#you know the show is intense when you start making up filler eps

[tealmoth]

i was all about the angst before the angst became canon so now my brain is compensating with sappy bs. currently imagining omega’s hair getting very unruly™️ while they’re living on the run and no one knows how to deal with it until hunter steps in to cut it his own gd self since he’s the only other one with HAIR around here. bonding and messy haircuts ensue. do you understand my vision.

[thehare1234]

Weekly TV Round Up

Me personally, I am having a blast and think this is probably the most intensely I've thought about TV in a while...this makes me want to rewatch shows I've already seen but probably watched too passively and examine them with this new outlook

QL Shows

🥘What did you eat yesterday? (Ep 9-12): Ok so I went and finished the first season and all I can say is this show is great and these few episodes were also really emotional. So much of it just feels so real, and I'm excited to keep going with the series and there's still so much left :)

💟Wandee Goodday (Ep 5): Another great episode, I think this one was just a lot of fun as usual. Kao continues to be #1 character of all time and every time he shows up he slays, same with the grandma. I'm intrigued by Cher/Oyei plotline, my guess is not cheating but maybe like financial problems? Every week the almost kiss build up is amazing and I'm thinking it'll be at least a couple more episodes....Anyways I'm still enjoying everything this show has to bring

🧍‍♂️My Stand In (Ep 6): Alright alright, this episode felt sort of like a filler to get the next part of the story (the stand in for himself plot arc I guess I could call it?) I'm excited for Ming to find out it was Joe the whole time who he was in love with next episode. At the end of the day, I am having a lot of fun watching this and while I don't know if the actual body swapping plot is super strong, it's keeping me hooked. I do think that Joe sometimes makes decisions that don't make sense, but I still support him <3

🏡Knock Knock Boys (Ep 1-2): Ok so I truly started this without knowing the plot at all and what a fun time. The first episode sort of drags, but after it I went and watched the trailer to see if I wanted to keep going and I thought it looked fun. Episode 2 continued and was super silly and I really like the set up of this. I love like the four strangers coming together, each with their own things they have to sort through and different personalities. The vibes of just four roommates drinking together to get to know each other better also just feel correct, like this is what I did with my housemates when we first moved in. I'm loving how fun this is and I'm ready for it to continue. Also I'm very down for this Almond/Latte pairing lol

🎬At 25:00 In Akasaka (Ep 4-7): This is probably my favourite show airing right now. These last few episodes were so beautiful and I loved loved the editing between rehearsing and shooting the show, and how the show has become more blurred in those lines as the relationship has continued. Episode 7 was also great because I love a good POV switch. I feel like we really finally understood Hayama's perspective and it was nice seeing the show from his eyes because you realize how much in Shirasaki's POV it has been before this episode. I also love how the both of them have realized that they have feelings for the other but in completely different ways which match their personalities. Hayama has had feelings for years, but he keeps them very close to his chest and deep down, he only has very small breaks in his composure even when he's feeling jealous. Shirasaki on the other hand, once he realized he liked Hayama, it was almost impossible for him to keep his feelings contained, which lines up with what we learn about him being overly blunt/outspoken in University. I'm ready for next week when they have to shoot the NC scene like it's gonna be a lot for both of them

🥟She loves to cook she loves to eat (Ep 6-8): These episodes made me cry ngl. The call Nomoto had with the other asexual lesbian and just the reaffirming that you don't have to fit in to a nice label, or there is no right way to be a lesbian, instead of moving from one set of expectations (I have to marry a man, etc.) to a new set (this is how a lesbian should act), just live in your truth and just because you don't see it depicted doesn't mean it isn't right. Anyways then the next episode hits me with the Rina Sawayama Chosen Family needle drop and I legit was tearing up. It was so beautiful, that whole sequence. And I love the friendship they have with the other neighbour. All in all, it's so amazing I'm so happy this show exists <3

🦋My Marvellous Dream Is You (Ep 4): Alright, here we are, another week, another set of drama. Personally, I like that we got more flashbacks to their dynamic and why they ended up where they are now. I think it makes sense why Kim feels so attached to Dawan and why she puts up with her the way she does. I do think that a lot of this show will be Dawan losing Kim and realizing that she can't take her for granted as she has been and I'm hoping that that plot progression starts sooner than later. Also, was Toon and the acting coach this episode, and more Jessie, always more of her lol

✨We Are (Ep 9): Ok Ok. I liked how this episode gave us more backstory on Tan and Fang and also Phum and Fang since before this I had just assumed they met at University. I think that this show is really spreading out when they reveal certain information of how the characters are connected. I didn't love the addition of Kluen as a character because it sort of feels too late. It doesn't really feel like there's any stakes because Phum and Peem already like each other, it doesn't feel like Peem would ever go for Kluen seriously. Also Phum did get jealous but because he doesn't really express his emotions the jealousy didn't really add anything to the plot in my opinion. Also the whole making Q jealous thing doing it a second time also doesn't really make sense to me...but I guess it's silly and fun? Anyways I'm still having fun with it but I think I will only know how I feel about the show once I finish it and look back to see how all the reveals and progressions feel when looking at all the episodes.

👩‍❤️‍💋‍👩The Two of Us (Ep 1): Not much to say this is a Deep Night side story with the lesbians and I will continue to tune in. It's also a prequel story I think? Not many thoughts at this point haha

Non-QL Shows

📝Bridgerton (Ep 2): YES! A kiss before the couple gets together that haunts one of them, my absolute fave. I love a "kiss as a favour" but oh no wait now I'm in love with you uh oh. Penelope having to write about her own scandal in Whistledown was truly so upsetting but at the same time, it had to be done. My love for a lot of characters is only growing (for some reason I am a Cressida stan now, maybe because I can't remember what she was like in season 2). Overall, Bridgerton continues to give me exactly what I want from it and that's romance and pretty people ballroom dancing. Bridgerton if you make Eloise/Cressida a thing I will literally sell my soul to you <3 I also like seeing more of the other Bridgerton siblings and just seeing each of their unique personalities, I feel like the characters or storylines that tie the seasons together make it even more enjoyable for me

👯‍♀️Hello My Twenties (Ep 6-7): Alright, another great 2 episodes. I love the romantic plotlines in this show like one of the couples is giving such intense yearning is amazing. Also the whole episode where they threw the party was so much fun. Also this show is so wild to me because it's like 3/4 silly goofy roommates and 1/4 murder plotline? Like why have half these roommates been involved in some kind of murder, or accident, or coma? Each episode ends on such an intense note but the rest of the episode is just like "let's all watch porn together!"

👽3 Body Problem (Ep 4): Ok we are slowly learning more...tbh in this show I don't really care at all about the drama the characters have between each other (like the romance drama) and am more focused on the aliens/cult storyline but luckily they don't focus on them too much. Again I have so many questions but I know things will be revealed slowly, especially since there is going to be a season 2.

🏫Degrassi (Ep???): I think me and my roommate only watched one episode this week and I don't remember it that well. But the next episode is part one of a 2 parter episode AND a season finale so you know some wild stuff is about to go down

🪶Little Bird (Ep 1-2): Definitely a heavy show but an important one and important to understand and reconcile with these parts of Canadian history. So far, the show has set up really well and interspaced the flashbacks and present storylines well.

Next Week:

I forgot I started Living With Him last week so I will return to it next week.

[cubedmango]

aw thank you again too 🥺 and you're welcome as well, i'm also really happy to know you appreciate my ramblings ❤️❤️❤️ and even though i only just got into it this year and ofc it has its downs and flaws as well, there's a lot to love about kr and toku as a whole, and i can see why characters from the other japanese media i like (i totally get you now, edgeworth) are portrayed as fans of the medium/genre 😅 speaking of that, i forgot to mention what maya's thoughts on build might be - like with edgeworth, idk if build would be her fave kr show, but i still think she'd enjoy it, and while she definitely has some similarities to misora, idk if that would be enough for maya to deem misora her fave character, and for some reason, instead i think either banjou or [redacted] (i'll tell you more about this person once you get further into the show) would be her fave. and i think she'd find sawa really cool in terms of her mysterious multiple skills and would want to emulate said skills, and she might find it cute that sento basically has a rabbit fursona fjgnkwjds

*maya voice* come on mr. edgeworth, you don't have to tell me he's gay when i can literally see he's a rabbit personified and obviously rabbits are gay animals. like duh [1/?]

(rest below)

(though that makes me think that edgeworth might criticize the fact that they cast a skinny prettyboy to play a former pro boxer and then he'd type up a whole essay ranting about how the actor should have been someone with actual beef like will powers instead and discoursing about toei's prejudice against bears in-depth lol) and oh wow i'm also really happy to hear that you actually started watching it!!! :D and you're already on ep. 8... get ready for the stakes to keep rising bc boy does this show do its best to keep its foot on the viewers' collective neck 😭 eps. 13-16 are some of my favorites so far, and ofc no one is ever prepared enough for the shit that infamously goes down in ep. 21 😔 there are ofc moments to take a breather here and there, but there are basically no filler episodes so yeah it can be A Lot jlmdjfjkhs. i'd love to know if you have any theories or speculations for some of the mysteries and questions the show has set up so far, because while i obviously can't discuss them in-depth atm, it's still fun to see other people's takes especially when they're going into build pretty much un-spoiled 👀 [2/?]

and oh really djwdjfnks i guess it's true that i didn't actually talk about the comedic aspects of the show in my previous messages, and the post i linked also didn't give off that impression since it mostly brought up the serious elements, so sorry for accidentally misleading you 😭 but i'm glad to know it's worked out for you so far! :-) i actually really like build's humor for the most part (other than a few things like the previously mentioned uncomfortable aspects of a male character having an intense parasocial crush on misora's mii-tan persona, where ngl it was a bit funny to me at first when it didn't come off as that bad yet but then it just kept going in a very 'why are we still pushing this' way - though tbf to that guy, even though i compared him to larry, i do think he has a lot more going for him in terms of an actual arc and his interactions with other characters can be compelling and fun, he just needs to stay 10 feet away from misora for 10 years and learn to be normal), and the comedy is definitely needed in these first several episodes since well, the show does get kinda dark later on, particularly when it gets to the war parts (though to my knowledge, it's never too edgy beyond the boundaries of what's allowed for ostensibly a kids' show) - like it still does retain humorous moments, but it's generally fairly more sobering compared to the early parts of the show 😔 [3/?]

if i remember them correctly, some of my fave funny moments from the episodes you've already watched include when sento was trying to drive off on his phone bike while he was still in the cafe, banjou attempting to explain his backstory when sento asked but he started from his birth and an exasperated sento threw the visual of baby banjou away, the satou taro stuff (which iirc actually became a popular enough meme in japan at the time build was airing due to the way inukai delivered the "let's eat yakiniku tonight!" part, to the point that non-toku ads apparently referenced it lol), sawa excitedly following around an annoyed sento as build for her news stories, the whole chaining back-and-forth between banjou and misora, sento getting excited at hearing about the bottles misora purified but then becoming sad that banjou figured out a best match before him, sento immediately trying to test out that sword invention thing of his on misora and a 'sleeping' banjou but the latter was actually awake and threatened him instead, isurugi making increasingly dejected facial expressions when the others rejected his shitty coffee one by one in favor of their canned coffees, and the recurring gag of banjou having to put on a silly disguise whenever he goes out in public (shoutout to the literally contextless random clown costume) bc of how he's still a fugitive at large lmao (also not specifically meant to be funny but i cracked up at banjou's first appearance being shirtless in the sewers - i know it's supposed to be a fanservice-y moment but instead it proved to me just how nonexistent those 'sweet pecs' he loves to brag about are 😭) [4/?]

in general i like the whole gag of sento having a bunny ear ahoge that sticks up whenever he gets excited about science, even as a lot of fans jokingly call it a hair boner instead because well. i guess it's not exactly wrong hdjfjnkwjs sento being horny for science is probably the least surprising thing about him though... and a lot of the episode recaps are funny too, like when they explain how isurugi came to give sento his name (idk if you've reached this episode yet though) and when sento loves overemphasizing the way he says the 'genius'/'tensai' part of 'genius physicist' lmao on a side note, i do like how anime-ish many of the fashion choices and character quirks are, like sento's ahoge ofc and also his mismatched sneakers, and banjou's shrimp braids (i've seen a few other people think they look uncool, and while i understand that they can be pretty jarring when you're not used to that kind of hairstyle, i personally have come around to them by now and find them one of his charm points tbh), and in general the way banjou dresses like a delinquent-type lesbian jock in high school fjskjwkajs [5/?]

also i only realized later on when i saw other people pointing it out that it's weird that misora doesn't seem to have an actual schtick or something as an online idol, like singing and/or dancing or even playing video games (and later episodes do nothing to correct this assumption), and when they're not giving her info on what's happening in the country/touto re: things like smash attacks, instead she just. asks her viewers to essentially doxx people 😭😭😭 like even if that was for a good cause in the end and it worked out okay, it's still pretty weird to say the least in hindsight 😭 also let me just say that banjou being a bit of an ass to sento in these early episodes to the point of knocking him out twice to get away with his own plans, plus that part where he duked it out with sento in the nascita basement after the tatsuya incident made me go :O at first like wow okay yeah, i get where he's coming from wrt wanting to prove his innocence asap but also he definitely needed to chill somewhat (and that convo between sawa and misora where the latter was genuinely worried that the tentative friendship between the guys was over for real but sawa said she was sure they would get over it or something along those lines... queen of being supportive hfjsmkws). i'm glad he at least apologized for what he did to tatsuya in the end (also sento making that dragon bot companion for him was really sweet, even if banjou found it annoying at first lol), and the rest of his character development will definitely be cool to watch :') [6/?]

and yeah the range of their acting is amazing hwjsfkrds especially since both of their characters in cm and odt have that anxious and easily startled prey animal vibe 😭 though banjou's otherwise shouty aggressive persona is at least offset by goofy stuff like that running gag of him getting jumpscared by the microwave, and ofc the fact that he has very few functioning braincells (i hesitate to use the word here since it's become oversaturated in the past few years, but i guess you could deem him a himbo) lmao also in general, i think toku actors deserve a raise purely for being able to constantly maintain their composure while doing actions that would be otherwise goofy (e.g. i can only imagine how it looks to be cranking that lever on build's driver belts without any of the special effects added in yet) 😭 iirc inukai actually talked about that at some point, about how hard it is to insert the two bottles when he's not supposed to be looking, so even if he gets the first one right on the first try, he might still mess up the second one, so he often has to do multiple takes and said that bc of that issue, he was planning on buying one of the belt's toy versions so he could practice with it at home (idk if he went through with it in the end though) [7/?]

i'm also happy to hear about how endearing you've found the characters already - that's definitely one of build's strengths imo even if some of them end up not being developed to their full potential 👍🏼 and ahhh i'm so glad you're seeing the narumitsu vision this early!! i knew i could count on you 🙏🏼 if you're liking them thus far, trust that it's gonna get even better - you're gonna see just how much this was practically preliminary training for their later respective bl dramas ^_^ and sento and banjou may not be of the 'estranged childhood friends where one of them was adopted by his dad's murderer and then molded to follow in said murderer's footsteps and the other changed their whole career path just to see the first person again and save them' variety but they end up having quite a few Insane moments of their own later on that i feel are narumitsu-coded too so it makes me go T_T and about banjou's instinctive knack for figuring out best matches - yeah iirc it does appear a few more times after that, though sadly it doesn't figure as much anymore at the point in the show i am now. who knows though, it might still make a comeback in later episodes 🙏🏼 and yep that dialogue between isurugi and banjou... that sure was Something. ofc sento's issues will come into play more prominently as the show goes on, and i'm looking forward to seeing your reactions to how they pan out 👁️👁️ [8/?]

hdkfjskjs i'm glad you like both misora and sawa too!! misora is truly a #relatable sleep-loving icon for threatening to cut people who disturb said sleep <3 and you don't need to worry on the fronts of misora's powers and both women's backstories - they'll definitely get delved into at some point (in fact, since you mentioned being on ep. 8 already, parts of misora's get brought up in ep. 9 iirc)! my main issues are just that certain aspects, or the effects of those aspects on both women, of their backstories and the relationships they have with certain other characters in connection with that, and even their personal friendship with each other (even as i like the content we do get), could have been expanded on - ngl as i'm writing this, i'm getting flashbacks to capcom's treatment of aa female characters like maya and trucy, so once again the aa comparison seems apt here - but oh well, you'll see when you get there. ultimately it feels like a case of 'it could have been worse' considering how too often female characters can get the super short end of the stick in stuff like these, but still. that doesn't stop one from wishing it really could have been better 😔 [9/?]

and oh yeah, i hadn't brought up them up yet because i wanted you to experience them for yourself, but both gentoku/night rogue (that reminds me of the funny scene in ep. 2 where sento was like "the batman..." and he was like "it's night rogue, actually" and sento just snapped back with "i don't care what you call yourself!" or something to that effect 😭) and blood stalk are interesting and compelling antagonists and their cringe evil toxic yaoi dynamic is very fun to watch ngl <3 and about stalk and his drama-loving ass in particular - you're definitely in for a treat re: learning more about his whole deal, i promise 😌 me 🤝🏼 you 🤝🏼 other fans on akaso eiji: what is this man cooking sometimes djfjkahgs. and gah i know, he definitely comes off as smart enough (certainly smarter than the character he plays in this show) to be aware of the implications of saying stuff Like That so like. come on dudeee. and the comment i mentioned him making at that post-series promotional event is probably the cherry on top as the most out-of-pocket thing i've heard him say wrt this show to date (looking forward to both of us finishing this show so we can talk about it for real) like... seriously thank you so much for speaking your truth but also it's a wonder the toei snipers didn't get you in that moment 😭😭😭 also i imagine this is what the build actors felt like reading the script they got with every new episode: 🏳️‍🌈❓ and that was just amplified as the show went on 💀 [10/?]

and i actually was able to find again the video for the first promotional event - youtu . be/OW1y8FNibDU?si=bezKLuvqfYvSSDJq, and akaso starts talking at the 1:02 mark, so you can finally see it for yourself (it's also at this event where inukai jokingly introduced himself as satou taro instead of sento, complete with the 'yakiniku' pose that got turned into a meme, and akaso had to 'remind' him of his actual character lol). and re: this event, this was done for the crossover movie 'kamen rider heisei generations final: build & ex-aid with legend riders' or heigen final as it's commonly abbreviated, which i mentioned in my previous messages in passing, so here you can see iijima (where he looks far more baby-faced compared to his appearance in odt, even though iirc he's only 2 years younger than inukai and also akaso) and the rest of the main ex-aid cast too like i've said before, it's not strictly necessary to watch because it's not really meant to be fully canon, plus other kr protagonists - namely ooo/eiji, fourze/gentarou, gaim/kouta, and ghost/takeru - you wouldn't be familiar with also appear in supporting roles (though tbf to those other riders, since this is generally meant to be a standalone, it doesn't delve that much into the stories of their respective shows, so some cursory reading of their synopses and who these protagonists are should be good enough, but yeah i guess it does contain some spoilers for how said shows end, especially ex-aid since that's the other main rider here). the pros to watching this though is that it apparently shows some nice banjou development, which is still included within the main series but other elements are just elaborated on here, and contains additional foreshadowing for some later twists and reveals in the main series (build's head writer shogo muto was definitely on a roll while co-writing this) - and by that, i mean that the continuity is such that heigen final is technically set in between eps. 14 and 15 of the show, so there are stuff in episodes afterwards that get further set up here [11/?]

