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stealforreal · 3 years

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Todoroki Shoto - Future kids II

After deciding that you and Todoroki would be their guardians as long as the quirk kept them here, you begin enjoying some family time. But then the work studies begin again and by some unfortunate luck both you and Shoto is interning at Endeavors agency. Let's just say Shoto is not happy.

This is a continuation of my futurekids series for Todoroki, if you haven't already read part one I would recommend it-. It can be read as a stand alone, but you might get confused. Find it [here]

Shoto x f!reader

Aizawa was right, it had indeed been a long night. They had called in Recovery girl, who ended up determining that the quirk that sent the twins back in time would wear off.

Eventually.

Until then y/n was permitted to stay in the class 1-a dorms with Todoroki, since they were appointed the twins temporary caretakers. So now the three of them were heading back to the 1-a dorms, with two still very sleepy children. Midoriya was coming up with a few plans for when school started, with both you and Shoto being a hero course student things would be complicated. You looked at your green haired friend, incredibly thankful for his overthinking mind. There was also one more thing that could prove to be a problem, if the kids didn’t disappear beforehand, that is.

Next week you would start interning again, most of the students would be with the hero they had their work study with. See here lays the problem, no matter how much Shoto disliked his father he was a decent teacher when it came to his fire. Shoto was therefore doing his work studies with Endeavor, and since the pro you had your work studies with went on maternity leave last week. Endeavor, had therefore allowed you to intern with him, as long as your hero was on maternity leave. It wasn’t as if you could just leave the twins here, not to mention alone. The teachers were busy people, which was also one of the reasons that you and Shoto had been granted guardianship over your kids for the time being.

No matter, you would take it as it comes. Right now you have to get your children to bed. Your children, it was such a weird thing to say. I mean you are all just teenagers, nonetheless looking at the sleeping children in Todoroki’s arms you couldn’t help but love them. These precious children were yours and Shoto’s, and you already loved them with all your heart.

Walking into the common room of the class 1-a dorms, the five of you were greeted by the rest of class 1-a. Nobody said anything for a while, instead their classmates opted to look between you, Shoto and the twins. The curious glances, and the aura they gave off made you subconsciously step closer to the twins, and in the process standing half in front of Todoroki, lightly pushing up against him. The twins were beginning to stir in their sleep, not feeling the movement from before. Shoto didn’t notice though, he was having a hard time keeping his composure. You, the love of his life, the most beautiful girl in school and the mother of his children were lightly pushed up against him. Your chest touching his arm, sent a wave of heat to his cheeks. Blushing he turned his gaze towards his classmates, who still had no idea what was going on. First he left with two children who called him daddy, then he returned along with the school princess from class 1-b and now he is blushing. ‘Is the world ending’ Mina thought, her always stoic and blunt classmate, the unobtainable Todoroki Shoto was freaking blushing.

With Shoto turning his attention towards his glassmates, they finally snapped out of their stupor. Sending a line of quick fire questions his way, unfortunately effectively waking up the twins in the process. “Mommy what is happening” the adorable and childish sleeping voice of your son Ren rang out. Turning towards the noise, Ren sleepily looked at them rubbing his eyes with his tiny fist. eliciting a string of aww’s from the girls. Ren, ignoring that, stretched his arms out towards you, signaling that he would like to switch parents. Carefully you lifted Ren out of Todoroki’s arms, and craddled Ren to your chest. Stroking his hair to lull him back to sleep, you turned to Todoroki, hoping to gain his attention. Only to find him looking at your interaction with Ren, a soft smile splayed on his lips. The seer beauty and contentment you could spot in that smile made it contagious, and without your knowledge you copied him. The rest of the class was still your audience, and it was clear as day to them that the two of you were in love. Causing them to, once again wonder, what the hell is going on.

“We’ll explain later, Momo, can you make some pajamas for the twins ” You silently whispered, not wanting to wake up the twins again. Seemingly satisfied with your answer, class 1.a began talking amongst themselves again, quietly of course. As hero course students they knew how precious sleep was, and after the whole ordeal with the young boy crying they could imagine how tired the little fella was. Turning towards Shoto, who was lightly bouncing Reina in his arms to keep her asleep, you whispered again. “ I don’t know about sleeping arrangements, but I assume the twins will sleep with you?” He nodded “Follow me darling” The endearment slipped past his lips before he could fully comprehend what he had said, but once his brain caught up to his mouth he blushed hard. The color of his face was a serious rival to that of Kirishima’s hair, not that your face was any less red. Choosing to ignore the heat in your cheeks, you gave him a small nod and smile, motioning for him to lead the way with your head.

Momo followed behind the little family. Not a minute after they were out of earshot, the class began interrogating Midoriya since he was most likely caught up on the situation. Making some small talk with Momo was pleasant, and you speedily caught her up to date. “ So those adorable twins are yours and Shoto’s, and as long as they are here you’ll be staying at the 1-a dorms?” She softly asked, sounding suspiciously happy. Nodding as an answer. “ But if the twins stay with Shoto, where will you stay?” Momo asked, and she raised a fair point. Where were you going to stay?. “ I don’t know, I didn’t think that far ahead.” You answered her, keeping your voice low. “ I can make you a mattress along with some sleep wear, and you can borrow the room next to mine, if you’d like?” Momo proposed. It was a good offer, and you gratefully accepted it.

After setting the twins up in Shoto’s room, you were standing with Todoroki in the doorframe into his room. The Japanese style room now adorned a mattress, with two six year olds sleeping on it. “Well, good night Todoroki” You silently bid him good night, turning around to make your way to your room. “ Call me Shoto, I think we might be over formalities” He lightly said, turning back to look at the twins for a second, before turning back to look at you. You looked so appealing, the soft light cast by the moon hit your face perfectly. To Shoto, in that moment, you looked ethereal, and he couldn’t be happier that he ended up with you. “ Then call me y/n” , giving him a closed eye smile, turning back around again.

You walked a few steps, still feeling his eyes on you. Remembering his little slip up earlier, you plucked up the courage to be a little daring and perhaps teasing. Turning your head to look over your shoulder, you gave him a small smirk “ Good night, darling~” turning back, satisfied with yourself you left for your temporary living quarters. Leaving a very flustered Shoto with his thoughts’. Small flames decorated his arm as a response to his flustered state, patting them and putting them out he closed his dorm room door and went to sleep with a small smile on his face.

Waking up the next morning, you were met with three arms around your waist. None of which belonged to you, two were way too small and one was way too bulky to be yours. Your arms were wrapped around a twin each, as they slept on each side of your chest. It seems that at some point in the night Shoto had wrapped his arm around the three of you, and no matter how hard you tried you just didn’t find the situation weird or wrong. On the contrary, sleeping with the twins and Shoto felt so natural that it was borderline scary. Remembering how you ended up in this predicament, was a hard task to solve with your sleep induced brain.

Right, Ren woke up Reina because he had a nightmare. In turn Reina woke Shoto up, because she was having a hard time calming down Ren. Shoto had no idea how he was supposed to calm down the now crying twins. Turns out Reina is easily emotional, so when Ren cries, so does Reina. So Shoto’s genius plan was to wake you up, to help him deal with them. Somehow that ended up in you cuddling the kids to calm them down, and then roping you into staying here and sleeping with them. After a quick nod from Shoto, who was secretly happy he got to sleep and cuddle his little family, you all fell asleep pretty quickly.

Dragging her frame out of bed, she silently left the room. Taking the escalator down to the first floor, she was met with some of the early birds. And after Bakugou helped you wake fully up, by yelling at you demanding answers as to why you are here in their dorms at 6 in the morning. You began on breakfast, as it would take a bit longer now that you had to make 4 portions. Humming to herself she failed to notice the increasingly growing crowd, having no idea how loudly she was humming. Only when she was done, turning around with a plate in each hand did she notice the crowd. Slowly they began clapping and showering her in compliments for her voice.

Standing to the side was Shoto with his content little smile. He had woken up a bit when he felt a cold spot on his arm that previously was warm, slowly cracking his eyes open and he noticed your absence. Carefully tucking the twins in again he began his quest on finding you, his first stop was the common areas. He bore witness to your little unintentional concert, completely mesmerized by the way your hips swayed to the beat you were humming. Slowly, subconsciously, he came up to you and put his arms around your waist, nestling his face in the crook of your neck.

You were picking up the other two plates of breakfast, when you felt the arms circling your waist followed by a face nuzzling your neck. It was odd, you had only spent one night together, and you were already acting like a married couple. It should have freaked you out, but you couldn’t find it within yourself to care. In this very moment with Shoto cuddling you and hugging you from behind, while you had breakfast ready for the four of you, you’d never felt more loved and at home in your life. His hair was tickling your cheek as he nuzzled his face more into your neck. Patting his head slightly, you tried to get out of his grasp. But would he allow that, nooooo, instead he tightened his arms around you, lips ghosting your neck. “ Sho, I have to wake the twins up before breakfast gets cold'' Kissing your delicate cheek he slowly let go. Sitting the two other plates down, you make your way up to the twins.

Entering Shoto’s room, the sight that greeted you was so wholesome you just had to take a picture. The twins were hugging each other, their cheeks squished together. Easing your way over to them, bending down to kiss their cheeks and lightly shaking them awake. Reina sat up first, shortly followed by Ren, both rubbed their eyes with their tiny fists. They were simply adorable and you had to fight away the urge to squeal in delight. “Breakfast is ready, my cuties” You said softly. Both twins stretched their arms towards you, silently pleading to get picked up. Rolling your eyes you picked them up, balancing on your forearms letting them hug your neck for more balance. Reina pressed the buttons in the escalator, since your arms were noticeably full.

Sitting Ren next to you, and Reina next to Shoto, you began to eat your breakfast. Talking about what you were going to do today, as it is a Sunday and the only day completely free before work studies starts up again tomorrow. The twins wanted to go to the park, and so it was quickly decided what you were going to do today. After breakfast you dressed the twins in some clothes that Momo had made, so you didn’t have to worry about going shopping.

Together you made your way to the park, ignoring the stares from the onlookers. The twins held hands, with Ren holding your left hand and Reina holding Shoto’s right hand. The four of you took up the entire sidewalk, but you didn’t care. You children were happily chatting with their dad, while you kept aware of your surroundings. Arriving at the park you and Shoto took a spot on a nearby bench, while the twins rushed towards the other children. It was clear that Reina was the more confident of the two, from your spot on the bench you could see that she was the one to initiate the twins joining the others.

While her attention was on the children, Shoto's was on her, the beautiful woman beside him. Inching closer to her, he debated with himself if he would be too forward if he put an arm around her shoulders. He couldn’t understand how he could be so bold this morning, because now he was a nervous wreck. It didn’t make sense to him, putting his arm around your shoulders wouldn’t even be half as daring as his stunt this morning. ‘I don’t think she’ll mind, if she did she would have pushed me away this morning right?’ He thought to himself. Deep in thought he didn’t notice that he subconsciously put his arm around you, he only noticed when you leaned on his shoulder. “ This is nice, '' She said softly, and Shoto couldn't agree more.

*Click*

You spoke too soon, the unmistakable sound of a camera going off brought you to that conclusion. Surveying the area with your eyes, you spotted them. There were about 15 reporters, pointing their cameras towards you and Shoto. You tensed against him “Shoto, there are around 15 reporters photographing us at 4 o’clock” He subtly looked the way, and sure enough he spotted them as well. “ You want to make a run for it ” You nodded against his shoulder. “Let’s meet up at the ice cream shop between 4th and 6th ” He gave a small hum of confirmation.

Standing up abruptly and making your way over to the twins, you took one each and they said goodbye to their playmates. Holding Ren to your chest you began walking away from the park and towards 4th, footsteps following a few meters behind you. Spotting a crowded area, you made your way in between these people, while also explaining to Ren why you were half speed walking and half running. Spotting an abandoned alleyway, you swiftly made your way down it. Effectively shaking the reporters off, but somehow you still felt their eyes on you. Fairly certain that you had shaken them off, you chose to ignore the feeling of being watched.

Standing in the shadows was Dabi, his eyes following his ears towards the sound of someone entering his alleyway. He had just finished a job and was taking a break, when he noticed who had entered an alleyway. It was a teenage girl with a child around the age of 6-7 years old. Normally Dabi wouldn’t hesitate to eliminate people if they saw him, but for some reason he did this time. Maybe it was the fact that the boy looked like an alternative version of his youngest brother, or maybe it was the fact that the story the little boy was telling the girl sounded like something straight out of his life. “Uncle Touya is super cool, even if he used to be a villain. Daddy said that it was Grandpa Enji’s fault he ended up a villain anyway. I wanted to be like uncle Touya, but then I got my quirk and it was like Grandma Rei’s, so I can’t make flames like he and Daddy do. But that's okay, 'cause mommy and daddy love me anyway. ” So for perhaps the first time, he ignored them and went on his way.

Listening to your son talk about his uncle Touya was wholesome, but Ren unbeknownst to himself also just ratted out one of the most wanted villains. The description of Dabi matched what your son was saying, and now that you think about it his wanted profile says cerulean eyes. The classic Todoroki eyes should have given him away sooner. Deciding that this information was something that you couldn’t come out with was hard, but something must have happened. Something good since Ren said that he used to be a villain, past tense. Figuring that everything would work out the way it was supposed to, you finished making your way to the ice cream shop.

Standing in front of the shop was Shoto, and a very excited Reina. The little redhead was bouncing in Shoto’s arms, and that only intensified when she spotted the other half of the family coming towards them. Together the four of them went into the ice cream shop, and agreed that it would be best to head back to UA. It was Shoto’s turn to cook today, so of course he had bought all the ingredients a few days ago, he was going to make Soba for everyone.

Shoto had gotten a scoop of vanilla and a scoop of strawberry per the twins request, so that his ice cream and hair would match. The twins got some kind of kiddie ice cream, it was rainbow colored and they were very pleased with their choice, if their delighted faces said anything.

Walking back into the 1a- dorms, ignoring the glances of the few curious that were lounging around the common areas. Shoto began dinner, with two very eager spectators. You sat down on the couch and talked with the Dekusquad girls. “ Isn’t it weird becoming a mom overnight like this?” Ochaco asked. “It should be shouldn’t it?, but I don’t feel like it is. Maybe I just have a strong maternal instinct” You answered her shrugging your shoulders. “ What about your relationship with Todoroki, you seemed pretty cozy this morning *kero*” Tsu pointed out, making you blush and stutter. Leaving the laughing girls behind, you went to the kitchen to see if Shoto needed any help.

Somehow it seemed the twins had smoothly talked their father into letting them help him. So now the twins were cutting the vegetables, while Shoto was cooking the Soba noodles. They were clumsy with the nice, but avoided cutting themselves. You had a sneaking suspicion that this wasn’t the first time they’d managed to weasel their way into a kitchen, for two 6 year-olds they were way too proficient in a kitchen.

Dinner was delicious and filled with light chatter and by the time that everybody was done eating, nobody even batted an eyelash at the twins' presence. You and Shoto had answered all their questions to the best of your abilities. Afterwards they began questioning Ren and Reina, you ignored them out not wanting to have your future spoiled for you. “ Do you have any siblings?” Kirishima asked, snapping you back into the conversation. “ Reina excitedly began nodding, making her red locks fly all over the place. “ Yeah, mommy told me and Ren she was pregnant, but she still hasn’t told daddy yet” she said with a bright smile, though she began frowning towards the end of her sentence. Everybody turned their heads toward you, “ don’t look at me, I’m not pregnant. The future me is” It was like they forgot, because when you mentioned future you, they all had an oh, right I forgot look adorning their faces.

The rest of the evening wasn’t eventful, and the twins somehow roped you into sleeping with them and Shoto again tonight. From the start this time, and so you slept on the left side of the bed with Reina next to you. Shoto slept on the right side of the bed with Ren next to him, which made the twins sleep together in the middle. Sometime throughout the night, yours and Shoto’s hands intertwined on top of the twins.

Monday came around, and the twins were still here. So over breakfast you and Shoto had to discuss the issue at hand, what to do with the twins and work studies. “ Sho’, we have to take them with us, the teachers are busy and they are our responsibility.” You tried to calmly reason with him. “ No, absolutely not! I am not letting my snowflakes near that burning piece of trash.” He sternly said, even if he didn’t yell it certainly felt like he did. “ So, what’s you plan then? And for the record they are our kids, not just yours Sho” You bit back, not breaking eye contact. Shoto looked away first with a scowl, you had a point. Nobody he knew could take the kids, and so he was left with no choice but to accept it. Frowning you stretched your hand over the table, and put it on top of his. “ Sho’ I know you don’t like it, and to be frank I don’t either but there is nothing we can do about it”. Shoto turned his hand up and interlaced your fingers, feeling a little better. “ Does this mean we get to see Grandpa Enji?” The twins asked in unison, sparkles practically in their eyes. You and Shoto shared a look before nodding, gaining excited shouting from the twins, probably waking the rest of the dorm residents.

Together the four of you took the train to Endeavour’s agency, only being stopped 3 times. Considering the reporter fiasco yesterday, to say you were relieved would be an understatement. You weren't sure if the twins were used to publicity or not. Arriving in front of Endeavour’s agency, you and Shoto shared a look, before intertwining your hands. You need all the emotional support you could get, and you had an inkling that Shoto felt the same way. The twins ran in front of you, and looked around the place in awe. Turns out that you were more nervous than you originally thought, because you were squeezing the life out of Shoto’s hand. But who could blame you, the situation was a bit bizarre and Endeavour is an intimidating man.

“Grandpa” two childish voices rang out in the big office belonging to Endeavour. Everything stopped, Endeavour and his sidekicks stopped talking. The silence was broken when two young children tackled Endeavor, and hugged him tightly. The two small children were grinning, yelling Surprise. Following the two young children was his youngest son Shoto, and his new intern y/n. They were holding hands, and looking at the children in his arms with a bit of uncertainty.

“ Ren, Reina, let go of Grandpa, remember you aren’t born yet and Grandpa is not briefed on the situation.” his new intern exclaimed. “Right sorry mommy, sorry grandpa” The redheaded little girl said before both the children left his arms. Endeavour watched them carefully as they hugged his new intern, she still hadn't let go of his son's hand. It was clear that they were the parents of these two children, but how it happened and why he wasn’t informed he didn’t know. Dismissing his sidekick, he turned his attention back onto the teenagers. Lifting a brow “care to elaborate” he pointedly glared at her.

Shoto, sprung into action, and relayed the story to the number 2 hero. From the start on how he met Reina, to how he met Ren and how you bumped into him and Midoriya on their way to Aizawa. How Recovery girl had said the quirk that had done this would wear off eventually, to yesterday and how they couldn't leave them alone. “ So father, meet your grandchildren from 15 years into the future” He pointed towards the twins, who were hugging each leg of yours.

