volume, lol!” and that’s without bringing up how the trailer fails to hype Weiss up like the other trailers did.

Blake’s Trailer was alright, especially in taking steps to address a problem regarding Menagerie, but it felt more like Ilia given the backstory dump we got that feels all the more like mandatory reading. The problem is that, and it’s perhaps the very first problem I’ve heard about RWBY, is that the trailers (and by extension, anything that’s a spin off of RWBY like World of Remnant) feel more like you need to watch this rather than you can watch this. It’s confusing, but let’s use Blake’s Short as an example.

Ilia talks about her backstory as it is contrasted with a chase between Blake and a random dude we never see again. Assuming you’ve never watched the trailer, you’d just get the truncated version of “MUH PARENTS ARE DEEEAAAD!” and not the bits where she was forced to resent her own race because it was easier to blend in to her surroundings, like a chameleon. It’s ironic, since RWBY would do the reverse problem with Adam, where his trailer isn’t mandatory but we barely get a backstory for him beyond “I got branded, but everyone will speculate that it’s because I did something bad and not that it drove me to do bad things”.

Lastly, there’s Yang’s short, which had the minor hiccup of contrasting what an interview said about running out of Aura means you can’t use your Semblance. The Aura thing is something that can be discussed for another day, but the basics you should take away from this is that, for some time, people didn’t know how running out of Aura is symbolized. Most people take the flickering as the signal as the next hit on those guys are usually the one that does them in. As such, you had this huge debate on what kind of flickering means Aura broken and what just meant Aura is low, which, personally, could have been avoided if the writers and/or animators just utilized that Aura dust thing (seen prominently in the Bumblebee vs Adam fight) as their definitive “aura broken” animation instead of just using it some of the time.

First Episode

The first episode proper promised a lot. In fact, a good chunk of the first half promised a lot. However, it became much clear in a second viewing that a lot of it was just padding at worst and showing us where the characters are at best. But what I think was done dirty the most in this episode was introducing Mistral. We were hyped in Volume 4 (thanks to World of Remnant) that Mistral was this dichotomy of rich, cultural people and the seedy underbelly of criminals and that, at least one of the elements would be utilized in Volume 5. Unfortunately, all we got were a few mat paintings that contrast what Lionheart was saying in regards to Mistral being in chaos.

And so, the most we get out of Mistral are those mat paintings and a perpetually raining downtown that we don’t see much of, even when it gets briefly revisited in Volume 6. We’re supposed to be invested in the city and yet all we get are empty rooms and 2D art. They took great steps to improve this in Volume 6 with Argus, though, so if there’s any consolation, it’s that they learned from their mistakes here.

But we now get into the biggest problem of why Volume 5 is disliked. Because of the situation, the group are left to basically wait until Lionheart convinces the council to get them some Huntsmen. The heroes. Wait. In a volume where the writers were talking about the themes of improving yourself and pulling through with your own strength.

Do you guys see the problem here? I know people have bitched about Volume 5 to hell and back and you’ve probably heard the complaints to high noon, but this entire issue is what rots Volume 5 to the core the most. Not the piss poor fight scenes, not the inconsistent characterizations, it’s that the plotting decides to take a back seat when the volume was meant to be about taking action.

As the episode goes on, you see the problem unfold. Ruby and friends hit a dead end until Oscar appears and has Ozpin exposit things to them, Weiss is denied a chance to save people and fight the Grimm until the Grimm come to her, Blake is hit with the dead end of the Albains deflecting blame, and Yang had the chance encounter with Bakugou where he knows the hideout of her mom.

The closest person who is taking action here is Yang, who established that she is actively looking for Ruby (technically Raven, but as we see later on, moot point). Blake’s situation is being handled by her dad, Weiss is sitting in the plane until the Grimm come for her, and Ruby is sitting on the couch that I’m pretty sure has her grooves molded into the cushion with how many times she’s sat there.

Episode 2

A minor complaint before we go to Episode 2, we had the Stinger repeat itself because the crew thought that people wouldn’t see the stingers. This is the show, mind you, that makes a point to include scenes at the end of every volume, regardless of how long they are or what point they serve in hyping the next Volume. Hell, one of the major complaints about Volume 2 was about the stinger not mattering. So why did they suddenly decide that the viewers might not see the stinger in a culture where the MCU exists?

Alright, cooling things down, we have three major scenes in Episode 2. Salem’s chat with Lionheart was meh at best and wtf at worst. I get the idea of Salem using different approaches to get people to do what she wants, but the cool aspect of Salem was that her approach was not what a villain would normally be. Instead of berating or choking her minions should they fail or talk back, Salem instead talks people down like she’s a mother to them. Even when Tyrian fails, she doesn’t hurt him, but rather tell him that he disappointed her. So, having her choke Lionheart, even when in hindsight it made some sense, is kinda an odd thing to do.

But not as odd as Salem’s whole “Not you, Arthur” bit. A lot of people drew points to that and the best I can explain is that it’s either a typo (she’s meant to say not yet or not now) or Arthur and Watts are some sort of Jekyll & Hyde thing. Unfortunately, it seems Watts is more a parallel to Watson rather than Jekyll, so that brings me to believe that it’s a typo and so, rather than have an easy explanation for a problem, we just have a compounded problem. One of many.

And there’s something funny to be said about Salem warning Cinder about Silver Eyes when Ruby barely learns about it this Volume. And also that she wants to speak with Tyrian but we never see what comes of it. At all.

I only have one new thing about Weiss vs. the Bees. Originally, the pilot was supposed to be gay, but held off on it because they’d be killing off their first revealed gay character, something that wouldn’t look good to the fanbase. Now, while I understand the reason behind it, I have to question the logic behind why they think it isn’t okay for their first LGBT character to be offed, but instead be someone who seemed okay with murdering her crush’s parents while sending said crush to her abuser.

But more on that later, we have Sienna to discuss. Now, there’s a lot to dissect. For one, RT has obviously realized that they’ve messed up and brought Sienna back for a bit (while taking the heat for “if she’s so badass, why did she go out like a chump”). However, in hindsight, what purpose did she actually serve outside of some cute nod to Shere Khan?

All she did was tell Adam that he’s going too far and that’s it. And really, it just seems hypocritical for the leader of the White Fang to effectively restructure the organization into a terrorist group, murder tons of people, and then suddenly back away and say “woah, too much” when Adam proceeded to help torch Beacon. It’s to the point where one question most people want to ask at cons is “did Sienna order the hit out on the SDC”, since we don’t actually know and that it could be a radical leader of that quadrant like Adam.

It felt more like Sienna should have been just the leader of Mistral’s White Fang faction instead of ruling over all the White Fang, which would make more sense as Adam would need permission to attack a kingdom that isn’t his stomping ground. Then there’s the introduction of Hazel, who at first is presented to be a pretty decent character, not wanting to kill people if he had no choice, but as time goes on, is basically your stock “big soft guy with a secret hulk side” character.

Unfortunately, this episode didn’t help enforce the theme of taking action when it’s the villains who are doing it and seeming to be two if not twenty steps ahead of the heroes.

Episode 3

Episode 3 has that whole speech thing I overlooked. Barring Ghira’s speech that the crew said is based off Obama’s “we killed Osama” speech (which, if it is, paints the whole situation of Sienna’s death in a rather dark light) before Ilia interferes. Now, I actually liked that Menagerie is hesitant to stand up for Haven. After all, humans hated their guts so much that the island was originally planned to be a place where people could dump Faunus on. There were lynchings and enslavements that are still going on to this day, just in subtler forms, Of course the Faunus wouldn’t want to fight.

Then Ilia swoops in and robs Blake of any agency she has with the scene. If RT wanted to not let Blake convince the people until three quarters to the end, they should have cut the subtlety and have some annoying kid go “IT’S TOO EARLY IN THE PLOT TO DO YOUR SPEECH!”. Hell, let Blake tell her story about her team, but the audience balks at the fact that she’s not only friends with a Schnee, but also a human who crippled a guy on live television. Remember that plot point?

We then cut to Oscar and this is perhaps the reason I decided to do this revisit of Volume 5. The way Ozpin talks of action and resolve, it felt like we’re going to the root of the themes of taking action. No more being subject to the events of the plot like in previous Volumes. Now? Now is the time to fight back! And that built up to… what? One training scene and Ruby learning headbutt?

Granted, we see later on that there was a bit more to the plan, but for the most part, it seemed like an excuse for “character growth” as opposed to actual character growth. A training arc isn’t just some short scenes of a person lifting weights and jogging up stairs. Its meant to be a sort of means of growth for the character. There’s a reason most training montages have the character suck at first, but then get better by the time the montage ends. It’s because it’s the quickest way to show growth. But even without that, you could get some serious mileage for a pulled off training arc.

Rocky IV and Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back have some good examples of it. Rocky IV had the titular hero train and work out in the middle of a cold, mountainous range, while his opponent is simply given steroids. It shows the dichotomy between the two and how they view their eventual fight. Empire, on the other hand, had that masterful scene with Luke in the cave, where he has a huge moment of both foreshadowing and character growth.

Here? We just have Ruby learn headbutt like she’s nothing more than a Pokemon. There could have been a lot more done with it, like having Ruby put a lot more force in her punches, causing others to realize she’s extremely angry about what happened to Pyrrha and Penny, or, if the need to exposit about Semblances is needed, bring something new to the table that isn’t going to confuse the fuck out of people… Something like:

“Your Semblance might not reveal itself until you need it most” or something like that. Not “A semblance is someone’s personality, but not. Wow! Exposition!” or “Hey, remember how we said Aura was passive? Welp, not anymore!”

Not to mention that Jaune is seemingly cool with Ozpin suddenly coming back from the dead. Here’s the thing, last Volume had him upset with Ozpin about what happened to Pyrrha, something that didn’t seemed to resolve itself. Keep in mind that, for all rights and merits, Jaune believed Ozpin to have died. In fact, it was that confirmation that Ozpin had lost against Cinder that convinced Pyrrha to kill herself. Now here he is, seemingly stuck in the body of another kid and he just outright said this is a normal thing for him.

You’d expect him to have something more than “golly!”. The fact that he didn’t seem to have any aggression towards Ozpin until after he ran to his hidey hole in Volume 6 seems rather odd given that his entire character is that he’s angsting about Pyrrha and angry at Cinder for what she did. The group seem rather content to just sit back and let the plot happen, which is the opposite of what the crew was trying to convey with their themes.

Episode 4 and Episode 5

I still stand by what I said regarding how Episode 4 was a good episode, finally having a reunion between two members of Team RWBY, but it’s perhaps one of the last good things about RWBY we’ll ever see in Volume 5. Because Raven’s promise to tell Yang “the whole truth” turns out to just be regurgitated exposition at worst.

But first, we need to have Blake, the woman who doesn’t want her race to be labeled, turn out to have labels for her friends. Okay, granted, it’s not that dumb but it is kinda patronizing that we need to have a character tell us what another character is. While the rest of her speech is pretty effective in defining Blake’s character, making her perhaps the only character these themes of growth and strength actually apply to, it still is annoying that the most we take away out of this is her boiling down every character to a single word, then bringing up how Adam is going to ruin everything for the Faunus. You’ll see why this is a problem later. I liked the setting of Menagerie’s Shallow Sea marketplace thing and felt like Menagerie is wasted potential.

Ruby’s whole speech still feels like damage control, but with the added complaint of Ruby deciding to blame Salem for something Cinder did. Now, I heard the common excuse a lot: “Salem told Cinder to do it so it’s all her fault”, but that problem with that? Cinder told Emerald to kill Penny. So… Yeah. It is her fault. Hell, I wouldn’t have minded this if Ruby didn’t word it like Salem personally killed Penny and Pyrrha. Like as in, she just up and appeared out of nowhere and shot both Penny and Pyrrha in the head.