so if you don't mind some spoilers for the other seasons, especially if you're not planning on watching those anytime soon, and the fact that this isn't strictly canon, you can watch it on the toku . fun site (since the page i linked you to contains all the spin-off stuff for this show already) once you're done with ep. 14 :-) on my end, i actually started watching it a while back, but i didn't finish yet and i proceeded with my main series watching instead and now i'm 20+ episodes in, so if you're too impatient like me, it's still okay to skip it for now and just go back to it another time 👍🏼 and there's also an interview with iijima and inukai as promotion for the movie that you might be interested in, though you should also definitely only read it after finishing ep. 14 since it contains spoilers for that and a couple of episodes before it, and ofc spoilers ahead for ex-aid too: docs . google . com/document/u/0/d/1gV0D6WhKQiV8Hi3OhOk1XNUD3hB2uF4f9j1tWTYXE3g/mobilebasic?pli=1 [12/?]

also since you got past ep. 2 already, i was reminded of how build does pull the 'dead girlfriend for manpain' thing which is. not a great trope as a whole, and kasumi could have stood to be a bit more developed before her death and even in the later instances when she's brought up by banjou and co., but from everything i've heard, this + how kasumi is shown haunting the narrative is still generally handled with more grace compared to how ex-aid did a similar storyline, so this is definitely a tolerable enough case. and yeah while i don't think it was that many so far, kr definitely has had a bit of a track record of featuring dead girlfriends for men's sad backstories (though tbf, there have also been plenty of backstories here involving dead male friends so there is some equality at least ig??), the quality with which they were written varying, but welp are we really surprised considering how men-dominated this franchise is ofc lol [13/?]

and i do think the mysteries pay off well for the most part, so i'm glad it reeled you in too and ofc i'm interested in hearing your future thoughts and reactions :-) and don't worry about your posts/answers getting long, bc i can assure you that whatever i send to you will almost always be longer fjkhfsws. and feel free to independently liveblog it in separate posts too if you like - you can just tag them and/or put them under a 'read more' so i can more easily find them and your other followers can also filter the tags if they don't want to see those posts, though hey, maybe it will inspire them to get into build as well and there'll be a resurgence in build fans 5 years after it ended?? lol and yeah i think that might actually have been an aa reference fr! (even if he didn't exactly point like phoenix and co. haha) i'm pretty sure it's like the most well-known mainstream franchise involving lawyers dramatically yelling 'objection!'/'igi ari!' in japan atp so i wouldn't be surprised. just another thing to add to the list of aa-build parallels ig! [14/?]

akshfjfkas that's definitely one of the few things adachi and banjou would have in common at least 😭 also i'd definitely like to see any build fanart you might make!! no pressure though, draw them only if you actually want to and at your own pace :-) though that reminded me, have you ever considered redrawing narumitsu (or any other big m/m aa pairing actually, like klapollo, asoryuu, or even langworth) as the 'heated drama between men' picture (since that tagline definitely applies to those duos)? i always thought that was prime redraw material for other media, so it saddened me to see very few actual redraws or edits of it so far 😔 (though maybe there were actually more back then, but since this show aired 5-6 years ago, those are long-buried now or something). no pressure again ofc, it's just an idea so feel free to draw or not draw it hsfjwkflds [15/?]

unfortunately, because this has gotten very long again, once more i'll have to relegate my thoughts on the f/f and canon lgbt+ stuff to other messages some other time... just know the gist that toei has for sure been taking baby steps in terms of the rep, and afaik most of it has ranged from decent to good or at least i don't think any of them have come off as blatantly offensive caricatures, but some other moves they've pulled here and there have also been frustrating, and while it's true we shouldn't actively be seeking authentic diverse rep from these corporations in the first place, it still would be nice to someday get a respectfully written canon gay and/or trans kr protagonist of any gender (though given it's kr, it will likely be a guy anyway) without a single no-homo or "it's up to interpretation" type of official statement you know? 😔 aaand that's all again for now, thanks again, and goodbye and talk to you next time :-) hope you enjoy watching the rest of the show! <3 [16/16]

also sorry to add on to this hours later but i just suddenly got struck with new ideas for other m/m duos in aa to possibly redraw the 'heated drama between men' picture as: the actual toku characters like steel samurai/evil magistrate, or even nickel samurai/jammin' ninja just bc of the engarde vs. corrida drama (even though the characters are actually from different shows and i don't genuinely think of engarde and corrida's relationship as romantic wjdekjfsjh)

anon hi again and thank u again for the asks !!!! sorry for the wait i didnt get to watch much these last few days (only caught up to ep12 now) so i was waiting until id watched enough that i could update u on the live reacting a little bit kajfkdsjgd but its been rlly fun !! the plot twists keep getting me but theres the silliness to balance it out but then the emotions and the stakes oh god oh fuck-

gonna start w misora and sawa again immediately bc 1) i care them So much and 2) WHAT THE FUFCKKFDJFK I DIDNT EXPECT THE SAWA STUFF???????? when they showed her being in kahoots w the weapons guy i was literally >:0 at my screen i was so betrayed i thought that was for It for her...... but then her backstory and how she came clean abt everything and still wants to help the gang out ooughghhg i wamt to give her a hug so bad...... and her friendship w misora too im gonna Cry!!!!!! also speaking of the misora lore is also intriguing (7 yr coma....... i keep saying this smth abt jp medias and their 7 years) and her getting to go out after so long and have fun was so sweet 🥺 the idol thing is still wild tho but u know what. valid bc the concept of a doxxing idol is so funny kdfjkgjkdfjg

also sento and banjou oh my god . I DIDNT KNOW OTHER GUYS COULD BECOME KAMEN RIDERS TOO???? tho when stalk mentioned the hazard levels earlier i had a Feeling but it failed last time banjou tried so i thought that was it but omg what the hell .... the design for him is so cool too im glad he had that chara growth moment !! tho the kasumi stuff is def #manpain flavored so far (did those two only ever meet at that one sakura tree goddam let them have other flashback scenes??) im glad at least they didnt just drop her after ep2 and actually have her death impacting banjou (and sento too w him taking the blame for it himself) and that driving him to work on himself and become more selfless its so [chefs kiss] i do hope she gets mentioned again tho bc that "i hope you can forget me" in the letter was Not helping

also yeag . they are NOT beating the nrmt allegations for me!!! its about the trust and belief babey!!!!!!!! what the shit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

AND WHAT IS THIS . WHY. (for some reason it reminded me of krdc in that one scene in ep5 fkdjksjg)

but seriously the progression of their relationship is so neat to see (esp at the moments they give each other a push to do the right thing those always get me ough) they are becoming Friends!!!!! now im super curious tho what akasos other out of pocket comment mightve been bc canon is already pushing the ship so much how could he have possibly added onto it 😭

as for theories hmmmm i dont rlly have any solid ones rn?? the sawa plot twist already threw me off for a bit and the whole govt/faust stuff is going p standard villain plot-ly so no speculations there...... tho stalk is still confusing me bc hes clearly helping out and he even says it but im gonna assume he has his own goals (tho actually since u mentioned redrawing the heated drama pic i went looking for it again + looking for chara refs in general earlier and uh . i mightve seen a spoiler abt stalk ?? [nervous laughter] ha ha what the fuck 😳 gonna try to forget that in case its real)

also ty for that info on the movie it sounds interesting i didnt know they did crossovers like that :0 still have to reach ep14 so ill think abt if i wanna watch it then or afterwards but looking forward to the banjou content i will take All of it (and seeing iijima again too maybe itll even get me interested in his season jkjdkjg he does look v babie in that vid i almost didnt recognize him help)

the aa/kr crossover potential rlly is there tho im seeing ur ideas abt the aa charas watching the show since theyre already toku fans 👀 i thought abt seeing if theres crossover fics on ao3 or smth but nope im going to learn from my mistake im going to Wait i dont want to get more spoiled kfjdkfjg me making fanart is also gonna have to wait but soon. maybe . if i can keep a good pace to watch and not take one billion years-

[cuteandtwisted]

This episode may not be action-filled or advance the plot much. But it’s not a filler.

It’s all about Porsche and his character development. (You know: Porsche. Literally one half of KinnPorsche. The show half named after him?)

In fact, most of the episode is from his POV. He’s in most scenes and most of them are seen through his eyes. He’s in his head and we’re right there with him. 

We’ve already established most of this as viewers, but this is Porsche’s opportunity to come to terms with these things as well (since he’s getting a little break from getting shot at):

Porsche is in love for the first time in his life

Porsche is sexually and romantically involved with a man for the first time ever

Porsche realizes that despite his rather promiscuous past and adventures with the ladies, he knows nothing about love or relationships. (Has he ever made love sober? Has he? Has he ever been touched while not intoxicated? I don’t think so)

Porsche realizes he doesn’t want to lose this/whatever this is. He asks for advice. He says to Yok, verbatim. “I really don’t know where to start. What should I do next?” 

Porsche works to make this work/whatever it is. He studies for their date/the first date of his life (kill me) and wants it “to be perfect”. 

Porsche realizes that, unlike him, Kinn has known love before and has experienced it before. 

Porsche experiences intense jealousy and insecurity for, possibly, the first time ever. He’s learning who he is as a lover. He’s learning new things about himself.

By the end of the episode, Porsche decides that it’s okay that’s he’s not Kinn’s first love, because he’s his now. Plus: A: Tawan is literally dead. Kinn won’t stay hung up on a dead person B: Kinn is convinced that Tawan never loved him, that he betrayed him, and that he was just using him. Kinn values loyalty above all else. Porsche is loyal. He’s not worried

Except everything crumbles at the end because:  A: Tawan is very much alive B: Tawan is going to fight like hell to change Kinn’s mind about his loyalty and his love 

So what’s the point of this episode? This ep is here to make the angst that will follow hurt A HUNDRED TIMES MORE. 

Porsche, in his own way, said ‘I Love You’ to Kinn twice (when he slapped Kinn in Ep7 and when he said that Tawan’s ghost was just jealous that they’re “in love”)

Do you know how many times Kinn said it back or validated Porsche’s feelings with words? ZERO TIMES.

And do you know how many times Kinn mentioned the word ‘Love’? Twice. And do you know who it was about? Tawan. 1) “I couldn’t imagine how I could stop loving him [Tawan]” 2) “He never loved me [Tawan]”

IN CONCLUSION:

Porsche is going to be heartbroken and so are we. We’ll likely get the “What was I to you? Did you ever even love me? Was I just a replacement for the real thing? Are you just going to throw me away now that you have him back? Now that he’s proved that he’s loved you all along and that he never betrayed you?” 

Porsche is giving Kinn his everything. All of his firsts. (And all of his lasts). His first love, his first date, his first jealous feelings, his first kill, his first gunshot wound, his first fuck, (+ his first sober fuck), his first fight, his first slap, his first heartbreak.

Porsche is giving Kinn everything because he simply cannot not give him his all. He’s already crossed the point of no return.

Kinn is going to break Porsche’s heart. And Porsche is going to let him. 

[actualbird]

Oh god!

I really love the poly headcanons they are so sweet.... (or don't but that's part of it and i think the tot boys+MC deserve all the love the world has to give).

But, liking it or not, our 4 beloved boys are kinda complicated (that's what makes them perfect). Plus I never thought about how people get in poly relationships. So i was thinking, how do you think they all get into a polyrelationship together?

(I really have no idea of how that would happen)

hi, two anons!! im glad you guys liked my nxx team polycule stuff!! i'll answer these in one go, my "headcanon" (in quotes because i think this kinda turned into a character analysis/minific of sorts HAHA) being what first anon asked, How They Get Together.

heads up, wc of this is 1.9k words long so buckle up for a bit of a read jfsjdfkjbf

because first anon, youre right!!! the boys are stupendously complicated which i love so so much but canon has also shown us clearly that each of the boys' quirks and habits and tendencies causes a lot of (mostly played for laughs) friction. the bickering, the backhanded insults, the "im the best one here" preening contests. theyre all SOOOO RIDICULOUS and it is hilarious but yep! the boys r complex!! and that means this beautiful ship, imo, has a lot of phases to get to the actual romantic relationship bit.

how they get together, in my opinion, starts because of mc.

not in the sense that she matchmakes them all, but like.

phase 1 of the nxx team polycule is this:

through being in love with her (which we all know the boys 100% are), each of the boys come to terms with their own flaws and weaknesses. it's very apparent to me in all the story thus far that these boys are flawed as hell, it's very compelling but even more compelling to me is how all of them also do intense mental gymnastics to Not Confront Those Flaws. like, marius is a dickbag always teasing and toeing the line of insincerity, vyn is a controlling mf who always tries to sway situations to his benefit, artem is so repressed to the point that he has genuine trouble with emotions, luke is a self sacrificial bastard and also a huge hypocrite about how no, actually, hes the only one that should be hiding his pain and being dishonest, no dishonesty from other people!! in the beginning of the story, all the boys have their flaws and seem to have just kinda...not addressed how those flaws are harming them and the people around them.

and then mc rolls around and they all fall in love with her. and she sees those flaws and she doesnt let them slide. she challenges the boys in her own ways to see another side of the situation, to acknowledge what theyre doing. she doesnt want to get rid of flaws, thats impossible and also not cool. she just has this beautiful hope for like, all of humanity, that goodness can prevail with the right work. so when she sees her beloved nxx boys, she believes that for them as well.

which leads to phase 2 of the nxx team polycule:

the boys, more aware of themselves, become more aware of each other.

they werent Unaware of the others of course. it's just that they didnt like...truly connect on a personal level just yet. they saw the other teammembers with their emotional armor and flaws and saw a wall that wasnt worth looking past.

but after mc makes them realize that hey, flaws arent the end of the world actually, it's alright and the person behind them may just be worth it, the boys like. end up understanding the others. A LOT OF THIS BIT IS UNINTENTIONAL, ON THEIR PARTS KJDSBFS. like they stumble into understanding each other by accident, they didnt plan it, but over the course of nxx investigations, it's inevitable that they end up seeing the depths of the others. i delve into this a little bit in my fanfic "filler eps of the lost gold" where the boys are just going thru their actions and then trip over another boy's fears or desires and through that, gain a deeper understanding mutually.

and with understanding, sometimes, comes trust.

phase 3 of the nxx team polycule goes like this:

everybody in this team, whether they like it or not, whether they know it or not, has a heart that wants to give love so desperately.

marius lives in a world full of snakes so he cant have his heart on his sleeve for his own protection. vyn wants to be seen as perfect and the heart is inherently messy so he holds it back. artem for a very very long time was focused on work and success and achievement that he neglected his heart. and luke has been giving love all his life in a sense but in a way thats hidden.

all these tendencies that are brought upon their life circumstances results in this: they want to love honestly but they havent been able to do this

until mc. and all of them want to push back whatever fears or patterns their life has instilled in them because they see her and see somebody so unwaveringly good that all their hearts begin giving love to her to make her happy and to make themselves happy as well.

but heres the thing. the boys dont just see mc. by this point, they have connected and understood and come to trust each other as well, and the consequence of that is that They Can See Each Other Now Too, Truly.

and heres the thing. all of the boys are unwaveringly good as well.

one by one, each of the boys realize that what they feel for the other boys in the team starts to...change. yeah theyre all friends, they pick on each other a lot of the time, but the bedrock of the relationship is solid and strong now. but when marius is with luke, marius sees a light inside of luke so bright that he seems unaware that he gives off. when artem is with vyn, artem sees a goodness inside of vyn that hesitates to make itself obvious and known because vyn is scared of getting hurt thanks to it. all of them see the other and their goodness and, unbidden, their hearts want to give love to each other as well.

and because theyre all a bit stupid in their own way theyre like, huh, weird! wonder why this feeling is so familiar! and yet i cant seem to name it...and then they all independently compare these feeling with the feelings they have for mc, a feeling they do know the name of, and theyre like.

WAIT.

THESE FEELINGS ARE...VERY BASICALLY EXACTLY WHAT I FEEL FOR MC.

which only means one thing: theyve fallen in love with everybody else

marius: //goes to his studio to Think and sees that a bunch of his recent art actually had little crumbs of these feelings already, etched into the brushstrokes and scenes. has an emotional crisis about it

vyn: //records a 1 hour long entry in his audio diary to examine and gain control of his feelings but by the end of the hour all he knows is that he wants to hold these people and be held by them

artem: //quite literally just bluescreens, artem.exe has stopped working, sits at his study and slowly, slowly, thunks his head down onto his desk, valiantly trying to ignore the fast pulse of his heart

luke: //manically vents about it to peanut who, by virtue of being a bird, doesnt get it. just keeps talking at peanut to get a grasp of it all and then lies down on the floor, overwhelmed

mc, sitting in her apartment watching some netflix: ...why do i inexplicably feel as if something very, very important has just happened?

phase 4 of the nxx team polycule is basically:

pining: extreme difficulty level

because pining is already hard when ur pining for one person. what more for an additional 3 more people. and those additional 3 more people are pining back.

and all these boys are SOOOO OBVIOUS with their romantic feelings, in their own special way. the way they show their affection to mc starts to bleed into their interactions with the others and everybody can CLEARLY SEE WHAT IS GOING ON, LOL, but also all the boys are too chickenshit to confront it, because if they confront it, what will even happen??? being in love with each other, all of them, thats going to be such a complicated fucking relationship, holy shit. it's 2030, yeah, being a polyamorous group relationship isnt completely unheard of, but sue them, theyre scared.

but mc (who i forgot to mention already knows of the boys' romantic feelings for her, shes just hasnt made a move yet on any of them because SHES IN LOVE WITH ALL OF THEM AS WELL and shes been trying to figure out how the hell to make that work, she cant bear to choose just one of them, she'd be heartbroken over leaving the rest of them behind) sees that the nxx investigation team is now all pining for each other FULLY and she kinda wants to laugh when she realizes whats going on because like, what are the chances? that this would happen? that they all found each other and their feelings fell into just the right place for nobody to be left behind?

theyre all scared, she can tell. and she is as well, she wont lie.

but shes always had a belief that goodness can prevail with the right work.

and love is one of the greatest goods out there.

phase 5 of the nxx team polycule:

It's Time For Communication, Baby!!!!!

the exact scenes of how this happens is a bit vague to me. it could go two ways: mc going to each of the boys independently to talk about feelings, hers about everybodys and his about everybodys as well. OR they have a fucking meeting about it all together and artem literally schedules it in his google calendar, or something.

either way, they like, actually talk about this. starts casual, maybe over a chill date, maybe over dinner at a nice restaurant, maybe over a walk in the park as the sun is starting to set. but where ever it happens, the end result is the same: a heart is laid out bare and it is taken in gentle, grateful hands.

marius: OKAY, NOW THAT THE FEELINGS ARE OUT OF THE WAY, CAN I PLEASE KISS ONE OR ALL OF YOU, PLEASE, IVE BEEN WANTING TO KISS U GUYS FOR FOREVER

vyn, laughing fondly: has anybody ever told you patience is a virtue? we quite literally just talked it all out.

marius: //needy whining noises

artem, embarrassed: ive...never kissed anybody before

luke, embarrassed but trying to play it Cool: ....same here

mc: kissing is great, you two will love it!

marius: awesome, awesome, so is ANYBODY going to give me a go ahead or WHAT????

phase 6 of the nxx team polycule:

i dont want to say it's happily ever after, once they all get together. thats not really realistic.

they all have their quirks and tendencies and habits. and those will inevitable clash against each other. theyll have their arguments, theyll get upset, theyll sulk and be angry, sometimes. but also...

theyll see each other smile and feel like their love shining so brightly. theyll reach out for another's hand and be held in such a way that makes them think that their heart is in a safe place. theyll love each other and theyll put in the work to continue loving each other. because goodness will prevail.

and they all see each other as the most good people in the world.

so whatever happens, theyll get through it together.