After the initial shock wore off, Endeavour was surprisingly understanding. He told them that they would train instead of going on patrol, so they could look after his grandchildren. Both you and Shoto were shocked at how easily he slipped into the grandpa role, even though considering how fast you slipped into your parental roles it really shouldn’t have surprised you. He was playing with them, showing them what he could do with his flames. Reina copied him, while Shoto and Ren played with their ice. They even ended up having an art competition, with Reina and Endeavour carving wood with their fire. Shoto and Ren on the other hand made an ice sculpture, and in the end you couldn’t decide who won.

Some time after when the twins were just playing with each other, and you and Shoto got some intense training, a sidekick came to report to Endeavour. They left for Endeavour's office. You and Shoto took this time to regain your breaths, sitting down and cuddling a bit. Your back was up against Sho’s heaving chest, his arms around your waist as you rested your head against his shoulder. “ Mommy, Daddy I feel funny,” Ren said. Standing up you go towards your children with Sho’ hot on your tail. Reaching a stop in front of the twins, you reach out to put the back of your hand on his forehead to check his temperature. When your hand reached his forehead, it went through. What? Coming to the conclusion that the quirk that sent them here in the first place, was probably nearing its time.

You turn to your children, and slowly they begin fading. “ Bye be careful our little snowflakes, mommy and daddy loves you” Shoto said, his tone melancholic. The last thing you saw was them nodding before they disappeared before your eyes. Turning towards Sho’ you embraced each other, silently crying. You had grown attached to your kids in the 3 days they had been here, you could feel Sho’s tears fall and land on your neck. After some time Endeavor returned, confused as he looked around for the twins. “ Where did my grandchildren go?” he demanded in a gruff voice. “ They went back to their time sir” You politely answered him, drying your eyes. Endeavour's eyes widened a fraction before returning to their normal size“ Well then bring them back” he suggested. Immediately you and Shoto separated, and blushed furiously. How could he say that with a straight face, you were only teenagers for All Might's sake. You’d see them again in the future, with that you continued the day with a small smile.

We’ll see them again someday.

@deloreees @rainypeachbakerygoth

#bnha shoto todoroki #mha #bhna #domestic #Shoto as a dad #fluff #dad todoroki #dadau #mha x reader #mom reader

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havethetimeofyourstyles · 3 years

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Chapter One.

a/n: welcome to the first chapter of wtsgd! i’m so excited for you all to read this story and for what’s to come. please please please support content creators bc we’re doing this for free and it takes up a lot of energy to put out stories. so reblog, leave feedback, and send a message to motivate and support them. happy reading everyone <3

SERIES MASTERLIST | word count: 6.4k

come talk to me about wtsgd! i’d love to know your thoughts!

March 4, 2017

The trunk was filled with heavy boxes that were labeled with thick black sharpie, which didn’t seem to leave Luciana’s senses; and one too many suitcases filled with her many articles of clothing that she couldn’t get rid of—no matter how hard she tried—since she was too much of a hoarder and every piece of clothing seemed to have a lost memory in them that she tried very hard to think of, which only meant that it was worth keeping.

A droplet of sweat leaked down the side of her face due to her nonstop packing and heavy-lifting from her childhood room upstairs to her dad’s car in the driveway. It didn’t help that the sun was beaming down at her with every move like she was on center stage, in front of the spotlight, but it made much more sense for the sun to do that because that’s where she belonged: on stage.

Moving to Brooklyn, New York from Cambridge, Massachusetts during, what felt like, the coldest but the sunniest day of March wasn’t the smartest move—to be fair, Luciana was never one to make a smart move, anyways—but it was one that needed to be done. Plus, all the lifting seemed to have warmed her up.

Her destination, or now, home, in New York was one that she’d been anticipating for a while now. She had auditioned for the role as Kim in Miss Saigon on Broadway in November, and she’d gotten a callback in January for the role as the second Kim, meaning she would be on rotation to perform every week or two weeks, so the main Kim could rest. But she would still have to go to rehearsals and be on the side of the stage watching the show just in case she needed to jump in at the last minute.

It wasn’t her ideal way of playing the main lead, but nonetheless, she was grateful for the opportunity, and she would take any chance that was thrown at her to not only take another step towards her dream, but also another learning opportunity to make her a better actress.

Little Luci would’ve been so proud of the present Luci because it’d been her dream ever since she was younger, to be on stage and eventually, be on the big screen. Although she was far from completing her dream of being a face in Hollywood, this was a step that would take her to where she wanted to be in the future, and for that, she was proud of herself.

As a child, Luci had been in various commercials; from being the kid that played with slime and had no lines but to just put on a big smile while the sticky substance ran through her small hands, to being the daughter in a car commercial with one line that said “Are we there yet?” with a groan and a face of exhaustion as if she were the one driving the car. She hoped that these commercials would have someone recognize her talent, to cast her as a Disney star, but that would require moving to California, which her parents were wary of.

The commercials stopped when she reached middle school. Her early adolescent years consisted of an abundance of attitude and mood swings; Luci was a very tough and determined kid. Her love for acting had grown into a big balloon that was let go and on its way into the galaxy where no one could reach it—where no one could mess with her achieving her dream.

She would always stand in front of her white wooden framed mirror—with delicately painted colorful flowers around the border—reciting lines that she heard from a television series or the films that she watched, and she would write them down in her blue notebook. Sometimes, her parents would let her search the script up if it was available online. But oftentimes, she would test and challenge her memorization, and listen to it by ear; testing her mind, and eventually, her memorization skills were immaculate by the age of eleven.

It was perfect timing because by the time she was in middle school, she was able to snatch the roles she wanted when her school’s drama department held school plays. Her family thought that she would start to hate being on stage since school plays always ran until late evening, but being part of the productions had only enhanced her love for her talent, and it only prepared her for a quarter of what her future may look like.

All in all, from a very young age, she always knew that she wanted to become an actress. The spotlight or the center of the camera was where she always craved to be.

And she was finally making that dream come true.

A black Toyota Camry pulled into the space behind the car that was filled with her belongings. Ren and Beatrice, Luci’s lovely parents, both get out of the car with a pink box of donuts—a snack for the road and for when she gets to her new apartment.

“Ready, Lucky?” Beatrice asked, rubbing her daughter’s back. She was quite bummed to see Luci leave her childhood home, but she’s proud to see Lucky Luci chase her dreams. She was, after all, twenty-five and was bound to move out at some point, but to see it actually happen made Beatrice quite emotional.

“Ma, please, don’t cry…” Luci frowned as Beatrice pressed her fingertips to the corners of her eyes. She wrapped her arm around her mother’s shoulder, comforting her. “You’re all coming to New York in a month, right? To watch me on stage?” Luci asked, reassuring herself that she would see her family in a different state to rescue her from her loneliness.

Luci was an independent woman. She could do tasks by herself, go places alone, and she wouldn’t have a problem with it; she enjoyed the company of herself. But to know that at some point she might be alone—that everyone had left her behind or forgotten about her—was what scared her. She needed to know that the people who loved her unconditionally wouldn’t forget about her.

“Of course we’re going!” Ren exclaimed with a smile that Luci was going to miss seeing everyday. “We can’t miss our baby on the Broadway stage. If we could, we’d go to every damn show that you’re in, but that would be a lot of gas, no?”

She chuckled, nodding her head. She felt tears pricking her eyes at how supportive her parents were—they’ve always been. If she could, she would take them with her to New York, but her one bedroom apartment and their work said otherwise.

“Now, Lucky, don’t cry.” It was Beatrice’s turn to comfort her daughter. Like any parent, when they see their child cry, it breaks their heart and they cry too. “We’re gonna see you real soon. You can always come back anytime you want. We’re just a phone call away and we’ll pick you up,” Beatrice said between sniffles. The mother and daughter were embracing so tenderly and comfortingly—enjoying every last moment together until they got to see each other again.

“Jeez, you’re both the same—always crying!” Ren interrupted, making the two women laugh; and he was glad they found what he said amusing because he couldn’t handle the sad moment. “C’mon here, my Lulu.” Luci settled into her father’s arms, hugging him tightly. She’s always been her dad’s girl, despite having a close relationship with her mother, her relationship with her father was something that felt like home; he always knew what to say and when to say it. It helped that she was the female version of him. “You’re gonna be the best star out there, I’m sure of it. Now, I want you to have fun, alright? The fame, the fortune, the big city…it doesn’t amount to anything if you’re not having the time of your life” He comfortingly rubbed Luci’s back, holding her in a warm and tight squeeze.

Luci smiled at her father’s words. She was always a bit hard on herself when she would mess up or forget a line or a movement that correlates to a specific line in her script. When she was younger, she would beat herself up for a sliver of a moment; she would cry into her pillow—sobs loud enough that they were heard from downstairs. Luci would think that she wouldn’t become a well-known actress just because of the minor forgetfulness her mind had presented. But Ren would gently tap on her ocean blue door, letting himself in because he knew his daughter didn’t have the energy to get up and let him in, and he would sit beside her, gently urging her to sit up with him. Once she complied, after many groans of refusals, she would be glad she did because her father looked deeply into her eyes—and it was like looking into the reflection of clear and clean water—and told her she was a star. It was only three words, but those three words reminded her to never give up and get up when she would hit the pavement of what she felt like were her fallen hopes and dreams.

Ren would then end it with a statement of advice that had always lingered in her mind, resonating to the silent and harshful words that she tells herself. ‘Nothing will amount to anything if you’re not having the time of your life.’

A rush of gratitude settled upon her as her eyes became glossier by the seconds she was in Ren’s arms. Beatrice looked at her greatest treasures fondly, a smile appeared on her face only for it to be replaced by a look of confusion.

“Where is that damn brother of yours? He said he was going to be here at ten!” Beatrice interrupted the sweet moment she was having with her father, making them disconnect from the hug—just as Ren did with Luci and Beatrice.

Speaking of the devil, her dear brother was making his way towards home on the side of the street, wearing a grey sweatshirt that was stained with his sweat as his earphones were nestled in his ears, loudly playing music. He loudly sang along to some rap song, breath staggered as he rapped along with his hands.

Nathan smiled once he stepped foot onto the driveway as he took out his earphones, seeing his family look at him vigilantly. Luci laughed, shaking her head.

“Hey, there’s our superstar, little Ana!” Nathan opened his arms, ready to hug you but she quickly stopped him, curving her spine backwards to deny his hug. Ana had been one of the many nicknames her family had called her when she was growing up from the second half of her name, but Ana seemed to have stuck with Nathan as no one else really called her that, so it was his own personal nickname for her.

“Ew, please, do not hug me.” Her face wrinkled in disgust from the spell of her brother’s sweat from his run. Nathan chuckled, playfully rolling his eyes before turning towards his parents.

“Ooh, donuts-”

Beatrice slapped the back of his hand before he even got a chance to open the pink donut box. “Not until you shower and change. Lulu needs to be in Brooklyn by three!”

“Ow, mother!” Nathan whipped his hand away from Beatrice’s burning slap, although he was just playing around and being dramatic. “But fine, alright. The star always gets what she wants, am I right?” He dropped his head towards Luci, sighing before he hurried inside the house to take a quick shower and change.

Luci giggled, telling her parents that she would be right back to go up to her room to check if she’d gotten everything, even though she knew that she had everything, she just needed to reminisce alone for a moment.

Her feet took her up the wooden stairs, where she, for some unknown reason, always spent her time sitting on as she leaned her back against the wall and read or drew. Nathan always found it weird of her when they were doing homework when they were younger, but it was just one of the many fun anecdotes he could tell reporters if he’s asked about their childhood.

Pushing open her ocean blue door that she never changed because she loved the color, she was met with the emptiness of what was once her sanctuary. Despite the paint on the wall changing, the replacement of furniture, and rearrangement of her childhood room, Luci could still see the baby pink walls where she hung up various posters of her celebrity crushes when she was eight. She could still see herself walking over to her Cinderella white wooden dresser as she pulled out an inflatable microphone from her drawer before she walked over to her bed to sing her heart out with her cousin. In the corner of her room was her mirror that she painted colorful flowers along the border when she was younger, and she definitely did not want to change or get rid of it; it wasn’t difficult to stir up a memory when she was in front of that mirror because up until now, she was always reciting her lines to her own reflection until the late night.

All of these memories that Luci held within her heart would help her ground herself—remind her where she came from. No matter where her career took her, she would always be the girl that was firstly known in her room, crying, laughing, and acting within the four baby pink walls until she was sixteen, and then it changed to an ecru white. The feeling of nostalgia clutched her chest, and for the second time today—not even noon, yet—she found herself crying.

She silently sobbed in her sanctuary. Her chest felt tight, like her heart was grasping onto the memories, begging her to not leave, to not move on. But moving on would mean being stuck, and she didn’t want to feel stuck—she just never wanted to be in one place where the walls would slowly feel like they were closing in on her. She didn’t want to be in one place and eventually hated it, so for that, she had to move on.

A soft knock was heard from the outside of her bedroom, making Luci turn around hastily. She found Beatrice standing in the doorway, warmly smiling at her daughter, and keeping the tears at bay because she needed the comfort of her mother more than her mother’s tears.

“My Lucky Star…” Beatrice walked into the room, welcoming Luci into her arms. “You okay?”

Luci deeply inhaled and exhaled as she calmed herself down from her cries. “I’m alright. It’s just hard saying goodbye to this place—to my room.”’

“Oh, Lulu. You don’t need to say goodbye. I know you’ll be coming back here soon, anyways. I know you love home too much to completely stay away.” Beatrice was subtly trying to remind Luci about her love for her hometown, for her home, but her words also were trying to remind her about that certain love for her home and to never forget that love so she doesn’t stray away because Beatrice was simply afraid Luci would never want to come back once she discovered the luxury of her career. And even though she knew her Lulu wasn’t one to forget about her family, Beatrice would never admit her fear.

Luci sniffled, wiping her tears away as she pulled away from her mother’s embrace. “Yeah, I know. Just…doesn’t feel real that I’m leaving.”

“Sure, you’re leaving, but you’re going off to do bigger and better things. You were never one to stay in one place, physically and mentally—you were always moving, always loved learning more. And I’ve always been so intrigued and interested in how your mind works.”

“Ma…” The waterworks seemed to be the highlight of the move.

“I’m serious! I’m so genuinely proud of you. You’ve been keeping your talent—and I don’t mean ‘high school plays’ talent. I mean your Broadway, Hollywood, Academy winning talent. Now, you get to showcase your light in front of thousands of people.” Beatrice always had a way of boosting Luci’s self-esteem, making her ego a tad bit more bigger than it already was. She didn’t mind if her self-esteem had skyrocketed into the galaxy of her dreams, but she always reminded Luci that being humble and kind always outweighed being obnoxious and arrogant. “Now, enough with these tears. You’ve got a road trip to New York. C’mon, now.”

They made their way downstairs and out the door where Ren and Nathan were talking about the latest basketball game of the Celtics. The trunk was closed, and the only thing waiting was Luci herself.

“There she is! Ready?”

Luci took a deep breath, turning her head to look back at the pastel yellow house that had kept her safe for the past twenty-five years. From here, she knew everything was going to change. Whether it’d be for the good or if things would go downhill from here? She didn’t know; all she knew was that she was going to be doing what she loved and she was going to have the time of her life doing it.

“Yeah, I’m ready.”

The state of Connecticut seemed to pass by quickly from the car as Nathan drove at a decent seventy miles per hour; the state vanished just as quickly as when they entered.

Luci mindlessly looked out the window, thinking about everything and nothing at once as she drowned out the music playing through the speakers of the car and Nathan’s voice singing along.

The cars passing by, the bystanders, and the locals filled the streets and highways, making her wonder what all of these people’s stories were—wondering if they lived in this city or if they were just stopping by to visit, or if they’re just going through the state to get to the one next door just as she was. Maybe she’s had an encounter or simply passed by them on the street in a world that seemed too large but small at the same time. She always pondered on whether everyone else thought the way she thought—if they wondered what her story was or the people around them.

The world is an interesting place and there were so many intriguing people out there, making her more excited by the minute as she takes on this new adventure in her life that would be completely life changing. Luci’s going to be meeting so many new people that, she would hope, have an impact on her personal life or career.

“Nervous?” Nathan broke the comfortable silence between them.

Luci raised her brows and curled her lips into her mouth. “A bit.”

He nodded, thinking for a moment. Nathan was always one to think before he spoke, and it was a quality that some people needed to learn how to do. He quickly learned that lesson when he was in high school; one of his friends, Johnny, and him were going back and forth joking around with one another. And for some odd reason, teenage boys liked to joke around about fucking everything, so Nathan had said “Yeah, I fucked your mom, what about it?” without thinking. Johnny stayed silent, the rest of their friends were waiting for his comeback, but they only received tears that glossed over his eyes before he ran off to a different part of campus, away from the lunch tables. Nathan found him behind the orchestra building with his face pressed on his kneecaps, crying. Later, he found out that Johnny’s mother had passed away before their sophomore year started and he hadn’t told anyone, which left Nathan quite speechless, but it was a lesson that he learned: to think before anything comes out of his mouth.

“I know you’ll do great. You were born to do this, born to be on stage. Everything you do is to greater your experience and opportunities. All the mistakes you’re gonna make, which we both know you’re gonna make, they’re gonna be learning lessons for you to continue doing what you’re good at doing; the mistakes are there so you can better yourself,” he reassured, occasionally glancing at you briefly before averting his eyes back onto the highway.

Luci smiled, never taking her eyes off her older brother. She leaned closer to the middle console, where his right arm was resting on the padded console. Hugging his arm tightly and resting her cheek on his shoulder, she accepted and appreciated his advice, his words. They made her heart fill up with so much gratitude and love, insanely grateful and happy that she had such an amazing and supportive family who always knew the right things to say when they could sense her nerves and anxieties powering through the roof.

“You’re gonna kill it out there. This is just a step towards where you wanna go, where you actually wanna be.”

She nodded, looking to her right as they quickly passed the ‘Welcome to New York’ sign from the state line of Connecticut and New York, and it was the sign indicating her new home.

Nathan pulled into the apartment’s parking garage, entering in with the code that the complex gave Luci on the silver keypad as the two watched the automatic gate arm swing up to the side, and Nathan entered the parking structure, parking in one of the many spaces available.

Luci excitedly got out of the car, rushing to the trunk where Nathan had opened it from inside the car. Unfortunately, she had forgotten to bring the hand dolly to help carry the boxes, which meant that the siblings were going to have to carry the many boxes she packed by her own hand and strength. But luckily, some of them weren’t that heavy; most of the items in the brown boxes were kitchenware and she figured she could just drag those.

One by one, they took one box each and headed for the elevator, where it took them to her apartment floor—floor four. Luci grabbed the keys from her purse that contained two copper keys hanging on one single silver loop and a small keyless sensor, and she unlocked her navy blue door, revealing her new apartment.