It still doesn’t fix the fact that Ruby is basically “hey, remember how I’m supposed to be upset?”

Lastly for Episode 5, we have the White Fang do the brilliant plant of murdering the chieftain who just spoke out against them. It’s dumb. Extremely dumb. What the hell do they think will happen after they murder the chieftain in cold blood? Menagerie is just gonna magically bend over and obey the White Fang? But perhaps the biggest waste is the White Fang in general.

You have these two sneaky fox brothers who seemingly oversee everything and even state that they’re only letting Adam do what he wants until he’s no longer of use to them, a buff bat dude, and a spider-lady… And they’re never seen again after this Volume. I get the idea, because RT is trying to wrap up the Faunus subplot as quickly as possible, but the problem that you can’t exactly introduce new characters or hidden depths if you’re just gonna throw them out with the bath water.

If they wanted to end the subplot, why did they put all the effort in some random characters that are just gonna be defeated off screen with a tea tray? Then again, this is a problem endemic to RWBY. Introduce this character, then quickly shoo them away before you’re committed to writing a plot for them. If you know you were going to half-ass the White Fang conclusion, why bother with stuff like more White Fang members or the SDC brand? In fact, why bother with the White Fang to begin with if you’re going to do so little with them?

Episode 6

Moving on before I lose my cool, we have Qrow aimlessly walking around downtown Mistral. Now, the crew said that Maria was supposed to be here… But… Why? What purpose would she serve? If she’s just gonna be a “hey, look, cameo to foreshadow Volume 6”, then that’s a horrible purpose. You know how most Cinematic Universes tanked because they spent more time hyping the next twenty movies when they should focus on their pilot? That’s what she would have been like.

Not to mention that she would have been caught in the crossfire of why Volume 5 was bad. “So here we have this random old lady who doesn’t matter at all to the plot so why is she even there” and then “Oh wow, she’s a SEW. They’re doing damage control to justify her unneeded presence in Volume 5”. And, don’t get me wrong, Maria is a fun lady and all that, but there needs to be a reason she was there beyond “hype for next Volume”.

What makes the problem worse was that they’re planning to include Maria so as to have a sort of Yoda to teach Ruby. This makes the complaint of “why didn’t Ruby ask about the Silver Eyes” even more of a complaint because now it seems like they decided “hey, we’re going to address it next volume, so let’s not bother bringing it up here”. Which is even worse than “hey, people noticed we didn’t address this so let’s completely invent this character for the sole purpose of addressing it!”

And then there’s Raven who is all “lol, I know more than you realize but I’m not actually gonna answer anything trolololololol” AARHG!

Okay. Okay. Before I completely lose my marbles, there’s one thing about the scene with Raven that’s stupid.

It’s the “there’s no such thing as magic” thing.

Okay. I get it. Turning into a bird is something that, in the world of RWBY, seems impossible. But there’s a ton of problems with this:

What makes summoning dead Grimm to fight for you so much more different than magic?

You’re willing to believe in magic rocks that augment your fighting style and are in fact part of a company that profits off magic rocks, yet turning into a bird is the messed up thing?

The guy who gave her this ability is currently inhabiting the body of a young boy and has said to basically devour his soul in due time, as well as create the magic that’s responsible for torching your school and your friend… And the BIRD is the most messed up thing!?

“But Raven made it sound like she was forced into it”. She didn’t seem to have any fucking problem with it though. Not only that, but it didn’t seem like a big dark secret that Ozpin wouldn’t want uncovered. In fact, he even said he gave Qrow and Raven the ability to turn into birds in an amused way.

Even more so when everyone but Yang seemed to respond to it with disbelief rather than outright anger. There’s a reason this whole bird issue was made fun of in Jello’s “So This is Basically RWBY” video.

Also, before we move onto Episode 7, I wanna bring up that the scene where Qrow visits the Shields is perhaps the reason why I hold Ozpin’s censorship of Lionheart’s role in the Battle of Haven to be one of the most scumbag moves he could have made. “Your mom’s dead, but don’t worry, the guy who sold her out is a hero!”

Episodes 7-10

Right, back to Episode 7. Okay, I’ll admit, it was a nice reunion scene all things considered, albeit with some rather unnerving things like Yang asking Weiss if she let the Boarbatusk skewer the trophy wife or even the dumb, patronizing “we haven’t made character arcs for us to go through so I’ll just say we had some”, since they had the great idea to use Ren, who is voiced by Monty’s brother, as the mouthpiece for that.

Unfortunately, this is the episode I always think back to when I think of Volume 5. The perfect epitome of a slow, monotonous Volume. The problem I have is that, yeah, it’s meant to be this breather episode, a calm before the storm, but this just feels like a long lull that’s made even more insulting with the cliffhanger. All it has is people dumping exposition that viewers have either figured out or weren’t even burning questions and I think the awkward silence that followed Ozpin saying how he was the wizard that gave the Maidens his power is the perfect epitome for just how boring the volume is. The dude just revealed a massive plot twist and it’s treated as nothing more than a “did you know” factoid.

While I liked how they addressed that Blake leaving Yang would have had some serious negative emotions in Yang, it felt rather half-assed that they basically resolved it with “hey, my mom’s drunk, so shut up and accept Blake the moment she comes back”, especially since it comes from Weiss, who told Blake at the end of Volume 1 that if she ever runs away again, she best let RWBY know. If they wanted to ship Bumblebee so badly, this would have been a great hurdle for them to come across instead of just “hey, let me resolve this plot for you”.

Now, the whole thing with Ilia… Let’s get the elephant out of the way. The way they revealed her sexuality, I feel, could have been done better. “You wanna know why I’m gonna kill your parents and bring you to your abuser? Because I wanted you to look at me like a lover!” There’s a reason why some fans label her as a “psycho lesbian”.

However, I want to bring up that Rooster Teeth did an excellent job at building tension during the climax of the Menagerie Arc. Sure, the cliffhangers were tiresome, but you couldn’t help but admit you were at the edge of your seat and it even did a good job at subversion. Even if they allegedly didn’t even intend for it to happen.

The constant dryness of exposition and dialogue exchanges is what made Episode 10 so much better than the other episodes. Not just because it’s action-orientated, but because it finally tries to get back to the themes that it was originally supposed to tell. Throughout the entirety of the middle portion of Volume 5, the group basically took a backseat and allowed characters and plots to happen to them rather than advocate for themselves. The closest thing we got to the theme of “building yourself back up” is Weiss talking to Yang about Blake.

In fact, the only actual characters taking action are the villains. Constantly roadblocking the cast, setting them in for a trap, and even aiming to screw each other over. These guys have more advocacy and agency than the main characters. The most any of them did was…

Burn down their own house and blamed everyone else for it, all while saying that the house is the message Adam wants to send.

Use a girl’s unrequited feelings towards them to their advantage, straddle them, and guilt tripped her enough for her to consider switching sides.

Cry about how things are not going their way until their hands start magically glowing.

Yelling at someone until they cry bitch tears and then have them run away without even bothering to close the door leading to the dangerous artifact everyone had been working so hard to keep out of enemy hands.

In the volume where the theme is “solving problems on our own”. Just because Yang drops the word strength a few times when bitching out at Raven doesn’t mean that the theme had been accomplished. In fact, they do nothing of their own accord and just follow a script. Even Ozpin, the supposed smartest guy in all of Remnant, doesn’t even bother to figure out a way to counter the trap. Just instead walk in. Hell, if Yang didn’t spot Raven, they’d be mulched.

But, back on track. Episode 9 was an entire waste that failed to pay off the expectations of what we had with the cliffhanger set up in Episode 7. “But it subverted your ex-” NO. There’s a good way to subvert expectations and being promised a fight after episodes of bland exposition only to have it be “lol, no, it’s just gonna be more talking” is not a good subversion.

No. Here’s a better way. Set up the cliffhanger like normal, but don’t show Cinder’s dragged out negotiation with Raven. Instead, have her “allying” with Cinder be a twist. That way, people’s expectations for what happened are actually, you know, subverted?

The Battle of Haven

But, you know where this is leading to… The Battle of Haven. Really, I don’t think I can say anything that hasn’t been covered by someone else. We all know it makes all the Vytal fights look like masterpieces by comparison, we all know the jokes about useless Weiss or Lionheart hogging the staircase, or even the plot holes of Raven knowing Cinder’s arm being Grimm but doing nothing about it or Blake, despite spending the past volume saying how Adam must be stopped, suddenly doesn’t care about him…

So let me cut it simply:

The reason this battle sucks might have to do with the crunch.

We don’t know how long this issue with Rooster Teeth had been going on for, but if it is indeed what people say it is and that animators don’t get paid for the last quarter or third of their work, then that might explain all the cut corners animators and writers made. Why the fights are broken up into one on ones or why fights are cut out entirely. Maybe they weren’t getting paid enough and thus, the quality of RWBY suffered as a result of it.

And that’s perhaps the shittiest thing about the Battle of Haven. It could have been this epic fight that would have made up for all the boring, drawn out scenes of exposition and chatting, but because Rooster Teeth got too greedy or even because of our own impatience (which, again, isn’t helped by the aforementioned long, drawn out scenes), we are treated to a final battle so broken and tiresome that the Battle of Winterfell manages to be a better final battle, with the only thing holding it back being that Haven had a better identity twist.

And if, for whatever reason, it isn’t due to crunch issues, then we have another problem. This was meant to be this hyped up rematch between the heroes and villains, who haven’t seen each other since the latter ruined the lives of the former. This would have been excellent to see how the killers of Jaune and Ruby’s friends would interact with them, how Yang would react to the person who framed her, even how the group had grown since their last battle…

But… if crunch wasn’t to blame for the quality dip and the writers intended for the fight to go the way it went… I have to say… What the fuck were they thinking!? So many moments could have been brought up here and yet they decided that they weren’t important enough to focus on! And now, with this battle over and done with, those moments lost their luster. If they decide to bring them up, it’d be too little, too late at best and “why the fuck are you bringing this up now” at worst.

I’ll deal with one commonly used example to get what I mean. Adam was established in Volume 3 to be a threat only made strong because he uses Blake’s emotions against her and has a Semblance that lets him dish out aura-breaking damage. Blake easily defeats Adam and has him on the ropes, only to let him run with a few excuses that some people have debated to death and back, when it would have been much easier for Blake to have to choose between apprehending Adam and helping Yang. Then, when he inevitably returns to haunt Blake next volume, suddenly he’s a threat that Blake is afraid of again despite Blake having “grown” to oppose him.

They wanted that “triumph” over him, but realize that by doing so, they’ve burned that opportunity to have the triumph be meaningful. Same goes with Emerald and Mercury. They had a good opportunity for Ruby to effectively call them out for their crimes like how Jaune did to Cinder, but instead she just headbutts Mercury. Yang had at least some closure on her arc with Mercury, but it was meh.

The Point in All of This

Hell, speaking of wasted opportunities, the reunion of Team RWBY, something that the opening had hyped and one that the fans had been waiting for since Volume 3 ended, is nothing more than an afterthought. They couldn’t even be assed to show Blake’s first fight back with Ruby and Weiss. That’s how little they cared. It’s like everyone was just wanting to get that paycheck but they needed to rush that final episode out the door and also need to make room for Gen:Lock and Nomad trailers. They didn’t even care about the stinger, as they basically ignored any sort of information relating to the stinger.