[heyitsyn]

The Past It Will Remain

Side Story!Oikawa Angst - Before ‘Enough’/ Before Making Up

a/n: dklsfjsldfkjsd yes we have a mona x seijoh manager really short story right now and uwuwuwu dont get confused you guys!!! this is an x reader so youre still y/n so im just going to give the current seijoh first year manager a name to avoid confusion :’) 

so yall remember that oc @animesportboys​ made right? so im using her for today so manager-chan’s name is naoki :’)

okay? okay

and lets pretend nao joined before the practice match bc i mentioned in kuws ep 2 she joined later but in this one, she joined earlier on

and kunimi!sister!reader doesnt exist in this one

YALL IM UNKNOWINGLY CREATING A UNIVERSE WAIT A MINUTE I NEED TO FIGURE THIS OUT

request:

- WAIT OMG i need a side story to the oikawa angst,,, set after the practice match,, the reader getting jealous of seijoh's manager because everyone can tell that the team is in love with their manager,,, and reader feels so down especially with how oikawa and iwa seem to be all over seijoh manager-chan -- chi ☆

for the “jealous of oikawa and manager chan” request with y/n (mona) it’s set before they get back together!! — chi ☆

okayokayokay lets start

so as seen in the top this is a side story so this is kinda a filler of what happened during that big gap before they made up

so lets bring a bit of background into this

oikawa’s knee was perfectly fine earlier that day

like the mans was able to do serves and sets and jump no problem

but buckle to the knee and he came crashing down to the ground

ofc nao, our lovely babie manager, was worried as hell so she sent him to the infirmary to get checked out

‘eieiei~~ nao-chan, oikawa-san is fine-’

‘i swear to god oikawa-san if i hear ‘fine’ out of your mouth again i will show this cotton ball in your nose’

dksljfdlks chile what

‘oikawa-san is okay then-’

*cue nao shoving two cotton balls in his nostrils*

and as much as she wanted to stay and make sure he stays resting, the team needed her so she went back to the gym

poor oikawa was now in the empty nurse room and he finally was able to freely cry

it hurt like an actual biatch and he was even amazed he was able to hold the pain in for so long

our mans is so strong like what the heck :’(

and the pain only added when he saw you

oikawa wanted to go back to the gym so he ventured out of the room and into the hallway only to see you and some gray-haired guy

your hair was tucked behind your ear as you filled the bottle so he was able to see the side of your face clearly

god you are so beautiful

and he cant believe he let you go

his shock came out of his mouth as a breathless call for your name made you turn around and notice his presence

but the real pain settled in when you claimed to not know him anymore

was that it?

nearly 15 years of friendship gone?

‘not anymore’

bullshit

oikawa’s eyes shook and his hands trembled as the all-familiar feeling of intense fear appeared

as if that sentence was the last confirmation that you no longer wanted him

you no longer needed him

you were saying your farewells

he didnt even notice you leave with the karasuno player as his feet stayed planted on the floor and refusing to move

his breathing started to get heavy and he tried to take a step but a dull aching pain sent him falling to the ground

a silent cry of pain was the only thing that came out of him not from his knee, 

but from a broken heart

when you found him down that hallway later, he was already dried up with tears

shrivelled and curled up into a ball of loneliness only to intensify the pain at your last goodbye

as you walked away, you clenched your fist at his quiet whimpers, pleads for you not to leave

but you knew you deserved better

you knew your worth and he was not it

DKSLFJDKJSFLDKF BRO I DONT REALLY KNOW EITHER BC HE HIT ME BUT THEN HES OIKAWA YANNO? LIKE IM SO CONFLICTED I HATE IT HERE

yet why did it hurt so much when you saw him and that girl interacting

you were in the gym, tending to the players, when you saw him walk in with an unknown girl by his arm

were his cries all a lie?

an act?

his desperate actions of wanting you back only to turn around and hold another girl?

you watched as the girl glared at him and scolded him while he laughed and ruffled her hair

no

you should look away and not care

maybe he was right

but he was also wrong

it wasnt him just being unfair

it was you too

the entire match, you watched as the entire seijoh team, even kunimi and kindaichi, smother this girl with affection and love

‘aww~~~ y/n-chan is so sweet to makki-san~!’

‘our little wifey~!’

SKLDFJSKDLFJSDMATTSUN PLEASE STOP IT

hell even iwa was practically giving this girl heart eyes!

kageyama noticed your stare and he sighed, knowing you were probably sad and grovelling over her

‘y/n-san, that’s nao. koga naoki. she transferred over to kitaiichi in my second year. shes really nice and i guess she continued being a manager-’

you nodded, watching her

so she was your successor

your failure of finding one made you feel guilty for years but knowing this unnervingly nice and charming girl taking over settled it down

AND MY GOD WAS SHE SWEET

you struggled to hate her as she audibly chided oikawa over his knee

‘youre already hurt yet you continue to play! youre going to get hurt more! do you want to hurt more? bc i can hurt you more by kicking your knee! maybe that would make you sit down and rest then?!’

it was a spunk you saw in yourself from way back in the day

and the way she ran around to give everyone towels to wipe their sweat off and even doing it herself to other players

and she even cheered on karasuno!

DEAR ASAHI SHE WAS JUST PERFECT

there was no way you could hate her

even after the match, you watched as the girl approached takeda and your team

‘hello, i forgot to introduce myself. im koga naoki, first year manager of aoba johsai volleyball team. you played really well today and you guys are so talented and i hope-’

as she continued to talk, your eyes moved from her to the blue-shirted boys who were watching her with such pride and love

as if she was the most beautiful thing in the world

but that didnt matter to you

what really mattered was what he was doing

and with the way oikawa would look at her, watch her with love-filled eyes, there is definitely no hope anymore

the .5 percent of hope you didnt know you clung on finally slipped and you knew he loves her

maybe it should be time he and you moved on

it was all in the past and the past it will remain

[armorsleevedsinglehit]

the huge shippuden music meta

no one asked for this but i’m gonna write it anyway. i’m going to focus primarily on the shippuden soundtrack here, but expect some references to the original series soundtrack as well. also before i begin i know approximately two (2) music so some of my terminology is probably going to be incorrect lol, it’s been a while since college. this is a general shippuden meta but it does focus on the uchiha clan, in particular sasuke and madara.

anyway, to start off, you can pretty easily divide the shippuden soundtrack into a few general categories:

traditional and/or acoustic

electric guitar tracks

some combination of these, plus orchestra hits aplenty

there are a few odd ducks here and there, but no worries, we’ll get to them. and then within these general categories we have a series of recurring character motifs (which can be a bit muddled, because certain themes are used for multiple characters. i assume that naruto (the show) isn’t necessarily scored the way a film would be, and so the directors just slapped whatever dramatic/sad/upbeat music they could find onto a scene, esp if it’s a filler ep, which definitely generates some confusion.) but characters and groups in shippuden DO sort of get their own motifs and themes, so here is my very basic list of those as well:

uzumaki clan and its descendants/allies: “emergence of talents/hyakkaryōran” has a very cool melody towards the end that comes back in “narukami/weeping god” and “shoryu/rising dragon”. we can basically call this the protagonist theme. naruto, sakura, kakashi, jiraiya, most of the konoha 11, and even minato get to claim this one. however, VERY interestingly, narukami is what plays when tobi (as madara) is telling sasuke about the glory days of the uchiha clan... possibly hinting at greater connections between the two clans???????????

akatsuki-related themes: i won’t link a ton of these because they’re super obvious. they’re often full of choir and organ (harkening back to orochimaru’s original series theme); they also tend to be slower. not always, though; look at crimson flames, a slapper if i ever heard one. prime example of akatsuki themes: girei, my FAVORITE bit of the shippuden soundtrack. UGH.

general shippuden themes: things like hurricane suite, heaven-shaking event, etc. most of the first ost goes in here. this category also contains the closest approximation to hashirama’s theme that i could find, experienced many battles and departure to the front lines, which both make me cry lol

there are other fun little motifs and bits and bobs that appear in this soundtrack that i won’t get into here for length (remind me to talk about the angelic herald of death sometime), but it’s a remarkably cohesive piece of work to the point where it gets repetitive sometimes; why are all the super interesting tracks unreleased!!!!??? anyway the purpose of this meta is to attempt to make sense of the way this soundtrack works. we’ll investigate sasuke primarily because i feel that he really ties the whole soundtrack together, and you can extrapolate a lot from the way his theme evolves.

sasuke’s theme (wandering/hyouhaku), yes the dramatic cowboy music theme, is this wonderfully atmospheric track that makes use of the kind of negative space between guitar strums to build up this aura, this Essence of Sasuke. this alone makes it stand apart from other mostly-acoustic pieces on the soundtrack, to me. the whole thing is just humming with this simmering frustration and melancholy and it really gives you a sense of sasuke as this tortured figure who has been severely wronged and experienced the world’s faults firsthand. notably, this version of sasuke’s theme lifts its opening notes (and structure, sorta) from sasuke’s original series theme, which i assume was on purpose. it shows that he’s grown jaded as he got older, i think.

anyway, as the inevitable battle between sasuke and itachi draws closer, we get our first variation on sasuke’s theme: black spot/kokuten. it has the same melody and structure as before, but features heavier guitars, more orchestration, and, in the final bars, notes that previously fell on 1 and 4 but now fall on 1 and 3, which bring a heightened sense of urgency to the whole thing. and more importantly, it ends without resolving itself? it leaves us hanging on this almost call-and-response bit with one wailing guitar after another, before winding the orchestration down and fizzling back down to the level of “wandering.” here we see a sasuke in progress, if you will, working towards a goal that some may find sinister, but he is determined if nothing else, and the instruments match his fervor. it’s roughly analogous to “crimson flames” in terms of intensity, but it’s very distinctly Sasuke.

there are several more variations of sasuke’s theme floating around, but the next one i want to talk about is this one called “sasuke’s ninja way,” apparently, never officially released but relentlessly employed by the anime directors. it takes a more subtle turn than “black spot,” but i don’t see it as a direct sequel to “wandering” for a few different reasons. i think it represents the dilemma sasuke found himself after finally killing itachi and learning the truth about him: the realization that this whole quest for power of his was never really about revenge on one specific person, but rather about reforming the shinobi world as a whole. it’s slower than “black spot,” yet darker, more ominous; it treads the same general path as “wandering” but with added electric guitar, and, notably, choir. recall that choir is often used for themes related to the akatsuki, which i think ties in neatly with sasuke’s motivations at this point. he, like nagato before him, wants to remake the world.

the final iteration of sasuke’s theme, “sasuke’s revolution/junkyousha,” brings it all together. the akatsuki is commonly represented through choir and organ, and this theme starts out with both of these cranked up to the max. this is (pardon the pun) sasuke’s rebirth, if you will. just combine the intensity of “girei,” the anger of “crimson flames,” and the determination of “emergence of talents” and you’re there. seriously: this culmination of sasuke’s character development basically pulls from every single facet of the soundtrack and produces this MASSIVELY rich piece full of anger and rage and hate and fury, while STILL managing to include the twangy guitar bits from “wandering” (which have gone back to 1 and 4!!). we also have someone going ham on a shamisen towards the end of the track, which calls to mind the shamisen solo from “emergence of talents” and other tracks. hinting at an eventual compromise with naruto, possibly?

anyway, i started out this meta trying to find a piece of the soundtrack that could serve as madara’s theme, but i wasn’t sure that one existed. i think the susano’o has a theme, and the uchiha clan has a theme, but....madara just doesn’t?? sure there are unreleased tracks like “legendary uchiha,” but i’d argue that doesn’t really go into his character as much as it just says “watch out for this fucking guy.”

but then i listened to hurricane suite one more time, and i was like HOLY SHIT THIS IS IT. for one thing, it’s long as fuck: this track is a whole journey. it really gives the impression of someone who has lived an impossibly long life and become jaded and cruel and hardened. i realize that the argument could be made that hurricane suite is sasuke’s theme, not madara’s, or that it’s a general shippuden theme and doesn’t represent one character in particular. and yes, i think both of these interpretations are correct. hurricane suite represents what sasuke could POTENTIALLY turn out to be, given his evolution from “wandering” to “black spot” to “sasuke’s ninja way” all the way to “sasuke’s revolution.” hurricane suite warns us that sasuke can (and very well may!) make the same mistakes madara did and end up destroying himself in the process. (the middle of “hurricane suite” GREATLY resembles “wandering.”) and recall that hurricane suite is used in the very first episode of shippuden: the episode where naruto encounters sasuke for the first time, AND- are you ready for this- when madara’s name is dropped for the first time in the series.

this is why i think that, along with it being a general shippuden theme, hurricane suite is also madara’s theme. shippuden as a whole is practically suffocating under the oppressive weight of madara’s presence, right from the very first episode. even before he’s introduced, he is VERY much there. so much of madara’s character is established before he even shows up. we hear so much about him from other characters (kurama, itachi, obito, hashirama), and as such our view of madara changes drastically over the course of the series. and guess what plays when itachi shows sasuke that genjutsu of madara stealing izuna’s eyes?

anyway, in my opinion and in my interpretation of the character, the music fits him perfectly. it starts out all low and choral with these slow ominous drums and deep strings, and this violin comes in that sounds like it’s weeping. we hear something like a heartbeat that grows darker over time, before the music comes to some sort of resolution, an inflection point, and the brass comes in heavy. NOW we’re dealing with the orchestra, three quarters of the way into the song, and we’ve got strings and drums set to a marching pace, more choral chanting, climbing strings and shamisen tumbling down the scales. it sounds like grief!!

and note that yes, this track is used in the very first episode of shippuden, during naruto and sasuke’s first encounter. but it is ALSO used during the scene in hashirama’s flashback when izuna is mortally wounded and madara makes the decision to abandon the clan on the battlefield to take care of him, despite his better judgment and hashirama’s offering of peace. the inflection point in the music represents a very real inflection point in madara’s life: the loss of his last brother. (it always comes back to that, doesn’t it.)

[straightfacedstrangeness]

Not that anyone asked (but seriously I’d LOVE for someone to talk to me about PokeSpe (just no spoilers past vol 13)) but since I made an offhand remark about my Top 5 favorite characters, it occurred to me that I actually DO have approximately 5 top favorite characters, and I’m procrastinating on work, so I’m gonna ramble

**just in case, note that a lot of this will revolve around my childhood experience with gender in a “I’m AFAB (and present-day me still identifies as a cis girl) but I don’t fit in with what media is telling me girls are like” way, a brief childhood feeling of homophobia, and probably general TMI about my opinions and emotions throughout my life, haha

1. Yellow

Okay, so, I was a little kid when Pokemon Adventures started coming out in English, back when manga was released as single-issue monthly comic books instead of complete volumes.  So I was rereading the same chapters over and over while anxiously awaiting the rest of the story (and wound up missing a bunch of issues anyway)

I enjoyed the RGB arc, I thought it was fun, but I didn’t LOVE the series until Yellow showed up.  At that age my ideal crush was “a cute boy my age who would be nice to me” and Yellow was presented to the reader as a cute boy my age who was sweet and kind and gentle, but also good in a fight, as all shounen protags must be.  Extra bonus points because they had just a few physically weak Pokémon and tried to fight battles in a way that minimized damage to their own and the opponent’s Pokémon, which meant they fought in a particularly smart and clever way.  And I was considered “smart” for being good at school, so being a SMART cute “boy” my age who would be nice to me, Yellow was PERFECT.  I mean, I loved the arc in general because of the clever battles, and the mystery of what had happened to Red, why these people were after Pikachu, why Yellow was so secretive about themself and their mission, etc was really engaging.  But also I adored Yellow as a character and partly in a “I wonder if ‘he’ would like me??” kind of way X’D  So to my tiny child self who didn’t even know it was possible to like-like someone of the same gender (because I hadn’t read Cardcaptor Sakura yet XD ), the reveal that Yellow was a “girl” was devastating—I had to cross out floating hearts on at least one drawing of us holding hands (scandalous!) and, while kind of stunned and shaken for a while, decided that what I’d felt all along was a deep, intense desire to be friends X’D (which probably wasn’t too far from the truth since I was pre-puberty and later turned out to be asexual)

(Also note that I never got the RGB issue that had the chapter where Red helps a little ‘girl’ capture a Rattata—later proven to be Yellow’s backstory—so the gender reveal really came out of nowhere for me.)

But anyways, I still love Yellow as a character for all the above reasons, without the crush aspects because I’m way older than them now.

Also when I reread the series ten years ago, I finally realized “wait, aside from surprising the reader, there’s no real plot reason for Yellow to pretend to be a ‘boy’ except that Green told ‘her’ to—so why did ‘she’ do it?”...and because at that time I didn’t even know that nonbinary genders existed, I decided it was cus they had low self-esteem and pretending to be a different person gave them courage (the same reading I had for Mulan at the time).  These days I’m more inclined to “yeah, I think Yellow’s nonbinary,” but that other interpretation was deeply relatable to me and only made me love Yellow even more.

2. Bill

Bill’s definitely a character I’ve grown to love more as an adult, since I’ve gone from seeing myself as “a protagonist doing cool things” to “a side character just living their life who hopefully gets to do something once in a while.”  But as a kid and now, I like him mostly for the slapstick and goofy expressions and the (early chapters Viz translations) outrageous accent  X’D  My brain desperately craves endorphins and the best way to get em is through a good laugh.

But also, I liked that he was introduced as a goofy character-of-the-week who got into ridiculous trouble and had to be rescued, but then kept being brought back, was slowly built up to be the “smart sidekick who explains things,” and eventually got to the point where he was participating in big battles (the Yellow finale on Cerise Island).  I rambled about this in the tags of another post, but I liked that he was a character who was “weak” without being “useless.”  As a kid who was good at school, I was obsessed with being good at things and had developed a black-and-white view of the world where either you were “strong/smart” or “weak/stupid” to the point that failing or just being not-so-good at anything was devastating (it still kind of is), because that meant I was actually “weak/stupid” when I was supposed to be “strong/smart.”  So it was kind of awesome that this guy who kept getting into trouble and having to be rescued—and didn’t even want to BE part of the final battle—managed to hold his own and get through it and help out instead of being a burden that dragged everyone down.  Seriously, he used a MAGIKARP effectively—the Pokémon everyone makes fun of for being “useless” and he used its one attack to save his life!

(Bonus points for all this happening in contrast to my devastating childhood experience of stanning The One Girl Character in every popular shounen series, waiting desperately for her to get to do something in battle, and then her one spotlight episode revolved around her struggling because she was so weak...not only was that actually happening to a boy for once, it was actually happening in a more satisfying/empowering way :’D )

3. Gold

I have extremely specific tastes when it comes to “the dumb shounen/action movie protag,” because as a kid I hated it when the main character was “dumb” because I was “smart” (re: good at school) and people who were “dumb” shouldn’t deserve to be the main character and have all the cool powers and save the world and stuff.  As an adult, I hate it when male characters are dumb and/or jerks but it’s treated as fine or even sexy(??) and the other characters fawn over them, and I generally still kind of hate it when characters who are dumb and/or jerks get the big important role when there’s a female character RIGHT THERE who’s more competent (and OF COURSE she has to wind up falling in love with him)

But anyway, I have extremely specific tastes, and Gold is it  X’D  He’s the perfect combination of “unshakably confident in his own stupid/egotistic views” and “treated as annoying and/or comic relief by the rest of the cast” with a bonus dash of actually being really clever in battle (so my inner child goes “Ah yes, technically, he is ’smart,’ and therefore...worthwhile“)  Making me laugh while also impressing me is like the key to my heart.

4. Crystal

I’m too lazy to look it up, but when Viz was publishing Pokemon Adventures as monthly comics, they must have switched to publishing it as trade paperbacks only and/or had a huge gap between the end of Yellow and the start of GSC, because for YEARS I’d thought Yellow was the end of the series and was shocked the first time I saw later volumes.  (My dad was buying us the monthly issues at the local comic store, and either they wouldn’t have ordered the trade paperbacks or he wouldn’t have thought to check those shelves.)

