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thornybubbles · 4 months

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Fourth Wall (JJBA Yandere Scenario)

Scenario: Recently, you’ve moved on from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure to a different anime series and fandom. You realize that this was a terrible mistake.

Note: This is based on a prompt I saw on Tumblr ages ago. I just expanded on it a bit.

Warnings: Typical Yandere behavior, threats, abusive behavior, possible harm towards reader, mental distress, anti-comfort. Remember that you alone are responsible for what you read.

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Changing fandoms wasn’t that unusual for you. You would find a new anime, fall in love with it, then it became your new hyperfixation. After a while, the process would repeat. This is what happened with you and JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure. It wasn’t that you didn’t like the series anymore, you just moved on to a new anime/manga. Still…it felt different this time. You weren’t sure why, but ever since you moved on to your new favorite series, you had this unexplainable feeling of guilt wash over you every time you watched an episode of your new favorite anime or read the latest chapter of the manga. Stranger still, there was an underlying feeling of dread as well.

As many times as you’d changed fandoms, you’d never experienced such feelings before. It was uncomfortable and you wished that you could move on to your new obsession without any strings attached. It was ridiculous, really. Why should you feel guilty about a change of taste? You weren’t hurting anything. No one would be affected by it. And yet, you still felt unnecessary shame over changing fandoms. You guessed it had something to do with the lingering attachment you had for certain characters from various parts throughout the series. It almost felt like you were leaving them behind somehow. Another silly notion. They were fictional characters and did not exist outside of the world within JoJo. They had no knowledge of you, much less having knowledge of your “betrayal”. You decided that it was stupid to dwell on it and dived headfirst into your new favorite series. That guilty feeling would surely fade after a while.

You got the perfect opportunity to binge your new favorite anime one day. It was one of those days when you were fortunate enough to have nothing to do. All of your responsibilities had been dealt with and you had no plans other than to sit on your ass and watch your new favorite show until bedtime. Sure, you could go out with friends, but you really just wanted to chill by yourself for the day. So anime binge party it was. You made a comfy nest of blankets and pillows on the couch and set up your laptop on the coffee table. You got some snacks and a drink, made yourself comfortable on the couch, and pressed play on the screen. You relaxed into the softness of your pillows and blankets and immersed yourself in another world for a few hours.

About ten episodes in, you had to go to the bathroom very badly. All of that soda you’d drunk was taking its toll on your bladder. You paused the video, untangled yourself from your blankets, and stiffly power-walked to the bathroom. Once you relieved yourself, you washed your hands and went back into the living room. You snuggled back into your blanket burrito and reached over to start the video, but something wasn’t right. On the screen wasn’t the anime you’d been watching. It was the first episode of Phantom Blood.

What…???

Did you accidently click the wrong thing in your haste to pause the video and rush to the bathroom?

That had to be it.

It was the only thing that made sense.

You clicked off of the JoJo episode and went back to the previous page which took you back to the episode of the new anime you’d been watching. You found the place in the episode that you left off on and pressed play. You settled back in your comfy nest and watched the rest of the episode. You watched for another hour or so. During the opening of one of the episodes, you suddenly found yourself watching the opening for an episode of Battle Tendency. You sat up straight and stared at the screen in shock and confusion.

“What the fuck?” you muttered under your breath.

You refreshed the page and the episode started properly. That’s the second time your video was suddenly changed to an episode of JoJo. The first time you assumed that it was because of an accidental click but now you weren’t so sure. You hadn’t been touching anything when it happened the second time. All you were doing was staring at the screen when the switch happened. Why did it keep happening? Some kind of glitch with the streaming service? You didn’t know, but it was a bit annoying. You hoped that wouldn’t be a constant thing while you were trying to watch your show.

The rest of the day went by without further incident. Eventually, you noticed that it had grown dark and you decided that your day of doing absolutely nothing needed to come to a close. You closed your laptop and reluctantly pried yourself off of the couch. As much as you wanted to just lay there in your blanket nest, you knew that you’d get a much better sleep in your bed. So you hobbled off to your room; your mind on nothing but getting a decent night’s sleep.

You woke up a few hours later with a dried out mouth and an aching throat. You swallowed a few times, wincing at the sandpapery feeling of your tongue against the inside of your mouth. Well that’s what you get for sleeping with your mouth wide open. You flung the covers off of you grumpily and climbed out of bed. You stumbled into the kitchen, not daring to turn the light on and submit your sleep sensitive eyes to an onslaught of painful luminosity. You made your way over to the counter, grabbed a glass, and staggered over to the sink. As you were filling the glass you suddenly had the feeling that something wasn’t quite right. You assumed that it was your sleep fogged brain at work. After all, part of the reason you woke up was because you were having a disturbing dream. You tried to remember what the dream was about, but you couldn’t piece the memories together to get a full picture. You just remembered being in a place that made you uncomfortable and meeting someone that was familiar to you, but their presence frightened you. You just couldn’t remember the details. It kinda made you want to stay awake for the rest of the night but you decided against that. You knew you’d feel like shit the next day if you didn’t get back to sleep. There was nothing worse than waking up with a splitting headache due to lack of proper rest. You downed the glass of water and put the empty glass in the sink.

You suddenly became aware of a strange odor in the air. What was that smell? Smoke? God, was something burning?! You took another sniff of the air and recognized the smell as specifically cigarette smoke. Okay, so that meant that your house wasn’t burning down. That was good news, but why would you be smelling cigarette smoke? The only way you would be smelling cigarette smoke is if it were coming from in the same room as you…

You heard the sound of rustling fabric from somewhere behind you. You spun around and immediately spotted the outline of someone sitting at your kitchen table. You could also make out the small glow of a lit cigarette sticking out of their mouth. As your eyes adjusted to the darkness, you could make out some details of the figure. They were large, broad shouldered, and wore a long white coat, and on their head rested an oddly shaped hat. In the miniscule amount of light in the room you could make out the glint of gold accessories on both their hat and coat.

“No way…” you gasped in a quiet voice. “No way in hell…”

The figure lit a lighter and held it to the wick of the candle that was located in the middle of the table. Once the candle was lit fully, you could see the figure better. It was as you expected, Jotaro as he appeared in part four was sitting at your kitchen table, glaring at you as if you were less than dogshit.

“You recognize me?” he scoffed and took another drag from his cigarette. “I’m surprised. I thought you forgot all about me… about us….”

You backed up against the counter, unable to believe what you were seeing and hearing.

Jotaro glanced down at the cigarette in his hand. He held it up in front of him.

“This is your fault, you know.” he sneered. “I quit smoking, but after you abandoned us, I started the habit again. I’ve been tolerant so far because I was stupid enough to think that you’d come back eventually. Maybe you were just taking a break and you’d come back when you were bored… that was my stupidity. I’ll own up to that. But when I realized that you’d thrown us aside like trash, well, I got pissed. I guess I took up smoking again just to stay sane…”

You were so appalled at the fictional character seated at your table that you hadn’t been paying much attention to what he was saying. Slowly the words began to filter into your mind and of everything he said, one thing stood out the most…

He said “us”. He said that you had abandoned “us”...

That’s when you became aware of the other figures lined up behind Jotaro.

You could make out their shapes and features in the candlelight. Jonathan stood there looking as utterly brokenhearted as a man could be. Joseph had a smug grin on his face as if he’d just caught you committing a crime. Josuke’s face was contorted in a vicious snarl while his fists were clenched by his sides. Ever so often his left eye would twitch indicating that he may be on the verge of a psychotic break. Giorno offered you a placid smile that was off putting when set against the coldness of his eyes.

Your eyes darted nervously from one face to another before finally settling back on Jotaro’s. It was too much. You pushed away from the counter and ran out of the kitchen. A voice that probably belonged to Jonathan called out for you to stop but you paid it no attention. Luckily the kitchen was right next to the front door. Once you were outside, you could run to the neighbor’s house and get them to call the police. You wouldn’t dare tell them the truth. What would you even say? You couldn’t tell them that five fictional characters from an anime had invaded your house. They’d think you were on something. You would just tell them that someone had broken into your house. That’s all. Honestly, you didn’t know what the hell the police could do against them, but you didn’t know what else to do. You reached the front door but your hand froze just as you were about to unlock the door and yank it open.

Two people were staring down at you from the window in the front door, two people you recognized. Kars looked down his nose at you with a haughty expression. He looked ever so much like a strict parent that had just caught his kid trying to sneak out of the house. DIO on the other hand had the most sadistic smile on his face. He made a “come-hither” gesture with his clawed hand as if he fully expected you to just open the door and throw yourself at him. Their eyes glowed with a hellish light and you couldn’t take the sight of them. You screamed and backed away from the door. As you stepped back, you saw two other familiar faces staring at you from the windows on either side of the door. Doppio had one hand pressed against the glass while the other hand held a rock from the garden to his ear as if it were a cell phone. One of his eyes had changed to a jade green color and glared at you with intense rage. His other, normal eye had a pitiful, disappointed look in it. From the other window Kira stared at you with an utterly emotionless expression. You didn’t dare speculate on what kind of thoughts could be going through his head at that moment. You screamed again and started to turn and run towards the back door…

“Star Platinum!”

Suddenly you were held tight in an iron like hold. An invisible hand covered your mouth preventing you from screaming anymore. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that you were being held in place by Jotaro’s Stand. Struggling in Star Platinum’s grip was useless so you just hung there in midair as Jotaro approached you.

“We weren’t done talking.” he snapped.

He leaned in slightly and you got a whiff of cigarette smoke mixed with cologne.

“Now you listen and you listen good,” he started to say. He held up a single finger.

“One. Just one more chance. That’s all you get. Come back to us and there won’t be a problem. Leave us again and it will get ugly.” he said, glancing up at the villains peering through the windows. His upper lip curled in disgust when he locked eyes with DIO and Kira, but only for a moment before his eyes were back on you.

“Is that understood?” he asked.

You nodded your head, whimpering behind Star Platinum’s invisible palm.

“Good.”

You don’t know what happened after that. You just woke up in your bed with a pounding headache.

“Fuck…” you groaned, pressing your hands to your temples.

You felt awful. You could only guess that you just simply didn’t sleep very well. Damn nightmares. What was with that dream? Was it all because you felt guilty about leaving the JoJo fandom? You grumbled and rolled out of bed. You were going to need to take something for that headache. First you needed to get a glass of water. You stumbled off to the kitchen getting an uncomfortable feeling of deja vu. The moment you entered the kitchen, your eyes glanced to the kitchen table and you nearly fainted.

The candle was out, but it was smoking as if it had only been put out mere moments ago. The cigarette butt that rested on the saucer that had been used as a makeshift ashtray was also still smoking.

That night you made it a point to sit down and watch a few episodes of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure starting with Phantom Blood. You planned to rewatch the entire series from the very beginning all the way to Stone Ocean. With each episode you watched, you noticed that ever so often a character’s eyes would slide over towards you as if making sure you were still there, watching them. Sometimes it would be one of the main characters. Sometimes it would be one of the villains. Sometimes it would be a side character. Regardless, they all kept checking to see if you were watching. Every day, you would make it a point to watch at least one episode of JoJo, no matter what. You didn’t dare skip out on your daily dose of JoJo. You also never went back to the other anime you’d been watching after you left the JoJo fandom. No, you learned your lesson. You were familiar enough with Jotaro’s character to know that he only gave people one chance and no more. Just like with Rubber Soul and Steely Dan. He gave them both a chance to leave mostly unscathed but they both decided to turn on him at the last minute. They both were punished severely. You weren’t going to make that same mistake.

So you sat there on the couch, stiff and terrified as you watched your “favorite” anime…

… like a good little fan should…

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ladyluscinia · 6 months

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Ok, I think I might be exiting the "are you fucking kidding me?" period and ready to make a real argument, so lets talk about Three Act Structure!

Is OFMD S2 just the "Darkest Hour"?

A very common explanation I've been seeing for some of the... controversial... aspects of S2 is that it's meant to be that way. That the middle act is where the protagonists hit their lowest point. Where we get the big failure point. Where everything looks kind of shit.

S2 is supposedly just that point. It's The Empire Strikes Back. People have been making that comparison since before the first episodes even dropped, telling everyone to expect something that could be disappointing or unsatisfying - it's just a matter of needing to wait for S3 to pull it all together.

It's not a baseless framework to consider the show through - I'm pretty sure David Jenkins has mentioned it in interviews (or at least mentioned he planned for three acts / seasons) so it's certainly worth asking how he's doing at the 2/3rd mark.

So - quick summary of Three Act Structure:

Act 1 introduces our characters and world. It includes the inciting incident of the story and the first plot point, where a) the protagonist loses the ability to return to their normal life, and b) the story raises whatever dramatic question will drive the entire plot. Act 2 is rising action and usually most of the story. The protagonist tries to fix things and fucks them up worse, in the process learning new skills and character developing to overcome their flaws. Act 3 is the protagonist taking one more shot, but this time they are ready. We get the climax of the story, the dramatic question gets an answer, and then the story closes.