Perhaps the biggest reason why Volume 5 sucked so hard was that it was running off the heels of Volume 3. Everyone basically accepted that Volume 4 was meant to be a breather Volume, with lower stakes and lower drama (with the exception of possible death flags for Ren and Nora), but the moment they made Volume 5 the grudge match everyone wanted, then the stakes got raised back to the heights of the third Volume, only for it to fail to live up to the expectations. Sorry, I think I mean to say “subvert the expectations” in this day and age.

Though, I think the huge problem with all of this, and perhaps the biggest bottom line I can say, is that it might be due to Volume 3 going too over the edge. By killing important characters and even dividing the team, the villains had raised stakes up so high, that people began to take the show more seriously. When characters were vaguely hinted to die, be it through threats from the villains or even flashbacks, people fretted that they would die. When the villains go back to striking distance with the heroes, people desired a grand battle. When the show tried to deal with the ramifications that happened with RWBY separating, people wanted to know what was going through the characters’ heads.

And when Volume 5 failed to deliver/“subverted their expectations”, people considered it a bad volume.

But worst of all, it failed to live up to its own themes. Jaune was the only person to build himself back up again through deus ex hands, and we saw next Volume that it needed a statue for him to feel better. No one was in a position of giving up only to be defiant and shout “we’re not done here”, but instead cry “it wasn’t supposed to be like this!”. The big problem of Volume 5, make sure the relic is secure, is only solved because two characters had a catfight in the basement and the survivor didn’t bother to lock up because their daughter was too busy bitching at her. No one really grew or strengthened their resolve. The triumph… wasn’t theirs to have.

Although, it seems Rooster Teeth had learned from their mistakes, with Volume 6 being leaps and bounds better than Volume 5, regardless of what you thought of the latter half. Best of all, the themes promised in Volume 5 were shown prominently in Volume 6, albeit some of the scenes capitalizing on those themes feeling more like a child is having a tantrum because they couldn’t have the airplane.

To close out this rather long winded discussion, and to give people a tl;dr on the whole matter, Volume 5 failed to address the themes it had presented and instead just padded itself out, expecting people to accept it because it’s RWBY.

[nerdsideofthemedia]

Bumblebee was always the plan part 2

It’s time to continue with my controversial posts. When I began writing this, it was intended to be mostly a response to arguments I see around and EF’s. Then my pretty confrontational post that had led to say to a friend “Thankfully no one reads my blog” became much bigger than I ever expected. There’s a good chance I would have gone for a different tone had I known it would get 500x the usual view of… 1, which is usually mine. This been said, it would have been a mistake. Still, I feel like I have to address some points that seem to have confused a few people and this is definitely to do that.

But first, soothing music to prevent knee-jerk reactions.

Let’s start with a claim that was kind of controversial: the suggestion that Blake could still turn out to be a lesbian instead of bi or pan as some claimed this was in itself bi erasure. I understand where this complaint comes from as bisexuality was basically considered to not exist in media, for example, Sex and the City has an episode where all the main characters but Samantha treat it as something alienating and a way to still be in the closet. Yeah, some episodes have not aged well. And I’ve lost count of the number of people that still don’t consider it a thing, even among progressive fandom like Janelle Monae’s and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s (I just gave you 2 bi anthems1). Just so we’re clear, even though I do think Blake is bothsexual (let’s see if someone recognizes that reference), I have to put on table of her being a lesbian as some gay people have dated members of the opposite sex for a very long time, and there’s high probability some of them were abused in said relationships. I can’t ignore those experiences (I suppose I can, but I shouldn’t and hopefully never will).

Black Sun: the ship that didn’t sail

Again, there were a few that didn’t like that I compared BB and BS, which they interpreted as a dick contest. That really wasn’t my goal. I did that because those were the ships involving Blake that had a chance to happen (Catmeleon and Enabling-abuse2 were not on the table) and I was arguing for Bumblebee having been the plan all along (which, to me, implies that Black Sun was meant to be a red herring, though I didn’t flat out say it – sorry, I didn’t think I needed to). The point was to illustrate how there had been hints for Bumblebee.

I argued for that way before volume 6 by pointing out several clues like the dance arc, the songs and the injury. At the time, someone asked me how I could know BB wasn’t the red herring. There are 2 reasons why:

While it’s not lacking in hints and foreshadowing, they are (mostly3) on the subtle side when compared to the very obvious Sun’s crush on Blake;

They’re a LGBTQ+ pairing. There are huge double standards when it comes to LGBTQ+ in comparison to hetero ones – many people will deny the first one until it’s impossible to do so. The point of the bait and switch is to have a little twist and you can’t have that if a significant part of your audience notices the switch, but doesn’t see the bait.

And if you have doubts about the last point, remember: in 6x11, Adam attacked Yang out of jealousy, then Blake held her hand while making a speech that put them as equal in contrast to Blake-Adam, a relationship where one of them constantly tried to make the other feel small (the point of the infamous speech). There were many denying BB. Then, he tried to make Yang feel insecure about Blake by telling her she had made the same promise to him and asked the super platonic question: “What does she even see in you?” and people still tried to deny it. In the last episode, Blake and Yang spent the time holding each other’s hands and yet, there were still people denying it. Not that I’m complaining, since it only increased my celebration time. It was like: episode 6x11, “yeah! Bees” for 3 days, the internet crashed my party for one, then 6x12, “yeah! Bees! This time is for sure” for another 3 days, again I had my enthusiasm dashed and finally, “yeah! Bees”. That time it stuck. So thanks guys! It would have been bad if by 6x13 I had already used all my fireworks.

If you thought BS was going to happen – that’s normal, because it was the bait. If I am aware that people tend to think of others as straight until proven otherwise, why do you think the writers aren’t? I may not live in the same country as them, but I still consume a lot of USA’s media and I know that if guy stalks girl, he usually gets her. Not to mention, the number of times media announces a LGBTQ+ character as tactic to gain some support yet deliver nothing, like saying Dumbledore is gay even though there’s nothing in the films or books indicating it (let’s leave the conversation about the “word of God” for some other time). There were more than a few LGBTQ+ people who were afraid Bumblebee would turn out to be just that: queerbaiting.

Miles and Kerry knew all of that and, more importantly, they were aware that you knew it too, so they played on your assumptions to make their bait-and-switch. However, there were plenty of hints that Sun was just the red herring and that Bumblebee was going to happen. Last time, I focused on the latter, this time let’s concentrate on the first. Let’s take a look at Sun and Blake’s relationship, shall we?

Sun was introduced in the last episodes of V1 and Blake trusted him immediately, because… he’s a Faunus. Though she told him about herself and the White Fang, he showed immediately he’s not on the same page as her as Faunus rights mean a lot to her and little to nothing to him. In 2x01, Sun talks to Neptune about Blake and concluded “and the best part is she’s a Faunus”, which goes completely against Blake’s words in the next episode “I want people to see me for who I am, not what I am”. She began going on a downward spiral to which he reacts with “Is she being all Blake-y?”, while Yang’s the one who gets through to her by exposing her own vulnerability.

Sun not fully understanding Blake is something the show hammers in our heads quite a few times even in more recent volumes. Like when he assumed she’s on her way to fight the White Fang when she was actually going to Menagerie to rest. Or suggested destroying the WF while Blake wanted to take it back.

In volume 3, they had literally no interactions besides him winking at her in the Vytal Festival – yes, she blushed, which can be explained by the fact that he did it in front of an entire stadium or that she had a crush on him. Personally, I’m inclined to the latter, but it really doesn’t mean much: not all crushes lead to something. A lot of them are a result of idealization and I think that was the case for Blake. By the way, I have to speak of Blake’s crush as likely, not certain precisely because it was never actually confirmed.

When Yang asked Weiss where Blake and Ruby were, Sun was there, yet it was Yang alone who went after Blake. The next time we saw him, it’s after their injuries and he is noticing an injured Blake grabbing Yang’s hand.

No, this shot doesn’t exist to show Sun seeing Blake injured, because he already knew that. He had just told Ruby that Yang was going to be OK, and the one who brought her there was Blake. Not to mention that if the point was to make him notice Blake’s injuries, it makes no sense for their hands to appear. Yang would have been kept out of the frame, instead of taking up more space than Blake. To me, this is the moment where Sun realizes Blake’s feelings for Yang. If the intention was for him to notice Blake’s injured, it would have made much more sense to see his face, then cut to her. Yes, they could have done the same with their hands, but this way they left it more ambiguous which was probably the intention. It would have made no sense for them to choose that if it was meant for Black Sun, because the audience was more than aware he was interested in Blake. We had been since V1 as there was never anything subtle about their relationship.

In volume 4, he flirts, Blake is usually either apathetic or downright annoyed. The exception is after the injury, and like I said, he’s the one who brings up Yang, revealing he realizes the bond between them. He is also hurt by the chick whose feelings weren’t reciprocated (I talked about that at length in part 1). In volume 5, their relationship is platonic.

Really, in spite of spending the volumes 4 and 5 together, it’s not about developing Black Sun in a romantic way.

Oh, a kiss on the cheek isn't romantic. It can be, but in the context, it was merely a "thank you".

Black Sun hasn’t sunk yet

While RWBY isn’t over, the possibility for Black Sun isn’t completely gone, though I don’t think I’m lying when I say it’s unlikely. You can like it more than Bumblebee, but it’s all right to admit it’s improbable. We (almost) all have been there. For crying out loud, in MHA, I sort of ship Kacchako4 (loses 2/3 of her readers – and that’s why this piece of trivia was originally intended to appear much later).

After everything he’s done for her (that she didn’t ask for)

This is usually phrased in a disgusting way.

There is a lot to unpack here.

First, it’s ridiculous to think you can be owed love/getting into someone’s panties. You can’t. People either love you/want to do you, or they don’t. If you want to do something for someone else, great, but do it because you want to and like (not necessarily in a romantic way) said person or because you’re altruistic – don’t expect a reward. This is what you sound like to us:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWFfrQtHag0

You wanted the guy to get the girl, fine. You know you can watch that in almost everything else, right?

Second, it’s idiotic to associate getting the girl with masculinity or not getting her with being “cucked”. If your notion of being a man is tied to getting someone else, that’s on you. If you need someone else to feel good about yourself, maybe you have some underlying issues to address (another reference to Crazy Ex-Girlfriend – watch the show, especially if you’re making comments like the one I showed: you need it. I feel like the narrator in “S.O.B.s”).

Third, even by the logic of “after everything I’ve done for you”, Sun doesn’t win, because Yang paid a much bigger price: she lost an arm and had PTSD while he had a minor injury from which he had basically recovered by the next episode. This isn’t a “Yang deserves her” either – that argument is nonsensical no matter the pairing being defended, I’m just pointing out that it doesn’t even favor BS.

By the way, I noticed that a few people completely missed the point of why I compared Yang’s injury to Sun’s and think I did it to indicate Yang deserves it more or to win (?). It’s a bit confusing because I flat out say why I made the comparison, but here it goes again: it’s not to say Yang deserves Blake, but to indicate that, in fiction, we usually associate romance with higher stakes. I literally wrote:

“I think Yang’s and Sun’s injuries are everything I should need to prove the likelihood of BB as they contrast the two main Blake ships: Bumblebee and Black Sun. While heroes tend to save many people who are indeed just friends or sometimes not even that, there’s a reason why Superman and Spiderman usually include Lois Lane and MJ (or whoever the love interest is in said film) in the climax – it makes it more personal, raising the stakes. From this perspective, it’s easy to understand the importance given to either by comparing: what the injury was, who caused it, why and Blake’s reaction, thus allowing to conclude which couple was given more weight.”

“[…] point Bumblebee as the first one is more associated with romance.”

That was me explaining what the points were as well as why I was comparing the 2.

And yes, paying attention to dramatic weight is completely valid, we are talking about fiction after all. It’s not like we accidentally walked in on a guy threatening a gal and saying “I’ll destroy everything you love… starting with her” as another woman appeared in real life. Things happened the way they did because writers (editors, directors, etc.) wanted them to. 