When she entered, she was met with a door across the entrance that she would use for her coats and shoes, things that she would need when she’s rushing out the door. Going through the small hallway in from the entrance, it led her to another small hallway to her left where her bedroom and guest bathroom was; and to her right, it would take her to the kitchen and living space. With four big windows with black window frames, the natural light really came in, making her place brighter for saving electricity.

Walking in and putting the boxes against the black cabinets in the kitchen, she immediately fell in love with the space, her space. Despite already taking a tour of the apartment a few months prior to her official move in day, it felt different being there for the second time because she now knew that this place was hers. She saw it in a different light, and she was already anticipating the memories she was going to make in her new home. The place was empty; and with every step and every noise from her mouth, the room would echo, and she loved it. There was something satisfying about the echo in an empty space that was hers, like she wanted to furnish the hell out of it, but at the same time, she didn’t mind the echo.

“This is your new home.” Nathan put an arm around Luci’s shoulder. He got a bit emotional seeing his baby sister grow up and move away from home, but he was excited for all of the experiences and memories she was going to make. Luci looked up at him, not saying anything but smiling as she was speechless. Nathan could practically feel the excitement run through her and all he did was chuckle at her speechlessness. “C’mon, let’s go get the rest of the boxes.”

For the next fifteen minutes, Luci and Nathan hauled the boxes from the car, to the elevator, and down the hallway to her apartment. There were about four more boxes left in the trunk, and they would’ve been finished by now if they hadn’t been taking breaks.

Nathan’s phone rang as he was sitting on the floor, leaning against the cabinets of the kitchen across from Luci who was sitting in the corner where her dining table would be.

“Hello?” Answered Nathan. “What? Tonight? I’m in New York. I’m helping my little sister move here. Uh, okay. Sure. Bye.” He groaned, standing up.

“Who was that?” Luci asked, nosy as she was.

“That was one of the board members at Mass General Hospital.” Luci’s eyes widened. “They just asked me if I could come in tonight to teach and supervise the new residents.” Nathan was a general doctor working in the Emergency Room as Mass General back in Boston. He’s always wanted to teach with all the knowledge he’s stored in his brain—always wanting someone to learn a thing or two when they spoke to him, and this was his chance.

“Holy shit, that’s amazing, Nate!” Luci stood up, excited for him.

He started to breathe a bit heavily and Luci immediately took notice; she could practically feel the nerves coming out of him, the same nerves she felt while going in for an audition. “Yeah, I actually have to leave, like, right now.”

“Hey, hey.” She quickly stopped him from running out of the building and out of his mind. “Come here—breathe with me for a second.” She held onto his wrists gently.

“Luci, I have to-”

He pulled away, but she tugged him back. “You’re going to drive yourself through the highway, and who knows what will happen, you might get pulled over and you won’t make it to the hospital. So, just take sixty seconds to breathe with me.”

For the remainder of the time that they had together, they took some deep breaths. She spoke encouraging and uplifting words to him to calm down his nerves and anxieties that he seemed to drive himself over a cliff for, and it seemed to work as Nathan’s shoulder’s weren’t so tense and the grip on her hands had loosened.

The two of them walked down to the parking garage where Nathan took down the last four boxes and placed them by the entrance of the complex. He was adamant on helping her get the last few boxes up to her apartment, but she shrugged it off, telling him that she was able to carry them and that he needed to leave because he’s most likely going to hit traffic during rush hour.

“Call me if you need anything, okay? I mean it. I will drive here in a heartbeat.”

“I will, I will-”

“Just not tonight,” he joked. “This is the highlight of my career.” His smile was so bright that it was like he was a little kid on Christmas again who just received a Hot Speed set from Santa.

Luci laughed, hugging him goodbye. “And call me if you need anything too. I’ll miss seeing you everyday,” she admitted, a slight frown on her face. She thought she’d have the entire day with Nathan, but it was cut short due to his work but she wasn’t mad about that at all because she knew there'd be plenty of times when he would drive down to walk along the New York streets and see her perform.

“I’m gonna miss you too, Ana. But I love you and I’ll see you next month!” He hurried into his car, and Luci watched him as he pulled out of the driveway, waving at the rear view mirror to say one last ‘see you later’ to his little sister.

Walking back to the curb where all of the boxes were set, Luci picked one up to test how heavy it was and she barely made it upright without almost hurting her back, so she put the box down to take a proper breather. She decided to drag the box closer to the door of the complex—which saved her a few steps without completely dropping the box that was labeled ‘glass plates’—and pulled the handle of the door, only to find it completely locked. There was a slight panic that flew through her until she realized that she needed her keyless tag that she had to press against the pad on the wall to get inside the complex, so she blew out a sigh of relief before reaching down to her pocket for her key, and with just her luck, her keys weren’t in her pocket or with her at all. Then she started to panic again.

Luci quickly walked out of the parking garage and to the front of the building where the leasing office was to find them closed, which was odd because it was Saturday, but apparently their servers were down so they just decided to take the entire day off. She rolled her eyes annoyingly, walking back to the garage in a fast manner because she didn’t want anyone to take her boxes, and so she figured that she could just wait until someone left the complex or arrived. She even left her phone at her place, so it wasn’t like she could call anyone to help her, but some sort of entertainment would help the time go by quicker.

Sitting on the curb in the garage, pacing back and forth on the sidewalk, and humming the melody from the Miss Saigon soundtrack, an hour goes by until she sees someone walk past the automatic gate barrier, heading towards the entrance where he opened the door with his tag. Luci sprinted towards the door, calling out for help.

“Wait, wait!” The man turned around confusingly, taking his AirPod out of one ear. She caught up, taking deep breaths as she waved at the man. “Sorry, I’ve been out here for an hour and I completely forgot my key.” He didn’t say anything but stared at her, wondering why he’s never seen this woman before. The apartment complex really only had four floors, and he’s sure that he’s seen everyone who’s lived here. She noticed that he looked down at the boxes and back at her. “Oh, I just moved in.” He nodded more understandingly. “Do you mind holding the door for me?”

“Sure.” Was the first thing he told her before stepping aside to hold the door. She took another deep breath, getting into the correct form so she doesn’t throw her back out, and began to lift the heavy box. He noticed her struggling, and he felt foolish for not offering his help in the first place when he noticed the four boxes on the cement. “Here, sorry, let me help with that. Get the door, yeah?” Luci’s heart flipped once she heard his deep, accented voice before she gratefully thanked him and he grabbed the box from her, replacing her hands with his and the slightest brush of their fingers made her flustered; he held the box tightly to his chest without much struggle.

“Yeah, let me just get this one.” Luci grabbed a much lighter box that had all of her shoes, and held the door for him with her foot as he made his way inside of the building and to the elevator. He pressed the button with the arrow pointing up, and luckily, they didn’t have to wait for more than five seconds before the bell at the top chimed and the stainless steel doors opened.

With the heavy box in his hands, he still let Luci walk in first, which made her smile and he followed in as she pressed with the bold ‘4’ printed on it. He held the box in between his chest and the other end of the bar on the wall as they waited in silence as the elevator lifted them up to her apartment floor, and she brushed past him when he lifted his arm, gesturing her to go first.

Her front door was closed but it was unlocked, which only made sense, so she opened her door, putting the box next to the entrance and politely asking the man to put it next to the one you put down.

“Thank you so much, really. You have no idea how much I appreciate your help.”

“It’s no problem. I was the same when I moved here too—forgot my keys and was locked out.” He related to make her feel lighter about the situation since it was an honest mishap.

“Did you go to the leasing office?” She asked curiously.

“Yeah, but they were closed.”

“They’re closed today too! It’s like they do that on purpose whenever someone new moves in.” The man chuckled, scratching the back of his neck.

She hadn’t gotten a proper look at him since she was too distracted by trying to get into her building, but just by one real look at him, he was very attractive—probably too attractive to where she couldn’t think straight. He was wearing a pastel yellow and white striped button down that was a bit flowy and open, showing his white tank underneath that was tucked into his black skinny jeans. His tank top was low enough, exposing a patch of chest hair and his necklace that rested against his skin, in between his swallow tattoos just below his collarbones. Rings hugged his long fingers on both hands as he held two brown paper bags from Trader Joes. He was handsome, that’s for sure, and she felt like she was going to compare his beauty to all the other men that she was going to encounter in the future.

“They’re not very good at going into work, but if you give them a call then it’s like they’re a 24/7 help center.”

Luci nodded, chuckling. “Good to know. I’ll keep that in mind.”

“I’ll help you with the last boxes.” Before she was about to protest and tell him that he didn’t have to help her anymore because she was sure the last ones were light, he made his way towards the elevator and she quickly followed.

To her surprise, one of the boxes was heavier than the other and she was glad that the man was able to carry it for her. They took the boxes up to her apartment, stacking it on top of the ones that were set down before she thanked him gratefully again.

“I really appreciate all your help.” She smiled, leaning against the doorframe.

“Not that I’m doubting your strength or anything, but how were you supposed to get those boxes up to your apartment?” He asked softly, not wanting to offend her by his words.

“Oh, my brother was supposed to help me, but he had to go back home for an emergency at work.” The man nodded, seeming that was the most acceptable answer, not like he was searching if she was lying. “But thank you for your help. You’re a true lifesaver,” she said with a soft smile on her face. Her tone was a bit flirty than she wanted it to be, but it naturally came out.

“It’s not a problem. I’ll see you around.” Luci hadn’t closed her door yet, but she found out that he was literally her neighbor on the opposite side of the wall. He didn’t even have to take two steps to get to his place—all he had to do was turn around and he was home. She smiled at the thought of that, glad that her neighbor was already so kind to her.

As he was fumbling with his keys, he eventually got his door unlocked, and Luci was itching to ask what his name was—maybe make her first friend during her first day living in the big city. The man felt his neighbor's eyes on him, burning through the back of his head, so he turned around at the same time she spoke.

“Uh, hey,” Luci called out. He was looking over his shoulder, pursing his lips as he raised his brows. “I was wondering if…you’d like to have dinner with me tonight? Y’know, to thank you for all your help and practically saving me while I was stranded.” She chuckled, playing with the tips of her fingers as she looked at him with hope.

He thought the invitation was nice, but…“It’s okay, really. I, uh, have plans already tonight,” he admitted honestly because he doesn’t make a habit of being dishonest.

Luci had some thick skin—she grew it throughout the years, and she had always been pretty confident. So many people would think that she could handle rejection well because she’s auditioned for many roles in her lifetime, and had been rejected for most of those roles. But the rejection that her neighbor handed to her so respectfully and politely was one that hit her the most, and she didn't know why.

Curling her lips into her mouth as she felt the pang of her heart sinking into her chest, she nodded and placed a small smile onto her face.

“Have fun tonight, then. I’ll see you around.” She grinned, hiding the slight bit of pain that she felt. He nodded, walking inside his apartment as she was in her doorway as well. “Oh, I’m Luci, by the way.” She introduced herself, feeling like she should have done that ten minutes ago, but it had slipped her mind.

The corner of the man’s mouth turned up into a sly smirk, and she nearly felt herself fall as she gripped the door handle tightly. It was enough to make the pain in her chest disappear, and all thoughts of the rejection that she would think about for the rest of the night vanished.

“Nice to meet you, Luci. I’m Harry.”

With that, Harry closed his door, putting a barrier between him and Luci, who was still standing in her doorway. She let out the longest sigh of her life, feeling like she’d been constricting herself from breathing properly for the last ten minutes.

Luci closed her door and leaned against it, looking down at the boxes that were resting by her feet. She softly smiled, her cheeks were starting to get warm, and she was fully aware that Harry was the cause of it.

come talk to me about your thoughts and feelings! hope you all enjoyed the first chapter, thank you for reading <3

ty to @sunflowers-styles for beta reading!

#harry styles fanfiction #harry styles angst #harry styles series #harry styles x oc #harry styles fic #harry styles ff #harry styles smut #harry styles fluff #harry styles au #boyfriend!harry #harry styles writing #harry styles solo #actress!oc

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devil-of-the-field · 2 years

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CFV Vampire AU

Fair warning, this is going to be long.

In this post I want to go over two topics: a general overview of the story (themes, setting, structure etc.) and how vampires work in this universe. There are a lot of vampire stories out there but they all tend to do them a little differently, so I want to give you an idea how they function in our universe, because it’s a bit more unique. However, I’m not going to tell you everything yet, since I’d like for you to find out some parts of the vampire mythos on your own when you read the story, hehe.

General Overview

I’m not sure if I made this clear before, so I’m just going to spell this out: This is a horror story. I mean, mostly it’s a character-driven paranormal drama, but it has a lot of horror elements. When I upload it to AO3, it’s going to be rated either Mature or even Explicit, and not for sexy reasons. Also, I want to warn you that the Archive Warnings will be Graphic Depictions Of Violence and Major Character Death. Do with that information what you will.

Originally, the cast was just contained to the core OG one, but it has expanded quite a lot. This AU might have the most referenced CFV characters of any AU me and co-writer created. Haha. Oh boy.

The OG characters here are there G ages, so Kai and Co. are 20, Aichi is 19, and the G characters are 14 etc.

The pov is going to be 3rd person limited. Since the cast is so big, there will be a lot of pov switches to cover all of the subplots.

Kai is the protagonist. a) because I love him and b) because his perspective is one of the most interesting here. He’s a vampire hunter, trying to balance his newfound human life and his nightly hunting activities. Through his eyes we can see both the human world and the world of the vampires, and how he’s torn between the two.

For those of you who don’t love Kai, don’t worry, there’s lots of other povs as well! Ren, Ibuki and Gaillard are also major pov characters, and Kai’s friend group (Aichi, Miwa, Misaki, Kamui and Mamoru) get pov chapters and their own subplots.

There’s more characters who will become important over the course of the story and get some pov chapters too. No spoilers but if you are attached to the G characters...

How Vampires work

Vampires are immortal (duh), and don’t age. They also have incredible regeneration abilities.

They are very hard to kill, but it’s not impossible. More on that in a second.

They burn in the sun. However, they don’t instantly crumble to ash, it’s more like getting slowly burned, starting with 3rd degree burns and getting worse quickly. So they can technically go out during the day, but once they come into contact with sunlight, it’s like being stuck in an oven. They get cooked slowly. So they are only active at night most of the time.

Vampires have supernatural strength and speed. Also, their skin is basically bulletproof. Even hurting them is difficult.

Still, vampires have a weakness. It’s silver. (Listen I know this is not the classical vampire weakness but I am sick of Christian crosses everywhere.)

Silver can penetrate their skin. Touching silver will slowly burn them. Wounds torn by silver will only heal very slowly.

Vampires can be killed a number of ways, all of which are difficult to achieve. Decapitating them or ripping out their heart is a sure way to permanently deaden the undead though. So is draining them of all blood, since it’s essentially the juice that keeps them going.

Once a vampire dies they won’t crumble, but instead revert back to the human corpse they were supposed to become when they turned.

Vampires sustain themselves by drinking blood. They have no need for human food. However, they don’t need to drink that often. Normal vampires only need to drink blood about once a month.

If they haven’t fed in a long time, they will slowly get weaker and gradually grow more desperate to drink blood until they’ll fall into a feeding frenzy. In that state they lose all control of themselves and will attack the first thing that smells like food.

Vampires have enhanced senses. They can see in the dark, and have an advanced sense of smell.

One last important thing: Vampires in this AU can compel people. By looking into their eyes, they can essentially hypnotize people and make them do whatever they want. How effective the compelling is depends on how strong the vampire is and how much willpower the human has.

Now, how do people turn into vampires...? That’s a topic for a future post.

Aaaand that’s all for now! I’ll likely make more posts in the future covering more of the plot and lore. In the mean time, feel free to ask questions, and I’ll answer them as best I can!

#cardfight!! vanguard #fic: vampire AU #kai toshiki

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itsclydebitches · 3 years

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RWBY Recaps: Volume 8 “The Final Word”

Well, we made it to the finale, everyone, and if you're reading this it seems you've survived the watching of it too. Barely. To say that some questionable choices were made across these 20 minutes is... an understatement.

But before we delve into the episode, I want you to cast your mind back to November 7th, 2020. A horrible year that heralded a horrible RWBY volume. There, coming off the shaky writing of Volume 7, I posed a number of questions and concerns that the show needed to tackle, with the promise that we would return to these expectations in four months time. Now, here we are! Let's refresh everyone's memory, yeah?

Taken directly from that recap, what RWBY promised us, through various teasers and Q&As, included:

Emphasis on Ruby’s leadership and how Summer’s death has impacted her

Insight into Ren and Nora’s flaws

May Merigold will supposedly have a larger part

More information about The Long Memory (Ozpin’s cane)

Theme of the volume is that you can respect someone but that doesn’t necessarily mean you agree with them

Very short timeline (supposedly just two days)

Yang in particular is very suspicious and distrustful

And you know what? They did all this. In the spirit of being fair and honest to this show, RWBY succeeded in delivering on everything they promised... it was just our foolishness that expected that these ideas would be delivered well. Ruby's leadership took center stage in the form of her hiding for multiple episodes and then others telling her she's still The Best before the plot dropped a solution into her lap... one she could have used at any point prior to this. Summer's death certainly has an impact, though it's an impact born of a crazy reveal that Summer likely isn't dead, but turned into a horrifying grimm monster. Ren and Nora both delve into their flaws, but heaven forbid either grow from that reflection. Ren learns that if he pushes past his primary flaw of keeping his emotions buried and actually expresses his doubts for once, he'll be yelled at and ignored until he admits how wrong he was. The "real" flaw is being a bad friend, with "bad friend" equaling "Not agreeing with Ruby 100%." Meanwhile, Nora considers that maybe she shouldn't rush in recklessly and hit things with her hammer... which is why she rushes in recklessly, hits something with her hammer, gets grievously injured, and is told that this is just who she truly is. No growth there, not unless we count her sudden desire to figure out who she is without Ren... but that exploration hasn't started yet. Too bad she wasn't the teammate separated at the end of the volume!

Meanwhile, May did indeed have a larger role to play, one I quite liked, it's just that this role — like all the others — inevitably circled back to realizing how wonderful Ruby is. May challenges Ruby to make a decision, but instead of being the catalyst for Ruby's growth, May becomes another forgotten side character who does a sudden about-turn regarding her perspective, leaving the group with the contradictory message that Ruby is actually doing her best, she's just a kid, no need to try any harder... everyone who claimed otherwise up until now was mistaken. May is another Cordovin. She's another Qrow. She's another Maria.

Fun fact: we don't even know if Maria is alive right now. That's how little she means to the show!

Actually, wait... anyone remember this nonsense from Volume 7?

I was too lazy to change the date.