If you want examples, the Star Wars Original Trilogy is a very popular template. And, hell, he said it was a pirate story... the main Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy also does a solid job with their three acts.

Let's compare. (Spoiler: I'm not impressed 🤨)

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First thing I need to establish... Wait. Two things. First is that Three Act Structure is flexible, so we can't really analyze success or failure by pulling up a list of necessary plot beats that should have been hit in X order. Second is that if you tell me you are writing a romance with a Three Act Structure - where "the relationship is the story" - the first thing I'm going to do is ask you how you are adapting it. Because while there's not necessarily anything preventing you from applying this to a character driven plot, most people are familiar with it as plot structure for externally driven conflict.

Unless there's a reason the status of the main relationship is intrinsically tied up in the current status of the war against the evil empire, a standard Three Act Structure is going to entail either an antagonistic force that absolutely wants your main couple apart being the main relationship obstacle OR the romance aspect being a subplot to the protagonist's narrative adventure. None of those sound like how the show has been described.

So how is OFMD adapting it?

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Act 1

(Can't figure out how well Act 2 is doing if we don't start at setup.)

Right out the gate, OFMD breaks one of the main "rules" for a story where the Acts are delivered in three parts. Namely the one where the first Act is treated as an acceptable standalone story, with it's own satisfying yet open ended conclusion.

In Star Wars, A New Hope ends with the princess rescued, Luke finding the Force, Han finding his loyalty, and the Death Star destroyed. The Empire isn't defeated, the antagonists still live... the story is not over, but this one movie doesn't feel unfinished.

Similarly, Curse of the Black Pearl gives Jack his ship back, Elizabeth and Will get together, and Norrington has the English Navy let them all off the hook and give Jack and the pirates one day's head start.

OFMD's final beat of S1 being Kraken Arc starting is not that, even if Stede returning to sea is still a pretty hopeful note. Now... I don't necessarily think this was a bad call. At least, not if the story is the relationship. It's easy to close on a happy ending and then fuck it up next movie if the conflict is external and coming for them. Not so much if you're driving the story with your protagonists' flaws, in part because it should be really obvious at the end of setup that your main characters need development and can't run off together right now. I actually like that they were risk-takers and let S1 look at the situation clearly vs doing a fragile happy end, because it takes into account the difference between a character-driven and plot-driven narrative.

I think OFMD's Act 1 actually ends at maybe the Act of Grace? Well, there through the kiss on the beach, counting as our "first plot point" before everything goes wrong, basically.

At that point, they have setup the story and characters. We've been introduced to Edward and Stede's current issues. Signing the Act of Grace does make the intertwined arcs between them real - it's no longer a situation that either one of them could just walk away from like it was in 1x07 - and we narrow in on the (alleged) driving question of the show:

It's not about "Will Stede become a great pirate?" or "Will we develop a better kind of piracy for the crew?" - the show is the relationship and the big question is "What is Stede and Edward's happy ending?"

Act 1 ends on their first solution, being together and making each other happy and admitting it's more than just friendship. Act 2 starts, appropriately, by saying both of them are currently too flawed for that to go anywhere but crashing and burning.

Now... looking back, what does Act 1 do well vs poorly?

I think it's really strong on giving us the foundation for BlackBonnet's characters and flaws. We aren't surprised Stede goes home or Edward goes Kraken (or at least... we weren't supposed to be surprised. There are still a lot of holdouts blaming Izzy for interrupting Edward's "healing" despite how at this point in the story it doesn't make sense for Edward to have the skills to heal... but I digress). The relationship question is compelling at the end of S1, the cliffhanger hooks, and the fandom explosion of fics did not come from nowhere - the audience was invested.

I also think Act 1 does a great job of settling us in the universe. We understand the rules it abides by, from how gay pirates are just a fact of life to how there's no important organs on the left side of the body. Stede has a muppety force field. Rowboats have homing devices, and port is always as close as you want it to be. Scurvy is a joke. The overblown violence of pirate life is mostly a joke, but we are going to take the violence of childhood trauma seriously.

Lucius's fake-out death, while technically part of Act 2, works well because Act 1 did a good job of priming everyone to go "obviously this show wouldn't kill a crew member for shock value, and we're 100% supposed to suspend disbelief about how he could have survived getting flung into the sea in the middle of the night." And we do. And we get rewarded for it.

Regarding antagonists - a big focus of any setup - the show is deliberately weak. The one with the most screentime is Izzy, and he's purposefully ineffective at separating our main couple. Every antagonist is keyed to a particular character, and they function mostly to inform us of that character's flaws and development requirements. The Badmintons tell us about Stede's repression and feelings of inadequacy, and Izzy tells us about Edward's directionless discontent and tendency to avoid his problems. Effectively - the show is taking the stance this will be a character driven narrative where Stede and Edward's flaws are the source of problems and development the solution. No person or empire (or social homophobia) is separating them...

...which leads me to something not present - there nothing really about the struggle of piracy against the Empire. Looking at Curse of the Black Pearl... we see piracy is in danger. The Black Pearl itself is described as the last great pirate threat the British Navy needs to conquer. Hangings are omnipresent - Jack is sentenced to die by one almost as soon as he's introduced to the story, when his only act so far had been to wander around and save Elizabeth from drowning. OFMD tries to invoke this kind of struggle in 2x08, but there's no foundation. Our Navy antagonists are Stede's childhood bullies, and so focused on Stede the crew isn't even in danger when they get caught. The Republic of Pirates is getting jokes about being gentrified, not besieged.

Even the capture of Blackbeard by the Navy is treated as a feather in Wellington's cap but not a huge symbolic blow against piracy... because we just do not have that grand struggle woven into Act 1. You only know the "Golden Age of Piracy" is ending if you google it, or have watched a bunch of pirate shows.

Overall, a solid Act 1, well adapted to the kind of story they've said they were looking to tell - a romance in the (silly-fied) age of piracy, instead of a pirate adventure with a romantic subplot.

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Now, Sidebar - Where is the story going?

The thing about the dramatic question - in OFMD's case: "What is Stede and Edward's happy ending?" - is that a) there's normally more than one question bundled up in that one + sideplots, and b) while you aren't supposed to have the answer yet, you can usually guess what needs to happen to give you the answer.

Back to our examples... Luke's driving question is "Will the Empire be defeated?" Simple. Straightforward. Also: "Will Luke become a Jedi?" The eventual climax of our story from there is pretty obvious... the story is over when Luke wins the war for the Rebellion in a Jedi way. That's the goal that they are working toward.

Pirates of the Caribbean is a bit more complicated. We're juggling more characters and have a less defined heroic journey, but there are driving questions like "Is Jack Sparrow a good man?" and "Is Will Turner a pirate / what does that mean?" and even "Will the British Navy defeat piracy?" They get basic answers in Curse of the Black Pearl, and far more defined ones in At World's End. Still, this is another plot-driven narrative. They've laid the foundations for the Pirates vs Empire struggle, and when that final battle turns into the trilogy climax then you know what's happening.

OFMD is not doing a plot-driven narrative. To judge how they are doing at their goals, we have to ask what they think a happy ending entails in a character sense.

Clearly it's not the classic romantic sideplot, where the climax is the first kiss / acknowledgement of feelings. They've teased a wedding in Word of God comments a lot, so that's probably our better endpoint. Specifically, though, a wedding where both of our protagonists aren't ready to flee from the altar (big ask) and where they've both grown enough that their flaws / mutual tendencies to run away from life problems won't tank the relationship.

In Stede's case it's still massive feelings of inadequacy and being too repressed to talk about his problems. Also he ran away from his family to chase a lifelong dream of being a pirate - "Is Stede going to find fulfillment in being a pirate captain, or will the real answer be love?" Edward meanwhile expresses a desire to quit piracy and retire Blackbeard, but we also find out he's struggling with massive self-loathing and guilt from killing his father - "Is retiring what Edward wants to do, or is he just running away?"

If they are going to get to a satisfying wedding beat at the climax of their story, what character beats do we need to hit in advance?

Off the top of my head - both characters need to self-realize their flaws (a pretty necessary demand of anyone who runs away from problems). They are set up to balance each other well, but also to miscommunicate easily. They have to tell each other about or verbally acknowledge that self-realization so it can be resolved. Stede has to decide how much being a pirate means to him. Edward has to decide if he's retiring and what he wants to do. They both need to show something to do with getting past their childhood traumas given all the flashbacks. Through all this, they also need to hit the normal romance beats that convince the audience they are romantically attracted to each other and like... want to get married.

Oh, and this is more of a genre-specific sideplot, but once they demonstrate a behavior that hurts the people who work for them, they need to then demonstrate later how it won't happen again. Proof of growth, which is kind of important in a comedy where a lot of the humor is based in them being massively self-centered assholes. Stede doesn't earn his acceptance in the community until he kicks Calico Jack off the ship, making up for causing the situation with Nigel in the first episode. A workplace comedy can get a lot of material from the boss as the worker's antagonist, but if you want the bosses to stay sympathetic you have got to throw them some opportunities to earn it.

All that sounds like a lot, but like - the relationship is the story, right? If we spend so much time on establishing flaws big enough to drive a story, we also have to spend time on fixing them. Which is where the turning point hits.

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Act 2: How it Starts

This is where the full story reality-checks your protagonist. Glad you saved your boyfriend and embraced new love in Act 1, but his repressed guilt means he's about to completely ghost you, and your own abandonment issues and self-loathing are about to make his dick move into everyone else's problem.

Again, it's a non-conventional choice OFMD has this start at the very end of S1 rather than with a sudden dark turn in the S2 premiere, but it's still pretty clearly that point in the Three Act Structure.

In Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back opens with a timeskip to our Rebellion getting absolutely crushed and hiding on a miserable frozen planet. The Empire finds them as the plot is kicking off and they have to desperately flee. They get separated. Han and Leia try to go to an ally for help and end up in Vader's clutches. It's a sharp turn from the victorious note that A New Hope ended on.

Pirates of the Caribbean's Act 2 starts dark. Dead Man's Chest opens with our happy couple Will and Elizabeth getting arrested on their wedding day for the "happy end" escape of the last movie. Jack has not been having success since reclaiming his ship, and we'll soon find out he's being hunted by dark forces. As for the general state of piracy, we get a horrifying prison where pirates are being eaten alive by crows, and a new Lord Beckett making the dying state of piracy even more textual. "Jack Sparrow is a dying breed... The world is shrinking."

The key here is making a point that our heroes aren't ready. This is the struggles part - things they try? Fail. The odds do not look to be in their favor.

Now, OFMD apparently decided to go all-in on flaw exploration, especially with Edward. The first 3 episodes of S2 are brutally efficient in outlining Edward's backslide. In S1 you could see he had issues with guilt and feeling like a bad person. S2 devolves that into a destructive, suicidal spiral where Edward forces his crew into three months of consecutive raids, repeats his shocking act of cruelty with Izzy's toe offscreen (more than once!), escalates it with his leg, and finally they state directly that Edward hates himself for killing his dad so much that he fears he's fundamentally unlovable and better off dead.

Stede's struggles are subtler, but most definitely still there. He's deliberately turning a blind eye to tales of Edward's rampage, half from simply being too self-centered to care about the harms Edward causes others, and half from being unable to face or fathom that he had the ability to hurt Edward that much. Upon reunion he wants to put the whole thing behind them, not addressing why he left in the first place. Very "love magically fixes everything" of him, except Stede is no golden merman.

Interestingly, here, BlackBonnet's relationship dysfunction has very clearly been having a negative impact on the surrounding characters we care about. Make sense, since it's the driving force of the story, but that also adds a lot more relationships we need to make right. Like... Edward is the villain to his crew. The show focuses on their trauma and poisoned relationships with him. And then draws our attention even more to Stede taking his side to overrule their objections to him.

For a story where the conflict and required resolutions are primarily character based, and the setup had already given the main couple a good amount to work with, dedicating a lot of S2 to adding more ground to cover was... a choice. Potentially very compelling on the character end, certainly challenging on the writing end... but not a complete break with the structure.

Bold, but not damning.

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Act 2: How it Ends

Now it is true that Act 2 tends to end on a loss. Luke is defeated by Vader and loses his hand, and Han has been sent away in carbonite. Jack Sparrow for all his efforts cannot escape his fate, and he and the Pearl are dragged to the locker.

But the loss is not the point. The loss is incidental to the point.

Act 2 is about struggles and failure, but it's also about lessons learned. There's a change that occurs, and our cast - defeated but not broken - enters the final act with the essential skills, motivation, knowledge, etc. that they lacked in the beginning.