Don’t pretend you didn’t know that it’s relevant that the one who caused Yang’s injury was Adam, Blake’s ex-boyfriend, while Sun’s was caused by Ilia, the friend whose feelings weren’t reciprocated, and that it doesn’t say anything about the links Adam-Yang and Sun-Ilia. I lost count of the number of BSers who wanted Sun to fight Adam and wanted him to be the one taking Adam down (even though it got in the way of Yang’s closure), which shows many of you were perfectly aware of the importance of said connection.

As for the dyke representation… (the fact that they phrased it that way is very telling) if it was just that, then any lesbian couple would do. RWBY is about 4 female characters. Seriously, how come people never ask themselves why this one is so popular, even though Yang and Blake aren't the most popular characters? From what I've seen, Weiss and Yang are.

The claims of “pandering” and “SJW” have been raining for a while and I expect them to continue until they realize CRWBY can’t be bullied into erasing BB. Count on that to happen whenever a show reveals a main character is LGBTQ+ mid-series (unless it’s a particularly progressive show). If your reaction to seeing LGBTQ+ characters is to call it “pandering”, it says a lot about you, none of it good.

I know that we perceive straight white male as default. This is so entrenched in our culture that the first Transformers didn’t have any female transformers because the writers thought it would require an explanation. Yup, apparently you need an explanation to include half of the world’s population.

I suppose screaming “pandering” is better than to pull an EF and say “Bumblebee was and is the safest LGBTQ ship they could have done. Lesbian couples are the safest representation a show can make […] It’s more comfortable to see woman on woman action just because of how fantasized they are”, which:

doesn’t justify why BB is the safest LGBTQ+ couple as there are a ton of lesbian couples possible (White Rose, Checkmate/Monochrome, Freezerburn, etc.);

fails to consider the high number of LGBTQ+ women in RWBY when compared to LGBTQ+ men probably has something to do with the fact it has more female characters;

when did we see woman on woman action in RWBY? How did I miss that episode?

if lesbians are so appealing to straight men, how come they’re the ones whining the most about BB?

The whole straight-men-like-lesbians while being the ones complaining about them is particularly odd to me. It doesn’t sound like they like they are spending their time wrapped up in sexual fantasies. Maybe they are and can't stop. And that's why they don't like Bumblebee anymore... Poor things... But really, it just sounds like they need some kind of… safe space.

You can tell them not to worry. They still have most shows/books/films. And for the next 2-4 decades, they'll be able to count on Disney (taking shots at it since my very first post).

As usual, the original.

More RWBY posts:

Filmmaking and Bumbleby

Bumblebee was Always the Plan

Bumblebee was Always the Plan part 2

Faunus and the White Fang: The Portrayal of Racism

BB & Renora

Weird Post on Weiss’s Clothes

Foils: Adam and Yang (this one is in wordpress; it was my first one and I didn’t have Tumblr then)

Let’s talk about Adam Taurus (I didn’t post this one on Tumblr because the title and tags could lead Adam fans thinking this was about “his wasted potential” when really it defends the decision of killing him off and explains why it happened)

1 “Make me Feel” can also be taken as a pan anthem as Janelle as identifies as such (and I think she’s OK with being called bi too).

2 Enabling Abuse is what I call AdamxBlake.

3 I still consider “Burning the Candle”, V3 finale and the ship named “Pride” to be pretty obvious.

4 Not only are the odds against Kacchako (BakugoxUraraka), the shippers are considered villains who worship chaos, which is fine by me. I can’t say some part of me doesn’t enjoy being The Dark Knight’s Joker and that part is saying: “Tell me Batman, how does it feel to be the hero of a film that everyone watches for its villains?”

[whatwashernameagain]

My fangirling about female representation, ethnic diversity and relationship models in Steven Universe

The knowledge that children will watch this show and learn that it is okay to be gay, autistic, polyamorous or a proud big, butch, non-binary or black girl is marvelous to me. I’m sure this has been done before, but I want to share my love for this progress in storytelling with my fellow famders (because I have to tell someone.right.now.)

Steven Universe, (created by the non-binary angel Rebecca Sugar) in short, features the (actually genderless) aliens called ‘the crystal gems’, who are almost exclusively considered female and raise a boy that represents the opposite of toxic masculinity.

Steven:

He embodies healing, nurturing, protection, acceptance and friendship - all usually female traits, and relentlessly tries to befriend villains and mosters alike. Wonderfully, he is allowed to make silly mistakes and learns that he is still loved.

Pearl:

She is the epitome of a caring and nurturing female that sacrifice themselves for their charges, portrayed with grace and beauty. At the same time, the struggle of this sacrifice and threatened loss of self are shown. Pearl comes from a background where she is taught servility and prettiness (as women have been for centuries), yet she has learned to re-invent herself and became a master-swordfighter. She’s also a lesbian in canon.

Amethyst:

She’s a bombshell. A loud, small, roundish troublemaker with issues and a dirty, immature humor. She suffers from anxiety over expectations of physical standards she cannot live up to, since amethysts are expected to be a certain way she cannot achieve. An example for the damage of impossible beauty standards.

Ruby and Sapphire:

An example for a relationship that grew over time with work and effort and is based on mutual respect and love of the things that make their partner different. Additionally, while they are not only a mixed-race lesbian couple, they come from different classes of society. Their union represents the way a healthy relationship can create something greater than the sum of its parts. 

Garnet:

A kick-ass, huge woman of color who loves herself and loved being herself. A counterpoint to the lesson we have been taught for too long: to be humble and unobtrusive. My favorite character of the show. She’s the result of the fusion of Ruby and Sapphire and combines all of their awesome lesbian love vibes. No one would ever dare to make this black goddess feel like she’s anything less than amazing, as no black girl should.

Click for more enthusiastic rambling.

Connie:

Steven’s best friend. Their friendship is the purest thing, based on communication and mutual consideration. She’s the nerd. Smart, bookish, hard-working - and a fierce fighter who does not let anyone stand before her, despite the fact that she has no powers. As she was intruduced, she was just another girl in a dress. Her arc shows what girls can accomplish when they demand entrance to circles usually closed to them.

Stevonnie:

One of the most liberal and creative uses of gender I’ve seen. They are the fusion of Steven and Connie. At no point in the show is there any conflict about the fact that a boy and a girl have fused to create something new - with a femaleish form. This non-binary person is considered something especially wonderful, perphaps because they embody characteristics of both. they are even refered to as them in the show by Pearl. (notice how Connie dips Steven? Awesome)

Smoky Quartz:

The fusion of Amethyst and Steven. A chubby, black person with self-esteem issues handled with a lot of good-natured humour. Wonderfully, their weight is never the issue for even a moment, because they are awesome and we need more big angels being cute and beautiful! They’ve also been referred to with they/them pronouns.

Peridot:

This tiny nerd has overcome a lot of prejudice and has had to learn to co-exist peacefully with her new friends. Due to what I would interpret as autistic tendencies, she has trouble reading emotion and reacting accordinly. Technology is easier for her to handle, which is therefor used by Steven to bridge the distance between them. She now lives in a cute and domestic lesbian platonic partnership with Lapis where they grow crops and create art with their ‘dog’ pumpkin.

Lapis:

She is the victim of abuse in different ways. After being locked away for a long time, she closes herself off or lashes out and requires patience and understanding to heal, thus representing the violence women often suffer from. Unfortunately, she soon gets entangled with Jasper, ending up in another abusive relationship as victims of violence often do.

Jasper:

The abuser. Female violence is a topic not often portrayed, yet one that definitely exists. She represses and uses Lapis (who binds her as well) and yet becomes a victim of their relationship herself, since toxic relationships hurt both parties. The damage done to her by her obsession with Lapis, and by extension her desperate need to be in a partnership, is represented by a corruption that eats her up.

Bismuth:

Isn’t she wonderful? Flat-chested, rainbow-haired, broad-shouldered alpha bitch with a loud and brash humor that you cannot help but love. This lady is a perfect example for the way women are allowed to be butch in this show and still be unquestionably beautiful. With her occupation as a blacksmith and her violent anger when hurt, she pushes relentlessly into traditionally male characteristics in storytelling.

Fluorite:

“How many gems are you now?”

Fluorite: “Six. Or more, if we find the right gem.”

This gentle rainbow giant is another example of the way fusion represents relationships - a polyamprous one in this case. As in our society, they are cast out and misunderstood for being different, but kids will simply see it as normal and that is awesome!

Rose:

The mother. Though she has been a bad-ass war criminal before, feared and hunted and a brave and inspiring leader, she has sacrificed everything once she became a mother. Portrayed as a traditionally nurturing female form with round, fertile lines and pale rose colors, she represents the mothering aspect of femininity. The fact that she is twice the size as her partner Greg and can easily pick him up once again shows that being feminine doesn’t make her weak. She shows the self-negating and sacrificing tendency many women display for their family in a very drastic way, since she literally disappears as Steven is born and becomes a part of him.

This is where I’ll stop this already too long post, even though I could say lots more about the insecurity Lars experiences because of toxic expectations of masculinity, the modesty of Sadie that makes her allow others to walk all over her, or the appreciating way the show deals with Greg, who is arguably a bad provider but still a loving father. I just adore the caring and supportive tone of this show so much and I hope everyone will give it a chance.

Love you all

[ivory-haired-queens-blog]

I just played ep 3 and you wanna know what things fucking ripped my heart out and fucking stomped on it and tried to shove it back in with scotch tape and glitter glue? SPOILERS, DUH.

*Also this might be the most in-depth and analytical thing I've done so... it's long.

A) When Louis picks up Minnie's crossbow and fucking accidentally shoots that woman and he's like "i..I didn't mean...fuck" or something like that. That fucking voice acting shredded me and I will never be over that. Louis, Louis of all people, the lighthearted jokester that just wants everyone to be happy was forced to shoot a woman in the skull! In one of the most grisly deaths in the season at that! Skybound can throw hands with me for that one. Also when Clem goes to get Aj Louis, even as broken and torn as he is at this point, he still tries to come with her. The best boy honestly.

B) Look, I know Lilly is the villian of this season. I'm fully aware of this. But she obviously still kinda cares about Clementine, as in ep 2 she said, and I quote "this SHOULD be easy." But it's not. It's not easy to shoot clem. But then she just fucking takes Aj? And then tries to strangle Clem on the side of the boat? And then when I mercied her and tried to let her live, she just???fucking kills James??? Like, I already didn't like James (I'm sorry James stans) but he didn't deserve that. And then the bomb goes off and we don't even get to Aj in time??? Like, 👊👊👊 throw hands.

C) When Aj talks about Clem getting bit and how he'd want her to bite him. Like, fucking James just had to say something. This boy is 6, maybe 7 at the absolute latest. He's impressionable, he learns from what he hears. You can't just tell him that walkers are still kinda human. If they had any shred of humanity left, they would not kill people. Especially those close to them, like Lee's brother tried to kill Lee when he was under that lamppost. Just fucking stop I'm crying.

D) LOUIS' STORY. If you did the Violet path and didn't hear Louis', basically he was rich. Like, filthy rich. But the only thing his dad wouldn't buy him was singing lessons. Louis got so mad at what his dad said to him, "You can either be happy or you can be rich," that he wanted to teach his dad a lesson. He started buying things on his dad's credit card that eluded to his dad having an affair (jewelry, hotel rooms, etc.) And when this worked, his parents got the divorce, he came clean. He told his dad "You can either be rich or you can be happy." A week later he was at the school. And just fucking??? How much his character has grown in the 8-9 apocalypse years??I'm so proud of him. Sure, younger Louis was a little shit, but he knows how fucked up what he did was. If you watch the scene, it's so....heartbreaking. like it's his biggest regret, even with all the Marlon shit thrown in. I love Violet with my whole heart, but I fucking love Louis' storyline.