Moving on, Ozpin's cane turned out to be a stakes obliterating bomb that came out of nowhere, makes no sense logistically — how do battles store energy that only hurts grimm? — yet nevertheless seems to have killed Hazel? It's a disaster of unanswered questions. Similar to the disaster of our two day timeline when, I'm fairly sure, we've had an unnatural number of sunrises and sunsets. I'll have to take a look back at the volume as a whole now that it's complete to be sure of that though. As for our themes... did we really explore the idea of respecting someone even if you disagree with them? Because Ironwood wasn't shown any respect. Ren wasn't shown respect. I think the closest we got was Oscar calmly validating Yang's worry about getting buddy-buddy with Emerald, but the whole point there was that Yang was wrong. She wasn't wrong, but that's what the text would have you believe. She is indeed "very suspicious and distrustful," but that's hardly unjustified in these circumstances. I'm still boggling at the fact that it took the group three volumes for forgive Ozpin, even while he was actively working to assist them, yet I-helped-destroy-Beacon-and-tried-to-kill-everyone-you-love Emerald is the group's new BFF after she... ran away with Oscar? She didn't save him, she just went along for the ride. At the very least we might have gotten a scene where Penny was like, "Hey, why are you all laughing with the woman who just tried to kill my dad?"

But oh yeah, the story doesn't remember Pietro exists either. His daughter is DEAD and he hasn't been on screen since Episode Five, let alone there when she passes.

I had my own list going in, including such expectations as "Ozpin bb you got done dirty please acknowledge this" and "Queer baiting, queer baiting… you’re on thin ice at this point, RWBY. Just skate on over to the queer snack bar before you fall straight into the lake." Obviously these needs were not met.

So what, given this mess of expectations, did we end up with?

Our finale — for some reason — breaks the one word title trend with "The Final Word." It's an expression that refers to the final word in an argument or a discussion, the idea of winning by making a last, devastating point. It can also refer to making the final decision on something, which is the best way I'm able to apply the title to this episode (outside of any “final” comparisons). Penny's death is certainly all about choice and making some kind of decision... but on the whole, this title doesn't feel like it fits well. Not like "Worthy" or "Creation" or "Risk." The two latter titles had obvious connections to the episode in question through dialogue and plot, while the former was a deliberate callback to Watts' speech. "The Final Word" feels... less obvious in what it’s trying to say.

That's a minor nitpick though. Let's get into the meat of the episode.

We open on the grimm whale still disappearing, which is weird. I get that it's massively bigger than any other grimm we've seen, but they all turned to dust near instantaneously and it's been, what? At least an hour since Oscar blew it up? Likely longer when we factor in their walk back to the manor, the fight with Ironwood, fixing Penny, and this entire evacuation. It certainly makes for a nice visual, but like so many details in RWBY, it raises unnecessary questions along the way.

The important bit though is that amidst the whale carcass a blob of evil is swirling about. Salem, obviously.

She’s not reforming in time to actually do anything though, don't worry.

Instead, we cut to the Ironwood vs. Winter fight and there's at least some dialogue this time. Ironwood yells that he's sacrificed everything to keep Remnant safe. Winter yells back that he actually sacrificed everyone else. Obviously, Ironwood should be called out for things like, you know, his unprompted murders, but instead they have Winter listing stuff that she was never shown to have a problem with before. The embargo? "Squeezed Mantle until it broke?" She, as Ironwood's second hand, understood and supported both the decision to close the border and the need to collect resources for a plan designed to take out Salem. I hate that no only did she turn without an ounce of hesitation or grief, but now they're having her act as if Ironwood forced these decisions on everyone, rather than everyone supporting him through them. We all remember Volume 7 when Ruby pressured him to finish Amity, right? And in trust RWBY fashion, most of these words are meaningless. Mantle "broke"? What does that mean? The class disparity did not come about through Ironwood: that's been in the works for generations. The lack of resources made things harder, yes, but when they were reclaimed by Robyn nothing improved. Watts is the one who turned off the heat and Salem attacked Atlas, leaving Mantle alone. Now, all the citizens have escaped through magical portals. So how is Mantle "broken" exactly? More importantly, why is Winter upset over this vague, nonsensical dilemma when she could be yelling about Ironwood wanting to bomb Mantle?

Again: this woman watched Ironwood shoot the councilman, shrugged, and continued to believe in him up until she realized his bomb threat was real. That was one of the main reasons why I thought the councilman might be alive, with Ironwood only shooting a warning shot past him. Because this is how you react to a good person unexpectedly killing someone else

whereas this is what we got from Winter and Harriet.

Hell, Weiss has more of a reaction to Yang telling Ruby things aren't super great right now.

So either Ironwood didn't do something that bad, thereby justifying these tame reactions (unlikely, given where his character ended up), or we should believe based on the animation that everyone was super chill with him killing an unarmed civilian. Which is then directly contradicted when they're like, "You're going to shoot Marrow? Bomb a city?? How could you do such horrible things??? 😲" Friends, buddies, fictional pals... you already watched him murder a dude.

The point is, there's a lot for Winter to be upset about, but she's not upset about that. There's a lot that Winter herself believed in, but the writing has forgotten that. This entire arc went off the rails a volume ago.

Also, why is Ironwood fighting with that giant gun? This is his final battle, presumably ever, and he's wielding this awkward, sluggish weapon we saw him randomly pick up two episodes ago? Let him use his regular guns! Give us a fantastic battle like he had with Watts! Instead, RWBY's final showdown consists of him using this no-name weapon as a unwieldy club in some of the most boring choreography we've seen to date. It doesn't help that this fight needs to share time with three others. Instead of an epic showdown, we're given glimpses of the battle before continually cutting away from it.

During that first cut we return to the Team RWBY battle where Penny, doing her best to stay out of Cinder's reach, is whisked away on Weiss' wasp.

Too bad she didn't do that for Yang...

Jaune and Nora watch this horror unfold until Jaune says, "Priority one!" and they split. Except... what is priority one exactly? Helping the civilians? I guess, because they don't enter the fight until the very end of it, when everyone else seems to have made it to Vacuo. And you know what, I like that. For once it feels like the group — or at least the B Team — is acting like huntsmen, putting the needs of the people over their own, personal desires. I'm sure Nora wants to help the group after Yang's (presumed) demise and that Jaune would like nothing more than to get his hands on Cinder, but they put those grievances aside to do the work they signed up for. Good job!

My only real gripe is that we don't really see this struggling in the animation, I'm just assuming it's there. In particular, there's a moment when Jaune sends Nora through the portal for reinforcements — not knowing they can't return — and they seem a little too jovial when, by this point, three friends have died.

There's letting your cast be supportive, and then there's having them ignore that three teammates have perished in an abyss. It really doesn't help to sell the idea that Yang, Ruby, and Blake are in any danger here.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Penny tells Weiss that since Cinder is really just after the Maiden powers, she can buy the rest of the group time to escape. Weiss, obviously, isn't fond of this idea... and then the both of them are blasted off the wasp by Cinder's fire. Which they deserve, frankly. They're just having this casual conversation about sacrifice while in the middle of a battle. Did they somehow forget that Cinder can fly too?

Note that multiple attacks from Cinder, another blast, and a hard landing on the pathway gives their auras a knock, but doesn't break them. The primary defense for Yang's aura shattering in a single, simple hit was that everyone is exhausted and running on little to no power... yet here the rest of the cast is, tanking multiple hits as we've come to expect. There is no explanation for Yang's defeat except that the writers chose to ignore the rules of their world for a dramatic death scene... even though that drama was erased a week later as half our team falls into the void too.

We'll get to that though. For now, Cinder corrects Penny's belief with "I want it all" and proceeds to try to finish them off, only for Blake to arrive, having made her choice from last episode about who to help. It's a legitimately nice attack, but I happened to pause at the bEST MOMENT

Anyway.

We leave that fight to return to Qrow and Harriet who have, off screen, started an entirely different battle. What I mean is, last we saw Qrow had broken through the windshield of the airship, roughly pinned Harriet, and was taunting her about getting the fight she wanted. Now, suddenly, he's going “You’re making a mistake, Harriet, what happened to Clover—” as if he's been trying to talk her down this whole time. It's jarring, especially when we consider that Qrow had a volume long "kill Ironwood" arc that was dropped because... Robyn reminded him that murder is bad? RWBY feels like a storytelling pinball machine. Characters bounce from one personality to the next, one perspective and another, round and round until you don't know where they'll end up.

Harriet screams for Qrow to just shut up already and honestly? Same. I love Qrow, he's one of my favorites, but I can't deny that he's been done dirty like so many others since Volume 6. I love who Qrow was, not the mess RWBY has created the last few years.

Time to delve back into fic after recapping!

Sadly though, this strange dialogue wasn't the only "wtf" moment. Harriet is still trying to drop the bomb — which is its own mess of confusing motivations — when Vine and Elm show up on Harriet's ship. Elm begs Harriet not to do this "because you’re our friend!”

Am I glad that they finally acknowledged that the Ace Ops have always been friends? Sure, but why did we spend two volumes claiming otherwise? They were friends, a fantastic team, then Harriet announces that's a lie and we get a bunch of "Team RWBY is superior because they're actually friends" messages. Except this entire time we're still watching the Ace Ops be kind and playful with one another. But they're not friends, the story says. Not friends as they fight these battles. Not friends as they grieve for Clover. Definitely not friends as they react in horror at Ironwood nearly shooting Marrow. No, there's nothing there... until Elm claims there is! Then Harriet reacts in shock. I have friends?

Except Elm was labeled the one "just following orders" by Yang. Elm is the one who shook off Vine after the whale exploded. This isn't the story of one character, Harriet, thinking she was alone and then realizing that people do care for her, this is a story that, seemingly at random, had this group being BFFs or acting like they hated each other — and at each point the visuals are contradicted by the story's message. When they act like friends, we're told they're not friends. When they don't act like friends, we're told they really have been this whole time. I mean, do any of them even care that Marrow teamed up with Qrow and Robyn to take them out five minutes ago? All three were going along with Ironwood's scheme until they were physically stopped, but now Elm is convinced this is a bad decision she needs to talk Harriet down from with the power of friendship?

None of these characters are characters, they're just slapped together reactions based on whatever the plot needs. Who is Elm? I've got no clue. Her personality changes every episode.

Also, love that Qrow moves to stop the bomb from dropping and Harriet screams at him to "Get out of the way!" rather than just... attacking him? She even throws her hands out like she's having a temper tantrum. This feels like schoolyard bickering, not a life or death struggle.

Even though, you know, the audience is aware that the people of Mantle have already been evacuated and Qrow's group is aware that Atlas is falling on top of Mantle as they speak, so... why does the bomb matter? It's going to, what? Destroy the city thirty seconds before Atlas does? Oh no, the horror.

Things then, if you can believe it, get even worse. The bomb is still about to drop, so instead of doing anything to stop it — I mean seriously, we know it takes four people to shoulder the bomb's weight, but you're telling me Qrow and a reformed Harriet can't snag it in a pinch? — Qrow sits there, looks at Clover's pin... and the bomb careens towards the side of the airship instead, stopping.

Because I guess Qrow has good luck now? Or always did and somehow never noticed it? Or his semblance evolved?? Again, we don't know, but it's a bad moment any way you slice it, imo. Qrow has always been defined as the guy with a bad luck semblance and, much like Penny's android struggles, the allure was in watching him overcome those challenges, not having the show erase the challenge entirely. Especially when we don't even understand how it was erased. Qrow just... stops drinking, stops caring for Ironwood, stops wanting to kill Ironwood, stops causing bad luck, I guess. RWBY takes major character traits and flips them off like a light switch, leaving the audience with no emotional tether. We didn't watch Qrow overcome his drinking, or realize he can't bear to kill Ironwood, or discover a way to live life with the horrible hand he was dealt, he just blinks one day and those things are gone. Why? No one is sure. Not even the writers, I'd wager, because otherwise they would have written explanations into the text.

Many in the fandom insist that any basic information provided by the story amounts to "hand holding" when in fact there is a massive difference between the sort of unnecessary exposition that bogs down a tale, and having facts enough for the audience in its entirety to be on the same page about what is actually happening. For example, recently someone argued strongly that the "Penny is human" take is incorrect because Penny isn't human, she has an inhuman body made entirely of aura... yet where in the world does this exist in the story? Ambrosius may have been unsure about what Penny would be prior to removing her robotic parts, but that ambiguity is gone once her body forms, the equivalent of worrying about that gun only for a flag with 'BANG' to appear instead of a bullet. Worrying about something doesn't mean that something actually occurred. Penny appears human, expresses human sentiments, and then, this episode, dies as a human. If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck and succumbs to the mortal peril that all ducks face... it's probably a duck. As I said in a recent ask, I implore the fandom to stop writing RWBY's scripts for them. Or rather, do so in some amazing fanfics. Don't do it on critical posts as a means of insisting that your revision is canon.

So Qrow has good luck now, maybe, but this character change doesn't amount to anything because Watts remotely starts the bomb's countdown.

At least he’s entertaining and competent. We had that for a time.

Back to the main battle, Neo is kicking Ruby's ass. Why? Because there's no consistency in power levels in this show. The ancient woman who hasn't fought in decades dances circles around Neo, highlighting how weak she supposedly is, yet now Neo dances circles around our main character. None of us should expect fights to follow the logic of the world, only what drama the plot wants to stir up. Ruby is eventually knocked down from a hard hit — yet her aura's intact! — and is saved at the last second by Weiss tossing Neo into one of the portals.

Far more of a problem than the power leveling is that Ruby gives no indication here that Neo just murdered her sister. Again, that's what the characters are meant to believe, yet Ruby is as stoic as she would be fighting a bunch of White Fang grunts. If you showed this scene to a RWBY fan on its own and asked, "What do you think happened prior to this?" the answer would be, "Uh... nothing? Ruby is just fighting Neo like she did on the airship in Volume 3." Nothing about this scene — from dialogue to animation — sells the idea that Ruby just lost the person most important to her in the world.

When we do finally mention Yang, it's Weiss who goes, “Come on, we have to do this for Yang” and the delivery is... meh. Honestly, I normally don't pay much attention to the voice acting, but I had a problem with most of Weiss' lines this episode. The "Leave her alone!" during this fight and later a "Get back!" as she attacks Cinder both fell really flat for me. Given the devastation and charged emotion that's supposed to be here, we can't give her anything better than generic cries that, again, she’d throw at any grunt? In that later scene the animation absolutely helps sell Weiss' distress, but the dialogue is common and the delivery has no emotional punch, leaving it feeling like Yang is just hanging out in Vacuo and they promised they'd beat the baddies before catching up with her. No one but Blake is acting like Yang died.

In fact, we see more emotion from Ruby when Weiss shoves her back, taking the brunt of Cinder's blast.

Weiss' aura breaks, not that that's a danger or anything. Everyone falls before they're injured, Winter gets the Maiden powers, Ren barely has to fight. Losing aura in this show used to be a moment of peril, where just last volume Winter was bruised, bleeding, and now needs an assistive device because she had to continue a battle with no aura. Now it's a joke. Aura breaks left and right across the volume with no repercussions attached to that.

We see a bit of the Blake and Penny vs. Cinder fight where Cinder blasts Blake off the edge. Penny rushes after her because at least one character remembered that they can fly.

Ruby, meanwhile, remembers that she can fly when it benefits her. After getting hit down onto a lower level and watching Crescent Rose plummet, she taunts Neo into an attack with a move that's actually quite good. I like the confidence with which Ruby riles her up and I like the strategy of darting behind Neo to knock her off the path instead. “Whatever you wanted, I hope it was worth it."

The only thing I don't like is that this speed and ingenuity had to disappear to justify Yang falling.

Cinder breaks Ruby's aura from behind though, sending her over too and grabbing onto Neo's leg. In an obvious moment born of the trope, it looks as if Cinder is reaching to help Neo, only for her to snag the Relic instead. “You should have never threatened me," she tells Neo and to Ruby: "you should have never been born.”

Love that they erased all that cool growth from last episode! And by "love" I mean "hate." As I said last recap, I'm not going to pretend that Cinder's character isn't riddled with problems, but realizing she was stronger by teaming up with Neo and Watts was one of the best things they've ever done for her. It made Cinder dangerous again and showed Watts' speech having a clear impact. It also made her more entertaining, creating a new dynamic among the three villains. Now though, Cinder is just... Cinder. The same boring, stupid Cinder we've had since Volume 4. She betrays Neo and then later betrays Watts.

So Cinder kicks Neo and Ruby both over the edge because why would we want to make her interesting? Neo falls, but Ruby has friends there to catch her! Unlike Yang. Jk. Weiss’ aura is gone and Blake actually tried both times, so major kudos for her. Using momentum supplied by Penny, she snags Ruby and hooks her weapon into one of the pathways... only for Cinder to cut the ribbon. Both plummet and once again Penny has a more believable reaction to all this, just like she did last week

Speaking of reactions, does anyone else find it weird that Cinder finally succeeded in killing Ruby and... doesn’t seem to care?

No? Just me?

At least we get that good animation with Weiss I was talking about before, even if the dialogue is lacking. I love that she snagged Blake's weapon and uses it to try and take out Cinder, shaking the whole time. Those are some great details.

Back to the bomb, Qrow is trying to escape, but Harriet says there isn't enough time to get out of the blast range. "I've killed us all." Vine has the solution though, using his semblance to wrap up the airship, thus containing the blast when it goes off. His final words are to reassure Elm that he can give his life, "if it means saving all of my friends." Just in case you missed the part about the Ace Ops being super close this whole time. Even though they also weren’t. Trying to eat your cake too, RWBY?

Frankly, I didn't feel much of anything during this scene, not when Vine made the sacrifice, nor when Elm and Harriet look on sadly while Robyn pilots them away (that's her contribution this episode).

All I can say is, good on RWBY for not killing one of the three dark skinned characters, or just murdering the Ace Ops as a whole. What the story is going to do with them though, who knows.

Jaune and Nora have that ‘You can do it!’ moment after three of their friends have presumably been killed. I swear, about 80% of Jaune's scenes do not work tonally and oh boy, things only get worse from here.

First though, I like his entrance. He slams into the fight against Cinder and lines up with Penny and Weiss, who is still dual-wielding her and Blake's weapons. That's an epic shot.

It looks as if they stand a decent chance against Cinder — Weiss' lost aura notwithstanding — except then Cinder's arm starts going crazy and she gleefully announces that Salem has returned.

Working on a time limit now, Cinder unleashes a volley of attacks that Penny steps in to protect the other two from. It's here that Cinder grabs hold with her grimm arm.

It's here that Penny dies. Again.

For the third time.

Friends, I am tired. This moment honestly deserves the most epic of rants, but that, in turn, requires energy. Energy? In this economy? Ha! That's hilarious. Taking this seriously though, the problem here can — as usual — be boiled down to a single question: What was the point?

Penny died in a horrible attack that shook the cast and audience both to their core.

That emotional impact was erased through her resurrection.

The resurrection did not create a new emotional impact for our heroes to grapple with.

Penny is given the Maiden powers, solidifying the fact that she's always been a "real girl."