Luke Skywalker could not have defeated the Empire in Return of the Jedi until he'd learned the truth about his father and resisted the Dark Side in The Empire Strikes Back. (Ok, confession, I'm using Star Wars as an example because literally everyone is doing so, but frankly it's a better example of formulaic Three Act Structure repeating within each movie because on a trilogy level - relevant to this comparison - it is a super basic hero's journey in a very recognized outfit and as such the Act 2 relevance is also... super basic "the hero tries to fight the antagonist too early" beat where he learns humility. Not really a lot going on. So, for the better example...)

Dead Man's Chest has a downer ending with the closing moment of the survivors regaining hope and a plan against an enemy now on the verge of total victory - a classic Act 2. But in that first loss against Davy Jones we get Will's personal motivation and oath to stab the heart, Jack finally overcoming not knowing what he wanted and returning to save them from the Kraken (being a good man), Elizabeth betraying Jack (being a pirate), Barbossa's return, and Norrington's choice to bargain for his prior life back. The mission to retrieve Jack from the World's End is the final movie's plot, but things are already on track to turn the tables back around as we enter the finale.

Now, relevant sidenote - one major difference between Three Act Structure within a single work vs across three parts is that Act 2 continues into Part 3, and only tips over into Act 3 about midway through. This is because obviously your final movie or season cannot just be the climax. That's why both movie examples start with a rescue mission. They have to still be missing something so they can get the plot of their third part accelerating while they go get whatever that something is.

But if you wait until the 3rd movie / season to get the development going at all - you're fucked.

Jack's decision in the climax of At World's End to make Elizabeth into the Pirate King goes back to the development we saw in the Pearl vs Kraken fight in Dead Man's Chest. So does Elizabeth's leadership arc. Will's whole arc about becoming Captain of the Dutchman gets built upon in the third movie, but it starts in the second. Not just as an idle thought - he's actively pursuing it. Already consciously weighing saving his father vs getting back to Elizabeth as soon as he makes the oath. Everyone is moving forward in Act 2. Their remaining development might stumble for drama, or they might be a bit reluctant, but I know that they know better than to let it stick, because they already faced their true crisis points.

I'm not sure we can say the same about OFMD.

S2 does a good job of adding problems, yeah, but there's not really any movement on fixing them. Our main couple stagnates in some ways, and regresses in others.

Stede opened Act 2 by running away in the middle of the night back to his wife without telling Edward anything. We know he did it because of feeling guilty and his core childhood trauma of his dad calling him a weak and inadequate failure. Now in S1 he actually speedruns a realization of his shitty behavior with Mary, but what about S2? Well...

He continues to not talk to Edward about... pretty much anything. My guy practiced love confessions galore but Edward only finds out about going back to his wife via Anne, and it gets brushed aside with a love confession. He seems to think Edward wants him to be a dashing pirate, or maybe he just thinks he should be a dashing pirate. Idk, it doesn't get examined. Regarding his captaincy, they give him an episode plot about Izzy teaching him to respect the crew's beliefs, but this is sideplot to a larger arc of him completely overruling their traumas and concerns (and shushing their objections) to keep his boyfriend on the ship so. That.

Stede kills a man for reasons related to his issues, shoves that down inside and has sex with Edward instead of acknowledging any bad feelings. At least this time Edward was there and knows it happened? Neither Chauncey's death nor his dad have been mentioned to anyone. He gets a day of piracy fame that goes to his head, gets dumped, and ends on a complete beat down by Zheng where he learns... idk. Being a boor is bad? He's still wildly callous to her in the finale, and spends the whole time seeking validation of his pirate skills. He reunites with Edward, kisses, and quotes Han Solo.

Where S1 ended on a great fuckery, his S2 naval uniform plan after they regroup is ill defined except to call it a suicide mission - and we don't get to see what it would have been because it devolves into a very straightforward fight and flee. And gets Izzy killed. Quick cut funeral (no acknowledgement of his S2 bonding with Izzy), quick cut to wedding (foreshadowing), quick cut to... innkeeper retirement? Unclear when or even if BlackBonnet discussed Stede's whole driving dream to be a pirate and live a life at sea, but I guess that got a big priority downgrade. Despite the fact he was literally looking to Zheng for pirate-based compliments in the post-funeral scene.

I guess he's borderline-delusionally dogged in his pursuit of love now - so unlikely to bolt again - but he's also got at least a decade of experience mentally checking out in a state of repression when he's unhappy. And he's stopped being as supportive and caring toward the crew in that dogged pursuit, while arguably demonstrating a loss in leadership skills, so, um, good thing someone else is in charge?

And if Stede is a mess, Edward's arc is so much worse.

As established, they devote the Kraken to making Edward worse. He literally wants to kill himself and destroy everyone around him in the process because Stede left, and this is fixed by... Stede coming back. That's it. The crew tries to murder him and then exiles him from the ship (and Izzy takes the lead on both, indicating exactly how isolated Edward has become), but it's resolved in half a day by Stede just forcing them to put up with his boyfriend again. Like they think he murdered Buttons and still have to move him back in???

The show consistently depicts Kraken Era as a transgression against the crew, but they also avoid showing Edward acting with genuine contrition. He admits he historically doesn't apologize for anything, and then mostly still doesn't. It's a joke that he's approaching probation as a performance (CEO apology), and then the only person he genuinely talks to is Fang - the one guy cool with him - and the only person who gets a basic "sorry" is Izzy - the guy he really needs to be talking to. Edward's primary trauma is guilt, but apparently he only feels it abstractly after all that? He's only concerned with fixing things with Stede, despite Stede being about the only person around who hurt him instead of the reverse.

Speaking of primary traumas, Edward hating himself doesn't really go anywhere after the beat of self-realization. Apparently Stede still loving him is enough of a bandaid to end the suicide chasing, but he doesn't like. Acknowledge that. Edward is maybe sorta trying to go slow so he doesn't hang all his self-worth on Stede again (you can speculate), but they a) absolutely fail to go slow, and b) he doesn't make any attempt to develop himself or another support structure. Just basically... "let's be friends a bit before hooking back up." And then we get the whiplash that is Blackbeard and/or retirement.

Kraken Era is Blackbeard but way worse, like no one who has known Blackbeard has ever seen him. In the Gravy Basket Edward claims he might like being an innkeeper, before destroying his own fantasy by having the spectre of Hornigold confront him over killing his dad. The BlackBonnet to Anne & Mary parallel says running away to China / retiring makes you want to kill each other - burn it all down and go back to piracy. Stede rightfully points out prior retirement plans were whims. Edward gets sick of the penance sack after a day and puts his leathers back on to go try "poison into positivity". But also claims to be an innkeeper (look - two whole mentions!) when trying not to send children to be pirates after teaching them important knife skills.

Killing Ned Low is a serious, bad thing that prompts ill-advised sex and then going hardcore into retirement mode - leathers overboard, talk about mermaid fantasy, get retirement blessings from Izzy, end up dumping Stede for a fishing job instead of talking about how he's enjoying piracy. The fishing job, however, is also a bad thing and a stupid decision because Edward is a lazy freeloader fantasizing about being a better person. We have an uncomfortable, extended scene of "Pop-Pop" weirdly echoing his abusive dad and then sending Edward to go do what he's good at - disassociate, brutally murder two guys, fish up the leathers, rise as the Kraken from the sea. He continues with comically efficient murder but also he's reading Stede's love letters and seeking to reunite with him so... wait, is this a good thing? Post makeout / mass slaughter he's trading compliments on his kills with Zheng so. Yeah. Looks like it. Murder is fine.

Wait, no, skip ahead and Izzy is dying and Edward suddenly cares a whole lot as Izzy makes his death scene about freeing Edward from Blackbeard. Now being a pirate was "encouraging the darkness" because Izzy - a guy who had little to no influence over Edward's behavior - just couldn't let Blackbeard go. Murder is bad again, and he is freed. Minus the little detail that the murder he explicitly hates himself over was not related to Blackbeard or piracy whatsoever, so presumably haunts "just Ed" still. Anyway he's retiring to run an inn with Stede now, as the "loving family" Izzy comforted him with in his dying moments sails away from the couple that can best be described as the antagonists of their S2 arc. Also Edward implicitly wants to get married. It's been 3 days since making out was "too fast". He's still wearing the leathers.

So most of the way through Act 2 and Edward's barely on speaking terms with anyone but Stede, who he has once again hung his entire life on really fast? Crushing guilt leads to self-hatred leads to mass murder and suicide, but only if he's upset so just avoid that. He's still regularly idealizing Stede as a non-fucked up golden mermaid person (that maybe he personally ruined a bit) because he barely knows the guy. His only progress on his future is "pirate" crossed out / rewritten / crossed out again a few times, "fisherman" crossed out, and "innkeeper ?"

Just.

Where is the forward movement?

It's not just that the inn will undoubtedly fall apart - it's that the inn will fall apart for the near-exact same reasons that China was going to at the beginning of Act 2, and I can't point to anything they've learned in the time since that will help them. I guess Stede realized he loved Edward enough to chase after him, but that was in S1! They should be further than this by now. You can't cram another crisis backslide, all the Act 2 development, and the full Act 3 climax into one season. Certainly not without it feeling like the characters magically fix themselves.

If they just fail and keep blindly stumbling into the same issues because they don't change their behavior, then Act 2 doesn't work. You're just repeating the turning point between Act 1 & Act 2 on a loop.

---

Where Did They Fuck Up?

Actually... lets start on what they did right.

The one consistent aspect of S2 that I praised and still think was done well in a vacuum (despite being mostly left out of the finale) was the crew's union-building arc.

With only 8 episodes and more to do in them than S1, side characters were going to get pinched even if the main plot was absolutely flawless. That was unavoidable. With budget cuts / scheduling issues, we regularly have crew members simply vanish offscreen outside of one scene, meaning cohesive arcs for your faves was not likely. Not to say they couldn't have done better - my benefit of the doubt for the TealOranges breakup and Oluwande x Zheng dried up about when I realized he was literally just her Stede stand-in for the parallel - but something like Jim's revenge plot from S1 was realistically not on the table without, like, turning half the crew into seagulls to afford it.

The union building works around this constraint really well. They turn "the crew" into the side arc, and then weave Izzy's beats in so that they aren't just about Izzy. The breakup boat crew working together to comfort each other and protect him turns them into a unit, and Stede's crew taking it upon themselves to address the trauma vibes while the captains aren't in the way solidifies it across all our side characters. The crew goes to war with Stede's cursed coat and wins, they Calypso their boss to throw a party, and they capitalize on a chance to make bank with an efficiency Stede could only dream of.

We don't get specific arcs, but Frenchie, Jim, and Oluwande are defaulted to as leaders in just about every situation, and Roach is constantly shown sharing his inventions with different characters. Individuals can dip in and out without feeling like the sideplots stutter. Any sense of community in S2 is coming from this arc - even if there are cracks at the points where it joins to other storylines (Stede and Edward, Zheng, etc.)

So why does it work? Well, because it's a workplace comedy, and you can tell they are familiar with working on those. They know where the beats are. They know where to find the humor. They know how to build off of S1 because they made sure the bones were already there - an eclectic group of individuals that start as just coworkers, but bond over time in the face of their struggle against an inept boss who they grow to care for and support while maintaining an increasingly friendly antagonism because, you know, inept boss.

OFMD does its best work in S2 when it's being true to its original concept... and its worst work when it seemingly loses confidence in its own premise.

"The show is the relationship," right? It's a romance set in a workplace comedy. The setup of Act 1 was all about creating a character-driven narrative. So given that... where the hell are we getting the dying of piracy and a war against the English Navy?

That's not a character-driven romcom backdrop, it's an action-adventure plot from Pirates of the Caribbean or Black Sails. It's plot-driven, creating an antagonistic force that results in your characters' problems. Once the story is about the fight against the Empire, the dramatic question becomes the same as those adventure stories - "Will the British Navy defeat piracy, and will our protagonists come out the other side of the battle?"

Forget the wedding. The wedding is no longer the climax of the story, its back to the happy ending flash our romantic subplot gets after winning this fight.

Except, of course, trying to pivot your story to a contradictory dramatic question near the end of Act 2 can be nothing short of a disaster, because either you were writing the wrong story until now, or you've completely lost the plot of the real one. I shouldn't even be trying to figure out if they are doing this, because it should be so obvious that they wouldn't.

And yet.

What do the Zheng and Ricky plots add to the story if not this? Neither of these characters have anything emotionally to contribute to Stede and Edward - they truly are plot elements. It's a hard break from the S1 antagonist model, but it also takes up a lot of valuable screentime. This was considered important, but still Zheng's personality and motivation only gets explored so far as it's an Edward-Stede-Izzy parallel with Oluwande and Auntie, and they only need the parallel for Izzy's genre-jumping death scene. Which follows a thematically out-of-left-field speech about how piracy is about belonging to something good (workable) and how Ricky could never destroy their spirits (um...?). And then David Jenkins is pointing to it and saying things about "the symbolic death of piracy" and speculating S3 might be about the crew getting "payback"??? An idea floated by Zheng right before our temporary retirement, btw.