E) VIOLET WHAT THE FUCK??? As I stated before, I love Violet. She's my favorite gay/gal in the whole apocalypse. But what the fuck? Like, you...I get it. I saved Louis instead of you, but wait a fucking minute I made it blatantly obvious that I love Louis (my son) and when you see me in the prison cell you're like "fuck you I'm staying here with my psychotic gf." Like??? I think the writers made a huge character mistake with that because there's no way Violet would have actually done that to me. Also especially after Minnie admits to killing Sophie, which I'll touch on later. Like, her character would NOT do that. Idgaf if she still loved Minnie or not, she'd be fucking pissed.

F) We have to talk about Minnie. Just....ugh. Props to telltale/skybound because holy fuck. That got me. That got me good. She just??? Is completely brainwashed by the delta and lilly? She killed her own sister, and despite me telling her what Tenn told me to she still locked me in the cell? Also she doesn't say one loving thing to Violet, who literally is willing to get herself blown up just to be with her. And when that woman tells her her family is the delta and to forget about Tenn she just fucking accepts it? Like??? Fuck off bitch?

G) Louis' date was the cutest shit

H) I'm sorry but at the party that first bio sounded a fuck ton like Marlon and Idc what anyone else says you cannot convince me that my love Ruby ever did such things.

I) I hate that the story is so compelling that, even after all she's fucking done, I still care about Lilly. I call this "the Kenny effect." We have history, and that matters a lot to me. Even if I don't agree with her ever, I still don't want her to die. (Like with the Kenny/Arvo thing) I see her as family, which is why in s1 I let her stay after she shot carley and in ep 2 of this season I told her we were family. I do care about Lilly, and then she just kills James??? Like, ugh. I wish she would just fucking stop and I could hug her and everything would be fine and Lee isn't actually dead and Christa and Molly and Kenny and everyone's alive and AAHHHHH.

J) The scene where Minnie has clem's knife against clem's chest and is pushing down is so fucking similar to the Kenny/Jane situation is s2. Minnie is Jane and Clem is Kenny, this time all of the kids from the school is clem. Both Minnie and Clem want them to be safe, but they have very different ideas on how they'll be safe. Clem wants to protect them at all costs, and Minnie wants to protect them by getting rid of clem. (Like how Jane wanted to get rid of kenny) I'm crying in the club.

K) James fucking making me walk in the barn full of walkers to touch the wind chime. I was literally so anxious during this and I knew that it's a game but just??? That would have been a pointless death.

L) ABEL. NO! Look I don't like this guy as much as the rest of ya'll, but they way he just breaks down??? I refused to torture him, and I put out his cigarette. He begs to be killed because he doesn't want to turn. This is so visceral and raw that I almost cried when my knife went through his head. Then the screen thing told me I tortured him in front of Aj?? Hello? When did I do that??? I gave him mercy, I gave him peace.

M) Louis toasting to the fact that he thinks he's gonna die at the boat just fucking destroys me.

N) Rosie is the goodest girl and didn't get enough screen time.

O) Louis helping clem up when she gets pulled under water by a walker is cleansing for my soul

P) Omar and Aasim got like 4 lines between them and that's fucking breaking the law

Q) I literally only found 1 collectible where the fuck where they all???

R) I was legitimately going to not kill any of the walkers when James was getting his mask, but I honest to God kept dying over and over so I literally had to kill one of them.

S) the fact that James kept bringing up how much of a heartless bitch I am for not caring about dead people that are walking and killing the living and everyone I've ever cared about.

T) The sheer genuis of the dialogue option that asks James if he knows the names of the walkers and he's confused and clem is just like "Omar, Aasim...Violet." like, he doesn't know the walkers. They're killing machines that he has no attachment to. Clem's friends are alive, and she cares about them deeply. Like fuck off m8.

U) Aj is so broken and confused and scared I don't know how to fix him he's a murderer but he's trying to atone and I just hope to God Lee would actually be proud of Clem and I just wish he was alive and Clem and Aj and him were a family and he could meet the boarding school kids at then Louis would learn about history, something I hc him as never being good at in school, and Louis teaches him how to play the piano and he teaches Violet how to actually map the stars and she teaches him all the fighting skills she's learned and Lee takes a liking to Tenn and makes sure to thank Omar for cooking and appreciates willy and mitch and what they do and supports and learns medicine from ruby and stops Aj from killing Marlon and talks him through the bad shit and helps him atone for his sins and then he meets Rosie and when he sees Lilly again she stops being a hateful cunt and we kill all the delta people and go back to the school and everyone, including mitch and James and Minerva and Sophie is alive and this is getting way to long aahhhh.

V) When Louis is freaking out about the responsibility of planting the bomb, and it gives you to either slap him or kiss him and that's the fucking cutest shit

W) the fact that it never let's me hug Tenn or Willy, nor have a funeral for Mitch. Like I know we were crunched for time, but it would've taken 10 minutes tops.

X) to my knowledge, Tenn and Menerva never see eachother. Maybe she would have changed if she saw him? I don't know...

Y) I don't have the option to cuddle with Rosie and that's an actual crime.

Z) When the kids are talking about all the people they've lost. 34 people. 34. We've lost a lot, don't get me wrong, but I don't think it's 34. It might be close, but some of those people we weren't close to nor knew for very long. Also the fact that they've lost 34 but only have like 5 graves. Wtf?

*) AND THE BIGGEST THING THAT TORE MY HEART INTO PRICES WAS THE LEE SCENE, AND THE DIALOGUE OPTION OF TELLING LEE HE'S NOT REAL AND HE TELLS CLEM THAT IT'S OKAY TO BE A LITTLE NUTS AND THEN THE HUG AND THE "LOOK AT YOU..." FROM LEE AND AAAHHHH I MISS HIM SO FUCKING MUCH.

*Edit: I'm not saying I love Lilly as much as I do Kenny, I could never like her that much, even if she had a change of heart and died protecting clem or Aj. I'm saying "the Kenny effect" because he was being an asshole, however you try to defend him. He wasn't in the right, and harmed an innocent kid (Arvo) just like Lilly does. Cool? Cool.

[perispinel]

The comment I left on Lily Orchard's Steven Universe video

For @harryhenry1 , @ankle-beez and anyone else who wanted my hot take before it was deleted (potentially)

"This video is very bad, and I can give you like a hundred reasons why, but let's stick with some simple ones.

- You have a lack of understanding of the meaning of character development; Steven going from being a silly rambunctious kid with no sense of danger to a soft-spoken pacifist with defined beliefs isn't them going back and forth on his personality, it's him developing as the series goes on. Remember how Finn from Adventure Time started out as just a super obnoxious and loud kid but then slowly turned into a very mature teen with an understanding of how he affects others? Yeah, it's the same thing, except this is Steven Universe (the show that gets more flak than it deserves). Oh wow, Steven changes as a person because of him going through a series of life-changing events from season two to season five, what a big surprise! I would've expected him to just go the Goku route of collecting new powers and upgrades without ever changing his beliefs or ideals to fit with things he's learned, shame on Rebecca (who takes sole responsibility for everything that happens in Steven Universe for whateer reason)!

- It can be very easy to say that the writing of a show is lazy by simplifying characters and events down and removing anything beyond that, (Amethyst being laidback, Garnet being stoic, Pearl being anxious, Diamonds being nazis???, etc.) but if that's what you think the characters boil down to, it just means you don't grasp them too well. For example, you simplifying the events of Mindful Education to just 'Garnet singing vaguely about trauma and nothing happens until the last minute' clearly means you missed the song's message about how to deal with anxiety, and that you think that being subtle and vague is interchangeable.

- Rebecca Sugar is not an animator, literally never is she credited as an animator in any episode of the show, but besides that, I think you don't think you understand the meaning of animation if you think that's the same thing as 'proportion inconsistencies.'

- Using the term Hide Your Gays to describe a character who is literally symbolic for a gay relationship is kinda ridiculous, and the fact that you admit that Ruby and Sapphire themselves have a well-written relationship shows you don't have a foot to stand on with this flimsy argument. Ruby and Sapphire *are* present, if they weren't then Garnet wouldn't exist. I don't have much else to say on this, so let's move on to your biggest point. (I skip over the whole Concrete thing because that issue is over and done with, with her apologizing thoroughly)

- So Pink being Rose somehow ruins every scrap of potential the series had? I think by 'ruin' you mean 'enhanced by adding even more possible potential storylines and plot-points.' Honestly, character growth wasn't ruined at all, it was actually way more interesting that she was a Diamond- having Rose be super badass and perfect by assassinating the enemy singlehandedly in a way that would literally be impossible would be kind of dull, especially since we already knew she was flawed (which is apparently a bad thing to you). If you think this twist is complicated when you've had so long to think about it I don't think spending so long ranting about it was really the best idea- Pink Diamond's time on Earth made her realize that the Earth had life that deserved protecting, she was unable to convince the Diamonds to stop the colonization because they didn't take her seriously, she sparked a rebellion since she knew they wouldn't be able to ignore it, and because she makes the obviously flawed decision to fake her own shattering with the idea that the Diamonds don't actually care about her and will stop the colonization because of her death. What was that about Kingdom Hearts having a more complicated plot? If you think Pearl, Amethyst, Lapis and Steven are 'the most wretched people you've ever met' because of those overexaggerated traits, I can think of plenty more characters you might think are the worst. "Bugs Bunny uses manipulation and gaslighting to get his way, Daffy Duck is a hot-headed idiot, Elmer Fudd is a sociopath who shows no hesitation to kill sentient beings and doesn't learn from his mistakes, etc." Do you see how oversimplyifying things can make anybody sound horrible? And Pink Diamond's motivation was not 'I hate responsibility,' it was 'I feel empathy toward the life already inhabiting this planet and am not being taken seriously, making me think the only way I'll make any impact is by lashing out.' Her motives are meant to be flawed, Rebecca Sugar even once said in a podcast that Rose was a bad person, so all your ranting about her being bad serves no purpose when the creator states that was the purpose.

- I'll summarize the idiocy of this whole "Space Nazi" thing in a sentence: It is ridiculous to claim that a Jewish woman is trying to send a message that Nazis are okay just because she makes her villains sympathetic (aka has good writing).

- People who come to the conclusion that Rebecca Sugar is a fascist sympathizer are... just dumb, don't give them credit for thinking that.

- This video easily could have been shortened to like fifteen minutes if you just went over the essential points in a clear way, but it seems you have a masochistic thing for yelling about things you don't like for as long as possible. In conclusion, anyone who claims this video is taking down Steven Universe and is super epic is kind of just wrong."

[knightofbalance-13]

http://saltwukong.tumblr.com/post/173979310856/miles-luna-is-unequivocally-the-poster-child-for

Well then, let’s give you a bit of criticism yourself then.

Miles Luna is unequivocally the poster child for immature assholes who should not be in charge of other people or creative writing and the sooner people realize that the better.

Says the guy who threw a fucking fit over Scarlet being gay and calling it ‘insulting’ like a whiny bitch. (http://saltwukong.tumblr.com/post/174002001031/actually-let-me-say-this-clearly-no-praise-is)

Be polite in your criticism” fuck off. Miles is every bit as immature as his fandom who have famously taken every bit of criticism, no matter how it was phrased, as hate. Miles Luna and his rabid fanboys can fuck off.