Anyway, that’s a long lead-in to the statement of “Crystal would automatically be my #1 or #2 if I’d read her arc as a kid.”  She’s a girl, she wears pants, she’s EXTREMELY smart (genius-level “book-smarts” about every Pokémon’s behaviors and weaknesses PLUS being clever in a battle), was tough as nails (she KICKED her Pokéballs!!), had no interest in romance or her appearance, AND had a short arc about losing her confidence and training herself back up to full power.  I would have KILLED for a character like that when I was a little girl being told that “girls don’t like action shows like Dragon Ball Z” (but I was a girl and I did???) and that girls were supposed to be pretty and obsessed with fashion and dating, and that girls were never the main character of action series, just side characters who either did nothing or got one chance to do something and were pathetically weak (see above, and/or Sakura’s fight against Ino (Naruto), those couple filler eps where Téa/Anzu played Duel Monsters (Yu-Gi-Oh), Videl getting pummeled by Spopovich (DBZ), etc).

So anyway, she’s awesome, she’s exactly the type of character I would’ve loved as a kid.  The only reason she’s behind Gold here is because at my age, “makes me laugh” > “the kind of main character I used to wish I could be”

5. Green (the girl trainer...I’m just too loyal to the Viz version to call her “Blue”...)

I’m trying not to rehash the same “I’m a girl but none of the girls in my shows/comics are like me!” childhood woes over and over, haha, but as much as I always enjoyed Green for being extremely clever and outsmarting the boys and being funny when she did so, she always lost points with me for being “pretty” and flirting to get her way, because that put her in the box of “girls are supposed to be pretty and desired by boys and obsessed with their appearance and romance” that was so foreign and disheartening to me as a kid.

But her staredown with Ho-oh at the end of the GSC arc TOTALLY got me.  As a sad adult with anxiety, watching characters who are absolutely terrified overcome their fear, watching characters who are completely beaten down struggle back to their feet and keep fighting, is like my ultimate power fantasy.  That sequence genuinely had me in tears.

Also her bond with Silver is super precious, especially since that’s like the first time in the series we’ve seen her be genuinely emotional and vulnerable with someone instead of teasing or manipulating them.

Honorable mention: Sapphire

I haven’t gotten up to R/S in my reread yet, and I only read that arc once over like a weekend ten years ago, but I’m pretty sure she’s gonna be a Top Fave cus again there’s that “I'm not like other girls!” childhood feel  (last time I’m saying it, I promise)

It’s a story arc where one protag wants to fight the gyms and the other protag wants to win the beauty contests, but the one who wants to fight the gyms is the girl!!  And she’s the typical “dumb but extremely good at fighting” shounen protag but she’s the girl!!  She’s feral and illiterate and a total tomboy and wins all her fights and she’s a GIRL!!!!

--

Anyway, those are my kids and my dude and my probably way-too-personal reasons why.  If you wanna reblog, reply, or send an ask about your own faves...please

[pendragaryen]

And FINALLY things are getting into motion! With watching episode 4 I had the strong and constant feeling that they’re finishing up all the storylines of the different pasts and begin to combine them, leading them into the present - this is so exciting! But besides that I really loved the whole introduction scenario with Hope and Dev and their shared past so much, these short five minutes were so intense - on large part bc of the beautiful soundtrack. So many emotions. And Dev definitely deserved better… I was shook… I also enjoyed the little flashback with Hope and Octavia and the story of the Hesperides. We love us some history-nerdy Blakes. ;)

And finally there’s my badass Clarke again determined to safe (her husband) her friends, acknowledging that they are most likely in gravely danger - and tossing her own safety overboard with it. WE STAN! You go girl!!! I’ve been waiting too long for this story arc. Seriously tho, I felt entertained by the first 3 eps, no doubt, but they felt like filler episodes to me compared to all of the things and actions that started now. Like Miller said: This planet sucks anyway - or what was it? MOOD. I wasn’t much into Santum even right from the start. And I’m not sad leaving it and all its story arcs (again: Sheidhedawho? Not interested). I really enjoyed the scenes with Raven and Jordan later on. Raven was in her element again, it was so good to see her joy and excitement coming back! On the other hand I really love how they handled her trauma initialized by what she had to do last episode. This HAD to be addressed and I really appreciated the little princess mechanic moment we got concerning the matter. None of us is innocent…

>Before I go on I’d like you to know, that you can always blacklist my rant about certain characters by blacklisting “anti” + the name of that character if you don’t like to see it on your dashes (sorry, that was badly written...>.<). I completely respect other opinions, but mine is very clear  - and it was from the very start in this particluar case... I disliked the character of Echo even way back in season 2, and as far as I am concerned the writers didn’t make me feel any better or different about her along the way. That scene in today’s episode, her ruthless merciless killing of these Disciples and the way she was treating the man who considered her as a FRIEND after 5 years of living together (or at least as an ally) had literally cemented my judgement about her. And yes I know literally EVERYone in this series has done horrible things to safe their own or themselves. But she’s proven time and time again that she hasn’t changed a bit and/or that she hasn’t the slightest doubt about the fact that death/killing is the only possible choice… Remorse excluded. Maybe... we’re SUPPOSED to dislike her, maybe this is the purpose of this whole character. To always question their actions. But i’m too tired for this. I’m literally done with her. I am not interested in her story arc whatsoever. End of rant.<

Returning to the much brighter notes now: No, I still can’t see anything else than friendship and understanding between Clarke and Gaia. It’s exactly like we thought: Their bond was shown and pronounced, bc it had to make sense that Clarke leaves Madi with her while she’s gone. Their mutual trust in each other had to be comprehensible.

And the man who attacked Gaia? (And it WAS a man, those strong legs and the grunting noises left no doubt about it.) I can hardly believe I’m saying this but I agree with some of your speculations here and say, that this really could be Bellamy himself… But omg… How the heavens would this make any sense?! But then again… what DOES make sense at this early point of the ride… mh… I HOPE I’m wrong, seriously. Couldn’t stand the thought of Clarke going for his rescue - just for him to return to Sanctum (and then through the wormhole) again and NOT being there when she arrives…

Finally something funny: I really have to mention my feelings when Clarkekru set foot on Nakara (is it Nakara? The ice planet?) for the first time. Does someone else maybe remember a show called “Sliders” back in the 90s? Bc hahaha… I was SO REMINDED of it, when the anomaly kinda spat out our lovelies! And it looked so poorly made, really bad CGI, like it was back then in the 90s, seriously, I really had to laugh so hard. But besides that: SHIT. Are they now STUCK on that planet bc the anomaly stone of Sanctum was destroyed? So at least a return to Sanctum seems not possible anymore. Ugh…

What an episode! I really enjoyed the watch! (And especially Gabriel in his tank-top 😉😋) But yeah... i want my Bellamy back please... *sigh*

[happymetalgirl]

February 2020

After a slow, but solid, start to the new decade last month, February sure picked the pace back up with a ton more releases. As usual though, the early month has seen a few more filler albums pushed out without the bands’ labels stirring up much of hype around them, and for some of it, you can see why. We got several more solid projects though that have me excited for what else their associated record labels have in store for the rest of the year. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves here, there’s plenty to talk about for February, starting with Sepultura.

Sepultura - Quadra

Machine Messiah was the first album I reviewed for this blog, and in that review I made note of the silliness ongoing complaining about this Sepultura lineup not being the “real” Sepultura by fans who still clamor for Max to come back or for the current lineup to retire the Sepultura name. As the size of the Derek Green era discography gradually dwarfs the Max era catalog, Sepultura fans gradually come to accept that the past is the past and this is Sepultura now. And the mild contrast between Sepultura’s output as old late and Max’s creative output through Soulfly, Cavalera Conspiracy, and Killer Be Killed hasn’t really shown any major gulf in class between the estranged artists. Sepultura may not be putting out successive critically acclaimed masterpieces, but they sure have maintained a greater ambition for grander sounds and concepts than Max, who, by contrast, has come through with some solid projects himself, but has largely repeatedly retread the tribal nu metal ground of Roots and tried to give the death metal he practiced with Sepultura some modern updates, with mixed results. Machine Messiah found Sepultura weaving proggy and orchestral elements into their modern form of death metal with respectable success, and the band’s ninth album with Derek Green is a solid continuation of the styles and aesthetics that the band had been evolving into on and leading up to Machine Messiah. Quadra, though, I think just lacks a bit of that creative spark that its predecessor had. It splits the band’s compounded sonic evolution into its main parts by going through sections of thrashy songs, groovy songs, slightly experimental songs, and more moody melodic songs, and it makes for a nice flow to the album, but it feels like each part is missing some of the others while also not going all-in quite enough to make the splitting up of their stylistic components worth it. Again, it’s still solid, just not blowing me away.

6/10

Ihsahn - Telemark

Kind of an odd one here, just a quick five-track EP: three originals and two covers. The first of two EPs to come this year from the Emperor frontman and black metal progressive progenitor finds him largely continuing in short form the slightly blackened prog-rock he had going on on Ámr. The opening track, “Stridig”, rides this mostly continuous guitar rumble over a few intriguing proggy passages while Ihsahn snarls in classic fashion. On the vocal front, his style is raspy and distinctly black metal, but he keeps the roughness on his throat to a minimum to not overpower the instrumentation around him and to make more potent use of melody with his vocals. The second track, “Nord”, introduces a few little modern Opeth-isms and some subtle horn accents to up the prog factor as the EP gets a little lighter. The title track in the middle of the record really goes to prog town even more dramatically than the previous two and takes with the horns with it. With covers of Lenny Cravitz’ “Rock & Roll Is Dead” (which sounds like it wouldn’t be too far off from a Marilyn Manson cover if he also decided to cover the song) and “Wrathchild” by Iron Maiden rounding the album, Ihsahn continues his use of raspy vocal tones and meager black metal rasp over the rock and metal classics while giving the Maiden cut a sweet extra flair with the brilliant addition of a little horn section. It’s a splendid little addition to Ihsahn’s solo catalog and a continuation of his proggy vision for his brand of black metal.

7/10

Intronaut - Fluid Existential Interventions

I have kind of long seen Intronaut as the heir apparent to Isis, with their spacy, sludgy brand of post-metal taking that of the post-metal godfathers’ into more proggy territories, and the L.A.-based trio have gradually grown more into their skin over the past few records, taking , and with The Direction of Last Things having been released almost five years ago, I was starting to get a little worried about if they’d hung it up for some reason. The band shows that the longer break has not dampened their boldness or creativity as they pick up right where they left off with the marriage of gargantuan sludge heaviness and ethereal post-metal atmosphere. The band get a little Meshuggah-type jazz fusion going on in the song “The Cull” and keep that jazzy flow going on the spacy sections of “Contrapasso”, while getting infectiously headbangingly groovy on “Pangloss”. I love the ways the band finds to shift in so many different directions so smoothly. I’d say though that the repetition of smooth movements in similar directions from song to song continue to be the band’s Achilles heel, sometimes really needing some kind of X factor or some kind of compositional surprise to break their cycles in these songs so as to not feel so circlular. The groovy riffage on “Pangloss” is probably the closest the band comes to diverting from their post-metallic mould, and as much as I love it there, I wish there was more. It’s a strong effort from them nevertheless, but I hope the band don’t take so long to progress in this vein on their next album.

7/10

Napalm Death - Logic Ravaged by Brute Force

With a new record on the way this year, I’m sure happy to get a little appetizer from the grindcore legends in the form of this two-song EP. The first song, the titular “Logic Ravaged by Brute Force” kicks off on a melodic brooding note, but quickly ramps up into the band��s famous high grinding death gear. It’s a pretty solid track, just a bit lacking in aggressive pay-off during the choruses, the verses constantly bringing the tempo down. But it’s definitely the kind of Napalm Death song that fixated on its melodic brooding mood and its titular hook, not necessarily representative of the band’s whole catalog or the album to come. The second track of the two, the cover of Sonic Youth’s “White Kross”, is a bit more of a burner, but it fits quite well into that mould for that kind of Napalm Death track like “Omnipresent Knife in Your Back” that could work as an album closer as well.

It’s just two songs and you want a number? Come on./10

Anvil - Legal at Last

The long-running Canadian outfit’s previous album, Pounding the Pavement, served little more than a reminder of why they never ascended to the heights of thrash metal during that genre’s peak of cultural relevance, and I have not revisited that record since re-listening to it to figure out exactly where to place it on the year’s worst-of list. The bar has never been super high for Anvil, and Pounding the Pavement really made it seem like the only way to go was up. The corny cover art to this follow-up here, though, didn’t give me much hope, and it sure isn’t much of an improvement. As with any Anvil project, the lyrics on Legal at Last are malignantly atrocious, and any attempt to enjoy the album is going to have to overcome the serious hurdle of tuning out some of the dumbest lyrics that sound like they were lifted from a high-schooler’s math notebook. I, again, kind of went into the project not expecting much, and knew I was going to hear some truly cringy bars. The “Chemtrails” song, nevertheless, manages to astound me with its ridiculously stupid lyricism feeding into the titular conspiracy theory seemingly unironically. Nice one guys. I’ll say, the band at least kind of redeem themselves with their pointing out the obvious corruption surrounding the fossil fuel industry and government surveillance. Anyway, predictably shitty lyrics aside, the band channel the same Motörhead-esque proto-thrash they’ve channeled their whole career with similar compositional predictability and lack of imagination, and it tires really quickly. And there really isn’t much to say about it musically. The riffs here, I’d say, are marginally better than those on Pounding the Pavement, and this album at least slightly more tangibly fun than its even more bumbling predecessor.

4/10

Sylosis - Cycle of Suffering

For some reason I didn’t quite like this album when I first heard it, and what an idiot I was in that moment, because damn this album is solid! Blending thrash with some technical death metal much like Revocation and knowing when to inject a little metalcore rhythm, Sylosis have come through with a ferocious and pummeling, but melodically nimble record that channels pure thrash aggression in every direction it travels. The band works in rewarding thrash breakdowns in songs like “Arms Like a Noose” and gripping harsh vocal melodies on songs like “Idle Hands”, and all sorts of little touches that only make the compositions more and more intense; I think this may be their best effort yet!

8/10

God Dethroned - Illuminati

The trajectory of blackened death metal has really been impossible to separate from Behemoth’s highly influencial landmark album, The Satanist, with bands in the field all aware and taking cues from the Polish juggernauts on how to size up the already-mammoth-y style to biblical proportions. And while they still have their instinctive old-school death metal war-like brutishness showing through on songs like the title track, God Dethroned seem to be more willingly working in ethereal choirs and . Songs like “Spirit of Beelzebub”, “Eye of Horus”, and “Gabriel” show a clear Behemoth influence wrapping itself around the band; the intro of “Broken Halo” is perhaps the clearest tribute or rip-off of “Ov Fire and the Void” I have ever heard, and the song only continues to expound on the integration of Behemoth’s style into God Dethroned’s. As nice as the alternating mesh of old and new for the band is aesthetically, there are a few too many bland, filler cuts on here like “Book of Lies” and “Satan Spawn” weighing down the more excitingly volatile tracks with dragging performances that can only sound so good over such dry compositions.

6/10

Five Finger Death Punch - F8

Ivan Moody did a little phone interview with Loudwire prior to this album’s release and his assessment of his band’s recent output was actually pretty sober and realistic. Along with detailing the mental health benefits that have come with his newly committed sobriety (which I am genuinely happy about for him) Moody admitted that the band’s past two albums (And Justice for None and Got Your Six) have not been very special, and he’s right. He even said that the band’s double album pair was bloated and should have been trimmed down to one album, and he’s definitely right. He stated that he felt that the band has been in a rut for awhile and expressed a rejuvenated desire to make music that isn’t so here-today-gone-tomorrow, and he’s right about that. And he said that on this album, F8, the band really stepped it up and improved their craft to finally make something special again, and that’s where his hot streak of correctness ends. Don’t get me wrong, he’s partially right about F8 being better than the past two albums, but that’s not a very high bar to clear. I was very critical of And Justice for None when it came out in 2018 and I agree that it and Got Your Six are without a doubt the band’s worst albums, and that is saying something because they were on a downward slide for a long time and it wasn’t very surprising the way they bottomed out so badly on those two albums. While I don’t think the improvement was quite as dramatic as he made it out to be, I will say that I can see what Moody was talking about with the refined songwriting on F8, it really does seem like the band tried to inject a little more boldness into their writing and their performances have a bit more of a sense of purpose this time around. The band gives us a few glimpses of their younger selves with returns to The Way of the Fist heaviness on a couple songs, and even though they still don’t have the best track record for ballads, the few mellow tracks on F8 are certainly better than the past two albums’. On that subject, the track sequencing on F8 isn’t quite so disjointed and awkward as it was on And Justice for None. But again, the improvements still aren’t as dramatic as Ivan Moody might see them. The band still don’t really break out of their box too much; it’s not so much an album of them finally getting them out of their creative rut as it is an album of them slowly making their way out of that rut or getting them more capable in that rut. Again, it is a noteworthy enough improvement over the past two (or four even) albums’ drivel, but it’s not quite a full return to form. Hopefully this gets them back in the right direction though if it’s not too late.

4/10

Blaze of Perdition - The Harrowing of Hearts

The Polish quartet’s fifth full-length is another set of solid modern occult black metal with just enough of a sense of atmosphere and emotional rawness lifted from blackgaze. I certainly wouldn’t call this an atmospheric black metal album, but the band does venture into those more ethereal realms of black metal too. They do well to maintain their intensity throughout it too, as the atmospheric elements serve to create a more expansive and grand feel to the music rather than just breaking up and diluting the darker, heavier aspects.

7/10

Sightless Pit - Grave of a Dog

After a pretty big past few years for them, Lingua Ignota mastermind Kristen Hayter, The Body’s Lee Clifford, and Full of Hell frontman Dylan Walker teamed up for a seemingly casual dark-ambient-noise-venture to kick the decade off. I’m contrast to the extreme abrasiveness most of these artists peddle through their main projects, Grave of a Dog remains predominantly ambient until Dylan Walker’s distorted-noise-backed screams on “Drunk on Marrow” usher in the industrial noise of “Miles of Chain” and “Whom the Devil Long Sought to Strangle” being the standout exceptions. I enjoy Kristen Hayter’s ever-languishing operatic vocals across the album, especially on the minimal, piano-driven closing track and on “Violent Ruin”, on which the trio play with some autotune on her voice that actually comes out nicely. But for the most part, this album is so casually below all these artists’ punching weight, it’s no doubt just a quick bonus album project for all three of them that I’m sure pales in comparison to their past and future releases.

6/10

Insect Ark - The Vanishing

With clear influences from avant-garde elites like Sumac, Deathspell Omega, and Neurosis seeping through the pores of this album, Dana Schechter continues to refine Insect Ark’s spooky, psychedelic brand of instrumental doom metal with the help of newly-recruited drummer Andy Patterson’s well-tempered percussive accents to give the brooding songs more than just a steady anesthetized heartbeat, but also a newly percussive sense of punch. And the two gel in artistic partnership in such an seemingly innate way you would think they’d have been bandmates for years. The Vanishing, again, continues to hone the spacy, darkly ambient metallic psychedelia Insect Ark has carved out a niche for, floating from unnerving oppressive heaviness to eerie drones of dark, brassy ambiance with ease and confidence. I definitely respect and recommend this one highly.

8/10

Godthrymm - Reflections

Godthrymm is the offshoot project of a couple of former members of My Dying Bride, and Reflections is the trio’s first full length project together after a couple of EPs (from which a few songs on this album are pulled) that gave me mixed anticipations for this full-length. A Grand Reclamation in 2018 sounded very prototypic and derivative of Candlemass without the crucial bombast to back it up, but the band made some strides on 2019’s Dead in the Studio that clearly piqued Profound Lore’s interest, with much more melodically compelling songs like “We Are the Dead” and “Cursed Are the Many” making it into this LP. The band had a more I like the emotive Spirit-Adrift-esque guitar melodies that “The Sea as My Grave” incorporates and the more straightforward funeral dirge of “The Light of You”, and the band even improved the originally amateurish “The Grand Reclamation” from the first EP greatly with a more professional vocal performance and better drum accents. Still, much of the melody on here is not enough to really conjure any strong emotions and the grand doom the album shoots for isn’t quite as epic as it should be as a result. The band did well to improve upon their first efforts together, but I think they do still have a way to go.