Fuck, the final episode of S2 didn't have time for our main couple to talk to each other because it was so busy dealing with the mass explosion of Zheng's fleet and Ricky's victory gloat. We get lethal violence associated with traumatic flashbacks until they need to cut down enemy mooks like it's nothing, at which point we get jokes with Zheng. The Republic of Pirates is destroyed outright, and it feels like they only did it because they got insecure about their "pirate story" not having the right kind of stakes. Don't even get me started on killing a major character because "Piracy’s a dangerous occupation, and some characters should die," as if suspending disbelief on this aspect makes the story somehow lesser, instead of just being a fairly standard genre convention in comedy. Nobody complains about Kermit the Frog having an improbably good survival record.

Did someone tell them that the heroes have to lose a battle near the end of Act 2, so they scrambled to give them one?

Just... compare the wholly plot-driven struggle in 2x08 to Stede and Edward's character-focused storylines in 1x10 and tell me how 2x08 is providing anything nearly as valuable to the story. Because I can't fucking find it.

At best they wasted a bunch of time on a poorly integrated adventure plot as, like, Zheng's backstory or something, and just fucked it up horribly by trying to "step up" the kind of plot they did for Jim. In which case the whole thing will be awkwardly dropped but damage is done. Otherwise, they actually thought they could just casually add a subplot like this because they've done something wildly stupid like think "pirate" is a genre on the same level as "workplace comedy" and can just trample in-universe coherency while you draw on other media to shore up their unsupported beats.

Bringing us to the most infuriating bit...

---

"...end the second season in a kinder spot."

If this was the goal, the entire season was written to work actively against it in way that is baffling and incompetent.

The really ironic thing is that the reason that the Act 2 part typically gets a downer ending is because of the evil empire that OFMD did not have to deal with until they pointlessly added it. A plot-driven story has an antagonistic force - a villain - that the heroes need to defeat. Something external working against them. The story ends when they beat the thing, and it's not much of a climax if they do most of the defeating before you get there. Ergo, they have to be outmatched up to the climax. Ergo, the second part cannot end on them feeling pretty comfortable and confident going into the third.

The same rules do not apply in the same way to a character-driven arc.

We already established Edward and Stede declaring their love is not the end of the story. Nor, necessarily, is both of them confidently entering a relationship. Even once they've developed a bunch they will have to show that development by running into the kinds of problems that would have broken them up before and resolving them better.

David Jenkins keeps talking about this idea that S2 is getting a hopeful open ending and S3 will get into potential problems, and like... I don't see any reason why they couldn't have done that successfully. They didn't, but they could've.

If S2 grew them enough as characters and then had them agree to try again in the last minute of the finale, they absolutely could have had a kind and hopeful ending where you were confident they could do it. And then a potential S3 can show that. It's a bit rockier than they were counting on, but they have learned enough lessons to not break up. And then the overall plot can build to proposal (start of Act 3) and wedding (the romantic climax). It doesn't have to be a blow out fight to be emotionally cathartic.

(Hell, the main rockier bit that they overcome in the S3 Act 2 portions could be marriage baggage. I'm sure they both have some. It would work.)

In the same way focusing on our character's long term flaws and character-driven conflict makes an Act 1 "happy ending" more difficult, I suspect it makes an Act 2 "happy ending" easier.

Instead they wrote an Act 2 that failed to convincingly start development and got confused on its direction, and then presented a rushed finale ending in a copy of the predictable disaster from S1 as though it's a good thing. They yanked the story at least temporarily into an awkward place where a romcom is trying to sell me on a bunch of serious drama / adventure beats that it has not put the work into, and inviting comparisons to better versions of those same beats in other, more suited media that make it look worse. The need to portray everyone as reaching happy closure overrules sitting with a major character death and using it for any narrative significance, while still letting it overshadow those happy endings because a romcom just sloppily killed a major character with a wound they've literally looked into the camera and said was harmless.

If I'm being entirely honest, Dead Man's Chest ends effectively at Jack Sparrow's funeral and then cuts to the British Navy obtaining a weapon of mass destruction, and it still feels kinder and more hopeful just because I leave with more faith the characters are actively capable of and working toward solving their problems.

OFMD S2, in contrast, has half-convinced me our main couple would live in a mutually obsessed, miscommunication-ridden horror story until they die.

---

Additional Reading

Normally I link stuff like this in the post, but that requires more excitement than I'm feeling right now. Here's my alternative:

Where I thought they were going with Edward - really outlines the mountain of character development they still have unaddressed

Where I thought they were going with Izzy - touches on a lot of themes that might be dead in the water & also context that's still probably relevant to why Izzy got a lot of focus in S2

My scattershot 2x08 reactions

An ask where I sketched out the bones of this argument, and another where I was mostly venting about the fandom response

This one, this other one, and this last one (read the link in op's post too) about genre shifts and failure to pull them off

The trauma goes in the box but it never opens back up - the whole point of Act 2 is that they needed to start opening shit like that - and also they focus so much on needed character growth and so little on following through

They can't even carry through on character growth that we got last season???

Why Izzy's death feels like Bury Your Gays ran smack into shitty writing

EDIT: Oh and this post is REALLY good for outlining the lack of change in way less words than I did

#our flag means death #ofmd #ofmd s2 #ofmd s2 spoilers #ofmd meta #three act structure #character arcs #blackbonnet #genre #blackbeard ofmd #stede bonnet ofmd #my meta #ladyluscinia #ofmd critical

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willlic · 1 month

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My fiance and I were blabbing about potential one piece movie ideas last night and I'm obsessed with this one idea and I know it will never happen but FUCK I wish it would. So basically the premise is its a normal fantastical high stakes adventure for the strawhats, that doesn't change. Plot beats don't change either. But, the twist is its all from usopps perspective. Not like literal looking theough his eyes, but focused on him, and his experience. Generally as a character he notices everything, it's his job to be the sniper, and that paired with anxiety makes usopp hyper aware of his surroundings, the crew members, and where they're at. Idk if you guys have noticed, but unless he's super into a hobby or something he's doing for fun, he's super aware of everyone and their emotional state, safety, his environment etc. That's part of why he's scared all the time, he's very risk aware. So the movie would be showcasing that basically. You would see his strategy options he debates and why, the things he notices about crew members, and get a good look at his internal workings and his perspective of his crew members and their capabilities. And because he values them highly, it will end up having these moments of appreciation when he's observing their strengths. But the story would be his perspective, his experience as he's running around, his thought process and concerns for others that motivate his behavior etc. It wouldn't jump to other characters, just show his story. And after my fiance was done describing the opening scene and its cool details(I won't even try, he did it so beautifully and I can't recreate it) I was like "wait, so are we basically describing 'the zeppo' buffy episode but just usopp instead of Xander as a premise?" And he was like, "oh my God, yes. That's the one where the world is ending but we just follow Xander around and see his highjinx and emotional journey of recognizing his value right?" "Yes, and by the end he doesn't need other people to see his value, or know his experience because he sees it himself and that's good enough." Anyways I'm obsessed with this idea now and desperately wish it would be a real movie. Usopp is such an undervalued character and his scenes are framed as comedic even when he's really cool. This could break that form(slightly, it would still be fun but he wouldn't be comedic releif) and also could showcase characters like nami and chopper as well. Usopp sees their value as well and I don't think namis fights in this would be reduced to just using thunderbolt tempo etc.

#usopp #one piece #god usopp #one piece movie #btvs #the zeppo #btvs episode the zeppo #xander harris #usopp-centric #i wish this was real #cat burglar nami #nami #tony tony chopper

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grapebritain · 7 days

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Jax is not an npc

I've seen the idea of Jax being an npc being floated around after ep2's release, which while i ADORE this idea in concept (as some parts of it explain certain parts of his character )that doesn't mean that this is the answer as to why Jax is the way he is.

Jax is a self absorbed, sarcastic, and non-serious character who seems to know far more than he actually should so far with what we've seen. He is the only human who has broke the forth wall , not just once, but twice, and has a very performative 'vibe' to him. Like he's on some sort of stage a bit like Cain does. Due to this, and with the plot of episode 2, people have drew the conclusion that this MUST mean Jax is an npc which, eventho it is deffo plausible , there are several reasons why i do not think this is the case, and people are trying to jump to conclusion too quickly to find an explanation to these questions.

1.Pop culture reference

Jax in episode 2 makes an offhaded joke about Charlie and the chocolate factory, a popular piece of media that most people do know about. It seems pretty insignificant but boy is this a really important detail.

With the recent release of other teasers of the next episodes that are yet to come, in terms of copyrighted media showing up in the game, we can see that Cain INTENTIONALLY makes off branded versions of popular parts of our world such as McDonalds and other fast food brands

So for Jax to make a pop culture references, the names would likely have to be inaccurate from the actual piece of media, being...well...off branded versions of them. The fact he literally uses the accurate name "Augustus Gloop" adding an "ed" on the end for comedic effect shows that he HAS seen or heard of the actual piece of media, which would be impossible if he was an npc.

furthermore, say even the offbranded version was due to glitch themselves not being able to use actual brands in the show visually (which is also highly likely), the implication that Cain made an ai that was aware of these sorts of things is almost nonsensical considering that gummigoo didn't know anything outside of the established plot he needed to serve his in game purpose. When another npc doesn't even have a visual memory of his own mother, something closely linked to the established motive of an npc, why would Cain give an ncp knowledge of random pop culture reference for no reason ?

i would say this is a pretty strong point to put the argument forward Jax is not an npc.

2.NPC's immersive feature

this point is a little less strong, but is still a very important one to make.

I think people are forgetting that Gummigoo is intentionally meant to be far more immersive compared to pervious ai. We are going on the basis of Jax being an ncp , based on how intelligent Gummigoo is, which with the timeline we have, would not exactly work out that way.

Obviously, Cain establishing that the ai SHOULD be more immersive, doesn't mean it will be, but if we take into context the episode prior, it does actually seem to be somewhat more advanced in a way than it wasn't before, dialogue being a bit less generic and more fluid . With the consideration this is only Pomni's second adventure, and the ai already seemingly at least, being far better than the last, that could imply that going back a couple of adventures before Pomnis arrival , this ai was much more primitive.

Looking at when Jax arrived could give us some idea of how good the ai was at the time, and with gooseworx establishing jax arriving before zooble (who already seems to have grumpily adjusted to the world) , i would imagine that Jax, if he was an npc, would be far less advanced then he currently is and much more one dimensional as a character to hint at him being an npc....which brings me onto my next point.

3."Jax is violent and impulsive " argument

I've seen the occasional argument that Jax being violent and impulsive could be an argument for him being an npc. He realized he has no purpose, so started being violent and uncaring of the world around him, but this argument completely disregards the fact that...the human characters kind of have that 'reality shattering' moment too. Pomni does, which is why she can relate in the first place to Gummigoo.

All of the human characters have to come to the scary realization that, they are stuck here. Stuck in a fake world. Most of the characters draw closer to each other people that are real because of this as some form of comfort such as Pomni and Ragatha, but Jax is own person, and different people react differently to different situations. Jax just happens to react in a rather emotionally distanced way to the seriousness of the situation.

He seems to be the most emotionally immature character, so it makes complete sense as to why he would react in an immature manner. Not to mention he is the youngest out of all the cast, and may have been even younger when entering the digital circus.

When an emotionally immature, impulsive , frankly not very morally amazing person is told they can basically do whatever they like with little to no repercussions to their actions, what are they going to do? Cause chaos of course, which is exactly what Jax does.

he even more so causes chaos by breaking one of the only rules he's can't break, the whole keeping everything family friendly.

This seems to be his way of coping with the situation and seriousness at hand, brushing it aside and acting impulsively instead because he knows full well he couldn't do this in the real world, it also keep him emotionally distant from everyone else, which seems to be an intentional move by him as he doesn't go to Kaufmo's funeral despite briefly seeming upset about the matter.

He cares in his own weird way, but he refuses to show that to the rest of the cast (unimportant but i wanna add as well, it is common for men to be emotionally closed off due to the idea vulnerability for men esp is a bad thing, which ofc it is not ).

Which also builds up off my pervious point that despite his exterior, Jax isn't one dimensional or flat as a character, which if he was an old ai npc he probably would be 1d, and we wouldn't have this small moment of slight care from him, despite still trying to stay distant.

Final thoughts

So what about the forth wall breaking? him owning keys to all the rooms? Well quite honestly, i don't think we know enough about him or anyone to fully know why Jax is the only one to do this. It could be for some deep lore meaning, or it could be simply he is the comic relief character so is the one to do this more consistently than the rest.

Personally, i DO think it's something deeper, what that deeper thing is yet is something i'm sure will be explored in future episodes, but rn, i think jumping at the first thing is not an amazing idea (eventho it is a super interesting and exciting one).