Of course, rationally sitting down and explaining why something went wrong and showing it like in Faboover’s ‘Thoughts-RWBY Volume 4′ Series (https://www.youtube.com/user/Fal3oover/videos) is the same as flailing your arms around and crying like a child who was told no. I mean, only a whiny, immature, self obsessed, selfish, sociopathic piece of shit would say that because they are so far removed from what defines a human fucking being that the concept is foregin to them.

By the way, you seem to have uh, blocked me for criticizing you once (https://knightofbalance-13.tumblr.com/post/167961927725/a-girl-with-sparkling-lies-saltwukong). I mean surely, this must be a mistake. After all, why would you block me unless you’re even more immature than Miles?

I’m tired of dancing around this, I’m tired of being nice. I’ll be nice some other fucking night. All blind RWBY stans can fuck off. MKG can fuck off. Rip the goddamn veil off. Acknowledge that your favorite content has a flaw or five. Acknowledge that your favorite “writers” are people too, which doesn’t just mean they’re people with feelings, it also means they’re people with flaws, who are responsible for those flaws and doubly so if they refuse to work on them, and triply so if other people have to sit through the results of them.

Okay then!

Miles has a SEVERE tendency to put in more characters than necessary. I have said this multiple times.

The time skip retcon is an ACTUAL retcon and was fucking stupid. I have also said this multiple times.

And they need a professional writer on staff to teach them how this is all done. I have said this multiple times...

No veils here. I’ve always seen them as people with flaws....

But I guess you don’t want me to see them as people with feelings though.

Okay then, let’s test this out on you people:

You are a fucking coward. You sit there acting all high and mighty while you block everyone who might disagree with you because god fucking forbid any hurt your pwoor prwcious fweelings while you preach hate and destruction on a level that would make the KKK question their life choices.

You are also a fucking hypocrite, saying that Miles and Kerry should be held accountable doubly and triply so when YOU refuse to work on your flaws and I have to sit through it with you. And yet, YOU fucking hide like the cowardly little shit you are behind a blocklist because the mere thought of someone even saying in the most polite manner possible that your ego is fucking massive and wholly undeserved.

You’re also a fucking sociopath since you think that people sending Miles DEATH THREATS and ACTUAL HARASSMENT are JUSTIFIED and that Miles should eat up this shit without realizing that a skill a writer MUST have is discerning constructive criticism from DECONSTRUCTIVE criticism. But god fucking forbid someone post Sun hate in the sun tag when you can just ruin a man’s life (http://saltwukong.tumblr.com/post/173391967376/dont-fucking-post-sun-hate-in-the-sun-wukong-tag).

In general:

You’re all fucking bigots. I have not met a single RWDE poster who wasn’t racist, sexist or hetero/homophobic. Dudeblade outright thinks that the writing is bad because they’re white men, Soku thinks Jaune being white is a flaw, Invested In Your Future adamantly REFUSES to see a female character as anything other than in the right ect. 

You’re all fucking cultists. You people will regularly attack anyone with different opinions than you while preaching your opinions as right. You religiously hate on Miles and Kerry to the point I’m pretty sure youd hear their names if I said ‘satan.’ And you indoctrinate people into your line of thinking all the damn time.

And you are all fucking SHIT at your jobs. Name five flaws in RWBY? I can name FIFTEEN!: Villians need a bigger presence, Aura needs to be explained, more racism against the fanaus needs to be shown, the fight scenes need a LOT of improvement, Ruby needs more focus, We need to spend time in locations in order to get a better feel of them, show don’t tell, the Maidens need more clarification, Volume 4′s plots were messy, Yang needed more screentime in Volume 4, Salem needs more focus, they need to show Aura breaking more, Ozpin’s morality needs to be more defined, the actual retcon of Volume 4s time skip, we need more interactions between Ruby and Blake.

RIght fucking there, I just made a list THREE TIMES LONGER than what you asked for. Thing is, I didn't lie about them, they aren’t formed from my delusions, they have an actual Impact on the quality, they are reasonable for RT to handle and I didn’t use misinformation to make them. That’s ALL YOU PEOPLE DO. You lie out of your asses so much if I hadn’t left I would have drowned in your bullshit, you demand fucking shit that would contribute to NOTHING except your egos, you demand RWBY handle shit more than RT can handle (which is one of the biggest problems with RWBY) and you rely on people forgetting certain parts of the show to make them work. You people aren’t getting shit for pointing out flaws: you’re getting shit because you are so BAD at it that you make people want to forget about them and thus enforce the idea that RWBY has no flaws. That AND as someone who tries to be critical of RWBY, I have to deal with you asswipes.

Actually, let me repeat that for the hard of hearing: “the writers are people too” means they are as deserving of criticism as the rest of us, no more, and definitely no less.

So...none at all, considering you people think you’re all SO flawless and perfect that if anyone criticizes you, they MUST be wrong.

Let me inform you of something: You DON’T see them as people. You see them as fucking SLAVES, you arrogant stain on the face of the Earth. You see them as slaves that you can beat and abuse and harm and harass and belittle all while expecting them to do as you say. You people are so fucking removed from humanity that unless people think like you, have ZERO empathy towards them.

Start thinking critically.

How about you lead by example?

Oh wait, if you thought critically for even a single moment of your life: You’d realize that half the shit you say is fucking delusional, that you sound like a ravening sociopath with zero humanity in him, that you are surrounded by people who will turn on you in a fucking instant if you step out of line, that 99% of the shit you preach if applied to you would make your life miserable and that you have likely driven away anyone who actually cares about and isolated yourself in a cage of hatred that you have no one to blame for but yourself. And when that all hits you, you’d try to scream but end up choking on whatever fatty soda is in your gullet and you’ll die choking on it, cold and alone. So you completely turn off every single part of your brain that performs critical thinking because let’s be honest: Critical thinking requires self awareness and said stuff is basically LETHAL to you at this point.

... Oh what, you have a problem with what I am saying? Well, all I’m doing is following YOUR rules. I’m just treating you as YOU treat Miles. You OBVIOUSLY don’t want things like compassion and empathy applied to you because you’ve never even shown a capacity for such a thing, let alone towards Miles. You wanted this and now you have to fucking take it, because even you know no one listens to a hypocrite. 

Now how about you unblock me eh? Let’s see how you handle your veil being ripped from you.

[tomishaped]

Rating:

Explicit

Archive Warnings:

Graphic Depictions Of Violence • Major Character Death

Category:

M/M

Fandom:

Supernatural

Relationship:

Dean Winchester!Izzy Hlton

Characters:

Dean Winchester • Izzy Hilton • Sam Winchester • Asmodeus • Dagon • Demons • Hellhound • Ellen Harvelle • Jo Harvelle • Hunters • Crowley • Charlie Bradbury • Bobby Singer • Ruby • Death • Pestilence • Famine • War • Castiel • Angels • Cain

Additional Tags:

Demon Dean Winchester • Demon Sex • Kidnapping • Gay Sex • Blood • Blood Kink • Hate Sex • Love/Hate • Major Character Injury • Major Original Character(s) • Character Death • Past Child Abuse • Past Rape/Non-con • Past Sexual Abuse • Past Torture • Past Violence • Canon-Typical Violence • Violence • Protective Dean Winchester • Bisexual Dean Winchester • Top Dean Winchester • Dean Winchester is Bad at Feelings • Izzy is too • Emotional Hurt/Comfort • Emotional/Psychological Abuse

Summary:

After being pulled out of hell Dean realizes quickly that the four months he had been gone made way for a lot of changes in the lives of everyone he knows, including the life he had known for himself before he died. Nobody was treating him the same, and there was seriously something going on with his brother that he could not figure out. He was spending most of his time alone nowadays, not really hunting anymore since Bobby and Sam were against it for him, and spending most of his time drinking instead to try and forget. He was angry, pretty much all the time. That anger really worked in his favour though when walking back to the impala he came across a freaking hoard of demons getting ready to attack some blond chick. He didn't know who she was or what the hell all the demons wanted with her, but there was no way he could just walk away. Maybe if he had any idea what trying to save this person was going to lead too he would have just walked away, maybe if he had actually given any thought to the situation before him he wouldn't have put himself in the middle of it, but even before hell he made impulsive and rash decisions... so maybe not.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter One: A Hoard of Demons 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Izrael had been one of those very rare and few humans to become a demon without having died and spending hundreds of years in hell. He couldn't tell you how it happened though, he didn't remember much at all about being a human. Actually, he didn't remember anything at all about his human life. His first memory is just waking up in some sort of dungeon, a captive of one of the Princes of Hell, Asmodues. He remembered the surprised look on the prince's face when he realized that his little pet was no longer a human. He was staring through the bars at a very confused little blond with black eyes sitting cross legged in the center of the cage. "Who are you?" Izrael had asked him. Asmodeus quickly realized that his little pet had no memory of anything at all, and really that worked in the demon’s favour. He had been able to mold the little blond into absolutely anything he wanted after that, and Izrael listened to him since he had no recollection of the years of abuse he had received from the prince. Instead of the cruel and vicious memories he had previously, his first encounter with the man now was of tqhe person who let him out of a tiny cage. He was grateful to him instead of fearing and hating him.

Asmodues had known his little blond was going to be powerful in some way, any human who turned demon without dying and spending hundreds of tortured years in hell was- not there were actually many of them running around. It was actually incredibly rare. The prince had the perfect weapon in his pet demon, and he planned on using the blond to help take out anyone in his way. No one knew Izrael existed after all, and he could and did keep him a secret while he trained up the young demon. Izrael learned quickly, he was fast and ruthless and ridiculously fantastic with a blade in his hand. Any blade. They became the blonds favourite weapon very early on in his training. And the small, feminine, stupidly pretty boy was quite easy to overlook and think nothing of. He didn't look like he could possibly be dangerous at all, and right there was the mistake that oh so many people and demons made. After fifty years of training with the prince and knowing only of life in hell, he was in reality one of the most dangerous men you could cross paths with. His appearance made that fact all the more true since every single person who met him once Asmodues finally decided to start using him underestimated him.

Almost sixty years since Izrael turned demon had passed now, fifty-seven of those spent in hell and only three on earth. Azazel and Ramiel were dead and Asmodues' only competition for the Throne anymore was Dagon, he sent Izrael out in the world with just a few instructions. Kill any demon who sided with Dagon and Lucifer, cause as much chaos as he could, and blend in with the humans.

Asmodues was the youngest Prince of Hell, so Dagon had the right to rule hell before he would. And she didn't seem keen on giving it to him. No. She was letting that prick Crowley keep it after Ramiel had given the crown to him until she could resurrect the only person she felt should run hell, Lucifer. The youngest prince had absolutely no interest in having the Angel who created him back in the picture, and he wanted to use Izrael to make sure it didn't happen.

The blond had been doing a very good job at listening to his master's orders. No demon knew who he was or where he had come from, and very few could even tell he was one of them when they first saw him. What they usually saw was the human persona he had created under his master's orders, Izzy Hilton. He knew very little about humans and how to filly act like one so he mostly came off as a rather ditzy, kinda dim, and pretty little blond. And that made the death of a lot of them very easy. After ten years of this though, he had grown somewhat of a reputation in hell. The few demons who managed to escape his grasp before he could actually kill them made sure that Izrael's name started circulating underground. There were three reactions that demons had, the ones that feared him and stayed out of his way, the ones that started to idol him and in turn Asmodeus and were now on the youngest princes side, and the smallest group were the ones who wanted nothing more than to kill him and get him out of the way so Dagon could continue work.

It was members of that third group that caused Izrael the trouble that he was in right now. It was never a good sign for a single someone when so many demons were working together to eliminate you. There were almost twenty of them here, surrounding the little blond menacingly. Weapons in hands and screaming taunts and threats at him. "You're going to die tonight, Princess, no matter what," the apparent leader of the little group said to him, grinning at him in a way that would have made most people piss themselves, "Tell you what, if you give in and take it, we might just take it easy on you. What do you think?"