6/10

The Amity Affliction - Everyone Loves You... Once You Leave Them

I didn’t totally hate The Amity Affliction’s pop-oriented direction on 2018′s Misery, but I didn’t like it much either (granted they’ve never really been my style), and I wonder if fans felt similarly about the stylistic drift because Everyone Loves You... Once You Leave Them is a definitive return to the band’s roots that, while still not entirely for me, I can definitely appreciate more than Misery. The band’s older sound that makes its way into this album is proportionally much more metalcore than the sound they trended toward on Misery, and even though I still don’t find the pop-punk-ish vocal style and melody writing to be a very fitting compliment to the early 2000’s metalcore the band rides instrumentally, I can much more clearly see the appeal this time around and enjoy a greater portion of the tracks here.

5/10

Kvelertak - Splid

Norwegian alchemists Kvelertak have been eccentrically fusing punk at varying degrees of hardcore and rock ‘n’ roll with black metal for four albums now and they’ve been pretty damn successful at it the whole time so at this point it’s a matter of what the band do with their established style, how far they can take what they already, and how much expanding they have to do to keep it sustainable. Splid shows that the band’s answer to all those questions is “yes, we can”. While much of the vibrant novelty of the self-titled debut and Meir has worn off, what’s left is a band showing that they are indeed more than an attention-grabbing novelty act and can keep their style going beyond that initial excitatory period. Stylistically Splid only occasionally draws from new-ish territory, occasionally going significantly light-spirited and even dancy, but otherwise it’s pretty much the Kvelertak we know and hopefully love, maybe some of that initial charm is a little worn and sensible through the compositional repetition, but sure as hell not to the point where it’s not a good time.

7/10

Frigoris - ...in Stille

Germany’s Frigoris continue to struggle to set themselves apart from the ambient black metal pack, which they present themselves as little more than a statistic in the growing homogeneity of the genre with all the baseline competence to pass but nothing stylistically or compositionally unique or forward-thinking.

5/10

殞煞 Vengeful Spectre - 殞煞 Vengeful Spectre

Blending ambient elements of traditional Chinese folk music into the atmosphere of Deafheaven-esque blackgaze (the vocals being some of the closest I have ever heard to George Clarke’s) this anomaly of a self-titled debut from 殞煞 Vengeful Spectre is a fantastic way to enter the fold for the Guangdong outfit, establishing a signature style early and with impressive genre-blending competence. I am eager to hear what this band has in store for the future.

8/10

Tombs - Monarchy of Shadows

A pretty sizeable EP from the Brooklyn-based four-piece, Monarchy of Shadows gives a pretty concise and tasty portrait of the band’s crushing Gorgoroth-esque black metal that sacrifices hardly any heaviness for its dissonant atmosphere. The compositions get a little repetitive as the EP draws on though, which does do a harsh number on the project’s otherwise consistently solid aesthetic. Luckily the more death metal-infused portions of the album like “The Dark Rift” and “Once Falls the Guillotine” kick some needed energy and compositional life into the project. I’d say it’s worth a go for anyone with a hankering for black metal with unrestrained distorted heaviness and occult vibes more than shoegazy ambianc; it’s not a mind-blower, but it’s a good quick dose of it.

7/10

Delain - Apocalypse and Chill

After being thoroughly disappointed by Within Temptation’s writer’s-block-ridden LP last year, I was honestly not in much of a mood for any more pop-oriented neoclassical symphonic metal this year, but after hearing a lot of praise for this new Delain project, I thought I’d give it a try, and Delain sure did change my appetite for the genre. The band sound so much more cathartically vibrant with their willingness to depart from the neoclassical norm into synthetic and other diverse stylistic territories, incorporating adrenaline-fueled downtuned guitar riffs, upward key shifts akin to alternative metal and power metal, and resounding melodic choruses into modern symphonies with big but tasteful production bolstering, and the Lacuna Coil-esque vocal trade-offs across it all are executed brilliantly. And even when the band go more traditional they show they can accomplish similarly invigorating results with a more bare production pallet, a truly impressive display of symphonic versatility and creative courage.

8/10

Suicide Silence - Become the Hunter

After the calamity that was their ill-fated attempt to branch out into Deftones-imitation and clean vocals on their self-titled album, Suicide Silence show that they thoroughly learned their lesson with their gruff, classically deathcore groovy sixth LP, Become the Hunter, which finds the band playing much more to their instrumental strengths and their signature style of deathcore chug (there is a lot of thicccc, delicious chug on this project), finds them taking their riff-writing style back a bit to The Cleansing and No Time the Bleed and feels more natural than what they were trying to do on the self-titled record. Eddie Hermida got the memo about his vocals on the self-titled; it’s all screams and growls here, not a “tee-hee” in sight. Unlike the aforementioned albums with Mitch Lucker behind the mic, Become the Hunter isn’t quite as productionally rough around the edges or as horror-movie eerie and menacingly evil. It’s all about the crunchy guitar rhythms all across the album, which finds the band repeating themselves a bit, but not so much that it feels more like derivative writing rather than convergent compositional tactics across the song. While it could certainly be seen as a run through the motions or a retreat to the band’s safe zone, this was definitely the return to form Suicide Silence needed after the misfire that was the previous record, and definitely a more exciting album for Hermida to showcase his deathcore vocal talent than You Can’t Stop Me. For me though, it’s definitely an improvement on the band’s meager first album with their new vocalist and its subsequent creative dry heave, and it sets a much more convincing tone for Suicide Silence going forward with Eddie Hermida.

8/10

Neaera - Neaera

Despite their fluctuating quality across the first run of their career, I was a surprised and disappointed when Neaera disbanded back in 2014, but equally enthralled to hear the band return to the fold thankfully not too long after. With this self-titled record being the German act’s first after returning from the grave, the band rose back up in the most emphatic way I can imagine. As self-titled albums are generally meant to, Neaera represents Neaera at their essence, blending Swedish melodic death metal with modern NWOAHM metalcore as they always have throughout their career. Indeed, the fascinating thing about this self-titled album is that it’s really not significantly stylistically different from the band’s previous efforts aside from some minor production tweaks. But Neaera really found the sweetest balance for themselves between the menacing blend of death metal urgency with a thrashy metalcore sense of rhythm and the cathartic guitar leads of melodic death metal, and I can’t honestly think of any other project that makes a better case for the intermingling of these styles than the case this album makes. While plenty of metalcore out there incorporates some elements of melodeath, Neaera’s brand that they crystallize on this album is the other way around, primarily melodic death metal but with the raw pounding drive of metalcore to provide a more punchy dynamic to a style that often finds itself in great need of it. And the band manages to mesh these genres in a manner that, rather than diluting them both, brings out the best in both of them. I could seriously sing this album’s praises for much longer, but I think I will leave it at it being the best album I’ve heard so far this year.

9/10

Ozzy Osbourne - Ordinary Man

I’ll admit that I don’t really follow the public life of the original Black Sabbath frontman too closely or intentionally, but it is pretty hard to avoid as well so it’s not like it’s even possible for me to be completely ignorant of how he’s doing. It goes without saying of course, but Ozzy Osbourne is a bonafide icon and singular figure for heavy metal that very very few, if anyone else, can compare to, and with his career and musical output kind of petering out over the past decade as his old age begins to get the better of him, there seems to be a greater sense of awareness in the metal world that we probably only have a few years more with Ozzy, if that. And it’s going to be a very profoundly somber day when the vocal godfather of heavy metal is gone. That being said, this is quite possibly the last album we will get from the prince of darkness and yet listening to it doesn’t quite feel that way. In the weeks leading up to the album, Ozzy’s supporting tour was postponed (or maybe just cancelled), and the man himself said that he does not have his health as is not happy. Yet the album sounds like a very stale, yet modern take on Ozzy’s doomy and classic heavy metal sounds with some modern rock production updates that honestly sound a few generations younger than its seventy-one year old apparent creator, and Ozzy himself sounds uncannily clear, coherent, and healthy. I saw a little bit of dismissal of this album as not being a profound conceptual contemplation of mortality like David Bowie’s, Leonard Cohen’s, or David Berman’s last albums, and while I definitely enjoy those artist’s swansong albums more than this and while I do feel like Ozzy deserves a proper album that better represents his importance to and impact on metal and culture at large, I don’t know if that’s the kind of album Ozzy wants to make. The man is struggling with Parkinson’s disease and based on his music leading up to this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if he just wants to make fun rock music therapeutically to get his mind off the pain rather than honing in on it and intensifying it. Going back to criticism of the album though, Ozzy still sounds so checked out in his performances despite his suspiciously healthy-sounding voice that I can’t help but wonder how touched up it is, the exception being the title track featuring Elton John on which Ozzy does get a little introspective about realizing his ambitions and cementing his legacy as a music legend. Ozzy also sounds more enthusiastic in his performance with Post Malone on the galloping, blood-pumping closing track “It’s a Raid”, but for the majority of the album, it really sounds like he doesn’t even want to be there, and I just hope this wasn’t something people around him pressured him into. I really do want to reiterate my utmost respect for Ozzy Osbourne and all that he has done for the music I love so much, and I would love to hear him round out his legendary career in a more fitting manner. But if he needs to end it here to rest and heal, which it really seems like he does, I won’t begrudge the man or take anything away from his legacy and what he’s accomplished for music. Thank you forever Ozzy, and whatever you do next, as always, go fucking crazy.

5/10

[mysterylover123]

BNHA Rewatch: Episode 39 “Game Start”

mysterylover123

SEASON 3 FINALLY! Who cares about anything that actually happens in this recap/filler ep because ODD FUTURE!!!!!!! 

I freaking love this OP. If you could somehow marry an anime op I would marry this one. I’ve heard it a million times and I always find something new I love about it. I love the song and the visuals, BTW. Most reactors seem to have it grow on them, slowly. I can’t fathom not loving it to death.

Opening scene is Recap at the Ol Villain Bar with Villain Mom Kurogiri, He recaps Episode 37. Remember that time when Tomura got mad about Stain and cornered Deku at the mall? Member? 

Recap #2: Deku likes All Might and wants to be like him. In case you didn’t know that already.

Recap #3: List off everyone’s quirks in Class A in alphabetical order! Man my eyes are glazing over at this point. I KNOW THIS ALREADY. 

WOW Deku is apparently so gay that Kaminari and Mineta can use him as a reverse beard. 

I like how the girls in Class A kinda get along. Solidarity in a male-dominated field is pretty realistic.

The swimsuits are canon, actually; Kami and Mineta fantasize about them in a volume extra. I kinda love them and how they fit the characters’ personalities pretty well. Ochaco’s is my favorite.

Sorry Kaminari, no heterosexual lust allowed here.

OMG WE’RE SO SPOILED. So many best boys all in one room. I remember the first time I saw this ep, it was on my lunch break at my trash job, and I thought “Thank you, BNHA, for giving me this pleasant image to keep me going through the day. It’s not substantial, I don’t even care.”

This might be the only time in a show I’ve ever seen the girls wearing more substantial clothes than the guys. 

“COME SWEAT WITH US”. OH MY. Join the gay orgy of your classmates Mineta and Kami! You cannot resist!

Now Iida, Deku and Shoto are reminiscing. Recap #4. Remember that time when we had bromance about fighting Stain? Member dat?  (OMG they’re so cute in this scene. Iideku and Tododeku vibes!)

“Hey Kirishima, you got Bakugo here?” “Of course, I have no life outside of being his sidekick, what else would I be doing?” (Sorry for the salt, it just annoys me how filler Kirishima basically does nothing but follow Bakugo around like an underpaid minion.) 

Another filler gripe: How post-Final Exam, punched Baku in the face Deku is apparently still as nervous and afraid of challenging Kacchan as he was back in Episode 3. He’s changed, ya’ll! Character development happened! Anyway, swim race happens. 

Bakugou is now reminding Todoroki that he’s part of the rivalry threesome as well, and Shoto isn’t fighting it this time.

“Swimming” race time! 

WOWZA. (How is Shoto not freezing? wouldn’t that be effing cold?)

BTW I really like the way they animate Ojiro’s tail as he jumps in in this scene; I don’t know why, it just looks good. Obviously Iida isn’t really using Recipro here, because he’d beat Deku at this point. )

This shot is always captioned with “Jealous Todoroki” and that cracks me up.

The OT3 of your dreams is about to race! Taking all bets, folks!

Wah wah wah.

“Game Start” is silly and kind of dumb, but I kinda love it. It’s not a great episode of BNHA by any means, nor a great start to a season this intense...yet i still get a kick out of watching it. I hope most future BNHA filler is more like this episode; just a fun dumb set of Class 1-A antics with a bit of fanservice and friendship thrown in. Man this recap was easy to write, because basically nothing all that substantial happens other than the collective guy-sexual fanbase squeeing in unison.

( Also, I wanna make a note that Deku got voted as Best Boy of 2018′s anime season, and I want to make a note of how that happened. Step 1: Remind the whole fanbase in the first ep that he’s ripped as eff by throwing him in skintight swim trunks).

BKDK CORNER:

Remember how we’re rivals, Kacchan! “Yeah, of course I do, you damn nerd!” The second part of this scene does show Deku calmly, with that determined expression on his face, accepting Kacchan’s rivalry challenges. I do like that in filler, because that’s Deku at this point. He socked this guy in the face at the final exam, he’s not about to cower in fear of him. Also, you cannot not convince me that Kirishima, ever Katsuki’s wingman, convinced him to go by mentioning that Deku was there in a tight swimsuit. 

BEST GIRL OF THE EP: No one new. 

RANKER: The Fantasy Swimsuits

6. Jiro’s (I feel like she’d look better in more of a wraparound style)

5. Momo’s (I love her but her taste in clothes is kinda tacky)

4. Tooru’s (hangs well on her)

3. Tsuyu’s (really creative and odd)

2. Mina’s (simple but effective)

1. Ochaco’s (girl has damn fine fashion sense!)

[kinetic-elaboration]

July 20: Thoughts on The 100 2x04, Many Happy Returns

It’s literally been five months since I did one of these…

The wasteland was a pretty cool concept and I’m sad that they kinda pulled back on it later. Like, when characters can get from point A below the wasteland to point B above it without apparently passing through it at all, it makes it seem like the area is actually not that big after all. Is it, like, just NYC? And maybe the metro area? Also, again, as usual, floored by the costuming on this show. Amazing.

So Zoran is the first human Jaha meets on Earth. A kid and a mutated human.

Clarke is so intensely pragmatic. She legit doesn’t care if people once tried to kill her, as long as they aren’t trying to kill her now. I don’t really see this as forgiveness, but rather an ability to forget the past that isn’t useful to her. Also lol @Anya for saying Clarke is weak, like who broke who out of the Mountain hmmm?

“Everything is Grounder territory.” Murphy telling the truth. And even if some parts of the world aren’t Grounder territory, how the hell would Bellamy know?

Murphy, canonically a terrible runner. Rewatching these early eps just reinforces his glow up since then. (Not in terms of running, but in terms of, like, haircut.)

The wreckage of the Factory crash is so devastating, following the trail of bodies to the crash site. I still wish we’d found out what happened to everyone else. I guess we’re supposed to assume the rest of the stations exploded before impact? But still. I feel some bitterness.

This saving Mel story is entirely, 100% about keeping Bellamy, Finn, and Murphy stuck for most of an episode, allowing Octavia to find them, and then forcing Bellamy to come back to Camp Jaha rather than continue searching for Clarke—so he can, you know, run into Clarke. It’s pure filler. And imo not even very interesting filler since I’m not really like a rescue/adventure story person. I can’t even figure out how Mel ended up stranded along the side of the cliff. Was she climbing up and then got tired? Also, on a related note, at what point do they, Bellamy in particular, realize which station this is? Is it immediately obvious from the wreckage, or only from the identity of the survivor? Because this is Bellamy’s home.

All that time they were talking, Sterling was there in the background, doing whatever. Honestly though shame on Bellamy a little for letting Finn convince him not to save Mel.

Totally forgot they built an electric fence at Camp Jaha. Then, began work on a radio beacon.

I can’t even pay attention to the Clarke and Anya scenes because I’m too attracted to both of them. Less so in the mud. Which is 100% gratuitous given that uh, I don’t think the Mountain Men who almost never go outdoors and are currently wearing big ass gas masks on their faces can smell shit.

Bellamy and his adventure squad are such dumbasses. Huh, let’s tie this thin rope with a single knot around a stump and then just watch our friend use it to scale the side of a mountain. Nothing can go wrong there. I mean there are fucking four of them just standing around watching when they could be, uh, securing the rope? Anyway RIP Sterling, cause of death: idiocy. (Slash the narrative’s need to put Bellamy in the hero role at this point, and to up the ante on his heroism, and to waste some time.)

To be more fair, I think this is semi-important for Bellamy’s characterization, an early version of ‘save who we can save today.’ He’s at a sort of crossroads at this point, not really a leader anymore like in S1, but sort of a leader, and he needs to figure out what sort of leader he’ll be.

Monroe’s “Sterling was one of us” warms my heart because it speaks to my “the 100 were a distinct social group” theory, which I wish (again lol) had been more important to the show and for longer.

Murphy does fall in, though, pretty fast. After Monroe says the ‘one of us’ thing. Which is actually pretty impressive given that a few days ago he was blasting a hole in the dropship and running away with all their ammunition.

This must be such a trip for Jaha, like, he is aware that forest exists still, because of transmissions from the 100, but he’s in the middle of the fucking desert, and this is all he knows of Earth, whatsoever. Also, again, these sets are perfect, I love them so much.

How did the City of Light become a legend among the Grounders? It’s made from the Alie 1 chips…. Didn’t Becca, like, not like those? I’m assuming of course that literally any of this was ever thought out or ever made sense.

“I have no room for hate.” You know what I’m just gonna say it: I think this is true. This is really how Jaha lives the rest of his life. I think people forget since he wasn’t really himself for most of S3, and even in S2 his mission to the City of Light seemed kind of nutty (and boring). But “I have no room for hate” both describes him pretty well, and is rather a lovely thing about him. If only he hadn’t been so obsessed with the COL, tbh. Searching for it was a bad idea from the very beginning and it was also, I think, a rather cowardly idea.

I forgot that this was where the concept of radiation disfigurement came in and was explained. Is that really how it works? Like random mutations, even generations after the event, from non-mutated parents? Lol I have no idea. That said, Sienna kind of looks like she has some scarring on her face, too.

Here is Jaha finding someone who left her people for her son, whereas he sacrificed his son for his people. Does this also change his mind on things going forward? Connect to his insistence on the COL, at the expense of a chunk of his people?

I miss this thing where characters knew other characters even though we’d never seen them interact before, because, like, a history exists and then the show acknowledges it. That was fun.

I shipped Raven/Wick and I don’t regret it, even though fandom’s toxicity basically killed it for me in a lot of ways. They had a good rapport. More importantly, he might literally be the only man to not take shit from Raven and to actually be brave enough to challenge her.

 Engineering is such a damn good set.

This is a weird episode because our two mains have pretty much the least important, or at least least-interesting, story lines. They’re basically just being moved into position to reunite at the end of the ep, and that’s it.

Clarke: “I just need something sharp and sterile [to remove the tracker from your arm].” Anya: bites it out with her teeth.

Why do they bother putting trackers on the Grounders? Do they escape often?