Just thought i'd share my feelings as this is the only theory i've seen around rn abt my fav stupid purple bunny.

#the amazing digital circus #tadc theory #jax theory #tadc jax #jax npc #jax is not an npc #npc tadc

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demiaroacejolynekujo · 7 days

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The Amazing Digital Circus Episode 2 Review

Warning: This post contains spoilers for the second episode of The Amazing Digital Circus. If you haven't seen the episode, please skip this post and watch the episode before reading this post.

This post also contains critical commentary about Vivziepop. If you're a Vivziepop stan, please do not interact with me. Critical fans and antis are welcome to interact. Reblogs on this post are turned off to prevent Vivziepop stans from interacting with me.

If you're a Vivziepop stan and try to interact with me by sending a PM or tagging me in a post, you'll be instantly blocked. Any asks sent by Vivziepop stans will be deleted.

I didn't find out that TADC had another episode out until Saturday night while I was preparing for my morning shift at work. I decided to watch the new episode before bed and wasn't disappointed at what I watched.

The episode starts with Pomni having a nightmare before Ragatha woke her up. Poor girl can't catch a break after what she went through in the first episode.

And now, for the main event of the episode. Caine assigned the crew to a mission to return the maple syrup that was stolen for a candy kingdom by a small group of gummy gator bandits. I also got some nostalgia feels for the episode as I grew up watching Adventure Time, and the candy themed kingdom reminded me of the Candy Kingdom from Adventure Time.

The chase scene was extremely hilarious, and I felt bad that poor Pomni had to try to keep the bandits from going away. If only Jax actually did something instead of antagonizing her. Gotta say that Jax is one lovable prick.

It made me sad that after Pomni and Gummigoo had their little bonding moment, Caine was like, "nope" and Thanos'd Gummigoo from entering the circus. But after that episode, I wonder what Gooseworx has planned for Caine. Will he end up being the big bad guy in the show? His role is to be some sort of ringleader, after all. I'm looking forward to the future episodes to come.

To end my thoughts about the new episode, I did like that the ending shows Pomni slowly starting to get comfortable with the others. I know Gooseworx said that she doesn't plan on shipping the characters, but maybe she might reconsider it with Pomni and Ragatha. But either or is fine. Gooseworx has the right to do whatever she wants with the show.

I've also mentioned at the very beginning of the post that I will add some critical commentary about Vivziepop. So I might as well address everything now.

I believe I've said this in my post about my thoughts on the first episode about The Amazing Digital Circus, which is that Gooseworx doesn't rely heavily on excess amount of swearing to make her content funny. I still got a good laugh out of watching the new episode. I also like how Gooseworx hired indie voice actors for the show, and it shows that you don't need voice actors who have been in the industry for years to get people to consume your work. Also, last time I checked, the new episode got over 30 million views on YouTube.

Another thing is that I really like how the characters are designed. I'm curious if there is any significance for the roles the TADC crew will play during the future of the show. For example, Pomni is in a Jester outfit, and I'm curious how it will affect her role in the show. And it's obvious that Caine, being the ringleader of the crew, by having him wear a suit and top hat to show that. Meanwhile, Vivziepop seems to rehash similar character designs for the rest of her characters, which, in my opinion, makes her characters look dull looking. Viv has the potential to create really well designed characters as shown with her past work. And I wish she could improve that in the future.

Lastly, the writing. I know The Amazing Digital Circus only has two episodes, but the writing is far better than Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss combined. The Amazing Digital Circus stays consistent to the plot by showing the crew going to various parts of the universe they're in to complete their missions. I will admit that the plot of Hazbin Hotel is somewhat consistent as it shows Charlie trying to redeem sinners on top of the threat of Heaven. My biggest concern with Hazbin is that whenever Season two comes around, I'm worried that Vivziepop will sideline Charlie's mission to redeem sinners and help maintain the population of hell to either filler episodes or deter the main plot by focusing heavily on heaven or things that are not significant to the plot of Hazbin Hotel.

And then there's Helluva Boss. The show was promoted being about a group of imp mercenaries doing kill jobs. It wasn't until Viv decided it would be a "brilliant" to show that the main plot aside to focus on Stolas and Blitzo's "relationship" (even though I don't consider that a relationship due to how predatory Stolas is towards Blitz and something similar to Angel Dust and Valentino).

To close this post, I would like to say that The Amazing Digital Circus is what both Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss could be, despite TADC only having two episodes. If Vivziepop hired indie voice actors, worked more on her character designs, rethink how she writes both Hazbin and Helluva Boss, and works on giving her female characters the character development they deserve, then maybe I'll rewatch them in the future. However, the problem is that Viv doesn't really handle criticism well and relies on her fans to protect her. She's a grown woman, and she doesn't need other people to fight her own battles. If she can't handle that as a content creator, then maybe she should either step down from her position as the lead of HH and HB or consider taking a hiatus and have her work on herself.

But anyways, that's was I gotta say. The second episode of TADC was a fun watch, and I'm looking forward to what Gooseworx has in store for her viewers.

#the amazing digital circus #tadc #gooseworx #anti hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel criticism #hazbin hotel critical #hazbin hotel critique #anti helluva boss #helluva boss criticism #helluva boss critique #helluva boss critical #anti stolitz #anti vivziepop #vivziepop critical #vivziepop criticism #vivziepop critique

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kidnappedbycartoons · 10 months

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I'm bored, so it's time to talk about Zutara. Again. I already talked about their connection while in the catacombs.

But what about after that?In the beginning of book 3, they are apart for the most part. Something interesting to me is that right after Zuko helps Azula defeat the gaang, he's on his way back to the Fire Nation and Mai comes to talk to him. She asks him if he's cold, to which Zuko begins to open up a bit. He tells her that he has a lot on his mind, he wonders what has changed, he wonders how he has changed. Now, we have never seen Zuko open up like this before. Actually, no, scratch that. We did see Zuko open up like this before when he was in the catacombs with Katara. And how did she respond to this? With warmth, with understanding, with compassion. But how does his canon love interest respond to this? She yawns, tells him to stop worrying, is sarcastic, and then kisses him. Do you not see the difference?

In the following episodes, the gang is hiding in the Fire Nation. I just want to point out these episodes because, I'm not saying that it was her talk with Zuko that influenced a part of this, but it is very interesting to see how involved Katara gets with the Fire Nation. She is excited to wear their clothes, she participates in the dance, she helps out the people in the village by donning a disguise heavily associated with their culture, etc. I just want to point this out, because a common criticism about them as a couple is that Katara would want nothing to do with the Fire Nation due to her trauma and it's like...baby, did you watch the show?

Now, when Zuko tries to join the gaang, obviously he's turned down. What's interesting is that, out of all of them, Katara is the one most against it. Which makes sense, she feels personally betrayed by him. She even admits that after their conversation in the catacombs, she felt sorry for him and trusted him. We all remember that conversation she had with him at the end of the Western Air Temple episode. This Katara and Catacombs Katara are different. If Zuko said that he wanted to join the gaang at the end of book two, I'm almost positive he would not have gotten this threat from Katara. We all saw that episode. We saw how they connected. We saw how they opened up to each other. No, he would not have gotten that threat from Katara. The reason why she is like this towards him is because she feels personally betrayed after she trusted him and opened up to him while they were in the catacombs. The pirates, the necklace, chasing down the Avatar, those have nothing to do with this. It is because of what happened in those catacombs.

Interestingly enough, for someone that doesn't trust him that well, she definitely has no problem letting her brother and the Avatar go off with him on missions alone. And each time they came back, they were fine. With these little adventures, she was slowly starting to see a new side of Zuko. Another thing, which should be apparent in the GIF above this paragraph. In the Southern Raiders episode, when Zuko is falling from the sky, who is it that reaches out to catch him? Katara. The one that trust him the least out of the group. The one that feels personally betrayed by him. The one that threatened to end his life. She is the one that reaches out to catch him. And it's in her character, I cannot see her willingly letting somebody fall to their death. But, I just want it very interesting that out of all those people on Appa, it was her that reached out for him.

I'm not going to talk about the whole episode here. I could do a whole breakdown of that. But I just wanted to bring up these moments here. It's the little things.

#atla #avatar: the last airbender #zutara #atla katara #atla zuko

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getcuboned · 3 months

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The hardest thing for a show to do without absolutely Destroying its audience's belief in stakes is fake out deaths. It happens all the time during a season or even series finale: A main character dies, but then is revealed to be mildly/moderately/extremely hurt (throw a dart).

All the emotional payoff a character dying is immediately followed up with a cathartic return of a beloved figure. When its done right, it's Effective. That's why it was so popular, that and another reason.

The other reason is that its relatively Easy. It doesn't require the writers to change the status quo. Silly fun adventures with the gang go on as always without any real changes. This is so Cost and Idea effective, that it got overused and now everyone is jaded.

Now there's good ways to do this of course. AtLA comes to mind: Genuine threat of death, maguffin from last season finale which has been haunting the previous episodes comes into play, and the status quo changes: Aang is recovering from a serious injury for weeks, is furious that he died and failed Again when the world needed him, and he can't tap into god mode anymore.

So what's this got to do with the tags? Well if you know you know. Otherwise spoiler warning so gtfo already.

Sir Pentious, and I suspect Adam, did die a fakeout death, but the death part was genuine. Sir Pentious was not found in the rubble of the Hotel. Sir Pentious didn't respawn and explain that Adam's divine energy beams weren't angelic steel. Sir Pentious was Genuinely dead and the status quo has genuinely changed.

But! The show's premise is that the Hotel can help sinners redeem themselves. Redeption isn't a reward you seek. Its a condition that one meets on a personal, individual level. Sir Pentious came to the Hotel as a spy, and when he was shown that Charlie was willing to forgive him, it changed his understanding of the world. He realized that he could improve, it just starts with one good sorry.

Sir Pentious put aside his self loathing, his shame, his anxieties. He used his inventions to put himself on the line rather than keep himself out of danger (I mean that's what the airship is all about isn't it?). He fought for the people he cared about. He died to protect the ones he loved. And that transformation: from a paranoid worm of a human being (slimy? Snakes are not slimy), to an actualized individual willing to put himself on the line, earned him salvation.

Now Sir Pentious is an Angel! He's in Heaven! Even more so he bypassed the Pearly Gates and functionally respawned In the Seraphim's boardroom. Frankly He was one of the older sinners to be around so it doesn't surprise me the implication that he's powerful enough be worth the notice of the Seraphims.

So what about Adam? Why do I mention him? He was killed by a filthy janitor. Well. As another post mentioned: In the 10,000 years that Adam has been in charge of killing his own descendants because Lilith and Eve (where the fuck is she anyway?) screwed him over with the assistance of a short, dumb, naive angel (poor guy just wanted to share his ideas, look at him. 10,000 years later and he's hardly got a drop of malice in him that isn't put there by someone else), Adam has become Prideful, Slothful, Lustful, and Wrathful. Even one of those is enough to make you fall. Yet he was tolerated by heaven, most likely due to his extenuating circumstances.

Adam has died. He died full of Wrath, and Pride. He died because he was unmotivated to come up with a better solution, and unwilling to keep himself in shape. He died because of his Blood Lust.

So I think that very early on in season two, we will get to see Adam's demonic form.

Two fakeout deaths! But not really. Both characters have provably died and both (theoretically) will create a new status quo not just by dying, but by reincarnating across enemy lines.