Izrael rolled his eyes, was he serious? Did he honestly think that he was going to make this little attack on him easy in any way? No fucking way. If he was going to die, and that was a big IF in the little demon's mind, then he was going to take as many of these mother fuckers with him as possible. "I think the fact that you're even asking me to lay down just shows how scared you all really are," Izrael told him, not even a tiny hint of fear in his own voice. In fact, he sounded amused and a bit annoyed if anything. Izrael bent down and wrapped his hand around the hilt of the demon killing knife that was hidden in his boot. He almost always wore some cute pair of boots as they made hiding his blades from view really easy. He held the knife in front of himself and waved it a little, "So let me ask, are y'all sure you wanna do this? I can promise you this, no one is going to like the consequences of your actions right now."

Dean… Dean was a hot mess. Granted he was less of a hot mess then he was a few months ago after he came back from hell. He was ‘gripped tight and raised from perdition’ or some shit. He had mostly given the finger to the flying dicks whenever they poked their heads around. Sammy and Bobby overruled and grounded him and all but packaged him up and sent him over to the Roadhouse. Sammy was going to be doing groundwork while Bobby tried to get the Colt up and working again and Dean was supposed to gather intel from hunters that came to the bar. He was sure everyone just wanted to keep an eye on him and his part was full of crap but hell it was the closest thing to a vacation he’d ever have. He’d never admit it out loud but he kinda saw the point after the fifth time Sammy had to track him down after a night bender stretched out a few days and he couldn’t remember. At least that was something he couldn’t remember.

He had been doing okay with the girls at the bar for the first month and a half but now he was starting to get restless. Why else would one walk down dark alleys in the middle of nowhere Nebraska? Either you’ll find a fight or a monster trying to get a late snack, win win. And what luck, this hardly seemed like a fair fight. Though he had to give props to the blond standing her ground with being outnumbered like that. He could smell the sulfur in the air with how many demons that were in the ally at once. He grabbed his brother's parting gift, having found the demon killing knife in his bag when he was states away. He had called him to tell him how much of an idiot he was but right now it seemed like a great idea.

He had used his moment of opportunity and snuck up on the group but just couldn’t stop his mouth from going off, keeping the blade out of sight. “Oh come on guys, I know you don’t like to play fair but even this is a bit much,” he said, looking over the group. “I mean blondies got a point, you almost look scared with how many of your friends you had to bring along,” he added with a laugh.

Really, right now there were just too many demons surrounding him for the feared little blond to pay much attention to anyone or anything that wasn't involved in this ambush against him in this alleyway. He couldn't afford to take his senses off of any of the demons surrounding him while keeping on the lookout for more demon scents coming close. This group may have feared the pretty little blond they finally cornered, but even Izrael couldn't fight alone against this many of them and get away without a scratch.

He had to hold back the surprise from his face when he heard a voice he hadn't expected, recognized, or even realized was there. What the actual fuck? No fucking way. Did a god damn hunter actually happen to stumble across this fight? Izzy looked to the owner of the voice and was surprised even more now at who he saw. That was that Winchester boy. The one who had been dead and in hell earlier that year. Izrael was sure of it. And it made his confidence of getting out of this alive rise greatly. This man was a hot topic in the whispers that went through hell so Izrael knew that the men here probably felt that Dean Winchester was probably only a little better to have to face off against than Izrael himself. He could practically see the other demons trying to figure out what they wanted to do.

Cornering Izrael again if they disappeared now was going to be near impossible now that he knew there was a group after him. But staying here and having to fight against that fucking hunter and try to kill Izrael before they were killed themselves might actually be just as hard. "Yanno, that guys right too," Izrael said, not wanting Dean to know he knew who he was. Now that the hunter had seen what he looked like, he didn't want him to know that he was a demon too. He was going to have to play Izzy from here on out, his human persona that Asmodues had insisted on. He hated doing that, pretending to be human was hard. "You sure you brought enough of them now though?"

The demon that seemed to be the leader of this little powwow growled at both Izrael and Dean, "Winchester, why don't you get out of here. This really has nothing to do with you."

“Oh but I think it does," Dean said with a grin, taking a step forward as he eyed the group. For this many demons this little stick of a thing must either have something they want or was important for whatever plan they had. With this many though he figured they all wanted the blond dead and there was no way he was going to let that happen. He might have been benched but he could still take down a few demons.

“You ass holes are in my town now,” he said and took another step towards the group, his demeanor unwavering against the demonic group. He had a feeling there was a chance he wasn’t getting out of this fight and there's alway a part of him that was always just fine with going out like that then walking away from someone else in that position. “Anything you do here has everything to do with me. Now I'd leave the pretty little thing alone before I make you," he added.

A few things happened after that, two or three of the demonic pricks just noped out and left their meat suits, letting them go limp on the cold ground. Then it seemed about half the group turned to Dean and charged and the other half turned back to the blond. He pulled out the knife out easily and got the first demon easily under the ribs, pushing his body back at the group to catch most of them off guard and slow them down, taking a few of them at a time.

Izrael was still mostly focused on the demons around him rather than the single hunter there, even if it was that one. But he could still hear him… and was honestly a bit surprised at how this was going right now. He had just been banking on the unfocused way Dean's presence was making them maybe give him a bit easier of a chance to fight his way out without getting hurt. He was cocky enough to believe that even with this many of them they couldn't kill him. But Dean… wasn't going anywhere. He was sure that Dean didn't know he was a demon as well, sure… but… what? The hunter… was backing him up…

He had never had any kind of backup before. It was a weird feeling. And he instantly didn't trust it. He didn't have time to try and figure out what happened to the human, the demons had all made a choice and leapt into action. "Aw, fuck!" Izrael snapped when he saw smoke curling away from them from the ones who fled before the attack started. Well they had to fucking move fast now. Those fucking three could go and gather reinforcements any second now.

Izzy moved quickly on his feet once the others started in on either him or Dean, glad the other was a bit busy with his own hoard at the moment so he couldn't pay attention to the blond working his way over to him. Kinda hard to pretend to be human when you've got ten or so demons trying really hard to kill you.

"You have no idea what you've walked into tonight, Winchester," the demon that spoke wasn't lunging at the hunter while he said it, and Izrael growled to himself. Why can't people ever keep their fucking mouths shut? This fucker was trying to tell Dean… well, something. But whatever it was, there was a good chance it wouldn't paint the blond in a good light in the other hunters eyes.

Izzy sprinted at him, jumping up as he got close and his legs locked around the demons head and almost too easily flipped the man to the ground, his own blade sweeping forth and pressing into the side of the mans head, "One of these days you fuckers are really gonna have to learn to fuck off from me," he snapped before he pieced the mans skull and he quickly let go to pull himself back up and grab his knife out of the meat suit. Ah. Finally, There was the hunter.

Izzy rushed over to him and grabbed his arm, "Okay hotshot, time to go," he said, trying to pull him back from continuing to go after the last of the demons that were on their way to attack the pair that was now together. He could already feel someone fucking getting closer. And he didn't like who he thought he felt coming. Oh gods how he wanted to fucking get his hands on her! But… she was a fucking prince of hell. And they are just… not as easy to kill as these little pansies. And she was probably only coming because… fucking Izrael and Dean were in the same fucking spot. The top two names on her personal fucking hit list. She was also a fucking pansy ass little bitch and would be coming with others. And an actual feasible plan and not this half baked happenstance these fuckers got lucky with tonight.

"Don't ask questions, we don't have time, because I don't feel like dying right now and I like this jacket too much." He said, pushing at Dean's back some, knowing he was probably pushing the man harder than he should right now if he wanted to play Izzy, "Don't worry about them, okay. They're nothing. I'll kill them when they come at me later. It's fine, it happens. But see, some of these fucks just went and cried to mommy… and we really should not be here when that bitch shows up." He only had his knife on him. The hunter seemed to only have a knife. Fat lot of good those were against a fucking prince of hell. Fuck! Sometimes… he really wished he could jump out of his skin like a normal demon could. It really would make getting out of here a lot fucking easier.

It was hard to keep track of everything when you’re in the middle of a fight with this many bodys, giving and taking hits can be damn distracting. He did feel himself get a little lost in the fight, the brute violence of it all was very therapeutic. This was better for his stress than just sitting at the bar, hearing everyone else's stories while he was sidelined. He did get to see the blond take down who seemed to be the leader to this shindig and damn, that was impressive. She was like a deadly spider monkey, it was kinda hot. He didn’t really get a chance to dwell on it for too long before he was grabbed and dragged. He was a little taken aback by it, having been completely ready to take them all on. Granted this probably was the smarter idea but he couldn’t help but pout a little before giving into the others shoves.

“Yea, aren’t they always," he muttered as they took off down a connected alley. “Alright, follow me," he said, tucking his knife back in his pocket as they ran. He didn’t know who this was or what the literal hell they had gotten into but clearly they knew what demons were and needed help. At the moment he was a bit glad he had stopped Sammy from taking his car. 'Over my dead body,' he said every single time Sam brought it up before they split up. Like hell he was getting shipped off to Nebraska without his Baby. Right now they were lucky it was only a few blocks away, he hadn’t gotten far on his ‘night walk’ tonight.

Now that he wasn't cornered in a fucking alley by twenty demons, Izzy wouldn't say he needed help anymore. Actually, getting away from Dean was what would help a lot right now. If they were split up again, Dagon would only be able to go after one of them at a time, and that just wasn't worth her time. Not yet anyways. Not while she was still trying to pretend Asmodues couldn't possibly be a threat to her plan and that his little blond pet project wasn't as big of a threat as he seemed. She was wrong. Izzy was the perfect chess piece to throw the whole game in the youngest princes favour.

He also wasn't stupid enough to think that the man who had just put himself into a wildly outrageous unevenly matched fight with demons for some random blond in an alley was going to let that blond off on their own. If he took off Dean was gonna come looking for him. He didn't need that right now. So he followed him, trying to remind himself that a human would be grateful to this man right now, not annoyed that he was going to want to keep helping him. Making himself relax was going to be fucking hard, he wasn't used to relaxing… pretty much ever. Dammit where was Harley when he needed her? Why the hell had he made her stay in that motel tonight? Sure, she had been tired but Izzy was pretty sure if she were here that would be the one way that he could get this hunter to go off without him- banking on the man being too scared of her to think much of the blond at his side. Fuck it… he could do this for now. Just long enough so the Winchester wouldn't go looking for him once he bailed, it shouldn't be that hard, right?

[thefatdrunkdragon]

The Worst RPer I have ever met (Nemo Saga Chapter 3)

 Okay, so let’s talk about the first worst RP and my worst Idea first. The Spooky RP.

 This idea should be on the list of unlikely and terrible crossover ideas ever. Simply imagine Spooky’s House of Jumpscares except no 1000 rooms, the layout is more akin to the Arklay Mansion and the spooky monsters that hunt you down are replaced with the Zeds from Killing Floor 2. This was during a time in my life where I had worse ideas in mind, and while I am not fully better, I’m slowly improving the ideas and concepts of something else before I end up doing the mistake of writting the “Life is Eldritch” Fanfiction... ANYWAY!

 The Plot of this RP I told to Nemo was that my Characters had taken over a small abandoned mansion and turned into an a haunted house attraction where an AI would sorta pick what monster comes out while a female character named Kate decides to do the voices to do some kind of a twisted warning about it. I told it to Nemo and he accepted it. Only because it had spooky and he was a big fan of Markiplier. And don’t worry, Markiplier doesn’t make a cameo.