Murphy’s not only helping with the rescue mission, he’s at the head of the line.

Bellamy’s legs appreciation.

Murphy: “Don’t you worry, Bellamy, I won’t drop you.” I mean…you did once try to hang him. But by-gones I guess. I do believe at heart Murphy just wants to be part of the crew.

I think the Raven and Wick scenes are my favorites of this episode. I have two uninjured legs and I wouldn’t climb that thing; Raven is a brave bitch. And when she has to give up and come down, probably the saddest moment of the ep, along with finding Factory station. Some of this is relevant to my big bang.

 After literally all this, Finn’s still like ‘Bellamy, just drop that rando’ lol. No, bitch, don’t do this half-assed. Stop being a wimp and pull them both up.

Before it’s revealed that the horn is Octavia, this really does look like Bellamy and the No Good Very Bad Day lol: first Factory is found destroyed, then Sterling dies, then you almost die when your fake rope breaks, then someone starts shooting arrows at you, then acid fog rolls in, like, what now universe??

I guess another purpose of this story line, being fair again, is that Murphy and Bellamy are now officially friends again. Like Murphy has proven himself completely trustworthy as of that little nod between them.

“She blew the horn” is s obviously ADR to explain what exactly is happening here. Which is helpful, even though she’s clearly carrying the horn.

Blake sibling reunion!

“Three mechanics made it to the ground.” I mean… you’d think it would be more than that… what with the entirety of Mecha making it. Or was that station mostly casualties? I don’t know, this still doesn’t make sense to me, how they split up people between stations. Season 2 implied it was random, Season 3 implied it was by home station.

“Your leg’s messed up and that blows. Figure out a way to work around it.” Legit question: is there anyone else who would have said that to her?

I really, truly miss Wick tbh. One of the few characters with a sense of humor. (And yet again: he was good for Raven.)

They’re really playing fast and loose with the rules about language in this verse huh? Warriors speak English, no everyone speaks English, no English is for friends only I guess?

Jaha just wants to be a dad. Like, do I think he was a good parent… I dunno. Is he a better parent than anyone else on this show? At this point I would have to say yes. (No, Clarke does not count as a “parent” jfc.)

Ruthless Clarke ftw.

Jaha making a chess board just breaks my heart. Just let him be a dad!!

It’s been such a freaking long time since I watched this, I can’t remember if Octavia had braids in the last ep or not, like how long she’s had them. And it’s really bugging me, because someone else must have put them in, and I’m trying to figure out who that might be.

Also, where did she get the horn? I guess the implication is it was Lincoln’s… I can’t really remember. Wouldn’t it still have been on his person when he was captured?

Octavia went off the rails but at this point I’m still very fond of her.

The map Finn gives Bellamy lists ‘statue’ (Lincoln Memorial?), ‘twin trees’ (???), ‘Ark’ (Alpha Station??), and ‘amusement park’ AND amusement park is very close to Ark so my question is why didn’t they use that amusement park for something interesting??

Bellamy knows he shouldn’t let Finn go off alone but then, what can he do? Finn never really adhered to his authority. And I don’t think he feels like he can flex that right now, like it’s sufficiently established in this new order.

But he does arm Murphy. Which says a lot about how much he has decided to trust him, but also how little he trusts Finn. I forgot about this split in the character groups, though I should have remembered it, since of course this leads directly to the massacre.

“Parting, such sweet sorrow, right?” is an interesting quote from a kid who can’t spell ‘die.’

Aw, Clarke goes back to the dropship. I forgot about that. But then of course she doesn’t realize… anything. She doesn’t know the Ark is down, she doesn’t know what happened to the few of her friends who were on the outside. And her face when she sees the message to her, and only her name is still visible…

Blah blah blah fight sequence.

Creepy skeleton parts on the ground.

 I think this could have been the start of an Anya/Clarke friendship of some sort: Clarke earns her respect by fighting well, Clarke’s people protect Anya, the alliance forms… too bad they had to kill her.

And Clarke figures out where Alpha is based on Raven and Wick’s balloon.

“We fell from Earth in a football stadium. I think they already know we’re here.”

BUT the balloon is also what sets off Byrne, and gets her so worried about Grounders she authorizes the ‘shoot on sight’ command that kills Anya and almost Clarke. On the one hand, this is a nicely wrought story line. On the other hand, they shouldn’t have killed Anya, so. A wash.

Was Byrne’s worry about the balloon warranted though? I can’t decide.

Zoran, such a kind soul.

How can there possibly be a bounty on Sky People (side note: Jaha’s reaction to that name like ‘huh well I guess that is what we are’) that people all the way out in the dead zone would know about? Like… they’ve been on Earth for like a month. And the war has only been going on for part of that time, arguably. If it even is a war.

Trent Lane voice: Betrayal, yeah, stab in the back, betrayal…

Too bad “To survive, we do what we must” didn’t end up in like the fandom lexicon. It’s a pretty good variant on the theme. Plus Jaha’s just so… like he’s been fucked over but he can’t even be mad, because he gets that she’s doing it for her son and he wishes he had that chance. Watching his scenes again, I really feel like he was underrated and I miss him a lot.

I wonder what happened to Zoran and family. Were they absorbed into the hive? More generally, what happened to people seeking the CoL before ALIE could get it properly running with Jaha’s help? Did they all just… die in the desert?

Alpha Station at night is so beautiful.

And Clarke is so happy.

And this is SUCH A SETUP FOR CLARKE AND ANYA TO BE FRIENDS OMG, Anya should have brokered peace with Lexa, there was such an obvious role for her… Her death was 100% random attempt at shock, this show’s #1 worst quality, which is saying a lot.

I mean shot in the back while she’s walking away these Sky Guards are incompetent.

RIP Anya.

I really thought the Bellarke reunion was in this ep for some reason. But then I also knew Anya died right at the end—for more Shock Value ofc—so I don’t even know. I remember the scenes but nothing of their order I guess.

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh S3 Ep 2: The VR Zone Has a Hell Ton of Trees

Alright guys I am regretting the hell out of this teriyaki ramen bowl I just ate, so it’s a better time than ever to go back into this VR arc. Now that the Big 5 have made their speech, all of them quite fat and one with a cane although he doesn’t even have a body anymore, they are ready to send everyone down a series of...plot-shaped holes.

Like they were JUST in some sort of tropic zone, to go back to here and then go somewhere else and so like--this is still VR I think? Like I’m assuming they went VR the moment they entered this room but it is quite vague at what point they were officially in VR. Was it when their vision went fwisssh and everyone split into RGB layers or was it that they got knocked out with gas quite a long time ago and were just unaware that it happened? Probably a bunch of these things.

With this announcement we find out that everyone--and I mean everyone--has to play cards now, although I’m pretty sure half of them have duel disks and the other’s are like...not equipped? I mean it’s VR, so hypothetically no one at all needs a duel disk anymore but you gotta sell toys, so no matter what, Yugi’s going to be lugging this heavy sharp thing on his wrist, even when he knows he will soon be shot down a wacky hole.

The title of last episode, ps was “VR Nightmare,” but like, it’s actually fairly pleasant, compared to the blimp hell we were dealing with just a few episodes back. I mean I guess people are actively trying to kill us here but when are they not?

The audacity of this show. Every state in the US has huge ass fake castles in it leftover from the Rockefeller era. Where else are our Moms supposed to drag us on Day Trips so we can get our history credit for Girl Scouts?

Americans are hella good at creating fake historical sites--all you need is a 50+ year old house and some turret work possibly made by a reasonably well known architect and it’s like “yeah that’s a good enough castle for me! Can we say it’s haunted, too? It’s hella haunted! Come to my castle B+B!”

(read more under the cut)

Tea landed in some concept art that kind of looks like the underside of a mushroom. I dunno how I’d classify this rock structure.

And then Kaiba landed in his worst nightmare which was being in a normal park with one single straight road but somehow still completely lost. At least Mokuba managed to fall into the same hole as his brother to ensure that Seto wouldn't be lost for like the rest of this arc. Which was actually kind of an unintentionally hilarious animation.

*rare shot of the Kaibas actually taking a break*

Man, this is the closest they’ve gotten to a real hug in kind of a while. Like when was the last time these bros hugged? Pegasus’ castle?

Meanwhile, Noah is admiring his work from this throne room and it would be a whole lot more intimidating if he wasn’t in calf-high black socks.

His outfit is like a white school uniform so what gives with the black socks? Like of all the things to complain about on Yugioh (especially since I see Yugi’s hair looking right at me in the next cap) those socks though. Those are pretty inappropriate with this outfit, Noah. Especially matched with this God Throne you’ve got going on. Did not see socks like that matched with a chair like this.

Meanwhile Yugi is all by himself but that doesn’t matter at all because he is 2 (3) people. This strategy to isolate everyone only really worked on Serenity and Joey, TBH, since Tea is also accompanied by slightlylessevil!Marik (who hasn’t really said anything since the VR started).

I knew Bakura would be out for a while, but I didn’t realize it meant everyone else wasn’t even going to once acknowledge it, it is baffling. I mean I get they’re super distracted right now but your friend is DEAD.

Honestly I would not mind if the big 5 succeeded and we had to see some old men try and work with Yugi’s hair and alt rock clothing, deal with Pharaoh sassing them from a brain labyrinth, go to Yugi’s school where people get savagely beat up like every other day, deal with Bakura and Marik trying to body snatch and other magic assholery during class breaks, and through all that watching the Big 5 attempt to take over the world with their megacorp that no longer sells guns but actually sells like...children’s entertainment supplies which include the dueling roombas from S1. How on Earth do they actually think that getting a body would help them at this point? They would be Yugi Muto and that is the last face anyone would ever take seriously.

Pharaoh pops up and is like “I guess we’re doing this right now? Really wish we weren’t doing this right now.”

Anyway, because they don’t physically exist in this digital world, neither do God Cards, or any other card in their deck. So, now they have to make new decks out of a pool. Very convenient for the writing team, bad news for Kaiba’s intense and vaguely romantic relationship with his Blue Eyes. Really glad we spent a full season talking about how much these cards meant to all these people, from the magicians, to Joey’s Red Eyes, and then that one card that was Mako Tsunami’s Dad or something--really glad we learned all of that to just completely erase it this arc.

I sounded sarcastic just now, I actually wasn’t for once, I am so glad to just purge my mind of all those card memories for a little while. Just allow myself to forget. Ah. My mind is already so much clearer. It feels so good. I am very much ok with this soft reset, I kinda needed it.

Since Yugi is supposed to choose a Deck Master from his set of cards for this particular type of duel monsters duel, he goes right for the dark magician--since that’s his MO, but for some reason Kuriboh chose himself? Like this greasy thing just hopped out of the card and played himself.

Anyway Kuriboh is now their new Pikachu and well...this show has done worse cute-character-that-does-literally-nothing-else type things to me, speaking of, lets see what Serenity is up to.

This is a digital hellscape, Serenity.

Serenity, you are going to die here.

Serenity.

So because I just realized just now in Season 3 that Duke’s necklace is a hot, over designed disaster (much like Duke himself) I figured I should like...see what this necklace is supposed to look like. So I typed into Google “duke devlin necklace” and guys, turns out there is a LOT of Yugioh jewelry--and I don’t mean like fanart (which there is also a lot), I mean like officially, a lot of people in this show wear a lot of jewelry and so it was sort of hard to find a good pic of a Duke Devlin specific necklace--especially since it feels like most people just go for the dice earring because that’s way easier.

But what’s interesting about the Duke Devlin necklace, at least from my quick search, is that when we bring it to the real world, it gets a little lost, like a game of telephone.

Cuz I assumed that was a clown on his necklace--and there’s quite a few clown necklaces, but I’m also seeing skulls, I’m seeing gothic crosses, I’m seeing spikes and knives instead of crosses. Bro thought it was a flower for some reason--I kinda blew his mind just now when I pointed out it was a clown. Some people think it’s made of silver, other people think it’s sort of painted? (I assumed the cross was entirely blinged out with rhinestones--my honest assumption) No one can actually agree. Especially since Duke apparently changed his necklace for the movie. I know that because it looks a lot like the Legend of Zelda emblem, and some people had the actual Legend of Zelda emblem mis-tagged as Duke Devlin. Which sucks a whole lot for their SEO, and sucked a whole lot for me in my search to find a real actual Duke Devlin necklace.

Like, feel free to attach a link to a reply -- is there an official physical Duke Devlin necklace that Yugioh inc sells? Like I just want to know--officially--what the hell I’m looking at.

Anyway, back to the show, much like everyone else, these two are hopelessly lost.

Kaiba seems to keep forgetting that his Dad is clearly behind all this and would obviously have his old tech but like...Kaiba forgets so much I can forgive him this.

So, faced with roads that lead no where, Tristan decides to do his tried and true method of solving all of his problems.

And at the other end of the VR zone Tea is getting kidnapped after...being kidnapped by Noah while she was already kidnapped by Marik. This is three levels of kidnap, yes?

OH SHOOT IS THAT A ONCE DOOR. DID SOMEONE DO WHAT I HOPE THEY DID? OH SHOOT.

I will read their fanfiction start to end I swear to you I will do it if it exists and I will report back to you who dates Captain Hook and who is related to Henry Mills.

OMG It didn’t exist.

You have got to be kidding me.

I am beside myself, this is the only property known to man that has not been turned into a OUAT fanfiction.

Incredible.

That or I’m just really bad at searching for fanfics since I haven’t actually read any since my LiveJournal days. Like, when you’re basically immune to shipping, as I am, you just really lose the desire to read about 90% of fanfiction.

Anyway, the closest we have to a OUAT Yugioh fanfiction, to my knowledge, is that cap I made just now right there. Your welcome, Once community.

This is absolutely made of load-bearing drywall. Why do none of the sets of windows line up with each other and how many stories is this? Like 2.5? And you can stand on the roof I guess because it has handrails? It’s super weird.

Anyway, I just made a OUAT joke and maybe it’s because I knew shortly after we were gonna get--that’s right--an orphanage flashback. OUAT was basically 6 seasons of effed up orphan flashbacks so I feel pretty well prepared. Like bro was worried how I’d handle this filler but y’all, I watched the Lily arc in OUAT. I can do anything.

*slaps hands together*

Totes ready for these boys to have been given up for adoption via a magical tree and a memory curse, only to find out their real parents are 3 years younger than them because of a time loop. Make it weird, Yugioh!

Anyway, as always, if you want a link to read these from the beginning in Chrono order and without any comments and all that jazz here’s a link

[dragon-ball-meta]

There comes a time in everyone’s life when they have to do something they dread. For me, that’s typically addressing Dragon Ball articles written by ScreenRant. Bear in mind, this is super stupid. For the most part, I included the complaint’s title in the response, but you may need to click through to read the extent of the stupid. Except for #4, since that was a doozy. So without wasting any more of your dash space, here we go with a Read More and a LONG list of responses to utter stupidity.