#hazbin hotel spoilers #sir pentious #hazbin hotel #writing advice #hazbin adam #lucifer #hazbin lilith #hazbin eve

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everythingisround · 6 months

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info dump about raggedy ann and andy, just recently watched the show and i am in love B))

hello!! ive been in the fandom for two and a half years (almost three lol), so i know a bit about raggedy ann and andy.

so raggedy ann and andy were created in the early 20th century, the former sibling coming first with her patent in september 1915. the most popular legend surrounding her creation is that she was based off an old rag doll that belonged to creator johnny gruelle's mother/sister (can't remember exactly), who he then drew a face on and gave to his beloved daughter, marcella, who sadly would pass away months after ann's patent. marcella's inclusion in the raggedy books has been seen by many raggedy historians as johnny working through his grief by immortalizing his daughter's likeness in his stories to remember her in a positive way. andy came around in august 1920 and is said to have been created with johnny's sons, worth and richard, in mind.

the 1977 film is probably where a lot of the younger fans first became interested in raggedy ann (well, that and tadc, and even then gooseworx is a pretty big fan of the film and even specifically based jax's voice on raggedy andy from the film), although the 1986 broadway musical has also been bringing a lot of people in through tumblr and tiktok. the film, despite ultimately flopping at the box office, had the esteemed richard williams at the helm of the animation, even animating the ever so popular "no girl's toy" sequence. of course, richard williams being richard williams, went way overbudget and way past the deadline and ended up being removed from the project just so it could get released. considering the composer of the film, joe raposo, theorized that the film flopping had something to do with the first star wars movie being released around the same time, it's interesting to think about how the raggedy film's fate could've been altered if it had released the year prior for america's bicentennial. the 1986 musical is a whole other can of worms, and im still learning a lot about it from being in the RARE server (which you should definitely check out, wink wink nudge nudge), but to summarize, a combination of a development team constantly at the brink of self-destruction, constant adherence to a family-friendly atmosphere spurred by parental concerns despite the dark themes playwright william gibson intended the story to have, and too much of the budget spent on expensive special effects that nearly killed the actors led to the musical notoriously flopping on broadway and ending its run prematurely never to be seen or heard from again. or so they thought.......

although the 1986 musical is considered a failure in the united states, over in russia, the story has a small cult following amongst childrens and community theatre productions. basically, in 1985, the musical was brought to the USSR as part of a cultural exchange between the two superpowers, and considering that russians had not been familiarized with raggedy ann or her cultural impact up until this point, this led to the rag doll and her friends not being seen as cheap americana, but rather somewhat of a childrens fable (ironic, considering raggedy ann as a character was born from johnny gruelle's stories...). because of this, russian productions of rag dolly (the 1986 musical) are plentiful, with even some very recent productions popping up every now and then. it should be noted that these productions rarely contain the original songs; sometimes the story will just be played straight with no music, while other productions will substitute the lack of musical songs with their own music. this can lead to some..... interesting results lol

i feel it is also important to bring up the various other adaptations of raggedy ann, too! there's the original books, of course, but if you're an animation nerd like me, there's the 1941 fleischer short (which takes some.... interesting creative liberties from the original source material), the two noveltoons shorts, the chuck jones holiday specials from 1978 and 79, the 1980s cartoon (watch at your own risk lol), and the two snowden specials from 1998; one is just a straightforward direct-to-vhs animated special, while the second is a full ice show with animated segments dispersed throughout. you get to see raggedy elvis! who doesnt want to see raggedy elvis?

in this last section ill just toss to you a bunch of links i recommend if you wanna learn more about raggedy ann beyond the movie!

(i should also probably mention now that some books and adaptations of raggedy ann feature racial stereotypes- i know suddenly its spring has a racial caricature in terms of adaptations specifically- likely due to the culture at the time. these depictions are obviously not right, but sadly when we're talking about a franchise that has been around for over a century, it's kind of unavoidable especially in the older books, so just be aware that those depictions will come up occasionally.)

youtube

my pal brooklyn is also working on a more extensive video on raggedy ann history, so be on the lookout for that when it comes out :)

#raggedy ann #raggedy andy #raggedy ann and andy #raggedy ann and andy a musical adventure #rag dolly #rag dolly musical #charlie’s last remaining brain cells fighting for survival

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imagines--galore · 2 months

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||Mind Over Matter|| Part Thirteen

Summary: Evelyn is Penelope Garcia’s protégé. She is a tech wiz, and knows her way around any kind of security and just like her mentor knows how to dig deep and get into the past of anyone and has a knack for anything with a chip in it. Including potato chips. The one thing she fails at is figuring out is the mind and how it works.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Evelyn Richardson(OC)

Rating || Genres || Warnings: T+ Romance. Adventure. Family. Some language, blood and violence in later installments.

Previously - Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve

A/N: Well what do you know! Heres another chapter. Random moments happening in between episode really. And please lemme know what you think! Hope you enjoy this chapter!

Takes place during Season 2 Episodes 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 & 8

A low humming sound filled the air as Evelyn put away the last of her files, having gone through them already. They were the files for the Team's most recent case. And Evelyn was of course, in charge of putting them away. One of her minor duties as part of the BAU Team along with being assistant techie. A position that hadn't been randomly made up by her mentor. Stepping out of the room and locking the door behind her, she very nearly bumped into the figure that was rushing by. Rather she did bump into them and instantly started to apologize.

"I'm sorry, I didn't see where I was-"

"Evelyn? What're you doing down here?" The red head blinked, finally catching on who she'd bumped into.

"Spencer?" Her instant reaction was curiosity as she stared at her team member, trying to figure out what was new with him. Spencer stared back at her quizzically and questioningly, raising an eyebrow at her. Realization dawned and the red head grinned.

"You got a hair cut!" Instantly his hand went up to run his fingers through his hair, a nervous habit, Evelyn had noted long ago. "Yeah, I figured it was time to get a new look." The genius replied with a shrug. "So what're you doing here?" He asked, coming back to his previous question.

"I had to box away a few files." She responded with a small smile. "It is part of my job to clean after you guys." She added with a teasing tone, prompting him to smile back at her. Blue eyes flickered to his newly cut hair.

And unable to resist Evelyn reached out to gently run her fingers through the ends of his hair, having pushed herself up to the toes of her shoes so she could reach easily. The position pressed her a little close to him, but neither of them seemed to notice as she smiled at him. "I like it. You look cute."

Cute.

She'd just called him cute!

As if the realization of her words just hit her, Evelyn stepped back, cheeks flushing, a nervous smile playing at her lips as she avoided Spencer's gaze who only looked back at her which she found more cuter then his haircut. Like that of a confused puppy. The red head however did make the mistake of looking at him, and instantly regretted it as her heart sped up and her voice reached new levels of high pitch as she quickly managed to squeak out a goodbye before dashing past him, leaving a slightly confused Spencer, who was confused by her behavior to say the least, yet none the less pleased at her words.

Evelyn for her part avoided Spencer for the entire day.

Of course they were both back to discussing(arguing) over a new theory the very next day.

Though Evelyn still felt that strange warmth in her cheeks any time their eyes would accidentally meet and she would be reminded of the little run in a few days ago.

So embarrassing!

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JJ traced the tip of her finger along the rim of her coffee mug. She was sitting on a stool in a little café a few miles from the office and was waiting for Evelyn to show up. Said red head was making her way towards her friend, holding her own coffee mug and setting it on the small table between them, before hoping onto the stool as well. Outside rain splattered against the glass window of the café, the coldness of it seeping through the window, one that both women felt, yet neither minded. They had their coffees to help keep them warm.

"So how did the assignment go?" JJ asked, once she'd taken a small sip of her beverage.

Evelyn gave a small nod. "It went well. And that is all I can tell you." She said with a slightly pointed look to which JJ chuckled.

"Right! Top secret, I know." The red head gave a low chuckle, before taking a sip of her own drink, frowning as the steam from the coffee fogged up her glasses. Handing her friend a tissue with a smile of sympathy she watched as she wiped the glasses clean.

"So what was it you wanted to tell me?" JJ asked. Evelyn sighed before reaching into her bag and pulling out a magazine from her bag and placing it in front of the blonde. JJ pulled the magazine closer, frowning at the bold title that greeted her in big bold letters.

NEW YORK SOCIALITE EXPECTING.

"After five years of marriage." JJ glanced up at the red head sitting across from her, who had her lips pursed as she stared at the image of the smiling woman on the cover. Along with a man, who was obviously her husband, going by the way they had their arms wrapped around each other. JJ bit her bottom lip before she sighed and reached out to lay a hand atop Evelyn's in a gentle grip.

"I've tried everything I could JJ. But she still refuses to listen to me. Even Gideon has tried to help but she's just so stubborn." Evelyn sounded almost heartbroken as she spoke, finally raising her eyes to meet JJ's gaze.

"I don't know what I did to her JJ, but I wish there was some way I could find out." Her friend sighed.

"I know you're trying Evelyn, but sometimes one person's effort isn't enough. The other party has to put in some effort as well." The younger woman sighed before nodding. "I know, but I was just hoping if I did my best it would get something out of her."

Her gaze, which she now focused on JJ was desperate and hopeless. "Why are people so hard to figure out JJ?" The other woman sighed and shook her head, squeezing the hand she held.

"It's a good thing that we have the BAU then isn't it?" The small joke prompted a smile out of Evelyn. "I wish I could ask their help but I don't want this turning into a professional thing. Its why I've only ever talked to Gideon about it. Penelope doesn't know either, and she's my mentor."

JJ frowned. "Then why tell me?" Blue eyes blinked as they caught JJ's. "Because you asked." The response had a wry smile pulling at JJ's lips, which had Evelyn smiling back and shaking her head.

"I don't know JJ. I'm still surprised I even told you about all of it. But I'm glad I did. It doesn't seem as much of a burden as it did before." JJ smiled at the response. "And I will gladly help wherever and whenever I can."

The smile she was given, sent a surge of affection and protectiveness through the older woman. She understood what Morgan had meant when she spoke to him about Evelyn. There was something so….pure about the red head that a person wanted nothing more then to protect her. Or as Penelope said, wrap her up in a bubble sheet and store her away someplace safe.

"Now! On to other topics, is there anyone you're seeing these days?" The groan of dismal she was rewarded prompted her to laugh loudly, one which Evelyn joined in soon after.

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Morgan suddenly slammed his file shut a thought occurring to him. The motion caused Penelope to look away from her screen and frown at him. "What?" The blonde asked. Though he turned his head towards her, his eyes were still trained towards the floor, though they were unseeing.

"Have you ever realized that Reid and Evelyn have the same glass frames?" Penelope looked taken aback at the question. She opened her mouth to say something but then closed it as Morgan finally met her gaze and raised an eyebrow as if questioning her.

"Coincidence?" The blonde suggested, looking and feeling uncertain.

"More like unconscious retention?" The confused look had him explaining further. "Basically he picked them out unconsciously because he's seen Evelyn wear them all the time." Penelope frowned. "He sees me wearing glasses all the time." Her hand raised to touch the side of her own glasses which were a bright orange that day. Morgan nodded.

"Yeah, but you change them all the time. Evelyn never did." Penelope sighed before shrugging and turning back to her computers.

"Unconscious retention it is then." She muttered under her breath before starting to type away on her keyboard. Morgan went back to his own files, pushing the observation to the back of his head.

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Cupping her hands around the paper cup she watched it scrunch between her fingers. It was more out of worry and sadness then anything else.

"I take it you heard." Evelyn glanced up just in time to see Gideon take Spencer's unaccompanied desk chair and turn it towards her. The red head shrugged.

"More like saw." Both their gaze turned towards the desk that had been previously taken by Elle. It was completely clear now.

"Its for the best." Evelyn's gaze snapped to look at Gideon. "She knew she couldn't handle the pressure any longer." She only nodded in agreement her face grim.

"Still, doesn't make it any easier does it?" Her superior shook his head at her question.

"Leaving is never easy. Neither is letting go." At that he gave her a slightly pointed look which she countered with a sad smile.

"No. Its never easy."

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Hotch glanced up from where he had been signing up the last of his papers to see his wife enter the bullpen. Pushing Jack's pram in front of her. He frowned. Hailey was meant to take Jack to her mother's for the night so that the two of them could go on a date. Quickly standing up he met his wife midway as she walked to his office. "Hailey? Is everything alright?" He asked, once he'd greeted her hello and smiled at his son who made delighted sounds at the sight of his father.

His wife nodded. "Yes, only my mom won't be able to look after Jack for the night. She has a cold, and Jack might catch it." Hotch sighed at the news, looking disappointed. "Great, now what?" He grumbled to which his wife shrugged helplessly. "I called the babysitter, but she's out too." The night was getting better and better with each second.

"Agent Hotch! I managed to scrounge up those reports you asked for. Who in their right mind would file them under X instead of Y when clearly it's a Z and-oh hello Mrs Hotchner! I didn't see you there! Is everything alright?" The woman only ever came when there was something going on, and for a minute Evelyn's heart stopped out of terror. But then restarted once the older woman smiled at her.

"Everything is fine Evelyn. Aaron and I just hit a bit of a snag, since we can't go on our date." The red head frowned, even as Hotch pursed his lips, thinking of the reservations that he would have to cancel.

"Oh? Why is that?" Seemingly catching sight of Jack the red head was quick to move forward and wave at the baby, who seemed fixated on Evelyn's hair. "No babysitter." At the answer Evelyn shrugged.

"I can look after him for a few hours. I used to babysit around the neighborhood when I was a teen."

And that was how Evelyn found herself holding a baby in one arm, the other holding up two baby bags. She turned her head to look at Jack who was looking right back with a fistful of her hair in his chubby fingers.

"That went well didn't it?" The baby only responded with a giggle before proceeding to pull at her hair, making her wince.

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For once the Team had the chance to eat together in their little conference room. Chinese take out boxes were set atop the table while they all assembled chairs around it. "I love take out with you guys. Its always so much fun." Penelope said with a grin as she settled into her chair and reached for her box.

"Hey, where're the other three?" Morgan asked, glancing up from his box of chicken. Spencer shrugged through his mouthful of rice. JJ answered for him.