That lesson was erased when the story decided to make her human for unexplained reasons (because no, she never needed to be human to survive the virus).

Penny then dies, passing the power to Winter... who was set to get the power in the first place.

We have, once again, come full circle. You can take Penny out of the story and nothing changes. Does Ruby lose any lessons or emotional growth? No. Does anyone survive who would have otherwise died? No. Does her getting the powers lead to someone unexpected snagging them upon her death? No. Penny's existence was filler. She was put in the story to take up time and, that done, was removed from the story once again. It's a choice that wouldn't be half as horrible if that filler hadn't done so much damage along the way.

First is the obvious: that Penny didn't deserve this. As a character, she didn't deserve to be brought back just to be killed off again, seemingly without narrative purpose, serving only to draw in viewers who RT knew loved the character. Second, keeping her in the story led to her entire arc unraveling. Initially, Penny died as an android in the world's eyes, but those who actually knew her — Ruby and Pietro — mourned the girl she really was. Now we have this horrible message that being a machine isn't real enough, so she has to die as a human being. It's a disservice to her character and, as an allegory for many minorities, downright insulting to the audience. Third, this offensive 'better to die as a human than live as a robot' message is wrapped up in the claim that Penny finally gets to choose something — “Let me choose this one thing. Trust me” — but she already did that when she chose to take the Maiden powers. We already had the better written version of this last volume!

And the fourth issue...well.

Fourth and fifth are the real kickers. Fourth is that Penny's death was an assisted suicide. She explicitly asks Jaune to kill her so she can ensure she's thinking of the right person when she passes (never mind that her thoughts would probably be on Jaune while this is happening) and that's... pretty horrible. Look, I'm no purist. I like a great deal of dark, gritty stories whose plot exists to make us uncomfortable. That's a valuable emotion that fiction can generate. The problem is not that RWBY is tackling a sensitive topic, but that they aren’t tackling it well. Yes, they put in a content warning and (from what I've heard) a suicide helpline as well, but providing the already necessary resources is not the same thing as writing that kind of scene with respect and care. All of the above tells us that, no matter what RT may have intended, that respect and care weren't communicated to the audience. Like Yang, they didn't even bother to keep Penny's death within the rules of their world. Jaune is right there ready to heal her and Penny says no, there's supposedly not time.

Um... since when?

Jaune's aura boost is instantaneous. The second he amplifies aura is the same second the healing starts and their talk could have been spent saving Penny. There was certainly time to save Weiss in Volume 5. To have a character go, 'Nah, it's too late' when the solution is right there is the ultimate cop-out. Suddenly announcing that the solution will no longer work For Reasons is not a legitimate limitation and it's made doubly insulting that RT didn't simply use the limitations already available to them. Jaune has been running low on aura since the whale. He then expended a great deal of aura boosting Penny to keep the virus in check. Every other ally has had their aura broken in this fight so, there. That's your solution. Have Jaune take a few hard hits from Cinder, his aura breaks, and then when Penny is mortally wounded he no longer has a semblance to heal her. It's that easy! Yet instead they had Penny reject help so that she could ask to die. That's what's offensive here.

Finally, reason number five... why is this moment given to Jaune? That's another easy solution: Jaune has gone through the portal and can't get back to heal Penny. There. Done. But logistics aside, this scene should have gone to any other character. Who is Jaune to Penny? Or Penny to Jaune? No one! They don't have a relationship. I get that the writers didn't want any of the girls at her side because then it would be hard to justify Penny not passing the power to them (which I get: making one team member a Maiden changes the show drastically), but you know who should be there instead of Jaune?

Pietro.

Pietro, who built Penny as a weapon and who was never given the chance to apologize for that. Pietro, who told Ruby he could only rebuild her once more, setting up an expectation that he'd sacrifice himself for his daughter (despite the complicated racial issues that would bring up). Pietro, who watched Penny plummet and has no idea what happened to her, let alone that she's been made into a human girl. Pietro should have been at her side, saying goodbye to his child and helping her complete her last wish.

And it would be so very easy to pull off. All it takes is a single line where Penny remembers that her father exists, asking Ruby to ensure a portal opens up in Amity. There's a quick reunion along the pathways before Cinder attacks. We hear a cry of despair as Penny falls and she looks, seeing her father racing towards her, though she thought he'd already made it out. There, you’re done. We open ourselves up to a lot of attacks whenever we say, "Why didn't RWBY just do ____?" because those who vehemently defend the writing like to go, "Oh, you think you could write RWBY better?" and no, I don't. I struggle with long-form storytelling and massive casts. I don't think I could do justice to the sort of show RWBY wants to be, but I do think I'm a decent enough writer to spot when there are major problems like this. The question of "Why doesn't Penny remember that her beloved dad exists?" and "Why, out of that massive cast, is Jaune the one to do this deed?" are both things that a newbie writer can spot, and a sometimes okay writer can figure out how to fix them both simultaneously. A good writer will start thinking about themes — what might it mean for Pietro to kill the creation he made? — and a great writer will find a way to pull that off without having that insulting, discomforting feeling pop up. At this point, our RWBY crew feels less like new writers making mistakes (because they're not new, not at all), but rather just writers who haven't bothered to learn from their mistakes after eight years. That's a lot harder to watch.

Because putting Jaune here doesn't just mess with RWBY's internal rules (not using his semblance) and it's not just useless in terms of Penny's development (she doesn't know him outside of "dude who boosted my aura for an hour"), but it also falls back into a pattern I thought RWBY had finally broken from: making Jaune the story's emotional center. This is not the JAUNE show. It's the RWBY show. Yet here, once again, we have Jaune in the spotlight. Why, after a whole volume of Ruby avoiding making decisions, does Jaune finally make the hard call? Why, after a scene where Penny asked Ruby to kill her, does Jaune do that deed? Why, after a divisive arc where all the grief for Pyrrha went to Jaune, is Jaune now set to shoulder the grief of Penny? At least Jaune had a relationship with Pyrrha, even if Nora and Ren did too. Yet with Penny he seems to be there solely because the writers can't bear to keep him out of that center spot for long. All of Team JNOR make it through to Vacuo... except Jaune. Jaune falls into the abyss too because, if the show goes this route, we apparently can’t have a volume just about Team RWBY, the main characters. The main characters are separated from the rest of the team and it's Jaune, not Oscar and Ozpin with a connection to the lore, not Nora or Ren whose development now hinges on them learning who they are without the other, it's Jaune who follows the title characters into a new dimension.

The issue is not whether Jaune deserves to grieve over the truly traumatic thing he just did now that he’s done it. He obviously does. The issue is the writers setting up a scenario where Jaune is situated to do that emotional work in the first place.

I like Jaune as a character. I don't like how the writing uses him as a character. RWBY is built on the idea that these four girls are the heroes of this tale, not the expected blond, blue-eyed, sword wielding guy we’ve seen in so many other stories. So why does that guy get the most important scene of the finale? Yes, Jaune had much less screen time this volume than he did in the past, that’s a good thing given the number of important characters RWBY has to balance, but that hasn't erased the problem of him being given significant moments that should be going to title characters. Does Ruby’s team rescue Oscar and take on Salem? No, Jaune's team does. Does Ruby's team save Penny? No, Jaune's semblance keeps her grounded and then holds the virus off. Not everything is a problem — we've also got good choices like having Ruby defeat the Hound and Ruby's team take on Cinder for the majority of the fight — but that doesn't erase that Penny’s death wasn’t something Jaune should have been a part of. Not unless he was going to heal her. Doing better than they have in the past doesn't mean that RT isn't still slipping when it comes to giving him undeserved focus.

They took one of the most controversial characters, controversial because of how much emotional focus he's gotten in the past, and had him help a fan favorite commit suicide while he cried about it, showing more emotion for a near stranger than our title character showed for her sister. This is a character who, up until two or three episodes ago, had no connection to the victim and still has no reason to thematically be the one committing this act. That is why the fandom goes, “The crew loves Jaune and does everything they can to put him in the center of the action.” Ruby, as main character and Penny’s first friend, is the obvious choice here. Pietro, as Penny's father, would be a good choice too. Hell, Nora is a better option given their moment in the Schnee manor this volume. Or Winter given their moments in Volume 7! Have her escape Ironwood, find Penny, receive the powers, and then finish him off. Literally anyone would be better than Jaune, not because Jaune is a bad character, but because Jaune has no emotional stakes here and putting him in a position where he could heal Penny but doesn’t is massively stupid. No one should be surprised that a lot of the fandom is upset about this. It was one hell of a reach to give him this moment and, since Jaune's problem has always been getting too much screen time and emotional nuance compared to our main cast, it's no wonder this act brought up a lot of bad memories. RT fell back into an old pattern after two volumes of improvement and they did so at the worst possible time.

The tl;dr is that Penny's third death is a writing travesty, just like her second. I shouldn't be surprised, given that this is the same volume that tortured a kid and the only thing they did with it was have him blindly trust his torturer... yet I find myself surprised nonetheless. Because Penny had such potential as an android Maiden and, as much as I personally hated it, potential as a former android learning to be human too. But why explore any of that when you can kill her off instead? Again.

As a final, far smaller note about this scene, we have the continuing problem of what purpose Cinder's arm is serving. If everyone recalls, its threat comes primarily from the fact that she can "siphon off" power from other Maidens.

She did it to Penny during the Amity battle and now she does it again, a great deal of green energy absorbed into Cinder. So what's left to give to Winter? Why doesn't Cinder become noticeably stronger with each successful theft? Like so much else in RWBY, we're told it exists without actually seeing the impact of that. Winter isn't a weaker Maiden for having lost power and Cinder isn't a stronger Maiden for having snagged it. It's just.. there, hanging out and looking vaguely menacing, I guess.

Outside of this unnatural not-transfer, we get to see how the power normally passes as Penny meets with Winter in some in-between place. It's a soft, heartfelt scene... with the exception that Winter says, “You were always the real Maiden at heart. I was just the machine. Just following orders."

I don't know how any viewer can doubt that RT now believes machinery = evil. Penny's machine body is magicked away so she can be a real-real girl. Yang announces that the arm she worked hard to make a part of herself is just "extra." The man with half a metal body is made this volume's villain and losing his second arm is, by the authors' own admission, a symbol of his lost humanity. Mercury with two metal legs remains a bad guy while Emerald and Hazel are hastily redeemed. Tyrian with his cybernetic tail is the most devoted crazy of the bunch. Maria, blind and in need of assistive lenses, is so forgotten by the story she was left in the tundra nine episode ago and won't be mentioned again until next volume (if then). Pietro, the guy in the wheelchair, is forgotten too, despite it being his daughter who dies on screen.

Now Winter, also bearing an assistive device, says that she's the real "machine" here and tells Penny, now human, that she was always the "real Maiden." I don't know what happened to make RT do a 180 lately, but the disability rep is no longer what it was.

Penny reassures Winter that she'll always be a part of her and then passes on, for good this time.

The rest of the episode feels lackluster, if I'm being honest. Images of Cinder beating Weiss are intercut with Ironwood beating Winter, getting her to a point where her aura breaks.

But then the powers appear and, as we'd expect, she easily turns the tide.

Gorgeous animation there.

But RT once again rewrites earlier scenes by having Ironwood claim that the "destiny" he chose for Winter has finally arrived — isn't that Cinder's MO? — and Winter shoots back that he chose nothing, this was a "gift." Except, it was never about destiny or orders? This was why Weiss' anger in Volume 7 was ridiculous. She acted like Ironwood forced Winter to accept the powers and Winter told her point blank she chose this. Ironwood didn't decide anything, he offered and Winter chose... kind of like how Penny is choosing now. I hate how nearly all of Ironwood's character has been ignored or, during times like this, outright lied about to make him seem super duper evil. He tried to bomb a city! You don't need to make him seem evil anymore, that job is done! Like their sudden change regarding disability, RT now seems to be allergic to nuance. Heaven forbid Ironwood be allowed to have valid points like he did in Volume 3. No, if you've got an antagonist every single thing they've ever said must be twisted into a display of their evilness.

Unless you're Hazel, who Oscar trusts for #reasons. Unless you're Emerald, who the group immediately embraces. Unless you're Cinder, who gets to cry on a rooftop and secures the trust of her allies long enough to betray them again.

But Ironwood? Nah, screw that guy.

Salt aside, the fight is pretty boring. Winter literally just throws up a wall of ice and Ironwood's blast rebounds, taking him out.

Winter flies through the portal and we return to Jaune. His sword is broken by Cinder, so weapons should be quite the problem in Volume 9.

There's a bit of sword vs. sword Maiden battling — this episode really pulled heavily from both Volume 3 and 5's finales — before Cinder gets smart again and attacks Weiss, currently trying to escape with Jaune. Weiss goes right off the edge and Winter isn't able to reach her in time. That's the entirety of Team RWBY, lost to the magical void.

Kudos to Winter's VA and the writing here though. This feels like an appropriate reaction to losing a sister. Screaming, sobbing, falling to her knees and beating the floor... Ruby, take notes.

A roar sounds through all the portals though, the sort of roar a pissed off witch might give. Jaune convinces Winter they need to leave Cinder behind, but before they can escape Cinder... makes a new wish?

Look, it works on all the major fronts. Cinder has the staff, check. We've basically established that Ambrosius can make an unlimited number of things per era, check. We know the previous thing disappears when a new wish is made, check. My only question is the timing. In all honesty, I'll have to re-watch the scene to be sure, but at the time it felt like the portals began disappearing almost the second Cinder left. Did she really have time to summon Ambrosius, deal with his explanatory nonsense, and get him to make a new wish without any fiddly concerns? Sure, fire is just fire, but it still felt like way too much happening too fast off screen.

Either way, the portals are gone and Winter makes it through in time, but Jaune does not. He falls through the void along with Team RWBY. And Neo.

Neo is the only addition I'm looking forward to here.

We get a few shots of our other characters as Winter arrives, saving the day by taking her grief out on the grimm. So glad something came of Ren breaking his aura again! Maybe they'll be more fighting at the beginning of Volume 9? If we see any of this group outside of 9's finale. My worst fear right now is that we'll spend an entire season away from the main action — remember how I said it would be stupid for Team RWBY to go on a side adventure while Salem is attacking the world? — and when they return there will have been some major time skip. Salem has destroyed most of Remnant, only pockets of survivors remain, it's all dark and dystopian... and oh look, every bit of character development happened off screen. How did Nora discover who she is without Ren? She did it while Team RWBY was gone. That merge we've been teasing for five years? That happened while you were gone too and, btw, Ozpin has ceased to exist. So sad, right? Not that anyone will actually mourn. Just take comfort in the fact that his last line was an "Oh no" about Ambrosius and his last major scene was apologizing for how the group treated him. Emerald's redemption? Off screen. Winter's grief? Off screen. Any and every one of these challenging beats to tackle can be waved away with, "We went through that arc while you were lost in the magical realm. Just get to know our new, improved selves now!"

Please, oh writing gods, don't let that happen.

Though I do worry because my last prediction came true.

But we all knew we’d end up here. My current theory? The portal should still be open at the vault. Winter will fight Ironwood, escape through it, and it will close right before he escapes too. He’ll fall with Atlas and everyone will act as if it’s some beautiful, poetic justice for him to perish with the city.

Ironwood didn't make a break for the portal — too busy being unconscious — but we got everything else. Winter left him, he falls with Atlas, and this is some poetic justice, I guess. Really, it's just an undignified death. I'd hoped for a sympathetic kill, something that showed the characters still cared about him even if they knew Ironwood had to be stopped. Baring that, I'd hoped for an epic battle that took him out with style. Instead, no one even bothers to kill him. Ironwood is now beneath the entire cast, not even worth finishing off. Winter casually tosses his blast back at him and leaves. Cinder throws out a "that's checkmate" and leaves. I don't think Salem even looks at him. Ironwood (presumably) dies with no one and nothing, just a casualty of the city Team RWBY made fall. And I say "presumably" because the audience isn't even given the satisfaction of being sure he's passed on. Like Hazel, Ironwood's death is this weird, ambiguous moment that, based on the other character reactions, isn’t meant to be ambiguous. Is he dead? Most likely. Is it possible, based on what we've seen, that he'll pop up two volumes later like

Yes and, memes aside, that sucks. I don't want to be wondering for the next couple years if Ironwood survived and if they'll bring him back just to drag his character through the mud again. Move on.

But no, we don't even get that.

I've spoken at great deal about Ironwood both in these recaps and on my blog more generally. Last week, I said I'd covered it all and there was no need to rehash it all again. I stand by that, so let me just conclude this travesty with a final note: if your bad guy's final moment is using the last of his strength to point a gun at the actual villain of this story, and you don't realize the problem of how this image contrasts everything else the story has insisted about his character? … I just don't know what to do with that.

Oh, actually, final-final note: Ironwood’s semblance is officially a Schrodinger's semblance. It is both canonical and noncanonical simultaneously. Wooo.

Cinder tells Salem she used her wish to "add more flames to the first of Atlas" and we cut to Watts, trapped in a roaring fire, unsuccessfully trying to break his way out. Wow, I hate that too! Next to Tyrian, Watts was our last remaining, entertaining villain. He carried a lot of the last two volumes and, I had hoped, was going to add some bright spots to the coming volumes as well. Apparently not.

Just another waste.

In addition to this casual, second murder of her ally, Cinder successfully convinces Salem that Neo killed Ruby and Ruby used the Lamp's last question, but she's back in her good graces since she snagged the Relics anyway. “You’ve done well, Cinder. Our work here is done" and they leave, blasting off like a less cool Team Rocket as Atlas plummets into Mantle.

Let's spend a second to tally things up then, shall we? What happens if Ruby, instead of throwing a moral fit, says, "You're right and we never should have lied to you, or betrayed you. But we want to help now. You get the Relics and the Maiden to safety in Atlas, if you can, we'll defend the people of Mantle"?

Well, they can still tell the world about Salem and call for help, much more easily now since Ironwood would likely just give them the code rather than them needing to spend an episode stealing it.

The Staff at least may not have ended up in Salem's hands and the group could have actually focused on getting the Lamp back (also solved if they'd been smart and just put it in the vault to begin with).

Mantle would still have been safe because Salem was never interested in Mantle to begin with.

Atlas wouldn't have fallen.

Ironwood wouldn't have died.

Penny wouldn't have died.

Even Vine wouldn't have died!

Our heroes unambiguously made the situation worse. Rather than banding together with their allies to fight the real enemy, Salem, they pushed until they made enemies of Ironwood and the Ace Ops both. Then they asked for help — which a pinch of logic said would never arrive — and twiddled their thumbs waiting for it. When it was clear none would come they...did nothing. They sat around, upset that the people were in danger, but not willing to do anything about it. It's only when one of their own, Penny, is threatened that they kick into high gear, hitting on a solution that they could have posed to Ironwood from the very start if no one liked the fly away plan. Yet instead of taking a few minutes to brainstorm other ideas — doing anything other than denouncing Ironwood to the rest of the group and attacking the Ace Ops — they spent two days sitting around, fixing minor messes they’d helped to create, then rushed through the portal plan, messing up the wish and stranding an entire kingdom in a sandstorm, with only Winter now to protect them from grimm.