Time for yet another long-winded reply to yet another clickbait article you guys crapped out about a series you clearly didn't even watch. 19. "THE TIME HE WAS INEXPLICABLY BEATEN BY KEFLA" I see you're ignoring three major factors. a. That Kefla is a Fusion of two female warriors. b. That Super Saiyan levels do not have inherent power levels, they're merely multipliers. So this scenario is still quite possible. c. That Goku, in this instance, was still half drained and recovering from his fight with Jiren. Hence why he wasn't even going all-out. Good golly, did you like, just not watch the ep and pick this one out of the YouTube Comment Section? Also, idk if you know, but.. he kinda does win this fight. 18. "HIS POWER LEVEL ALWAYS BEING HIGHER THAN VEGETA'S" (Yes. They actually tried to use THIS as a complaint.) Goku's power level was not 90K on Namek. He was holding BACK vs Captain Ginyu and his power level hit 180K. Secondly, Zenaki power boosts go proportionately to exactly how near death you were and how extensive the damage you healed from was. In Goku's case, his body not only suffered from having a foreign spirit in it, but was also once again crushed and mangled to the point of being inoperable. He healed from extensively far more damage than Vegeta did, hence his level being boosted to a higher degree. That's also not even factoring how much fighting Freeza pushed him, let alone the inherent boost that comes with unlocking that new form. But I do also note this website seemingly forgetting Vegeta once supposedly surpassed Goku because he got upset his waifu got smacked. Which actually IS an asspull but w/e. 17. "UNDERUTILIZING HIS SUPER SPEED" Goku uses his speed all the time. It was illustrated even back during the Saiyan Saga that even the human characters were fighting and moving at speeds so fast as to be almost imperceptible even to a trained warrior's eyes. They had to use their eyes in tandem with sensing the fighters to figure out what was happening. It's also why, in later fights, those who are stronger or more adept at sensing energies have to sort of play announcer to those who get lost. 16. "THAT TIME HE PASSED AWAY FROM HEART FAILURE" That... that was an alternate timeline and had nothing at all to do with ending the series. Goku contracted a heart disease in Future Trunks' timeline, Androids came and attacked, nearly wiped out the populace, Trunks came forward to prevent Goku's death in THIS timeline and also to hopefully get help in becoming stronger from him and his father, presumably then being able to save his own timeline as well. You are literally the sole person I have ever seen become confused by this. Again, I don't think you read or even watched this series, man. 15. "UNDERUTILZING HIS SOLAR FLARE" Solar Flare became increasingly less useful as the enemies it was being used ON either had a natural immunity to it or simply had the ability to sense ki and work around it, something not fully overcome until Krillin managed to amp it up so intensely as to dull even that sense. That said, it actually HAS been used, fairly effectively, in many fights, by Goku and others. So I'm not really sure how anything's been "forgotten". 14. "HE REGULARLY FORGETS HIS PHILOSOPHY OF ‘NEVER GIVING UP’" Goku... stood down once. One time. The actual hell are you talking about here? The SOLE time he chose to "give up" was vs Cell as he knew Cell was learning from him AND that he couldn't beat him. Their sole shot was in Gohan finally breaking through that all and ascending beyond a Super Saiayn. No other possible outcome. The only other thing you can accuse him of is holding back vs Buu, but that was both because he was stalling and using energy would reduce the time he could stay, and... well, because he was dead and gone, and felt it behooved him to teach new defenders rather than once again solve it himself and keep the Earth reliant on backup from a dead guy. But even then, Goku was guesstimating that he MIGHT have been able to win there. It's not a 100% guarantee. Also I believe the line you're quoting may be a dub-only line, which... would warrant many more paragraphs. 13. "CHILDHOOD GOKU KEPT GETTING SINGLED OUT FOR HAVING A TAIL" Goku was singled out over his tail because he was clearly a boy, yet also clearly had a monkey tail. Were he an anthro monkey, this would not phase people. That he was seemingly human, yet had this appendage, was odd and stood out. No, it was not an attempt to traumatize him as he thought everyone else was weird for not having one, and it didn't phase him one bit. Nor was the storyline about being a "Saiyan" even a concept at the time. You're way overthinking things to invent problems here. 12. "THE LACK OF PHYSICS REGARDING HIS HAIR" Wow, we're already scraping the barrel. This bodes well. His hair stays up when underwater when he has energy flowing up around him too, fyi. 11. "LEARNING MORE FROM KING KAI THAN ANYONE ELSE, DESPITE BEING THERE FOR THE SHORTEST AMOUNT OF TIME" Different. People. Have. Different. Degrees. Of. Potential. And. Skill. Goku's giftedness at being able to manipulate energy as well as the naturally higher healing factors and durability of the Saiyans.is what made him such a great candidate to learn the Kaio-ken and Spirit Bomb, and Goku's aptitiude at the former was only ever really met or matched by Krillin, who actually learned to form, aim, and throw the Spirit Bomb faster than even Goku did. So there's that. 10. "MASTERING ULTRA INSTINCT AFTER ONLY USING IT 3 TIMES" So again, you didn't watch the series, I see. Goku didn't "master" Ultra Instinct at all. He managed to fully tap into the completed form by being pushed far enough and finally taking Whis' instruction to heart, relying on instinct rather than overthinking, becoming one with his movements. BUT... it also kinda took a massive toll on his body, AND he has no idea how to even begin accessing it at will yet. So while that form may be called "Mastered" Ultra Instinct, Goku himself has not mastered it at all, by his own admission. 9. "THE TIME HE LET FRIEZA POWER BACK TO 100% RATHER THAN TAKING HIM OUT" You mean the time he declared he wanted to face Freeza at 100% of his power on an already-dying planet with no one really left to get hurt at a point when he was in a state of mind more savage than his normal self? How horrible. And no, he didn't kill him, and he explained why. NEITHER of these acts were acts of mercy, as this article claims, but of dominance. Humiliation and cruelty. Goku faced Freeza at the peak of his power, and overcame him so handily that killing him would have been almost pathetic. So he chose to let him live with the knowledge that a Saiyan, a Monkey, a being he viewed as lower than the dirt itself, had faced him at full power and deemed him not even worthy of the honor of a warrior's death. It was a sentence to live in shame. Not mercy. 8. "HIS FARMING SKILLS SERIOUSLY DECREASED AS HE AGED" Goku was literally doing manual labor to plow a field as part of Roshi's training vs actual farming done professionally with intent to sell his crops. You kinda need very straight rows to maximize your harvest. This is one of the dumbest complaints in here. 7. "GOKU HAS THE ABILITY TO DESTROY PLANETS, BUT NOT OPEN DOORS" I take it back, they actually dipped into the Legacy of Goku games for this one. It's called a Quest, my guy. Jeebus. 6. "THE TIME HE TELEPORTED HIMSELF AND AN EXPLODING CELL TO KING KAI'S PLANET" OK. Aside from Instant Transmission/Instantaneous Movement (as Goku knows it at least) requiring you to know where you're going OR have a Ki signal to lock onto (meaning no empty planets or random spots in Space), what "Conflict" did Goku start other than mild annoyance from King Kai and his pets as they were the only ones there? And even King Kai conceded he made the best call he could have given the circumstances. So... what? 5. "IGNORING THE PHYSICS OF SPACE" You are literally citing filler that actually makes logical sense in context with the rest of the series which shows that Saiyans can indeed survive for at least a time in Space, to say nothing of upper atmospheres. Lord. HOO boy, they're really picking #4 to get stupid on so Imma actually paste their entire thing before replying here. 4. "HIS HORRIBLE PARENTING TACTICS" "This is one nonsensical part of Goku that the show occasionally touches on, but not nearly enough. Goku is truly a horrible father to his son, Gohan. Not only is he never there for his wife and kid, but when he is there, it feels like he's always pitting his son against some super-powered adult who wants to punch the kid's teeth in." When? Piccolo's the one who forced the kid to fight the Saiyans. Gohan CHOSE to go to Namek, and Goku tried to keep him OUT of the fighting once he arrived. It was one of the chief reasons he was in such a hurry to get to Namek. When exactly was Goku tossing a small child in front of evil enemies? And again, stated for the hundredth time, Goku was there for his family far, FAR more often than when he was gone, and when he WAS, it was for good reason. "While Goku's reasoning is that he's just trying to train and prepare Gohan, the logic of it doesn't make much sense at all." How is training with your son not training your son? The first time Goku ever actively trained Gohan, or trained with him, was during the wait for the Androids, and it was for the very reason that he knew Gohan was actually dead in that other timeline. Best to have the boy able to defend himself as best he can. It also served as a bonding time between father and son. "At what point does Chi-Chi just leave with Gohan in order to keep their son safe from the dangerous whims of her husband? And at what point does Child Protective Services step in? While Goku isn't personally harming his child himself, he's almost always putting Gohan in mortal danger." Hold the hell up, when did Goku EVER hurt Gohan himself in any way other than training him? When? Piccolo hit that kid far, FAR more than Goku EVER did, yet y'all call him "Green Dad: or "Gohan's REAL Dad". If you're gonna make these dumbass comments, back 'em up. "During the Cell Games, even, Goku pitted his son against Cell, who is arguably stronger than Goku himself, and then gave Cell Senzu Beans to make him stronger. It's almost as if Goku hates being a father so much that he wants to end his son's life at any means necessary." ...Cell's not "arguably" stronger than Goku himself, he was. By a good bit. But so was Gohan. So much so that he knew that even though he was pushing himself, Gohan seemed to think his father was moving slowly and holding back because, as he sensed in the ROSAT (Time Chamber), Gohan had surpassed him and was nearly at the level of ascending beyond Super Saiyan. He just needed to push himself, get anrgy. So to facilitate this, thinking the adrenaline rush of a close fight would do it, and to psych Cell out, yes. He gave him a Senzu. And yes, he realized later he made a mistake... and he was actually willing to break the rules, take a Senzu himself, and go back in to try to save Gohan, to fight alongside him. I love how you all overlook that so much, to say nothing of the love and affection he OPENLY shows his boy throughout.  GOD this is so hostile and stupid. 3. "HIS SHIP IS SOMEHOW USABLE, LONG AFTER IT WAS DESTROYED BY A SPECIAL BEAM CANNON" Number one? That's a filler moment. Never happens in the manga. Yes, filler created problems. Been saying it for years. Not a problem with the original story though. Number two? Even then they say Dr. Brief used the PIECES of Goku's pod to build that new ship. Specifically saying "It was in pretty rough shape, but he managed to use what he could salvage as a base". Non-issue. 2. "INEXPLICABLY SURVIVING A SPECIAL BEAM CANNON DRILLING THROUGH HIS CHEST" ... Literally HOW do you get this stupid? Literally how? Serious question, and the ultimate proof that you again neither ever watched nor read the series before making this list. Goku dies from that. Outright. He's wished back to life one year later with the Dragon Balls. This is not something left up to interpretation, or something that's debatable. It's a fact. Yikes, bro. 1. "HE IS GENERALLY WAY TOO OVERPOWERED" Ah yes, the generic "he's too strong and therefore boring" argument. Not sure why that's on this list but uh.. Goku's been in positions where weaker characters could indeed feasibly take him out. nothing nonsensical about it at all. Multiple times during the ToP, he was nearly bested by warriors technically weaker than himself who used tactics, strategy, to get the upper hand. It's not hard to do. Goku's not Silver Age Superman here, he does have limitations and weaknesses. This list was plain embarrassing, man. Seriously, at least Watch/Read Dragon Ball before doing articles on it. Just... seriously. CBR and SR need to find people who’ve actually done research about this instead of crapping it out.

[alienatheart]

Reload Blast Ep 11 Reactionanalysis

Under the cut!

Summary: Everyone in the jeep reacts to Gojyo’s mark. Sanzo guesses right away that Hakkai knew all along, and points out WHEN they tell Gojyo won’t change anything. (See Hakkai, we told you!) Goku wonders when Gojyo went berserk, Gojyo proclaims he hasn’t, and laments it’s positioned such that he can’t see it. Various attempts to describe the mark fail, and speculation about its sudden appearance begins. The likely culprit would be the increased intensity of the minus wave so close to the source, but Gojyo isn’t too worried; he’s only half youkai, so it only half affects him, right? Hakkai is less sure; he thinks they should plan for the worst. He elaborates that he wouldn’t have suggested it until just now -since they’re no longer ordered to go, they have the option to turn back and minimize any risk. Gojyo doesn’t like being called a risk and calls out Hakkai’s egomania. Hakkai finally says it: if the worst happens, he can’t bring himself to kill Gojyo, or bear to let Sanzo do it, even as a mercy. Sanzo seems to agree, to Goku’s surprise, even as Hakkai admits he’s being selfish and trying to avoid regrets, remembering Kanan. Gojyo’s really mad everyone’s treating it like a foregone conclusion, and the last straw is Sanzo telling him and Hakkai both to get out now (and leave Hakuryu with him)!

Gojyo grabs Sanzo to ask where he gets off, telling them to leave, but Sanzo lands the first blow and it devolves into a standing brawl in the jeep. Goku tries to be the peacemaker and get Hakkai to help, but Hakkai’s in a supremely unhelpful mood. Goku yells at them to stop but gets Sanzo’s boot to the face for his trouble. He goes to pull them apart but runs into Gojyo’s kick and comes up swinging. It’s notable that Goku seems to be aiming mostly for Gojyo. Sanzo’s still injured but swinging at anyone anyway. The fight is only stopped by Hakuryu the Jeep revving his motor and popping a wheelie to drop everyone out on the ground! Lying on the ground give everyone a chance to chill out and reflect how lame it would be if their own bickering ended up proving Taruchie and the Aspects right. As Sanzo and Gojyo light up to cool down, Hakkai shocks the ikkou (and the audience!) by asking Sanzo for a smoke.

Meanwhile, in the youkai village, Sharak is finding out the population has decreased by half, despite the villagers’ efforts to resist the negative aura. Sharak cautions them not to have false hope, but tells them efforts are being made to stop the wave at its source, which is somewhat reassuring. However, Sharak recalls Sanzo’s report that Nataku was exclusively killing youkai, and decides to reinforce the village barrier as a precaution. The youkai are grateful for her shielding them from the minus wave’s influence, but Sharak downplays her assistance, saying their resilience is all their own. On her way out, a youkai baby reaches out for her, and Sharak reflects that while she can’t have her own children, she will do her utmost to protect others’ even if it means fighting. This resolution is extremely timely, because that gleam in the sky is Nataku and he’s coming in hot! Nataku imapacts the village, or rather Sharak’s Kouten Scripture, which she activated in time to shield everyone. Nataku evaluates his targets and summons the same attack orbs he used at the fortress.

Back at the jeep, the Ikkou has cooled down finally. Goku thanks Hakuryu for helping them come to their senses. Gojyo wants to know why Hakkai didn’t tell him sooner, and Hakkai says he worried the trigger might be emotional unrest. Gojyo asks if Hakkai really thought merely finding out would make him flip out, and Hakkai admits he didn’t think so, but he knows from his own experience acknowledging the youkai strength can lead down a slippery slope. Gojyo responds in the case of needing someone to bring him back from the edge, he’d be silly to abandon his own lifeline. Hakkai agrees and admits he was being “super lame” and Gojyo announces he’s awesome enough for both of them. Hakkai chides him for saying it out loud, then everyone’s startled by the impact over in the village.

In the village, Sharak introduces herself to Nataku, who responds that the humans have 10 seconds to leave, or be targeted with the youkai. Sharak asserts these youkai aren’t harming the humans and she will take responsibility, but Nataku ignores her statement and begins carrying out his orders, blasting an attack directly at Sharak! She shields herself with the scripture again, calling for Nataku to wait, but his second attack breaks her barrier as he announces she will be eliminated. Sharak casts a non-scripture spell that grows wood from the ground to entangle Nataku. One of the civilian youkai starts running away, and Nataku sends an orb after him, which turns into a masked warrior with a sword. The warrior deflects a shot from a Kouten Corps rifle, aweing the spectators. Nataku summons more orbs and breaks out of the tree that was engulfing him, then faces down Sharak with his orb army and issues the ultimatum: Humans must flee or die. Sharak and her guys stand ready and say they aren’t going anywhere, and the battle begins in earnest. The defenders are outnumbered but holding their own; the orb warriors attack silently and shrug off injuries; lost limbs and dead bodies dissolve into dust. But Nataku summons replacements, scaring more youkai into fleeing. Sharak sends Eijin after them but he’s too late to save them, and though he kills the two attackers, a third cuts him down. Nataku repeats his ultamatim and Sharak confirms Sanzo’s earlier observation that Nataku is executing orders and seems to lack will or emotions of his own.

Just as Nataku announces all will be eliminated, a shot rings out! Not a rifle, but Sanzo’s pistol, the Ikkou have arrived on the scene! Sharak apologizes for not having to time to explain, but Hakkai affirms they can pretty much guess the situation, Sanzo announces them, and Goku…can’t think of how he could have ever met Nataku before the fortress. Nataku tells the “humans” they should leave…then looks closer and identifies Gojyo and Hakkai as two new enemies. The Ikkou treats it as joke, and says its personal since Nataku is the reason they were fired. Nataku changes his orders to his soldiers, telling them to eliminate those four first! 

The orb soldiers are defeated quickly, but everyone barely dodges an extra-lethal blast from Nataku. Then Nataku re-summons his reinforcements, and Hakkai confirms they are Shikigami or something similar. The Ikkou eliminates a few waves, but more keep coming, prompting Hakkai to begin a review lesson for Goku. If you can’t destroy a shikigami’s medium, take out the controller! Nataku’s been blocking Sanzo’s bullets and effortlessly intercepts Goku’s Nyoi-Bo with his sword, the force of his parry throwing Goku into Sanzo. While they pick themselves off the ground, they’re open to another killing blast but Hakkai intervenes, blocking with his Chi Shield just in time.  He can’t withstand it for long though, and gets thrown backwards. Gojyo uses the chance to send the crescent blade of his Shakoujou at Nataku, but it’s double blocked by orb warriors, and then Nataku grabs the slack chain and hauls Gojyo forward, throwing him on top of the Ikkou pileup. Sharak begins to despair as the episode ends with Nataku ready to continue his mission…

So now everyone knows about Gojyo’s mark, and I can honestly sympathize with his frustration when the others think he’s going to become a liability. They’ve come this far, they should be able to trust each other by now, right? Hakkai admits to being selfish thinking he could protect Gojyo from it; even though he meant well trying to head off the problem like he couldn’t before when he lost Kanan, that controlling nature can be a negative trait. I really wish they hadn’t filled time with Goku joining the fight, because in the manga he was the voice of reason while Hakkai pouted and the other two squabbled. But by now I’m resigned to every anime series ignoring Goku’s repeated demonstrations of maturity. T_T

Anyway, Hakuryu knows you don’t split the party! And Hakkai! Smoking! What does it mean? The “lifeline” callback! Also, the “I’m awesome”/“You’d look better if you didn’t say so” line is a Gaiden callback that didn’t make it into this anime, I really need to start making some comparison posts one of these days.

Sharak in the youkai village is very well done. Since we never got the Oasis arc from the manga animated, its good to see these civilian youkai, and how similar they are to the human townsfolk from earlier episodes, just trying to live their lives peacefully. And Sharak being proactive as a guardian, as concerned for them as the other half-dozen villages she’s been keeping watch over, is so wholesome.

And Now! The fight with Nataku! The final battle of this anime, and its amazing to watch! I recall when these manga scenes came out and we were speculating if those spheres were physical objects or just glowing glyphs or sigils. The fortress fight answered that first, but now their second secret is revealed: Nataku is that boss fight with endlessly spawning minions! I don’t mind that they padded the episode with more of the Kouten squad fighting; it’s refreshing after so many helpless humans in filler episodes of past animes.  But the real stars are about to show up and…get their butts kicked. They do make a good showing though!

When they first arrive and start with the banter, you know they got their groove back, and the tension from before is forgotten, for now. After all, there’s nothing like a grudge match against the guy who got you fired, right? I loved watching every second of it. It’s interesting to note that the Ikkou doesn’t really do combo attacks, but they are so much better than they used to be at relentlessly striking one after another, and they always have each other’s backs, shielding or distracting when someone goes down. Unfortunately, Nataku is on a whole other level, he has his renewable bodyguards to run interference while he can outright stop bullets and packs some serious firepower himself. The episode goes right up to the last manga update we had when the series started airing, and it was only slightly less nerve-wracking to wait a week for the continuation than the 10 months where Gojyo was buried under a pile of rocks.  Going in, episode 12 was uncharted territory, and we’ll get to that soon!

[alkaria]

Nero’s SU S3 Rewrite

Hello! I got bored and procrastinated this yesterday. I was watching a few AMVs and it struck me how S3, narratively, is worse than S2. If you consider the S1 structure, with the Birthday arc as the mid-season finale, Malachite/the Cluster as the hype for the second half of the season, it should really be filler in the middle and then all the high-impact eps at the end. So I rejigged it a little. Details under the cut since it’s quite long (I got carried away)

Okay, so this assumes most of the S3 first half proceeds as normal, aside from Barn Mates (4), where Steven actually calls Lapis out on being a dick to Peridot, and Lapis explains that she’d really prefer to be alone to deal with her conflicts – but that she’ll put up with Peridot if she’s allowed to do it at her own pace. This is just to try and make the Peridot/Lapis relationship evolution more natural.

Greg the Babysitter (16) gets moved before Monster Reunion (14) and Alone at Sea to keep plot-based episodes all in the latter half of the season and keep the Jasper arc more intact.

Alone at Sea (15): Jasper and Lapis’ conversation goes differently entirely. Jasper doesn’t plead. She instead challenges Lapis, and when Steven tries to intervene, she traps him in a bubble.

J: “You could have beaten me fair and square, Lazuli. But you fused with me. You tricked me. Why?” L: “I spent five thousand years trapped by the Crystal Gems, and then you go and lock me up again! For once, I wanted to be the one in control.” Jasper accepts Lapis’ arguments but turns away. She reaches the edge of the boat. J:  “You’ll regret this. We could have been something, Lapis. This is your last chance. Fuse with me. Be Malachite again and destroy Rose Quartz. You’ll go back to Homeworld a hero.” L: “That’s not Rose any more, Jasper. I won’t hurt Steven. I’m – I can be happy here. I will be.” Jasper pops the bubble and Steven falls to the floor. J:  “You picked your side. Her side. No more chances.” Jasper glares at Steven before jumping back into the ocean. The ship does not sink. The idea with Alone at Sea was to give us a bit more understanding and development of Lapis through her discussing with Jasper why she tricked her - and goes some way to remove the weird metaphors/interpretation of Jasper wanting to be Malachite again, because whatever the intention, I don’t think the Malachite as Bad Relationship thing worked well.

This puts Alone at Sea right before Jasper’s next appearance in Gem Hunt (17). This is unchanged.

Crack the Whip (18): Amethyst is poofed and Stevonnie briefly holds their own against Jasper, but after the Quartz monster is poofed and Amethyst reforms, Jasper does a spin-dash, knocking Stevonnie off-balance and causing them to unfuse.

Steven crawls over to Connie. Both are in pain. S: “Connie, are you alright?” C: “I’m – I’m fine.” J:  “Even your fusions are defective, Rose! This is it.” Jasper charges for Steven and Connie – and is blocked by Garnet and Pearl, because future vision is a thing. J:  “You’re so weak that you can’t even fight your own battles, Rose? Hah!” Jasper does an anime laugh. “I have my own army now, and it’s coming for you. Jaspers always get what we want.” What Crack the Whip does here is still maintains the catalyst for Amethyst’s self-worth arc, but normalises Stevonnie’s power level relative to Pearl and Garnet - instead, Amethyst sees that Stevonnie, Garnet and Pearl don’t need her at all. Steven vs Amethyst (19): This proceeds much the same, but Pearl and Garnet arrive earlier and break up the fight, having picked up on Steven and Amethyst’s feelings. Since the fight is destructive and doesn’t actually accomplish much, it’s better for it to give way to a conversation that actually helps progress both Amethyst and Steven’s self-worth arcs. We cut to the ‘I’m not Rose Quartz’ pretty fast here too, since most of the focus is on Amethyst. P: “Amethyst, I had no idea you were feeling this way. I’m sorry we haven’t been there for you.” A: “Rose said there was nothing wrong with me, but there is. I can’t beat Jasper.” G:  “You aren’t supposed to be like Jasper, Amethyst. You’re supposed to be you. You have your own strengths and weaknesses that are different to Jasper’s. If you try to fight like her, you’ll never win, because her fighting style utilises her strengths rather than yours.” A: “My strengths?” P:  “You’re smaller and faster than her. Your whip lets you use terrain to your advantage rather than hers. Here, let me show you.” Pearl smiles and begins to demonstrate technique to Amethyst, who actually looks enthusiastic about training for once.