"Gideon had someplace to go, Hotch had a dinner date with Hailey, and Evelyn is-"

"And this is where your Daddy and the rest of the Team are briefed about the cases." The four of them stared as Evelyn entered the room with an inquisitive baby Jack, staring around with wide eyes. The woman holding him looked as if she'd been through some kind of storm that had knocked her glasses askew and her hair to be completely frizzy and her pony tail lopsided and barely holding up.

"Look Jack! Dinner! Excellent! Because I am starving!" So saying she dropped into a chair, and started to drop the two baby bags that were weighing her down onto the floor.

"Jesus! How much stuff does one baby need?" She grumbled to herself as she held Jack around the waist, having set him down on her thigh. The baby had his head turned to look up at her. Evelyn met his gaze and the two had an intense stare down. Which was broken when Evelyn made a face and the baby giggled loudly.

Morgan smirked. "Pint-size? Mind explaining what you're doing with Hotch's kid?" He asked the question that was on everyone's mind. Evelyn grunted as she picked up one of the bags and placed it on the table, doing her best to use only one hand while her other was occupied with keeping Jack secure.

"Babysitting Morgan. Something I happen to be good at. And Spencer? Help a girl out. I can't make his formula without some help." She'd already taken out the thermos with the water and the bottle which already had the formula in it. Jack was starting to fuss so she quickly stood up and cradling the baby to her chest starting to walk around while bouncing him a little. Spencer quickly stood up to do Evelyn's bidding, pouring the water into the bottle. JJ met Penelope's gaze and the two of them smiled at the sight of Spencer standing in front of Evelyn with the bottle in hand. She raised an eyebrow at him.

"Did you check the temperature of the bottle?" Spencer frowned. "No." The two of them were oblivious to the other three members of their team looking at them.

Evelyn sighed. "All those random facts and you didn't read about babies? Honestly Spence, what're you going to do when a case calls for a random baby fact?" She asked, her tone dry, wincing slightly as Jack pulled at her hair yet again.

"Just squeeze a bit out on your arm. If it burns, obviously we wouldn't give it to him." Rolling his eyes Spencer sighed before moving to unbutton his cuff and pulling up the sleeve. A few seconds later, little Jack was greedily drinking from his bottle while Evelyn cradled him, slowly walking around.

"Why don't you sit down honey?" Penelope said, pulling a chair next to her, if only to coo at the baby. Evelyn shook her head. "Can't. Hailey said he likes to drink while walking around."

"So much fuss over a baby." Spencer grumbled as he munched on a piece of carrot, prompting Evelyn to glare at him. "Oh, and aren't you particular about your eating habits Dr. Reid." She only ever called him that when she was especially ticked off. And Morgan had to say, seeing Evelyn jump to defend Jack was hilarious. Especially when Spencer pursed his lips in response, licking them before speaking.

"Aren't you?" The words had the red head glaring at him even more. "I'm not the one calling a baby out on his eating habits." Morgan laughed loudly. "Alright you two. Reid, leave them alone." The man chided earning a look of triumph from Evelyn who turned her attention back to the baby.

"Spencer is just being mean Jack, don't mind him." Of course, Spencer had to ruin her little bubble.

"I doubt he understands you Evelyn." This time it was JJ who chuckled reaching out to pat his shoulder in a reassuring manner. "Let it go Reid. I know you're jealous, but you'll have Evelyn's undivided attention soon enough." The words only reached Reid's ears who turned to stare at his friend, cheeks flushed and mouth agape.

"Why would I be jealous?" He managed to say quietly, despite having the urge to shout the words in surprise. JJ only gave him an amused look before she turned her attention back to her food. Reid glanced at Evelyn, who was now setting the baby on the floor after spreading a small blanket and placing his various toys around him to play with while sneaking in bites of food for herself here and there. "I was just teasing Spence." The blonde beside him spoke up, knowing he would most likely beat himself black and blue trying to find out why JJ would think he was jealous, when he wasn't.

After eating the four of them left to finish up their tasks for the night. While getting ready to go home, Spencer realized he'd forgotten his bag in the conference room. Quickly walking in he very nearly missed the sight of Evelyn and Jack on the floor. Jack was sound asleep, laid out on his back, one hand still clutching his toy. Evelyn was curled around the baby in what Spencer could only describe as a protective manner. She was asleep as well, her hair falling over her face, her glasses placed beside her head. She'd shed her cardigan to drape it over Jack so he wouldn't get cold and she was on the floor while Jack was on the blanket.

Spencer didn't know how long he stood there. Simply watching the two of them sleep. It was strange how the simple sight of Evelyn sleeping so peacefully had him feeling peaceful and somewhat calm. The notion had him frowning in confusion, yet he still didn't walk away. Not until Hotch arrived with his wife after their night out and the scene was disturbed by Hailey waking up Evelyn. At Hotch's questioning look he simply held up his bag and left without glancing at Evelyn, trying to ignore the flush on his cheeks and the calmness that stayed with him every time he'd think of his red haired friend.

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Tag List - @cillsnostalgia @kathaaaaaaa @lovelyygirl8

#spencer reid #dr spencer reid #spencer reid x oc #spencer x oc #spencer reid x reader #dr spencer reid x reader #dr spencer reid x oc #dr spencer reid x y/n #criminal minds imagine #Criminal Minds

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kiteblue42 · 6 months

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Part 4 of - what the heck is going on with Mobius anyway?

S2e5 - the one with where they get the band back together

Disclaimer- I’m a single parent and found it hard to be objective watching this one. For me this episode was a very perfect reflection of how hard, lonely it can be to bring up children by yourself and how you willingly give up so much of yourself for them. They did this very well - I hope they don’t screw this up in the final episode.

A good life, but not a happy one

Mobius timeline life is good but not super happy. He comes across as struggling and lonely. Mobius works 6 days a week, he tries to sell Loki one of his jet skis that he no longer can use, he’s constantly being interrupted at work by his kids, the house is chaos and he had to leave the boys to fend for themselves selves while he was at work (therefore he has no friends or family to watch them or money to pay for childcare). This is a person struggling to keep it together, but he does manage to do so for his boys and he manages to stay kind and positive towards them. The boys are the top of his list of priorities “I can’t leave my boys”/ “I need to check on the kids” “I got to get back to my boys” “I’ll know”. This all speaks of someone who has given up his own wants for the kids and feels guilty about doing anything for himself.

Given the slightly flippant tone of “long gone” when discussing his wife I think it likely she left rather than died (or blipped) - as that’s not how a grieving widower is likely to speak (especially if he might be overheard by the boys).

The whisper of adventure

There are a number of signs that Mobius has a desire for adventure. His love of jet skis, the fact he immediately agreed to try out the time door, how much he loved the idea of being “Mobius.” (“Mobius is a pretty cool name”)

The idea of being your better self

It wasn’t just adventure for fun that’s calling his name though but also the idea of being something more. Mobius reacted emotionally to the idea of himself as someone that would “save my life when I first arrived”. His delivery of “I sell Jet Skis man” showed how little he thought of himself, but also a desire to be something more.

Loneliness

This exchange killed me:

Loki “you saved my life when I first arrived. You saw something in me I hadn’t seen in myself”

Mobius “Are you really my friend?”

Loki “I am”.

Just the way Mobius says this tell us how much he really really wants to believe he could have a friend like this.

Loki’s view of Mobius

Once again the major topic of conversation between Sylvie and Loki is Mobius (this is becoming a theme - and if they do get Sylvie and Loki together it’s just mad and funny).

Anyway this conversation tells us that Loki believed Mobius when he said the TVA was the “only life he knew” and that he “liked it”. Of course there’s an element of this being wishful thinking on Loki’s part, but he is pretty insistent that Mobius should be given the choice. So Loki thinks (at least until Sylvie talks him out of it) that there is a good chance Mobius would chose the TVA - and himself. And as Frigga once said (Thor: dark world) Loki is “.. so perceptive about everyone but yourself”. So I don’t think we should dismiss Loki’s perception about Mobius. (He is also pretty insistent in his conversation with Mobius that “this is not the life of the man I know”. And there’s enough for viewers to see “Mobius” is more at ease with himself than “Don”.)

Sylvie undermines this and persuades Loki he is being selfish. (Side note - Sylvie puzzles me this season and in particular in this episode- if you watch closely she sees that her McDonalds meal disappears and Loki’s drink in the bar disappear too - but says nothing to Loki and does everything to stop Loki from trying to fix it - is it just denial or something more sinister?)

Last episode

So some theory based predictions for Ep 6

Themes that still need payoff:

- order & chaos

- Partners & Friends & loneliness

- Hard choices

Th end of the last episode has me thinking we may get a happy ending because it would be narratively neat to leave Loki surrounded by his new TVA family - especially after the way last episode was concluded.

It would pay off the themes positively as follows:

order & chaos - Loki (chaos) working with TVA (order) to give balance

Partners & Friends & loneliness - Loki and his misfit friends get to stay together so they don’t have to be alone

Hard choices - this one worries me but it would be possible for a number of hard choices to be made that still ends up in a good place (even if it doesn’t seem like it will at the time).

Hard choices Mobius

I think this is aimed specifically at Mobius - Loki made his hard choice in Ep 5 when he was willing to let this team go. I’m hoping they will be able to square the circle with Mobius and his family, because he’ll *not* be ok without the boys or without Loki (& the TVA).

Given this is a time travel show with magic I don’t see why they can’t find an solution to that - because the issue is about not having enough time to both look after the boys and look after yourself. I’ll be super disappointed if they make this unnecessarily miserable by making Mobius give up either his fulfilling life & friends at the TVA or his boys. Though I also won’t be surprised to see this as a plot point. If they try to sell it to me as Mobius being super happy to return to his life I’ll be doubly annoyed.

In theory the boys timeline should be long gone so this choice should not exist, but they seem to be setting up this hard choice for Mobius in particular ( so maybe the loom explosion was meant to be a full reset).

Hanging threads & wild cards

X5 /Brad /Zaniac - is still in the TVA - is he going to cause chaos as they try to fix the loom?

Renslayer - is in the void - will she tame Alioth? Is Miss Minutes really gone or does she have another instance in the citadel at the end of time?

Kang - is HWR really behind everything? Are all the events just one pre-planned trap of HWR?

Sylvie - Sylvie knew more than she has told anyone (eg she saw the disappearance of items and said nothing). She has HWR tempad. Loki treats her like she has words of wisdom so we also tend to accept she is right or benign, but her last piece of advice was completely wrong. She has been acting pretty oddly all season too - what’s up with that? (Worth remembering she is a Loki variant and they are generally not to be trusted).

Romance

My own reading of Mobius remains that he lost his heart to Loki sometime around S1e2. By S1e5 he’d accepted this, but concluded it wasn’t going anywhere - so conveniently he didn’t need to exactly work out what the feelings were. Mainly because Loki was focused on Sylvie. This episode doesn’t change that since we don’t get any TVA Mobius.

Loki on the other hand did give more away this episode - and it was the first one (for me) where it looked like his feelings could be romantic or at least headed that way. Whenever he talks about saving his friends we all know this primarily means Mobius. I mean how much interaction has he really had with the others? The discussion in the bar was particularly instructive- he wants Mobius to have the choice (this is *after* seeing him on the timeline when he knows what Mobius would be giving up) and he desperately hopes Mobius would choose to stay with him. But Sylvie persuades him otherwise.

Sylvie - there is really no sign of the romance from last season left here. Loki does still greatly admire Sylvie. I’d say Loki almost hero worships her - and especially takes what she says about free will and choice as authoritative (as if she were an expert on it). This is consistent with his romantic feelings from s1e4,5&6 which seemed to grow out of his admiration for her radical / free spirit nature. But by this episode it didn’t seem to be romantic any more - rather a mentor / mentee conversation. Loki did not declare he wanted Sylvie back or even anything close to it - and it would have been the obvious time to do that.

Sylvie has never seemed particularly romantically interested in Loki to me. She kissed him to distract him in s1e6 and no doubt thinks he’s quite hot, but that’s all I’m getting. I actually like this about her as a character (she’s just not that into you Loki sorry). I hope she is a bit more villainous than we know (a bit more basic Loki if you will) otherwise she has been a bit of a spare part this season.

I am not expecting any romance from the last episode though mainly because:

(1) I don’t think there is time to do either romance option justice with all the other plot points to be resolved (2) romance is not central to the plot of season 2 - they have pushed the friendship / found family theme hard and that will do for plotting & emotional payoff purposes, and (3) if you want to be commissioned for season 3 you don’t resolve romantic tension. We’re on Tumblr so we all know there are a significant chunk of fans of any media that follow the stories for the romance aspect - and we all know this audience is likely to be very loyal, vocal on social media and will predictably turn up to watch the next season just to see how it plays out. If they resolve a romance arc either way too early they kill a lot of interest in season 3 - people are always more interested in “will they won’t they” than an established relationship.