 Anyway, we begin this RP tale in October 30th, where the next day would soon be Velora’s Birthday (yi-fucking-pey). After some random bullshit where some dude through coffee on Velora’s Face for no reason, Everyone goes to the Mansion near the Villa.

Short Explanation: The Villa is a small abandoned “Town” that was half finished and forgotten by the government. The few buildings finished are just the town plaza and the Mansion own by a man who’s name is forgotten. The mansion is the setting for this RP.

 Anyway, they go in, dressed as a bunch of Emo’s and are told the rules. Nemo thought he was being sneaky when he and his mommy sues brought guns but I counter acted this by telling them that the monsters were incapable of harming them and in having a gun, they deprive themselves of the horror of a Haunted Mansion.

 But then fucking suddenly, Anathalia’s Archnemesis, Adelie (Brothel Owner lady), shows up and takes Anathalia. But Nemo then handcuffs her and the police take her away.

This won’t be the last time this shit happens.

 Within minutes we show them the mansion and how it works. While he was trying to push me into having Exposition dumped into my face, I tried to introduce the RP’s Main threat, the Spooky Hologram (I’ll explain what the fuck I was trying to do at the end of the story, because explaining everything here is confusing.) Needless to say, I forgot to mention to Nemo that this RP, while taking the title of Spooky, was a complete diversion from the games but he is still convincing himself he played through this game and it’s nothing.

 So the objective of this haunted mansion thing was to have people choose a direction and try to go through with it. Think of it like an escape room, except you’re trying to escape the house from mutants who can’t fully hurt you but can give you one hell of scare with their wails and hissing. Nemo and Velora chose the Basement while Anathalia chose the Second Floor. And then the games started.

 Then fucking suddenly, Adelie shows up (No details about how the fuck she escaped) and asks around for Anathalia to bring her back the brothel (Because kidnapping a “famous celebrity”, and doing so is more trouble than it’s worth!) and Nemo decided to have Kate (The person that we both created and the voice of the Spooky Hologram) go and try to defend Anathalia. It was there where Anathalia decided to choose Kate as another candidate, but Aiden and Ruby (Aiden being a sort of avatar of mine and Ruby being an obvious nod to an artist I like and a Female Dragon) tried to defuse the situation but Nemo comes and tries to stop the situation by threatening Adelie with a gun (Yeah, dipshit ignored da rules of the mansion and somehow had another gun.) But before anything could go any further, The cops show up and she is taken to a jail in paris yet again. Making this whole conflict pointlessly unnecessary.

 Meanwhile, Nemo and his mommy sues returned to the Maze and he keeps brushing off minor things that aren’t being part of the game as part of the game. I know it’s a sort of method for us to calm the fuck down but he was so smug about how the “escape mansion” was just like the Spooky game. Until he reached the laboratory, where the Killing Floor Zeds were being stored and manufactured. He at first brushed it off, until the lights of the lab came on and he saw them all, these hideous freaks all moving around in their cages, waiting for an opportunity to tear into him like a lion on a gazelle.

 He still continued to brush it off, but it was there where the Hologram made it clear that No one in the control room is doing this, it is now running the show and will now unleash these freaks for its own amusement. But leave it to Nemo to try and deflate the scary moment by adding in fucking “bachata” music (Bachata being a sort social dance music for us latinos). I wanted to go with a sort of dark like tone and he just adds unnecessary BS like this and just ruins it.

 It is after that the spooky AI was going to decide to unleash the monsters on them and he would have to escape the mansion with his life. 

Big. Fucking. NOPE

 He teleports away to safety, ruining the conflict so bad that I argued for a re-do because it was that insulting. I know It sounds annoying but jesus christ! I shouldn’t have done this because all I did was prolong the agony further.

 Anyway, It was there where Spooky had tried to force Nemo and his Mary Sues to pick a path and stick to it. His mary sues had the attention span of toddlers because they ignore everything she says, asks her about what is it like being a ghost (Despite the fact I told him in the beginning it was a Hologram.) and then I decided to pull a Deus Ex Machina out of my Ass and just have her ZAP away their powers. Nemo’s Response?

 Nemo(From the Archived RP I had): Did you know you can't do that to me, right? I'm different.

 Ofcourse he doesn’t want to play fair. Ofcourse, OFCOURSE! He has to act like he’s such a SPECIAL AND UNIQUE Snow flake. I was so sickened by this that instead of teleporting away, he just rushed the scary moments of being chased by the Zeds and then he escaped to the control room. Where the dipshit begins to change the subject to an unimportant side plot about how Adelie found Anathalia. I won’t explain the details, but it had something to do with a Hot Topic employee being a spy for Adelie and such bullshit.

 I broke character as Aiden, so tired of this inane bullshit, decides to grab a rifle, arm Eddie and an unpaid janitor, to go down the basement and take care of the monsters before they get out and then, just because I realized how much of a fucking mistake both the RP and the attraction was, I would burn down the mansion. Nemo gets offended that we were going to destroy the mansion and tells us to leave. So we do, and Nemo then decides that the next logical solution is to MURDER MY FUCKING CHARACTER and throw his body out of the rooftop of the mansion, ignoring all the other characters trying to kill him.

 But it’s okay gais! Because it turns out it was a Demon call Jack, Who was making him do the bad thing and Nemo has the most anti-climatic battle. I wanna take this moment to take another quote from the RP. Because I never noticed it and now that I do, I find it so hilarious

His friends like Ruby, Anathalia and Kate are in shock. What will they do without (Nemo)? They'll never know.

 Well, I can tell you one thing. Ruby would not miss someone who just happened to have Killed their friend in cold blood when there was never a sign of this possesion to begin with!

 So after an anticlimatic battle that could fit in the confines of a tweet, Nemo defeats the Demon and the day was saved. And he swept away all the problems by reviving my character and had all of my characters go “Oh, It wasn’t Nemo, it was a demon! He was the good guy all along.” And then there was a party.

 Aiden, Despite being revived by his “Saviour” has not forgotten his goal. So I told everyone to get ready for a big firework display. And everyone gave their stupid recommendations.

 At first the house had a minor explosion, before the memories of that shitty night were erased in a massive ball of fire. Bringing a huge smile on my face and an angry Nemo on my character’s face. He got into some whiny bullshit about how he would buy the land and rebuild it for the Vampire Clan or some Bullshit, and since the Vampire Clan was so Big and Important to the government, I took it a step further by lighting the flag on fire and telling him “I’ll call you for a war declaration later.” He repeats how I’m offending the vampire overlords but I told him I never gave a fuck. And he just flipped my character off.

 and that was the worst RP I have ever had with Nemo, and it sure as Shit would not be the last.

And now... A brief explanation on what in the actual fuck was the POINT of the Spooky RP:

 The idea for the Spooky RP was inspired by my experience playing KF2 on a free weekend on Steam while also learning about Spooky’s House Of Jumpscares. So I had a thought: Why not have an RP where there is a sort of Spooky Esque character trying to narrate your “demise” while also being chased by zeds. Although not mentioned in the RP, the origins of the Zeds come from the Mansions “Laboratory” level below the Basement, and when Aiden and Eddie first found it, they were stuck down the for a day until they shredded their way out. It was there where Aiden had the bright idea of creating the escape mansion to make a quick buck. But since they can’t just go and kill them, the characters decide that the best course of action is to lead the zeds out of the basement, trap it and try to declaw or detooth them, due to how dangerous those parts can be. As the mansion was built and the AI was already created, the AI went through an “Ultron Phase” as I like to call it, looking through video footage of the somehow working cameras of the mansion and seeing both Eddie and Aiden harming this creatures for entertainment purposes. So it plotted their demise and its plan to release the creatures out into the streets of Puerto Rico just for giggles. How the “Spooky AI” spoke was by replicating a lot of Kates Vocals and then mimicking it in a same pitch and everything. Yeah, it doesn’t make a lot of sense but I tried to atleast come up with a good idea before it got ruined horribly.

I should’ve quit after the SteamPunk disaster but I guess I’m responsible for my own demise when it comes to bad RPs. And like a masochist, I just kept coming for more.

[autistic-girl-academic]

eh whatever here’s those su rewrite ideas i had last night

okay so first of all tweaking the main three cg’s personalities/giving them more equal focus, they could each have a big emotional problem that steven helps them get over.

give garnet more of a thing about inheriting a leadership role with rose gone and struggling with that, like an extension of the future vision worries where she thinks she has to be more aloof to be ‘strong’ but really can’t do that 24/7 and needs to have her vulnerable moments.

take the soft sad gay thing they’re trying to do with blue diamond and give that to pearl, cause rose died incredibly recently for potential immortal aliens like them. have her struggle with speaking up for herself and such because with the rebellion over she doesn’t know what her purpose in life is (the whole “i was designed to be a servant” deal would be handled better this way i think instead of how it was in like the sardonyx episode).

bring out how much more amethyst enjoys human life than the other two. between that and being a kindergarden reject, does she feel like a ‘real’ gem the way steven sometimes questions his humanity? have her be the main link to the minor human characters next to steven - more than just vidalia, she knows like everyone in beach city.

then fusion tweaks:

opal becomes a thing about how pearl (ingrained traditionalist, but meek/unintentionally passive-aggressive) and amethyst (free spirit, defiant, wants to break norms but also feels like an outcast for doing so) find a middle ground. i love opal but i think she fuses a bit too easily sometimes? idk

SUGILITE. change like this entire episode. maybe the homeworld tower thing that they fuse to break has like a defense mechanism or something and sugilite gets amnesia (bc the part about losing the old identities makes much less sense for garnet and amethyst as sug than, say, lapis and jasper as malachite); steven and pearl have to help her remember with all the reasons they loved garnet and amethyst. and maybe add a little thing about how both parties want to hide their insecurities in the fusion, like sardonyx but much less yikes.

SARDONYX oh boy. maybe make her episode more about overwork/perfectionism. instead of pearl tricking garnet into fusion by rebuilding the tower, there’s some kind of trick to it they can’t figure out, so they keep having to reform even as it tires them out, as much as gems can be tired. again like with sugilite, the crux of the issue is that both gems are hiding their fear of making mistakes under sardonyx’s confident facade. then maybe they don’t handle it well at the end of the episode, blaming each other, and their reformation after keystone motel (which i guess in this rewrite, ruby and sapphire splitting would be triggered by garnet reaching max self-doubt) isn’t “pearl says she’s worthless and garnet says she’s not” but “garnet and pearl admit their mistakes and reaffirm what they admire in each other”. i rly like focusing on the cg’s friendships okay.

and that was the meat of what popped into my head last night but here was some extra little stuff

remove the episode where pearl wants to go home because it really makes no sense in light of what we know about homeworld, or like change it so it’s about steven wanting to go into space instead, maybe he finds an old gem ship and kind of takes off accidentally (but also at a point where he’s wondering where he really belongs + frustrated that he doesn’t know a lot about homeworld) and has to find a way back/to communicate with the gems for help

change steven’s racist uncle into, like, agent mulder. he’s a low-ranking Men in Black expy guy and that’s why greg hasn’t seen him in a long time, plus y’know hiding the alien wife. steven and greg are worried about all those movies where aliens get dissected and stuff and think he’ll hurt them but uncle just really thinks aliens are cool and wants to meet them. and then the twist is that the men in black stand-ins have low-key known about the cgs for ages or something.

instead of banishing them to the barn, have lapis take breaks to go off on trips exploring nature to heal and reacquaint herself with her love of water. have peridot like apprentice with bismuth (who rly needs like an entire post to herself). also change peridot from being short since we have too many short cgs, make it so she just actually has missing limbs or smth and gets to choose a middle ground between “homeworld forced these enhancers on me bc they don’t tolerate how i really am” and “my enhancers are my comfort objects” by letting her build her own and decide when to use them