Bismuth (20/21): Most of Bismuth proceeds as normal, but it’s still oddly standalone compared to the on-going Jasper arc - it does need some of this, but Jasper is mentioned as part of the conversations early on about Homeworld still being after the CG’s, and when Bismuth gives the gems their weapon upgrades and trains them. Having the Steven-Bismuth confrontation without any input from the other gems robs this episode of a lot of potential emotion, especially from Garnet and Pearl, as comrades of Rose and Bismuth who had no idea what actually happened. For that reason, Steven bubbles himself and Bismuth and transports them back to the Temple fairly early into the fight. Bismuth is stunned by the Bubble Room.

B:  “Look at this! Look at all these gems! I could have saved them Rose, but you stopped me!” Bismuth attacks, but is blocked by Garnet, because future vision is again a thing. G: “Bismuth. That isn’t Rose. It’s Steven. And we couldn’t save any of these gems – the power of the Diamonds was unsurpassable. None of these gems can even hold a stable form anymore.” B: “I could have tried! What happened to you? You used to love fighting! You were Rose’s general! Her eyes and ears! We could have taken the fight to the Diamonds – why are you such a coward now?!” Bismuth turns her anger on Garnet, attacking several times. Garnet deflects her fairly easily. G: “I’ve spent five thousand years clearing up the wreckage of the Rebellion. I’ve spent five thousand years having to put my comrades in bubbles, wondering if we’d ever find them all, trying to be strong for Amethyst and Pearl and Rose and now Steven. I don’t want to fight anymore, Bismuth! I want to rest! I want to enjoy the freedom we have, because I don’t know when it’s going to be taken away.” B: “I thought you were my friend, Garnet. Why are you turning your back on the Rebellion, on the Crystal Gems – on me?” G: “Because sometimes, I have to put myself – first!” Garnet punches Bismuth into the wall. Amethyst and Pearl run in due to the sounds of combat. B: “Pearl, you have to talk some sense into Garnet. She can’t give up on the Rebellion - the Diamonds are out there, we can do something.” P: “Bismuth... We can’t. We have no way of getting to Homeworld, and even if we did - we lost. The Diamonds won, even after we...” Pearl trails off as Bismuth roars in anger, brandishing the Breaking Point at Garnet - until it is caught by Amethyst’s whip and thrown into the room’s lava pool. Bismuth ends up impaled on Rose’s sword, having run into it in her attempt to attack Garnet. Bismuth chuckles and begins to cry. B: “You’re all just the same. Rose bubbled me and hid me away when I could have saved everyone - and none of you even care!” G: “Bismuth... I’m sorry, but it’s too late now. There was nothing we could do. And there’s nothing we can do now. S: “Bismuth, I wish this hadn’t happened to you.” B: “Thanks, Steven.” Bismuth smiles weakly, and then poofs.

This is the first long rewrite, really, and I hope it shows. I tried to add some more character to Garnet and explain who she is and who she’s become since the Rebellion, while actually having all the gems present to add to the emotional impact of them all discovering this about Bismuth at once. Amethyst’s role in combat hopefully helps show her growing confidence in herself since the last few episodes, helping keep her arc moving. Pearl makes a hint towards Pink Diamond for the dedicated fans.

At this point, we hit the lead-up to the end of the season, and I tear it all to pieces. Beta and Earthlings remain, but Back to the Moon and Bubbled are moved to instead be the high-impact start to Season 4 (because wtf was Kindergarten Kid) and replaced by an entirely new two-parter that is an actual season finale that caps off the Jasper arc in a more climactic way - Armies and Unbubbled.

Beta (22): This tries to unpack some more of the events of Bismuth from Steven and Amethyst’s perspectives. The last few minutes (everything after they arrive at the Beta Kindergarten) is moved into Earthlings, allowing time for more focus on the Barn - and more development.

A: “I don’t know. I’m gonna miss Bismuth. She didn’t mind that I was short.” S: “I don’t mind that you’re short.” J: “Yeah, but Jasper does. I won’t feel okay until I beat Jasper. It’s like I have to prove myself.” Steven and Amethyst arrive at the Barn to find Lapis (aided by water constructs) in a high-stakes duel with Peridot (in her robot). A: “Hey, they’re fighting too!” S: “Oh no...” Despite the fight, Lapis and Peridot look to be enjoying themselves. They both stop when they see their guests. L: “Steven!” P: “Amethyst!” A: “Wow, you two must hate each other. That was intense.” Amethyst gushes. L: “Uh... No. We were just letting off steam.” P: “Amethyst, come look at what I’ve done to my robot. I even integrated Steven’s ‘Tablet’ into the data-processing system!” A: “Uh, okay, P-Dot..” S: “So, you and Peridot seem to be getting along well...” L: “Uh, yeah... Today.” S: “Is something wrong? Do you need more space?” L: “No, no. Nothing’s wrong with Peridot.” Lapis sighs. “Sometimes I have a good day and sometimes I have a bad day. Watching Camp Pining Hearts helps. Let me show you the TV!” Lapis flies Steven up to the truck, only for Peridot to climb up and grab Steven. P: “It’s my turn with Steven, Lazuli! I want to show him my Meepmorps. You can have Amethyst.” L: “Uh.” A: “’Sup.” Peridot takes Steven into the main room of the barn, where most of her one-gem metal band is attached to the wall. P: “I’ve been practising my metal powers. My robot works so much better now - it’s like having the manoeuvrability of my limb enhancers back! Well, almost. Those were leagues ahead of it. But sometimes it feels closer, which is nice. Anyway, let me demonstrate!” Peridot pulls all the instruments down at once. S: “Wow, that’s really powerful.” P: “Thanks!” L: “I’m not sure that’s how these things work, Peridot.” Lapis picks up a tambourine and shakes it. A: “Look, this is some great trash and all, but I want to get back to training. Jasper could re-appear any day now!” Lapis freezes. P: “Uh, Amethyst, Lapis doesn’t really like it when you mention-” L: “No, it’s fine Peridot. Today... Is a good day.” Lapis gives a forced smile. S: “Sorry, Lapis. It’s just, Jasper keeps giving us trouble. When she spoke to you on the ship, it was just the start.” L: “I’m sorry, Steven. Jasper would never have caused you trouble if it wasn’t for me. I’ve been so selfish.” Amethyst wanders over to Lapis. A: “Hey, what matters is you’re here and you’re trying to be better, like the rest of us. Sorry for bringing it up.” Lapis smiles in response - a small smile, but genuine. S: “We should get back. We still don’t know where Jasper is or what she’s planning - we don’t even know any of her weaknesses.” P: “Well, if you wanted to learn about Jasper why didn’t you ask? Her Kindergarten’s just a warp away, and I’m a certified Kindergartener!” From here, the episode proceeds as normal and ends as Peridot, Steven and Amethyst arrive at the Beta Kindergarten.

What this episode tries to do is tie the Bismuth subplot into Amethyst and Steven’s perception of themselves and Jasper. Also, it adds some much-needed Lapis development instead of just meepmorps - it shows she’s adjusting to Earth, and she and Peridot do get along, but it’s not a constant uphill journey. Also, Lapis and Amethyst have a conversation!

Earthlings (23): The part of Beta set in the Kindergarten takes place here. Because of the training and the progress over the arc, Amethyst lasts longer against Jasper than she did in Crack the Whip. To better reflect Jasper’s power level, Smoky fuses but only manages to draw even with Jasper.

SQ: “Why won’t you leave us alone?” J: “Leave you alone? After everything you did to me? To my planet? To my diamond? I’ve been fighting since I broke out of the Earth’s crust and because of Rose Quartz, no one’s ever thought I was good enough! I’ll prove I’m good enough. I’ll bring you all back to Homeworld myself and go down in history, just as soon as my escort gets here. I’ve had enough of these skirmishes, Rose. It’s time for me to end this.” Jasper does a spin dash and materialises behind Smoky, using the same techniques as Rose Quartz in The Answer to defuse Smoky. As Jasper advances on Amethyst and Steven, Peridot uses her metal powers to pull down the injector, separating them. Realising that they can’t beat her, the three Crystal Gems retreat. J: “You’re on borrowed time, Rose! My army is almost ready!”

This ties in some of Jasper’s discussion from the episode, but also adds in more of her motivations. The Amethyst arc is mostly satisfied by the fact that Amethyst performs better relative to Smoky, while Peridot’s metal powers are more developed and less of a joke (Peridot makes enough jokes). There’s a hint towards the Rubies, as Jasper doesn’t know about Hit the Diamond. Instead of ending the Jasper arc here, this builds up her and her army of monsters as more of a threat, leading into...

Armies (24):

Peridot, Amethyst and Steven arrive back at the Temple to find Connie and Pearl about to go for training.

S: “Pearl!” Pl: “Ah, Steven, you’re just in time! We’re going to be working on team attacks today-” Pd: “There’s no time for that! Jasper’s going to attack with her Beta Kindergarten monster army!” Pl: “Jasper - monster army - beta kin - GARNET!” Pearl splutters. Garnet walks inside, already aware.  G: “We don’t have much time. Going to the Beta Kindergarten means that Jasper knows we’ll attack her if she waits. Her plans have been set in motion. Peridot, I need you to fetch Lapis and your robot. Pearl, Amethyst, I need you to go and make defences. We need to keep the monsters on the beach.”

Everyone agrees without complaint. Peridot warps out, while Pearl begins creating barricades from sand and Amethyst from trash.

C: “Garnet, is she really going to attack?” G: “She has no other option now. If she waits, we’ll attack her only safe location. And Jasper has no other reason for collecting these monsters than to attack us. But she can’t control more than a few monsters for very long. They’re going to run rampant, and if they get past the beach-” C: “Beach City!” G: “Exactly. Connie, I need you and Lion to go into the city. Make sure everyone stays inside. You’re a Crystal Gem now. Are you ready to help?” C: “I won’t let you down.” Garnet hugs Connie.  G: “I know. Remember to call if you’re in trouble.” Connie climbs aboard Lion and leaves. Lapis warps into the temple.

L: “Steven, what’s going on?” S: “Lapis, we need your help. Jasper’s going to attack us.” L: “Steven, I don’t even want to think about Jasper, let alone fight her.” S: “I know. But she’s not going to go away. She’s always going to be here and she’s going to keep coming after us until we do something. We have to put up a fight if we want to be free. We can’t change the past, but - maybe we can be happy, in the future. We need you, Lapis.” Lapis looks conflicted. L: “Fine. But first I want an apology.” Lapis looks at Garnet. “You kept me imprisoned - in a Pearl’s head! - for years. You still haven’t even spoken to me since you tried to take me away from Steven!” G: “I... I was scared.” Garnet removes her visor. “I was scared of what letting you out would mean for us, for Steven, for me. We had no idea what you would do. But it doesn’t excuse what we did. I’m sorry, Lapis. We all are.” L: “Thank you.”

Pearl and Amethyst run in. Pl: “Garnet, the ocean!” A: “She’s coming!” Everyone runs outside. The beach looks markedly different, with most of it blocked off by walls of sand (and trash). Peridot stands, robot-ready, as Jasper emerges from the ocean, alone. J: “This is it, Rose. Your army versus mine.” A: “What army? You’re outnumbered.” J: “You know, runt, you’re right.” Jasper slowly approaches the group. “I realised when we fought on the beach that I couldn’t get enough of these gems to beat you. But then I realised where I could find a lot of them.” G: “No!”

Jasper spin-dashes up the wall and bounces off, soaring past the others and straight into the Temple. G: “She’s going after the bubbled gems!” Pl: “The monsters! They’re here!” G: “Pearl, you’re in charge - take care of these monsters! Steven, with me!”

As the other gems take battle positions, Steven and Garnet run back into the house. Jasper has smashed straight through the screen door and into the Burning Room. As Garnet and Steven arrive, Jasper pops the first bubble. J: “Oops.”

The episode ends here. What Armies tries to do is actually ramp up the tension of the Jasper arc, rather than ending it and shoving in two unrelated episodes to be the finale. Instead of the tension being a Homeworld invasion, Jasper’s army is actually being a threat - not just to the CGs but to Beach City, adding tension because we’re worried about the human population too. Plus, with Jasper breaking into the Bubble Room, it risks undoing most of the progress the Crystal Gems have made in clearing up the monster population, adding new stakes and making the old monster subplot relevant as well.

Unbubbled (25/26): The episode opens in the Burning Room, where we left off. Jasper dashes from bubble to bubble, popping them all, while Steven and Garnet are overrun by the swarms of newly-freed monsters. 

We cut to the outside of the Temple. Opal is firing arrows from the Lighthouse and yelling commands at Lapis and Peridot, who are holding the line against the monsters coming from the ocean. Connie, on Lion, is chasing monsters up and down the Boardwalk. Lars and Sadie are barricaded in the Big Donut, trying to prevent a gem mutant from knocking the door down. We return to the temple’s entrance to see almost every monster from past episodes swarming out (Centipeetle is absent, of course). Jasper follows.

J: “Here’s my army, Rose! So kind of you to keep it in one place for me.” Lapis turns and throws a tidal wave at Jasper, but she weathers it and runs off. Back in the Burning Room, Steven and Garnet are alone, holding the final unpopped bubble - Bismuth’s. S: “Are you sure we can trust her?” G: “Yes. There’s too much at stake - Beach City is in danger. Bismuth always protected the weak.” Steven pops the bubble, and Bismuth reforms. She looks around. B: “What - Garnet, Steven - Where are the bubbles?” Garnet hands Bismuth an axe. G: “There’s no time. We’re under attack and we need your help.” Bismuth looks from Steven to Garnet and nods. B: “Lead the way.”

The three emerge onto the beach, where Lapis, Peridot and Opal have rounded up most of the ocean monsters - but the temple monsters have spread out across town. Together, they groups move to the Boardwalk, rendezvousing with Connie and Lion and freeing the Pizza and Fryman families. Opal defuses and Pearl runs to hug Connie.

P: “You’ve done so well, Connie! I couldn’t have asked for more.” C: “Aw, shukriyaa.” B: “I’ve never seen a human fight with a sword so well. It’s like Rose’s sword was made for you.” Bismuth is awed by Connie. This is followed by a quick montage of the gang freeing Lars and Sadie, Mr Smiley, and other townies who you all know and love. 

Eventually, we arrive at the water tower. Jasper, along with her army, is attacking it, trying to cause it to fall. A: “Hey!” Pl: “The humans need that tower for their sustenance! Unhand it!” Jasper turns to look at them. She is angrier than earlier, and her cool facade seems to be slipping. J: “I’m going to destroy this settlement like you ruined my colony, Rose. Like you destroyed my Kindergarten!”

Jasper charges at Steven, and he forms his shield, resisting her. The monsters set upon the other gems, distracting them, until Connie whistles loudly. Lion roars, and following him come the charging townies, roaring and armed with various brooms and pitchforks. The Cool Kids are in the front. With the townie backup, the monsters are now outnumbered, and the Gems are able to turn their focus back to Jasper.

Jasper summons her helmet and charges at Steven, but he knocks her back with his shield into Peridot’s robot. She fires rockets, throwing Jasper back into Amethyst, who entangles her with her whip and tosses her to Pearl, who fires a lazer from her spear, stunning Jasper and causing her to spin-dash wildly, only to be thrown by Garnet into Bismuth, who headbutts her, setting her on course with Lapis, who forms an ice ramp which throws Jasper into the air until she lands in front of Connie, who pokes her with the butt of Rose’s sword.

It is quite clear that Jasper is beaten, but she struggles to her feet anyway. S: “Why can’t you accept that I’m not Rose? Why won’t you leave us alone?” J: “Me? You started this - you rebelled and lied to gems, told them they could be whatever they wanted! I’m the best of the best and I’m a laughing stock on Homeworld because of you! Everyone thinks I’m defective too. I’ll show them - I’ll show them your gem shards!” Jasper dashes at Steven, but he leaps over with his floating powers. S: “I’m sorry for what happened to you Jasper, but what the Diamonds are doing is wrong! Turning this place into a colony would have killed everything on this planet! Humans deserve to choose - gems deserve to choose - but the diamonds shatter anyone who disagrees!” “You - hypocrite! How dare you say that after you shattered your diamond - my diamond - Pink Diamond!”

Everything seems to slow down. Steven stops. Pearl and Garnet both look horrified. S: “Rose - she - Mom wouldn’t do that, right? Pearl? Garnet? Why won’t you look at me? She didn’t shatter her, right?!” B: “Rose shattered Pink Diamond... and we still lost? The Diamonds are that powerful?”

Jasper looks confused as everyone else. J: “You... You aren’t Rose... She never told you?” Jasper falls to the floor, her form beginning to corrupt as the truth sinks in. J: “It’s too late.. I’m not going to go back... With her shards... They were right... I’m... a failure. Worthless. Everything on this planet is worthless.” A: “It doesn’t have to be that way, Jasper. You don’t have to listen to them. I’m happy here. I’m not a perfect quartz, but there’s still good things here. You can be happy too, you can-” J: “LIAR!” Jasper slashes at Amethyst, but misses. She begins to laugh. J: “I see how Rose did it now... She waited until you had nothing left... Because when you feel worthless, you’ll accept anyone... who makes you feel like less of a failure.” Jasper corrupts fully, and roars at the Gems. As the perfect quartz, she is much larger than the other corrupted quartzes - but she is nevertheless crushed as the water tower falls on her. She poofs. A: “C’mere, sis.” Amethyst bubbles Jasper.

Steven turns to face Pearl and Garnet. The townspeople are in the back, jubilant. Mayor Dewey’s van is on fire and he is desperately trying to throw water from the water tower onto it. The fire lends some epic lighting. S: “What else about my mom haven’t you told me?”

The episode ends on this. Hopefully, this episode adds enough tension to the battle - Beach City is actually at stake, rather than the Gems themselves - and it hopefully adds a lot to Jasper’s character. The Pink Diamond reveal is not split into two episodes but is kept here, in order to add more impact for Steven and to fully illustrate Jasper’s motivation as the gem who brought this army to avenge her Diamond - and failed, because the foe she sought was never there in teh first place, adding more reason for her corruption to happen naturally (no weird forced fusiion thanks).

Hopefully, this episode also adds development to Bismuth’s conceptualisation of the Diamonds and her desire to overthrow them. Garnet gets to show off some leadership, there’s a nice group fight scene which shows how the Crystal Gems have grown, and the role of the Townies helps make them relevant and show the growing ties between Gems and Humans. This also leaves S4 to develop the new ties between Lapis/Peridot and Beach city further, develop Bismuth now that she’s not in a bubble forever, and provides some of the impetus for Steven to hopefully stop imitating his mother and be his own gem-human. Also, Connie says something in Hindi to Pearl, who she’s starting to see as more of a mother figure (it’s intended to be an informal thanks - if there’s something better I can put in, let me know, but this is just something I found from 2 minutes of googling - because it’s that easy).

One thing I’ve thought that would be interesting for Season 4 would be to see some format changes - and this episode would feature the first, as we leave Steven’s perspective at the start of the episode, for a more epic feel. It’d be interesting if we saw the Crystal Gems split up because of these revelations after the Rubies 2-parter - Pearl/Garnet at the Temple, Connie and Steven travelling and training with Bismuth and Greg, and Amethyst staying with Peridot and Lapis at the Barn. The PD revelations were big, and I really feel like they should have had more of an immediate impact on the plot. S4′s filler could have easily been based around Steven sleeping over at every family’s house in Beach city since he wants time away from Garnet and Pearl. But that’s a story for another post I suppose...

Please give feedback - this became way longer than I expected but it’s really helped me express what I found narratively dissatisfying about how Season 3 was handled. Hopefully this was a good read and inspires some other people :)