#loki #mobius #loki spoilers #lokius #mobius m mobius #lokius meta #loki season 2 #loki season 2 theories #loki meta

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boilbluedenim · 3 months

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Over the liminal mindscape

I love and hate how this show's ending is completely left up to interpretation, mainly because of Wirt and Greg's potential deaths and how that makes me feel about the show as a whole. It attaches a sort of bittersweet feeling to it which I'm not too sure about. more on that soon though.

Anyway, when paying even just an inkling of attention to this show, you can almost immediately connect the dots and come to the conclusion that none of the adventures (for the most part) actually happened. This conclusion is heavily drawn from the frames we see at the very beginning, of Wirt, Greg, and Jason Funderburker (the frog) drowning. (ep 1)

and from the frames where Wirt wakes up in the water after having said goodbye to Beatrice, saving his brother and the frog by carrying them both out of the water. (ep 10)

Taking into account that Wirt, Greg, and Funderburker all fell into the water moments before almost getting hit by a train, which we discover in episode 9; Into The Unknown, I think it's pretty safe to assume that this is, in fact, the case and that OTGW takes place in either a mental space or a physical limbo, occurring while they are all in the process of drowning.

Another thing I'd like to mention is that OTGW is heavily based off of Dante's Inferno, which, in the simplest of summaries, is a poem about a journey that begins in a forest, leads through hell, and eventually into heaven, hence the theorized death I mentioned earlier. It's actually pretty easy to spot where these references and homages lie, for example, the formula of the story is somewhat similar, and the characters take on similar roles. (for example, Virgil: Beatrice/Woodsman(?)or even Greg in some cases, Beatrice: Sara, Dante: Wirt.) (please read Inferno or a summary of it to fully understand this if you haven't already because it's actually really interesting).

Rewatching OTGW with this in mind led me to realize a lot of things that I originally passed off as unique writing choices with no actual meaning behind them. Then again that could be the case but what's the fun in assuming that?

Upon entering the unknown, we're launched into a universe with a seemingly ever-changing time period. Characters talk funny and fancy, dress and act as if they're from the 1600s-1700s, and none of our protagonists seem particularly fazed by this (except for Beatrice, occasionally) with Greg using a phrase such as "brother o'mine" and Wirt's dramatic poetic rambles. Everything feels very inspired while also being all over the place, almost as if it's been composed from memories, lying in the pits of somebody's mind...

Wirt is a Huge Nerd.

If I am to believe that this show takes place in one of our protagonists' minds, which I do in fact believe, then I would say that that protagonist has to be Wirt. Wirt has a tendency to go on poetic spiels, even dropping two of them in the very first episode. Accompanied by his teenage boy dread (being a nerd at 14 is tough) and his overextending knowledge about curious things, which he showcases in his exclaim at Beatrice's ability to talk and his comment about one of the rooms in Endicott's mansion (below), It becomes a glaring possibility that OTGW is primarily from Wirt's point of view, with the Unknown existing solely in his head.

I've actually seen this point argued before, with some people mentioning the black turtles on the poster in Wirt's room or just his entire room in general. However, if true, that doesn't really answer the question of whether the unknown exists as a physical space or a mental one, having no supernatural effects on the real world.

2. The Implications of the Bell

Okay, so, listen.

I hate to be the kind of person who goes "Well it's probably just a fun and silly bit that doesn't actually mean anything." but I'm gonna be that person anyway, or at least I'm not going to assume character death because I don't want to and free will is a thing blablablabla. I will however be serious for a second and try to provide a tangible reason for why I think this scene doesn't have any real-world implications.

For one, this scene immediately jumpcuts to a voiceover, followed by scenes that serve as conclusions for the stories of the characters we've met along the way, all of them being positive. I think this serves the purpose of letting us know the story did in fact have a good ending, with Wirt learning how to treat his brother with respect. I also think that ties into the theory above.

Not only does the unknown serve as a mental limbo but it also serves as a lesson for Wirt in particular. This journey is riddled with self-critique, characterized as Beatrice, all the while Wirt is drowning and realizing he's not only failed himself but his brother as well.

3. The Beast

Surprisingly I haven't mentioned the beast yet even though he's very important to the story. The beast represents a couple of things, one being death and two being the overarching, real-world problem. Those may sound like the same thing, and honestly, they are depending on what you think the problem is. To me, it's Wirt's relationship with, and treatment of Greg in the real world that bleeds into the universe of the unknown.

The exchange that Wirt has with the beast at the end of episode 10 fully encapsulates his character growth. The characters his mind has created have actually taught him something, that being; wallowing in sorrow and accepting your fate is just going to lead you further down this winding path, or in this case, to the bottom of this lake. You will never get home.

Unlike I've seen others suggest, this is not a story of a boy failing and dying while so wrapped up in his own fantasy, eventually residing in a false heaven. Instead, everything is put back where it needs to be.

From the forest, through the unknown, and finally, back home.

#ramblings #over the garden wall #otgw #I havent written since september help

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carebooks · 1 month

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i know the whole reason for Chloe (in the show) to not have any real good!aligned character growth was because the creators said that not every person you meet will become a better person or grow to be a better person, and that’s part of reality, Chloe will always be a villain.

and yeah, ok, true, some people just never change, for better or worse,

but this is also a kid’s show, and while it’s good to show kids “hey, this person won’t change, but you dont have to be like them.” why not show them the person changing for the better? actually developing? is doesn’t have to be a full Amity from TOH development, where she went from mean girl to good person aligned with our heroes to one of the heroes. And it also doesn’t have to end the same way it did with Amity, it could end with Chloe just being a better person to only those she cares about, she could still despise Marinette and Alya but be nicer to Sabrina or Zoe in her own weird Chloe-way.

Maddie from Every Witch Way started out in a very Chloe way, but she wasn’t the main villain, ever, just for a few episodes in the first season because she was also a bully to the main character. After that however, she was still shown to be spoiled, vain, material-obsessed, and driven by popularity. But that didn’t stop her from caring about her friends, from only helping the mains bc her friends were in trouble. She got a boyfriend in s2 (a very nice one at that) and he helped her develop into a better person as well. Maddie wasn’t about to start doing things for the goodness of her heart or other people, she did good things for people she cared about which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. If anything she was more like an anti-hero.

This show wasn’t even a huge hitter on Nickelodeon (though we did get it to four seasons). So, why can’t they just do a similar thing to Chloe rather than keep her at this cartoon-level villain? I know it’s a cartoon but that’s never stopped ATLA, TLOK, SVFOE, Adventure Time, Steven Universe, or The Owl House to have nuanced, genuine, developed characters that don’t all have to be 100% aligned with good or start out that way.

#tales of ladybug and cat noir #miraculous ladybug #ladybug and chat noir #chloe bourgeois #marinette dupain cheng #adrien agreste #every witch way #maddie van pelt

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ravenalla · 1 year

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Please correct me if I’m wrong but from what I know Helluva Boss is written by only three people right? That being Viv, Brandon, and Adam. And while I’m sure ideas are bounced around here and there with the team, the way this season is going is begging for an actual writers room with more experienced people. Not saying those three don’t have any experience, but it’s clear they don’t know how to mesh the comedy and serious moments together well at this point. Part of writing is knowing when you need to omit stuff because it doesn’t fit the tone or story progession that you have established, even if you very badly want to include it. The writing for Helluva Boss in contrast feels they are forgoing any sense of coherence so they can stuff in whatever they like even if it goes against previously established plot points and try desperately to get to you pity these awful characters instead of letting them learn from their mistakes and grow as people naturally. Again, if this had stayed a dark comedy, that would have been passable, but now they are trying to tell a serialized dramatic story with arcs and emotion, and it’s just failing because that is not these writers expertise. This is complete speculation, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Viv’s aversion to any form of criticism is affecting it.

How many times must we see something terrible happen to Stolas because the show wants you to keep crying and pitying over without having these characters actually navigating it themselves? How many times will Blitz acknowledge he’s an awful person but not actively try to change his behavior in anyway and revert to the exact same character the next episode? How many times will Moxxie have to learn confidence because it’s the only arc they can think to do with him while Millie is a walking prop and Loona flip flops between liking her dad and physically abusing him for no reason? To the people who keep saying “just wait the shows not over yet!” we are basically halfway through season 2, there is no damn reason why Millie shouldn’t have had ANYTHING on her own yet or why Blitz and Stolas should be repeating the same “uwu he doesn’t love me” scene over and over again. If you give us what should be moments of character development but never actual show it through their actions or behaviors after the fact, it’s not character development at all, it’s cheap scenes you threw in cause you wanted the guise of something serious without actually taking the screentime to commit to it. And yes, the Stolas Blitzo stuff is probably going to pay off eventually, but it’s annoying for the audience to watch this will they won’t they game in almost every single episode just waiting for when the characters will finally change or have at least SOME type of acknowledgement of all they’ve been through instead of just keeping the status quo of another “Stolas looks sadly at his phone,” “Blitzo doesn’t really care about him until there’s one millisecond showing maybe he does 🥺.” Unless your a hardcore shipper, people won’t stick around with that forever.

The show wants to have world-building, quirky characters who are bad people, tons of villains, funny sex jokes, emotional investment, and a complicated romance, but there’s a reason lots of media fails when it tries to be everything at once. The Stolitz plot behind every episode now is sabotaging parts of the show that promised wacky demon assassin adventures, and the less serious moments like the Loona doctor B plot in turn ruins the atmosphere of the dramatic scenes associated with the Stolitz plot. They wanted to show a serious abusive arranged relationship through Stella, but they also wanted her to have be a campy bad guy so Stolas could have a reason to cheat on her so he wouldn’t look like the bad guy. This leaves us with confusing contradictions like Stella written as being legit mad about him cheating and wanting him dead while hinting at them having at least a positive public image as a family once through the background paintings, to suddenly her not having ever cared about him and seeking him out “cause she likes tormenting him” while she also now didn’t want him killed I guess because she’s opposed to the divorce because the Goetia want them together??, but then wanting him killed AGAIN after even though the Goetia probably always wanted that guy alive and her brother has to come in for no reason to make her look like an absolute dumbass.

Same with Loona. They try to give her development with Blitz, but they never do anything with it and by the next episode she’ll be beating the shit out of him again. “She’s a moody teenager!” She’s a woman in her twenties and I don’t care about her sometimes finding appreciation for her dad when she’ll just kick him in the nuts right after because physical abuse against a spouse is serious but with a daughter it’s funny I guess. And again, the entire argument fans have to justify this constant loop of creating and forgetting about character development is “just wait they probably have a plan.” Nah bro I’m pretty sure they just still wanted to throw edgy dark comedy in there and to do that they had to ignore any positive character changes it seemed like happened until a future episode specifically is written to continue that arc. Also the world building and class system in general is just bad when they actually choose to acknowledge it, which is rarely. It’s still so unclear whether hellhounds are seen as actually sentient autonomous people or pets, and it just makes scenes with Loona super weird sometimes. Same with imps, for an apparent underclass they sure seem to be able to go wherever they want and do whatever they want without too much trouble, and until the latest episode we’ve never seen any imp discrimination be a major factor besides comments from Stolas (which we are now choosing to ignore because Stolas can’t be a bigot that has to learn to be a better person, Stolas is perfect 🙃)

Yikes this got longer than I meant it to but overall Helluva Boss just could really benefit from some more inputs in the writing, not just ideas for story or jokes but someone who actually knows how to properly balance and structure this kind of stuff into an episode. As is it feels very disjointed, especially this season. I don’t think this show would ever be perfectly for me, just because I don’t find the humor at all funny and that’s kind of what makes the show, but at the very least it’d be nice if the actual plots and world these characters navigate was fun to watch, but most of the time it’s just not anymore, because you don’t get to actually see most characters interact or what their relationships are, and if you do they hardly ever change from what they were until suddenly it’s relevant for the plot. Blitz is uncomfortable around Stolas and is tired about being treated like a play thing, wait no now he’s turned on by Stolas’s flirting even though we’ve never seen that before and this is right after they literally had a huge fight, wait nevermind now Blitz doesn’t care again. Moxxie is always weak and sensitive when an episode is about him but suddenly super strong and has no problems killing in any other episode (“We’re not going up there just to massacre we need clients! -S1E3, exactly what he and Millie do to an entire audience of innocent bystanders in the Cherub episode and they don’t care). Stolas is super perverted and sees Blitz as an object, wait nevermind we’re just gonna change his entire fucking backstory so his behavior will look justified even though that man would literally have to be a the dumbest person in Hell to not see Blitz did not care and was actively repulsed by him all throughout season 1, yet continued to act that way to his supposed “first friend” because..he thought it was a sexy game or something they were playing? Even as a retcon for an excuse it’s still bad. Helluva Boss has no rules it sticks to, no jokes or character behaviors it refrains from even if it harms the quality, it’s just a badly written fanfic with pretty animation.

#helluva boss critical #helluva boss criticism #helluva boss critique #long post #rant

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