Fantastically done, team.

The villains won, yes, but not because the villains were smart and compelling. Watts' hack on Penny and the heat petered out to nothing and Salem... well, she sat around for the whole volume, expending energy only to torture Oscar and try to (unsuccessfully) stop some escapees. Neo and, miraculously, Cinder did the most damage, but only in the final hour, with this "damage" being that our characters fall into a void that we now know looks remarkably like a paradise! Everything bad that happened was a result of our heroes being stupid and stubborn. That's a compelling story to tell... but RT isn't trying to tell it. Our heroes caused so much damage, yet that damage goes unacknowledged — or worse, ignored into silence like with Ren — and everything else is waved away with the magic wand the series claims isn't there. The cold doesn't kill anyone. Oscar has no problems walking off the torture. Nora hops back out of bed. Ruby one-shots the Hound. The civilians lost to the void must have survived too. The entire kingdom successfully makes it to Vacuo... unless you count the massive army we never saw making use of the portals, but who cares about them, right?

The villains won, there was indeed something resembling consequences, but none of it was emotionally satisfying. Not even when the series tries so hard to insist that emotion is there.

Qrow watches Atlas fall, mouthing Ruby and Yang's names, but it's too little, too late. Where was this care for his nieces when he was obsessed with killing Ironwood? When did they care about him? Was it when Ruby shrugged at his arrest, when neither cared that he was missing, or when they were designing an escape plan that didn't include putting a portal where Qrow could reach? RWBY markets itself around the found family-ness of its cast, but they're done a poor job in recent volumes (not others) of convincing me that most of these characters care for one another. We went from Ruby denouncing all adults, to Ruby pulling an Ozpin with Ironwood, to Ruby watching blandly as her sister falls to her presumed death. This is my hero? This is the simple soul we're supposed to rally behind? Ruby doesn't feel like a character who cares about other people anymore and, given that she leads the charge, neither do most of her friends. Or, when that emotion appears, it's jarring and undeserved. Jaune cries over Penny's death? That's tonally and characteristically backwards.

This volume was the culmination of so many mistakes over the past two years. No, Covid couldn't have made things any easier for the crew — the fact that they got a volume out at all is amazing — but the pandemic isn't to blame for the problems in the story. These seeds have existed since Volume 5, with some (like Jaune) going back even farther. I don't think we're ever going to get that flawed, but emotionally fulfilling RWBY back. The show has dug too deep and unless it somehow manages to create a clean slate — those time travel ideas get more and more alluring! — there's nothing they can do but keep on digging. At this point, I can only hope that the series does wrap up within the next two volumes, rather than dragging RWBY to a Supernatural-esque length.

Our final shot of the episode proper feels fitting for what this volume has been. Atlas and Mantle flood rather than exploding, something that makes a certain amount of sense, sure, but definitely wasn't what I was expecting. And after all these shocking images — Penny dying, the grimm attacking, our main characters disappearing in a puff of gold dust — we end it all with bits of random debris. It's strange and underwhelming. Out of everything you could have done with the options you had, you choose to do this?

Of course, RWBY always has an after-credits scene (RIP Raven's, still amounting to nothing). Here, the sounds of water return to show us a beach. Crescent Rose imbedded in the sand, mirroring its classic pose in the snow.

There's a tree. It's a very different kind of tree from what we saw in Volume 6, but the height and shape is nevertheless reminiscent of Light's domain.

A tree of life, anyone? After all, the group has fallen into a dimension created by a Relic, the gift of Light himself. It certainly seems as if RWBY is heading towards another encounter with the Gods, though what that will look like and how narratively satisfying it will be remains to be seen.

As for our bingo board, RWBY certainly pulled its weight! Only three squares got gold stars: Watts and Jacques didn't manage another team up because both are dead, Oscar didn't apologize for getting shot because he was too busy being tortured, and Qrow didn't drink likely because he didn't have access to any alcohol across the whole volume. Can't say that's a stellar result. The final image is something to behold though lol.

What a mess.

And on that less than exciting note... we’re done. This has been the volume of desertion, with a large number of fans telling me that they will no longer watch RWBY, but baring something entirely unexpected in my future, I'll be back next volume, for whatever that's worth. It never ceases to amaze me that even one person would give these nonsense recaps the time of day, so in all seriousness: thank you for reading. You rock.

Now go forth and fill the hiatus with great RWBY content!

✌️

#suicide tw #rwby #rwby spoilers #rwby volume 8 #mymetas #rwby recaps #rwby the final word

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princesstadashi · 4 years

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A Post for Newbie Ren Faire Goers!

So, provided this god awful virus doesn’t shut them all down, it’s about ren faire season, at least for me and probably for some other people! And today at work I had this flashback to when I first started regularly going to faire, and man, was I confused about a lot of things--and I realized that maybe this would be a good time for me to make a post for others who are getting ready to visit their first Ren faire, or who are familiar with Ren faires but might still have questions and want to learn more. If you’re ready, let’s dive into this!

What the heck is a mug strap? It may sound random, and you may have never even heard of a mug strap, but this is actually one of the first questions I had about ren faires because it was something so many people were asking me if I had, so let me explain: It is a piece of leather that has two loops (at least one of which can come open), one loop to go around your belt and the other one (for sure the one that comes open) which can go around the handle of a mug or other drinking vessel for ease of carrying it! Which brings me to my second question:

Why are there so many shops selling wooden mugs (and other similar items?) This is because it is very, very important to stay hydrated at faire, especially when the weather is warm outside! A mug is an easy way to hold your drink of choice, and the mug strap mentioned above means you don’t have to carry it in your hands once you’re finished drinking! At least my local Ren faire has drink stations with water and gatorade for season pass holders, and even if yours doesn’t there are always water fountains! Do you need a mug to attend a Ren faire? Definitely not! But they’re pretty darn useful if you plan to go regularly instead of constantly buying bottled drinks, plus they look pretty cool!

What is “the cast”? The people hired by the Ren faire to play characters, you’ll usually see them walking around in the streets (or “lanes”) and performing in shows and events!

What the heck is “garb”? To put it in very simplified terms, it’s the old-timey clothes or “costumes” that you’ll see people wearing :)

(More below the cut!)

Is garb or any sort of costume necessary? No, absolutely not! Plenty of people go in regular clothes! But it is fun to get dressed up :) And you don’t have to have a full costume straight off--that stuff is expensive, so it’s okay if you need to build it up over time if you want to do that--all that matters is that you’re having fun and getting into the spirit of things! Back to not dressing up: Again, it is totally fine if you want to wear regular street clothes, and a lot of the cast will probably have fun asking about your “outlandish outfit” and any modern devices that you have with you! HOWEVER. I hate that I have to say this, but I do: if you don’t choose to wear garb, don’t be a dick to the people who are wearing it. Usually everyone is very chill, and of course some of the cast members will be wearing costumes that are meant to be very showy. But especially with regards to fellow guests: don’t treat them as part of the “spectacle” or like they’re animals in a zoo: basically just don’t stare, don’t treat them like they’re weird for dressing up no matter their age, and remember that they’re just people wanting to have a good time like you, they just want to look totally badass doing it!

So is it not okay to talk to people about their costumes or to ask them for pictures? Please, as long as you’re being polite, feel free to ask--many people like me feel like the reward of all the work we put into our garb is compliments and people asking for pictures! But use common courtesy: if someone seems uncomfortable with you talking to them, just leave them be. And always ask before taking a picture! You might see some photographers taking candid shots, but most of those people are professionals and have gotten permission to be doing that. General rule of thumb is just treat people like you would want to be treated!

I see a lot of people being very flirty/touchy feely/etc. with each other, am I allowed to do that? So here’s the thing about Ren Faires: especially the cast, we tend to all be very open with each other and let loose a bit in a safe space. And a lot of stuff like that that you’ll be seeing is between people who already know each other and are comfortable with each other, even if we might not be acting like that if we’re in character. Now does that mean no flirting is allowed? Totally not! But just like in any other social setting, use common sense: see if the other person is comfortable with it, and if not respect that and back off. Simple as that. Also please keep especially in mind with the cast that this is a paying job for them so while they have a lot more freedom than a regular customer service job, it is still in a way customer service, so they can’t be super rude to you if you’re making them uncomfortable. But also keep in mind that there is security and no one is afraid to call security on you if you’re being inappropriate with anyone, and they will escort you out.

Is that sword (or other weapon) really sharp? At least in my experience, no--for safety reasons, most weapons are blunted--they’re still heavy so they can absolutely do damage as a bludgeon, but everyone tries to avoid more injuries than necessary.

Can I hold that sword (or insert any other cool looking prop)? ASK. Dear God, ASK before you touch anything that someone else is carrying! I don’t mean to freak you out, but most of this stuff is VERY expensive and quite possibly damageable, no matter how sturdy it looks! Also if you start fucking around and injure someone else? There could be liability on the owner of the thing you were fucking around with. Some people will be chill about letting you handle their props, but if not, just be polite and thank them for their answer and move on! I’ve seen too many things be damaged/lost that were irreplaceable because people didn’t use common courtesy so I feel very strongly about this!

Do I have to use old fashioned speech? No, but it’s fun! And there are some pretty fun terms that are used to replace modern terms that don’t have a equivalent in the Renaissance! A few of my favorites: “The Book of Faces” = Facebook; “Please God 13″ = PG 13 (usually used to let you know if the content of a show will be slightly more mature); “Master or the Cards”/”Lady Visa”/”New World Express” = various names for common credit and debit cards!

Speaking of credit cards! There are a lot of vendors who take credit cards, but not all of them do, and sometimes reception can be REALLY spotty out in the faire grounds, so I’d say bringing about $40 per person (if you’re planning to eat lunch and dinner there) in cash is always a safe bet. Some faire grounds will have an ATM, but the line can get pretty long, and who really wants to pay ATM fees? Also tipping is how a lot of performers get to keep performing their craft! So having a couple ones to put in the basket at the end of a show if you choose to see a show is always a nice idea!

What about drinking alcohol, is that a thing? Yes, most Ren faires won’t let you bring your own, but most of the faires I’ve been to have plenty for sale! Just another general rule of courtesy: please do not treat this like a frat party, and try to avoid getting completely wasted and being a dick. Believe me. There’s a difference between being buzzed and having a good time and that. I have seen it too many times to count. It isn’t funny. There are usually children around you, and this is a public space. We all see you, and we’re all silently judging you. Please know your limits and drink responsibly!

I’ve worn cosplay before, is that okay to wear to Ren Faires? Cosplay is totally encouraged, especially if it works with the time period and/or it’s a character that is a time traveler! Hell, most of my “garb” is made up of cosplay! But please keep in mind: this is not a convention. There will be very, VERY limited places to sit. There will be very limited cover from the elements. You will most likely be walking on dirt roads with rocks and, if it has rained at all, you may be walking in several inches of mud. And the walk back to the car in the parking lot is a LOT longer than you think. So only wear something that you will be comfortable wearing for eight+ hours without being able to sit down for long/without having to remove parts of, and also something that can stand to get dirty and being out in the elements! (I have seen SO MANY floor length satin dresses that get dragged in the mud and it makes me physically cringe thinking about trying to get those mud stains out!) ALSO. COMFY SHOES. DEAR GOD. Invest in inserts if you can, just wear the comfiest fucking shoes you can find, your feet will thank you later!

Last of all: Don’t be afraid to ask question, and don’t be afraid to join in! Ask the cast and shop owners what the most fun things to do are if you aren’t sure what to do--sometimes they can point you in the way of really fun experiences that you wouldn’t even know about otherwise! If the Ren faire offers maps, definitely worth the investment, they’ll help you keep track of where you are (believe me, it’s super easy to get turned around!) as well as telling you where/when fun events and shows will be! Combining the two: one of my favorite parts of my local faire is Pub Sing, which is listed on the map but I might not have gone to without friends bringing me the first time and I LOVE it now. It’s basically a bunch of us sitting on wooden benches while one of the cast members leads singing of pub songs, and audience participation of new verses to the songs, lymericks, and toasts are fully welcome, and there’s even a big circle dance anyone can participate in and it’s always a great time, I try to never miss a single pub sing if I can help it!

So--yes, this probably got way too long, but hopefully this helps answer any questions that anyone might have had! Please feel free to comment if you have any other questions!

#ren faire #rennaisance festival #rennaisance faire

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margridarnauds · 4 years

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XCalibur: My Review

So, it’s been a couple of weeks since XCalibur came out and, while I’m trying to sort out my own thoughts about this, I decided to do what I do best: Force everyone to read an overly long, barely coherent post.

First off: Let’s get this off the ground. The fact that we got to see this at ALL was phenomenal. This is really, really fantastic, as a step for KMusicals getting a wider western audience, and it’s something that I DESPERATELY hope that they will continue to repeat in the future. I’d have supported it if it was anything, simply because that would give a clear message that there IS an audience for this.

However...

[warning for spoilers, brief discussions of rape]

Overall Impressions: Look....it’s WILDHORN. Wildhorn and me....we go way, way back. Like, to 12 Year Old Rachel listening to Jekyll and Hyde. And the Scarlet Pimpernel. And....quite a few musicals after that. I CAN’T hate it. It’s WILDHORN + ARTHURIANA. Two of my favorite things in the world. But, that being said....this might very well be my fault, but I did find myself a little disappointed, in the sense that, listening to the cast album, I was expecting a much, much better musical than what I really got. Which was a huge order to fill, given that I’ve always considered Artus: Excalibur to be one of Wildhorn’s more problematic musicals. But, in all fairness, they DID kind of promise me more, given that they retitled the musical and said that this was the “World Premiere”™. The set is fantastic, the music is stunning, but it just felt a little hollow to me.

Sets/Costuming: I LOVED the Dark Ages aesthetic to it. The costumes really were great, Morgana’s in particular stole the show, but Guinevere, Merlin, Arthur, and Lancelot gets some nice looks as well, and it all serves to give this idea of the Middle Ages (albeit HEAVILY preying on the old stereotype that it was The Dark Ages, with a very dark color palette generally being observable throughout). This also serves to make it visually very distinct from the Korean production of La Legende du Roi Arthur, given the two of them showed VERY close to one another. (2019 was just the year of the Arthurian musical.) As a Celticist....it isn’t REALLY historically accurate, it’s still fantasy, albeit more Guy Ritchie’s Arthur VS The Crystal Cave Trilogy in terms of how MUCH fantasy it utilizes. LRA (and Artus: Excalibur) took the approach of it being PURELY fantasy, there is....nothing. Historical. In there. One thing that irked me about Artus was that it, in particular, had a CHEAP feeling, like it had roughly as much thought put into it as a 80s comic book idea of Camelot that they were going to slap on the back of a cereal box or something. (LRA, to its credit, was GLORIOUSLY anachronistic, but it was high budget and sleek. I loved it for that.) XCalibur is TRYING for a more historical feel, and, for the most part, it does succeed. Whether the set is a forest, a deserted hall, or Camelot in its prime, they SELL the medievalism. It’s a bit of a pity there’s no WELSHNESS to it, but that is me being nitpicky about my field not being in there. For an Arthurian adaptation, I’m not really going to ask for anything more; it gives what it promises and it does it well. (Though I will say that, every once in a while, one of those costumes would flash in the stage lighting and I would question whether I’d seen that gold fabric at a Ren Faire etsy. BUT in all fairness, those costumes weren’t designed to be viewed in close up like that, and this is probably me being needlessly mean. OVERALL, the effect was good.)

Music: It’s a Frank Wildhorn musical, so of COURSE I’m going to like the music. This is DEFINITELY a stronger musical than Artus, with several new songs (including “The Tempest”, “Let the Sword Make the Man”, and “If he were standing here”, both of which are highlights to me) that really stand out. Since settling himself firmly in the Asian market, Wildhorn’s stuff has developed a polish that wasn’t really there in his Broadway stuff. It sounds much more modern, much more streamlined, with Death Note, the Man Who Laughs, Robespierre, and Mata Hari all having a distinct SOUND that I’ve started to call Wildhorn 2.0. There’s this distinct energy that runs through this production that wasn’t really there in Artus, and I found that it makes the cast album REALLY a treat to listen to. As with Artus, “Celtic” (which, in this case, of course, means “Riverdance”) musical motifs are present in the instrumentals, but I found it MUCH less heavy handed than before, and it’s evenly balanced out by more traditional tunes. I didn’t feel like it was AS overloaded as before, where I routinely found myself napping in between swelling instrumentals.

As with all of Wildhorn’s stuff, there are certain songs that sound very similar to other musicals of his, if you know what to look for. “Why am I here?” for example is nearly a carbon copy of “Who do you Trust?” from Tears of Heaven and “Wenn das Shicksal dich ereilt” from Rudolf, which themselves form part of a distinct genre of his songs that can be traced back to “The Riddle” from The Scarlet Pimpernel and “You and I” from Svengali. “The Mark of the Wolf”, a new song, sounds very similar at points to “How Many devils?” from The Civil War. Etc. etc. I don't really consider this a BAD part, at least in the case of the former, since the songs in that genre, to me, represent the best of Wildhorn’s music. And, after all, with over 30 years on stage....the man can only come up with new music for so long until he starts producing SOMETHING that sounds similar.

Overall verdict? Strong music. Not my FAVORITE of Wildhorn’s stuff, but I’ve definitely spent a few hours listening to the cast album on its own merits, and definitely more energetic and polished than the German run to my ear.

Plot: So, a big draw for me was “Has the plot been fixed from the days of Artus: Excalibur?” and.....I have many mixed feelings. I DO feel like we got more of a solid musical, but I also feel like it had some really, really sour notes and, in some ways, the transition to a new musical feels only half-way done. Like, they HAD a new musical in mind, they went halfway through the process, and then they shrugged their shoulders, said “That’s good enough”, and left us with a Frankenstein’s Monster. (Oh, wait, wrong KMusical.)

One of the biggest casualties was Morgana. Morgan le Fay has been one of my favorite characters in anything, ever since I was 7 years old and developing one of my first crushes via The Magic Treehouse. Morgana is always the FIRST one I look to in an adaptation to see how they handle her, and her plotline in Artus always felt weak for me, ESPECIALLY her relationship with Merlin, which Wildhorn once described as something along the lines of a “bit of a romance” but that was painfully underdeveloped, especially on her end. We knew that he was weak for her, to his detriment, we knew that she wanted what he had, and that they do.....the do together, but there’s very little REAL development in there, and no sign, on my end, of that “little bit of romance” as opposed to just. Using one another. When I heard that that plotline had been revised, I was THRILLED. Now, I feel like it was a monkey’s paw situation.

(1) Morgana goes from more or less apathetic to Merlin’s situation to.......being totally obsessed with him, to the point where she says he’s the only man she ever loved? Like, she goes from someone HIGHLY motivated by what she believes is her rightful inheritance to being motivated by Merlin’s dick.

(2) The timeline. My God, the timeline. Making Morgana a child when she’s shipped off AND then doing the “Only man I ever loved” thing (and SEEMING to imply that Merlin did love her as well, but refused to say it) is.....it’s bad. No other way around it. They did NOT think that timeline through.

(3) I HATED Guinevere getting Morgana in the back with an arrow, but you know? That was yet another monkey’s paw situation, given that at least it wasn’t “Morgana falling for a very obvious ploy that she SHOULD have seen coming from a mile away if she wasn’t, as has been established, obsessed with Merlin’s dick.”

I will say that, reworking the plot so that Morgana’s obsessed with Merlin’s dick DID work out better in the sense that at least the Madonna/Whore complex with her and Guinevere isn’t really there: We no longer see Evil, Sexy Morgana VS Sweet Forest Maiden Guinevere, and Guinevere in this version of the musical is allowed to be much gutsier than her German counterpart. They did give her quite a bit of character as opposed to “Naive Girl who believes Arthur is The Best but finds out Wrong”. Now, that gutsiness flies out the window once she marries Arthur and is mainly confined to singing sad songs and stepping in between Arthur and Lancelot, but see above for Frankenstein’s Monster.

I will say that I did appreciate that this adaptation was willing to really give us a DEEPLY flawed Arthur; it’s something I’ve seen relatively little of post-White in terms of Arthurian adaptations, and it’s something I’ve missed. (Once Upon A Time’s Evil Arthur notwithstanding.) Arthur is really rarely allowed to BE a character in his own right, he has to be an Ideal™ or, if he’s a flawed character, flawed in an acceptable, palatable way; here, he’s an angry young man who’s shoved into a position that he’s not really qualified for and has to grow into it. He shoves people away, he shouts, he trusts Morgana too blindly, and he basically causes the Guinevere/Lancelot situation on his lonesome. It’s actually a little great to see.

BUT. But. Monkey’s paw. I LIKED seeing Arthur being a little bitch on occasion, but, for better or worse, he is our main character. And, outside of his bonding scenes with Guinevere and Lancelot early on, we really....don’t get to see that many scenes where he’s LIKABLE. There are a few moments (the scene where he tries to get Morgana to dance at his coronation is ADORABLE), but the first time we’re really introduced to him, he’s in a fight, he (understandably) snaps at Merlin, decides that, hey, being king might not be so bad, is fun for a little while, and then he spends a solid chunk of the second act being a dick because his father died. I don’t really know. I feel like this is going to be one of those things that I keep rolling over in my mind, as far as whether I REALLY like HIM as a main character, or whether I like those individual moments where he’s likable.

A part of me liked that we had, instead of the two siblings fighting during “Was Will Ich Hier”, we have Morgana and Arthur bonding. That sibling bond was, in my opinion, one of the more interesting possible dynamics in the show. But, unfortunately, the resulting conflict with Merlin felt very “been there, done that.” It’s more PLAUSIBLE than in cases where, say, the Enemy of the Week poses as a little girl and suddenly the main cast, who have known one another for twenty years, are suddenly slinging accusations against one another, but it STILL felt rather forced and predictable.

I was actually really grateful that we didn’t have the Morgana/Lot relationship in this particular production--Making Morgana an actual domestic abuse victim and then killing her off NEVER sat well with me, but as a result of that, now we have this situation where we have two more or less unconnected villains: Morgana and Wulfstan, and the plot only really needed one. Wulfstan, as a character, just....isn’t interesting. He’s a more or less generic “Barbarian Warlord” type who’s pissed Arthur killed his son and creeps on Morgana. I can’t REALLY say anything more there. Their plotlines intersect in the very beginning, when they capture Morgana and she guides them to Uther’s old castle, but other than that, there’s a general disconnect between them, and there’s no real PAYOFF to that. Instead, it just feels like it makes the plot needlessly busy.

One thing I’ve noticed, with both La Legende du Roi Arthur and XCalibur, is this pressure to fit as MUCH Arthurian in as possible, and as a result, the final musicals become rather crowded, so there’s no real time for DEVELOPMENT or substance.

“Okay, we have to have the pulling from the sword here!” “Right!” “Hm, Morgana le Fay is one of the most iconic antagonists, we probably need her there.” “Saxons?” “Sure!” “Everyone’s expecting Lancelot and Guinevere, we can’t not have them in there.”

I FEEL like XCalibur is LESS bogged down than LRA with regards to that factor, since the latter also threw in Maleagant as a secondary antagonist to Morgana and the Grail quest, but I still feel like XCalibur bit off more than it could really chew. Which is a pity, because there are Arthurian plot lines that have gotten comparatively little attention in recent days that you could include instead of going the “Paint By Numbers” route.

This also really shows in how it deals with certain plot lines, which are either dropped (Wulfstan V. Morgana), or come out of nowhere. This is REALLY obvious with Lancelot/Guinevere, which is a pity because I found myself, against my own will, rooting for them more than any other pairing in the show. Lancelot goes from a cocky lady’s man to...suddenly being smitten with Guinevere.....and then suddenly, after Guinevere is sad about Arthur being a dick, the two of them are fucking. Now, it would be NATURAL, as far as “Guinevere goes to Lancelot when she feels like Arthur’s being cold to her”, but we don’t SEE that. We literally cut from her in the forest, singing a sad song, and the next time we see them, they’re postcoital. It feels like it comes out of NOWHERE. My investment in them, as a couple, is more due to the strength of the two actors involved than the actual WRITING, which thinks that because the BEDROCK for something is there (”Oh, Guinevere beat Lancelot in combat! Oh, she feels neglected!”) that that means the house is there as well (”Oh, Guinevere beat Lancelot in common....so NOW he’s totally in love with her and is never going to flirt with another woman again. Oh, Guinevere is feeling abandoned by Arthur.......so we don’t NEED to see her going to Lancelot.”) They jump from Point A to point D and the audience is left with a sense of whiplash.

Some things, like Merlin’s actions re: Igraine and Uther, as well as Morgana, are just not explored to a depth that I would really find is satisfactory. “Oh, I did all these terrible things....because of Fate!” is something that we’re REALLY supposed to pull behind, but, given the pain to everyone involved, ESPECIALLY the women (Igraine, Morgana, and Guinevere ALL suffer from Destiny™), you have to REALLY wonder if there was literally anyone else who could have done it.

...so, really. BBC Merlin. BBC Merlin.

MOVING ON FROM MY SALT...as a medievalist, I was actually relatively happy that for ONCE in an Arthurian adaptation, the conflict between Christianity and paganism (WHICH HONESTLY WASN’T EVEN THAT MUCH OF A CONFLICT IN TERMS OF THE CELTIC WORLD, BUT MOVING ON) was presented as being pro-Christian. I’ve dealt with WAY too much media, in my time, that treats, say, 8th century Catholicism in Ireland the same as 16th century Catholicism in Spain, and NO. They were VERY distinct. I am saying this as a confirmed, happy atheist. They were distinct. I do not need or want The Mists of Avalon 10.0 on my screen, no thank you.

That being said...Monkey’s Paw. Monkey’s Paw. I was NOT happy to see the conflict presented as “Christianity taking over is Destined and Good, the Old Ways™ have had their time.” There’s this rather ugly fatalism that runs through it, along with the idea that followers of the pagan tradition HAD to die for Christianity to take its place. It’s...not my favorite thing in the world. Perhaps I’m simply unpleasable in this aspect, but there has GOT to be some medium between the two. Maybe this is my Medieval Irish Bias seeping through here, given that, with what I’m used to, the druids were mentioned in law books through the 8th century. I own this. (”But Rachel,” you might say, reasonably, “This isn’t 8th century Ireland”, to which I would of course say, “BUT IT SURE AS HELL ISN’T 6TH CENTURY WALES OR CORNWALL EITHER.”) Medieval people, historically, while they didn’t REALLY have religious tolerance as we know it, didn’t always see it in stark terms of “PAGANISM IN ONE CORNER, CHRISTIANITY IN ANOTHER”: They were, as a whole, FAIRLY good at integrating aspects of both in, even when they didn’t really mean to. The entire thing is just mangled horribly.

Anyway. Celtic Studies Salt Over.

Actors/Actresses: I’ll be honest, I was expecting, primarily, Morgana, Arthur, and Lancelot to pull the plot along, mainly because they get, together, most of the primary numbers, and because, in the German, Sabrina Weckerlin essentially carried the show on her back. As it was, Kim So Hyang’s Guinevere was the one who REALLY, in my opinion, ended up carrying the show. She had a wonderful voice, strong voice, and her Guinevere was able to make a full, smooth journey between a young, bold girl to the troubled wife of a troubled king to a woman wracked with regret. I’ve seen her in a lot of things, but I don’t think I really NOTICED her until now. She did some truly phenomenal work here, I was really glad, actually, that I got to see and appreciate her Guinevere. (Though, as a Min Kyung Ah fan....I would have LOVED to have seen her Guinevere.) She had great chemistry with both of her leads, lending credibility to both relationships, more than the script itself might really give.

Kai isn’t really an actor I ever really LOOK for in a musical, I wouldn’t say that I’m a MASSIVE fan, but that’s only because I don’t actively search for his stuff. Every time I’ve seen him in something, he’s been solid, and I did very much like him in the press calls. It does seem a little unfair that he got both the press calls AND the pro-shot, but c’est la vie. I did like his Arthur, he had a steady voice to back up the role, his acting was solid. Arthur, as a character, doesn’t REALLY stick out for me, but that isn’t HIS fault so much as the script’s, really, and my pre-built in bias towards Morgana. I didn’t find him to be REALLY likable in the role, very angry and sullen, but.....well. See above for my take on Arthur’s general likability here. I do think the man did the best with what he had, though I also feel like he’s more natural in Arthur’s dorkier, more relatable moments, especially with, say, Guinevere, Morgana, and Lancelot. (Though I’m not sure if that’s because I like Arthur as a CHARACTER more there or if I’m reacting to his ACTING in the role. This is one of those times where I’d have really liked to see Do Kyum or Junsu’s take on the role, since that would help me iron out what parts are the WRITING and what are the actor, but, lacking that, I’m going to err on the side of generosity.)

Shin Young Sook....I WANTED to like her Morgana. I did. But, I’ll be blunt, even as far back as the press call, I was feeling Jang Eun Ah’s Morgana more, I was, definitely, feeling a little disappointed when the proshot cast list was announced. So, in some ways, the poor woman would have had to have done miracles to get me to REALLY warm up to her. And I didn’t really see miracles on the stage. Her voice remains reliable, she is a belter like few others on the Korean stage. I give her that. But her acting basically totally ruined the character for me. My issues with the role, as detailed in the “Plot” section, aside, I believe that the overall character COULD be salvaged, from an audience perspective, with a nuanced enough portrayal. But, when I saw this particular take on Morgana...I didn’t see MORGANA. I saw Shin Young Sook, Having Fun, instead of Morgana, as portrayed by Shin Young Sook. An actress having fun in a role can definitely be GREAT (Park Hye Na as Eva in Frankenstein is one role of hers I will cherish forever), but in this case, which required a lot of nuance to pull it off and make the villain sympathetic....it does clash when you can tell that she’s one step away from evilly cackling and releasing a final belt before running off the stage. There is a time to ham and there is a time to not, and this was one of the “not” roles. There came some point, perhaps during the song “Desire”, perhaps before it, that I actively started DREADING Morgana appearing on stage. I don’t KNOW that Jang Eun Ah would have done it better. She could have done it worse. But it is a tragedy of only having a single cast available that I will always wonder. I was disappointed here. I was really, really disappointed.

Kim Jun Hyun as Merlin was solid. It’s well known at this point that I have a soft spot for him, but for what it’s worth, on a comparative level, I feel like this role suited him much better than, say, Orléans in Marie Antoinette (where, personally, though still liking him, I found him a little too cold for my taste). He is appropriately distant and otherworldly, showing a human side and conflict as the musical continues. Is he enough to make me LIKE Merlin, as a character? Not really, given how many people suffer because of him and how little the narrative actually QUESTIONS it, but damned if he doesn’t try, and he does lend a subdued charisma to the character, to the point where I know that at least some people noticed him more than they did Arthur or Lancelot. I did think he had -40 chemistry with Shin Young Sook, but that could be because I was ALREADY attached to him and Jang Eun Ah’s chemistry in the press call, and that is not so much a failing on one actor’s side or the other’s (I want to emphasize this, because I do NOT have anything against Shin Young Sook SPECIFICALLY on this point), rather it’s something that can’t really be qualified. (And is entirely subjective, I’m sure that plenty of viewers saw NOTHING wrong.) For me, it did cause me to actively cringe at certain scenes, such as the “This is where your Arthur came from”......”seduction”.....scene.

“Lord....I actually have fewer problems saying no to this than you might think, nvmind.”

It COULD be that that’s the look of conflicting desire, but to me, personally, watching it, it rather looks like Merlin just realized that he forgot to turn the stove off at home. Which is a pity, because I was REALLY going in here expecting to like Merlin/Morgana more than the love triangle and instead found it to be very awkwardly handled. I haven’t ENTIRELY given up on it as a ship, in some abstract way that would involve another rewrite of the entire musical, but I can’t REALLY say that there’s. Anything I like about it either. And I think that if I was less stubbornly determined to find SOMETHING in it to like, I’m fairly certain I would be even more uncomfortable with it.

My final verdict: Watching this, despite some impressive visuals (though not QUITE to the same level as fellow Wildhorn musicals The Man Who Laughs, Dracula, and Mata Hari) and performances, I found myself continually wanting to go back to the cast album rather than actually WATCH the musical. Changes have been made since the German production, but I found that, while some of the changes definitely served to make a stronger musical, some of them actively weakened the show, and it's still a little too busy for its own good. I’m also not REALLY sure that the changes made really justified it being given the label World Premiere™, given the hype around it. If it was available for streaming again, would I do it? Yes, because it IS worth at least one watch and the industry NEEDS to do this more. If it was available to buy, even, for $20 or so, I would probably get it. But I’m not sure that, if it was for the~ $100 price that Toho musicals tend to sell for, I would seriously be able to say “Yes, get this”, and I’m not sure that, if an American/European tour of it was miraculously announced, I would REALLY bend over backwards to get tickets.

6/10

Tl;dr: “WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO MY SISTER?”

#xcalibur #artus: excalibur #arthuriana #excalibur crit #(For anyone who doesn't want this in the tags)#long post

19 notes · View notes

sillyfudgemonkeys · 4 years

Note

Was reading your response to the Okumura Ryuji/Morgana fight, and the way the person worded Ryuji's character made me wanna ask... Do you think a bad fanbase is a fair reason to dislike a character? I've heard people say things like "no look at the character too", but... For example, I'm very neutral on Ryuji. When he's good, hes SO GOOD, EXCELLENT BOY, but Ann is my favorite girl. Guess who he pervs on exclusively and is rude to all the time? I've never seen his fans talk about (1/2 sorry)

His rude behavior, or his pervy tendencies, or his more selfish desires regarding the PT. That's fine!! Not everyone wants to constantly talk about bad things their fave has done!!! But people referring to him as a "woman respecting king" so insistently rubs me the wrong way, since he treats Ann Like That. That, and (more personal) i remember making a post/ask thing once about my grievances with Ryuji, esp his perv stuff, and the fans that interacted very aggressively denied his behavior (2/3)

And it even turned into a big discourse on the blog I submitted it to (it was that one confession blog). All the people that responded and just tried moving the arguments to "well Yusuke did this-" or even tried to push blame on Ann "she was asking for it" just kinda cemented my already growing dislike for Ryuji. Super sorry this is so long!!! Final question: is a bad fanbase a fair reason for disliking a character? (3/3)

Don’t say sorry about multiple sent asks, I don’t mind kfdsjla;fja As for the answer, I want to say yes and no, but really it’s just “yes with a side note attached.” Yeah, it’s ok to not like a char because of their fans, but I think it’s as long as you know why you dislike the char beyond the fans (well tbh, imo it’s usually the crazy fans so I think stans is a better word, but even then there’s diff stans). And tbh, I....can’t....think of a character I don’t like that the fandom/fanbase does....but I know nothing about the char all the while (closest and most recent example this....is....I know people dislike that grey haired moe blob on twitter even tho I don’t think they watched the show, and while I’m not a fan of the moeblobness I don’t know anything about the char so I’m personally not upset). I can only name chars I don’t like because of what happens in the text, fandom be damned (but sometimes they don’t help). Which is why it’s a yes with a side note. If you don’t like the char despite not knowing them.....probably get to know the char first even if your impression is clouded by the fandom....at least you gave the char a chance.

Under cut cause length (first few sentences in the first paragraph under the cut/tldr at the end gives you the answer a bit more in depth, the rest is rants related to that and why I get frustrated in a similar sense too, but yeah sorry if I repeat myself, I kinda jumped all over + my tendency to try to nail a point home I feel like might’ve had me repeat a bit more than usual akslfjdakfjaf):

I say this because.....it’s hard....it’s hard to keep them separated, unless you completely isolate yourself from the fandom (which is basically impossible if you wanna keep up with news, even the comment section is part of the fandom tbh...and you might be looking down their for diff reasons). And then.....well...the big reason....sometimes seeing the fans really highlights the reasons you dislike the char. That’s what happened to me and Makoto, specifically cause of....a certain fan (and buddy if you happen to see this, nothing against you, no bad blood, def won’t mention your name I respect you and the debates we had)....AND TO THE TUMBLR READERS WHO GET NERVOUS: It wasn’t on this website in case anyone is freaking out so if you’re thinking “Oh god it’s me” it is most likely not you (tho I think we do know each other on here cause of usernames/saw each other in passing but we def aren’t mutuals last time I checked), and while I do respect that person.......my god did they highlight the reasons I had issues with P5 and Makoto. Ironically in trying to defend her and show off her good sides, I realized the writing issues more and more and her bad sides became more glaring. It turned my frustrating dislike and attempt to try to work out my issues with her and P5 (ironically “working out” in hindsight would’ve been me....denying and refusing to look at P5′s flaws) into....well......the salt factory you know today. (same thing happens with like......Yukari and Junpei fans too tbh...that’s more recent tho, it feels like they are just downplaying their negatives constantly and I’m not about that). Basically, you probably have issues already, they are just more pronounced now.

As for “look at the character”....you kinda already are doing that, and that’s probably where your existing issues originated from (tho if someone wants a more in depth reason as to why, while you DON’T OWE them an explanation, it is also hard for someone to understand your feelings and reasons if you don’t try to explain).

As for Ryu, yea, I getcha, I like the guy, I’m neutral positive on him....was my best bro but he’s 2nd best thanks to post-Kamo writing. I like him because of his positives, but I always keep his negs in mind because. Cause like while I agree with the fans IT MAKES NO SENSE! P5′S WRITING IS BAD! it happened, same as I agree that Anne kicking Ryu’s ass, along with the other girls, is shitty. Hate the scene, and I accept that it happen (low key gonna start some kinda 2nd wave war with this bs cause the fandom be like that, but I’m really surprised no one took Anne smacking Ryu behind the neck cause he was being too loud as super offensive and abuse.......it’s def something a friend might do, not like belting him just a tap, and it’s framed as chill and also as warning him to reign in the volume control, but high key surprised no one has tried to cancel her cause of that). BUT that DOESN’T mean it erases all the creepy stuff he’s done. Is he the goodest boi when he’s being good? The best. Is he always a good boi? No, he def is not. And hearing that he is can be frustrating to people that do see his flaws (cause they are there). And like....you are 100% able to like a character despite and because of their flaws, while also accepting they have those flaws. I do it with Yosuke, Ryuji (for the most part), Teddie, Shinji, Ken, Kanji (when he’s not around Naoto, then he’s in a trash can for me), P1/2 casts, Aigis, Mitsuru, as long as the flaws are within reason and are treated pretty well....then I’m ok with it. (again, Kanji/Ryu have moments when I’m like....NOPE! but when they aren’t doing the bad thing I’m cool with them). As long as the flaws are withing reason (aka they aren’t making a jerk person out to be the person in the right, or the writing is trying to sweep what they did under the rug, or trying to force us into empathizing with them despite what they did while also trying ot sacrifice empathy towards another char.....*cough*Makoto/Yukari/Junpei*cough* if the writing isn’t doing that...... I’m probs neutral to pos on them).

Like I’m fine if they are criticizing the writing and being like “Him doing this makes no sense cause it conflicts with the good boi we’ve already seen!” That’s a-ok! Not only do you recognize your char has flaws, you also are able to identify issues with the writing. But saying “so I’ll choose to ignore that scene” isn’t....ok. Because sadly it did happen, as contradictory it did happen. AU it all you want, but you have to accept it happened outside of that AU. Like, I don’t like the Mika conflict in Anne’s CoOp, by which I don’t like how it went down (100% fine with Mika, and there being conflict with her). How it the whole thing started doesn’t make sense if you put MainStory!Anne in her CoOp. MS!Anne can read the room and other people’s emotions (only other person capable of that is Haru, or at least with Mona), hell she was so good at it she noticed something was up with Shiho without Shiho telling her about it! The issue was the fact Anne’s not a mind reader and could only assume the issue Shiho was going through that Anne was aware of (and that was her spot on the team). Now MS!Anne is not like Yosuke, she doesn’t put her foot in her mouth. She’s not like Naoto who can’t read the room. She’s not super eloquent, but can empathize and when she can interact with people she can do it pretty well. So why the hell does she basically not think before talking and insult Mika? Sure Anne’s not GREAT at school, but she’s not a moron, she can talk to people. But her CoOp makes her a moron all around, 100% airhead, and that’s how her issues with Mika start, by not thinking before talking and accidentally insulting her via blatantly “not caring” about the job to a full time person......it’s stupid, it makes no sense, I hate it. But it’s there, the flaw might not be present in the main story, but for the all around character (cause CoOps are included) it is now and I just have to deal with it. We can bitch about it all day (and trust me I will) but it happened. Basically never frame it as “it didn’t happen,” but instead “It SHOULDN’T HAVE happened.” One is denial, the other is critiquing the text.

Anyway my rant aside, yeah I hate it when...well Ren/Ryu/Yusuke (no one’s said Mona yet, cause....well yeah...which is good they haven’t labeled him as it yet tho), are labeled as “drinking respect women juice” and I’m like “I have one to a few women who would disagree.” I know some people will argue Goro is drinking it, and imo he’s not....he’s just eating the “I don’t discriminate sandwich” which is different. And yeah the “But Yusuke-” yeah yeah we’ll get to him, but right now we’re talking about RYUJI. I’m not a fan of derailing a topic *war flashbacks* *shivers* anyway. But yeah I remember that debate, I was probably one who was like “We’ll get to Yusuke but right now we’re talking about Ryuji” and pushing the blame onto Anne is disgusting and Kamo Arc!Ryuji would be very upset. >:( (btw high key I think I was the first one who started the first anti-makoto war wave with me saying “yeah Anne shouldn’t have apologized Makoto started it and blah blah she was an ass” not the exact words but basically just calling her out on her shitty behavior cause the game certainly didn’t......tho as Miley Cyrus would say.....”I didn’t mean to start a waaaaaar~!” I actually wrote my first Persona Problems on that topic.......but it got lost in the drafts....my photo examples kept getting messed up which is bad considering the whole post really relied on them....I should try to dig it up tbh....)

Tldr/short answer: Yeah, you probably already have issues with the char to begin with tbh, and the fanbase can highlight those issues more. It’s also hard to escape the fanbase (I see stuff I don’t wanna see despite trying my hardest to avoid certain circles, it just happens).

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go-hux-yourself · 4 years

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Holdout

Request fill for @thethespacecoyote: Hux trying and failing to keep his pregnancy secret from SL kylo because he thinks he wont want it but when kylo does find out, he's SOFT. YES this is right up my alley let’s do it!

Also on my ao3 here :) My masterlist archive of bullshit i write can be found linked at the top of the blog or here.

He’d thought he could hide it.

A tall order when dealing with a mind-reader, but Hux was certain Kylo would have neither the inclination nor the interest in the rearing of children, so the alpha was left in the dark about the pregnancy.

It would be a while more before the omega’s lithe stature gave away his secret. A while more for Hux to figure out how to hide it from a Supreme Leader that sometimes shared his bed, but had no greater urge in life than that which to hunt down every last faction the Resistance still had left.

Kylo had let it consume him, as if there were something he needed to prove, and his sole focus had kept him from Hux’s bed for weeks now. The First Order had been keeping very busy indeed; little time for attention on personal matters.

Hux hadn’t even noticed his heat was two week’s past, so embroiled in the detailed movements of the Supreme Leader and their various military incursions was he. Intelligence was coming in from various posts in the galaxy, and Kylo left Hux to delegate as he personally searched after leads. It was an exhausting amount of work, and one that prioritized sleep well over any ideas so strenuous as sex.

One exhausted moment of introspection about how he was sure to stress himself right into heat he was so tired, and Hux realized with dread that he was actually overdue for his own.

One panicked visit with a medical droid whose memory he wiped immediately after, and Hux was blankly faced with the fact that he was just over two months pregnant with the Supreme Leader’s pup.

It was far from an ideal situation.

Unbonded. The solidity of his relationship with Ren tumultuous at most. They got along best between the sheets, though professionally they still butted heads a great deal.

It was clear that his priorities and that of the new Supreme Leader went in opposite directions towards the same goal of conquest. They both wanted the old galactic systems of rule to die. Peace from war. Order. Crime punished, and people efficiently managed into a working system of governance.

Ren thought the destruction of the order of the Jedi would secure that end, and meanwhile Hux sent battalions of stormtroopers after Resistance hideouts to strike hard and fast with confirmed intelligence. But Ren was clear that he wanted every lead chased, every whisper checked out, and it spread their resources far too thin, their net cast just a bit wider than Hux would say was effective. Much of the crew had pulled extended shifts in order to deal with the heavier workload and sifting through gathered intel, and Hux was no exception.

His own duties as General kept him far too busy to add an infant to the mix. The idea of sending his own progeny away from him into the First Order nurseries, and subsequently into his Stormtrooper program, would never be an option. He’d never much entertained the idea of having children but already he was fiercely possessive about the pup inside him. His father might not have wanted him, but he desperately wanted his own.

Hux liked kids. They were moldable, adaptable, and the idea of being the father he never had-- to love, to cuddle, to teach his own child to carve out their destiny- plucked at some sore spot inside of him that would do anything to keep it.

When weighing the possible outcomes of telling Kylo, his mind easily imagined the worst scenarios, hard-based on their once-violent professional relationship. Even in the better-case scenarios, he couldn’t imagine a Kylo that would choose fatherhood over being Supreme Leader; to prioritize time for a pup over waging war. And with his hang-ups over family-- ignoring Hux’s own for the moment- his concerns weren’t just over Kylo’s indifference; he was worried the alpha would actively not want it.

Even now with their sometimes-heated arguments, he wasn’t necessarily afraid of the other man. Kylo had promised to never use the force against him in such a manner again, and while Hux did believe him, the cynical, protective part of himself still decided it wasn’t worth risking the not-yet-visible bump on his middle.

He could take being thrown about by the Force-- the terror didn’t do him any physical harm like the hard edges of console once had- but if Ren were to be particularly upset upon Hux’s insistence on keeping it-- in wanting some say in choosing just who would be siring any heirs to his reign- it wouldn’t take much to make the omega miscarry.

So Hux kept quiet, abandoning any ideas of letting the alpha know, and trying to formulate some plan to keep it from the other man’s notice before and after it was born. He had a lot to prepare, and many plans to make.

He didn’t mention it when Ren returned from some trek through an icy moon, warming himself around Hux for the first time in weeks with kisses and touches he’d sorely missed. And when Ren left on some mission again without even bothering to inform him, he felt vindicated in his choice to not inform the alpha in fair play.

Hux began his plan of discouraging their trysts when his belly began to show obvious signs of the pup there, pleading exhaustion to their workload that he followed up with a jab about how surely their Supreme Leader couldn’t spare the time to fuck him when he didn’t even have enough time to inform the fleet when and where he took off to at a whim. It only helped matters that, in terms of security, Hux’s jab was in-line with current Order protocol for high-ranking officers. As Supreme Leader, that made him the rule, rather than the exception.

It played well right into Kylo’s own petty sense of spite, and he’d declared that two could play at this game; if the man thought he could dictate when they’d fuck, then Kylo could wait until Hux became so frustated for his knot that he’d be begging his way back into the alpha’s bed.

That had been about three months prior, and the past three weeks Hux had been growing considerably concerned that his greatcoat could no longer hide the prominent bulge of his pup beneath his modified uniform. Holo-calls instead of in-person meetings, and general avoidance of one-another was the only thing standing between Hux and Kylo finding out his secret. But he knew that the further along the pup got, the more difficult his plan would be.

Thankfully, one could always count on Kylo being far more petty than he. The alpha avoided direct-contact with him (even if he made allusions to innuendo in order to frustrate Hux on their private calls), but by some mercy of the galaxy, Hux’s secret was still unknown by the Supreme Leader.

He knew his scent must be unmistakable now, and he was fairly certain that the inquisitive little looks he saw Mitaka give him were informed of the fact that their commander was pregnant. It was a credit to his crew that they largely pretended otherwise. Hux did the same, continuing in his duties no matter how his feet hurt or his back ached, trying in vain to keep to his usual routine and workload when his body was busy growing a little person.

If Hux’s crew didn’t know he was pregnant before, then when he’d collapsed from exhaustion on the bridge, they certainly did after.

Waking up on his back minutes later with Mitaka and petty officer Thanisson leaned over him was as disorienting as it was embarrassing, and Hux tried to right himself before the worried voice of his lieutenant gave him pause.

“Sir! General, please, we’ve called for a hover-stretcher--” Mitaka’s concerned voice informed, the other omega’s hands palm-up as if to deter him from getting to his feet. It was clear he wanted to touch Hux to keep him down, but also wouldn’t dare to do so without permission.

Thanisson got to his feet, informing those alerted that Hux had regained consciousness. Mitaka kept his place at Hux’s side.

“Hover-stretcher?” Hux repeated, cheeks growing a bit red as it sank in that not for the first time in his career, he was laid out flat on the bridge of his own star ship. His eyes darted around, passing over Thanisson’s face as the beta was speaking to presumed medical officers on comm. Mitaka’s gaze settled on Hux’s belly more than once, and Hux realized the telling-bump in his uniform was clearly visible in the way his greatcoat had fallen open on his figure. The stretch of modified, regulation pregnancy-attire over his belly was informing of its own, but splayed out on the flat of his back, it became wildly apparent that he wasn’t just pregnant, but heavily pregnant. Hux could curse Ren’s imposingly large stature later for what was surely going to be a pup that would take after its sire’s height, but for now, he focused on keeping his breathing even and deep even as his heart rate sped up. This wasn’t knowledge he could easily take back.

It was telling in the way that the other officers on-deck kept their attentions on their stations and not on the general lying prone on the floor. His secret was thoroughly exposed, even if the crew willfully ignored the spectacle as Mitaka personally fussed. He didn’t know if the crew were doing it for his benefit or his dignity, but the shock of their general effectively passing-out on-duty would have been cause for the exact opposite of focus on their jobs. That they weren’t gawking told him plenty.

The thought made Hux flush deeper.

“You collapsed, sir,” Mitaka informed in a gentle, respectful tone. “Until the medical team gets here...” his eyes darted to Hux’s belly in concerned meaning as he trailed off, still not touching the other man but gesturing for him to remain where he was.

Hux realized with gratitude that Mitaka was trying even now to be discreet, but as it was abundantly clear that the entire bridge now knew that someone had bred their general, not mentioning his belly for what it was was a practice in well-meaning futility. “I’m fine, Lieutenant.”

“But sir, your--”

He wanted to snap at the other man for defying him, but it was clear in the way Mitaka’s eyes continued to bounce back to his belly that the other omega was just worried about his pup. Maybe it was hormones, or just stress, but Hux appreciated the concern deeply. He bitterly thought it was nice that someone else cared about the pup, let alone knew of its existence, and also thought that that person should be Kylo.

The alpha was still hell-bent on waging his one-man wars on minor Resistance outposts than sharing Hux’s bed, though.

He reminded himself he’d chosen this, and that he’d have to step up his plans perhaps a bit sooner.

“Nothing feels wrong,” Hux informed as he managed himself to his knees, eyes scanning defensively over the crew as he possessively touched over his belly with both hands. Thanisson politely looked away; Mitaka awaited instructions. “Help me to my feet, Lieutenant.”

Mitaka stood, uncertain about how or where to touch the general, but Hux just extended a gloved hand to the other man, more than capable of still hauling himself around, albeit a bit cumbered. He pulled himself to his feet with Mitaka’s forearm.

“...Sir?”

Hux felt nauseous, a little dizzy, but the adrenaline of that slight humiliation would be plenty to get him back to his quarters and between sheets that had lost Ren’s scent some time ago. He gave the other omega a look before gratefully removing his gloved hand from the man’s arm. “I shall retire to my quarters for the remainder of the shift. You may send a medical droid there. I leave the bridge to you.”

A look passed between Thanisson and Mitaka, but neither pressed the general on an escort. Their concern was palpable, but the last thing Hux wanted was an audience as he effectively retreated from the bridge. He wouldn’t faint twice if he had any say in the matter, and it was with that focus that his feet brought him without incident to his door, and he deposited himself in bed.

The medical unit that entered his quarters gave him a vitamin-drip and beeped out that he was anemic and overworked, but that his pup was okay. Nothing he frankly didn’t already know or suspect. He’d limited his own caf intake significantly since finding out about the pup, and he hadn’t used a stim in ages. The strain of working without stimulants had simply caught up with him.

It didn’t help that even with all his plans in motion, his hormones craved the alpha that had put him in this state; even as he was sure that Kylo wouldn’t be interested in it. Rather traipse across the galaxy in search of sith relics after snuffing out Resistance cells than spend his time chasing after Hux. Far too busy to indulge in a pregnant omega who was supposed to be his second-in-command with his first priority to the fleet.

He wrapped his arms over his belly reassuringly. He didn’t need Kylo. He didn’t want him. He could manage this all on his own. He could prove he could still keep the Order running as he always had, pregnant belly or no.

Hux considered wiping this incident-- and the record of the pregnancy- from his medical file once the droid was done with him, but considered it an act in futility. Too many eyes had seen what he’d been hiding, reinforcing what they must’ve suspected for months now. Whether it got around the ship or not could be deterred with the threat of reconditioning. Kylo never checked medical records anyway, and the pup would be here in a few short months besides.

He complied with the droid’s orders for rest, but his sleep was plagued with dreams of an uncertain future for his pup; a future both with and without Kylo in it.

Hux tossed in his sleep, waking from nightmares only to hunker down into the pillows defiantly. He placed a warm palm over his belly as if to soothe the pup from his own dreams.

It would be okay. It would all be okay.

Second chapter will be found on the ao3 post for this fic :)

kofi | ao3

#kylux fanfic #kylux #omegaverse #armitage hux #kylo ren #omega hux #alpha kylo ren #fanfic #my fic #all tags detailed on the ao3 post :)#mpreg #im still taking kylux and gingerpilot prompts btw :)#trying to get some short stuff done for funsies :D

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everyonesonthespectrum · 4 years

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30 days of Autism Acceptance: Day 3!

April 3: Talk about special interests. Do you have any? What are they? How long have you had them? What does it feel like to have special interests? What does having special interests mean to you? Talk about your past special interests

HOO BOY! Ok, I’ll try not to go on too long about my special interests, but I have a lot to say about them! Also, some of my special interests are in this weird grey area of “are they a SpIn or a hyperfixation?”, so I’ll cover those as well, and make it noted when that’s the case for one. Also, this will be VERY LONG, so I’ll put it under a cut.

SpIn #1 - Pokemon

Pokemon has been my main special interest since I was 9, I believe! Black was my first game that I got for my birthday, and I was super happy to get it since all of my friends at the time would talk about it! I’ve gotten (almost?) every major release since then, thought I usually only get one out of the two versions.

The Pokemon games that I have are *inhales*: Black, Black 2, HeartGold (got a few years after it came out), X (I have the limited edition 3DS), Alpha Sapphire, Moon (first completed Pokedex!), Ultra Moon (haven’t beat and probably never will), Let’s Go, Eevee!, Sword (still trying to beat), Conquest, Art Academy, PMD: Gates to Infinity, Picross, Rumble World, Battle Trozei, Pokemon Quest, Pokemon Playhouse (for when I’m regressed), Poke Park 1 & 2, My Pokemon Ranch, and Battle Revolution!

I also used to play the TCG competitively, and in my first competition, I placed 9th in my division! I stopped playing about a year after that though because the cards I used in my strategy when I would practice with my Dad were too old to be viable.

I have a growing stuffie and merch collection as well! I have a lot of Unova stuffies, and a print of the Unova map that I got at a ren faire when I was younger (it currently hangs above my dresser)! My two favorite stuffies at this time are Baby my Eevee Build-A-Bear (named after my Eevee in Let’s Go, Eevee!), and Lily my Wooloo! I have a couple of Pokemon sketch cards that friends of my Dad’s drew, and some prints and figure-y things I’ve gotten in Artist Alleys over the years!

I also own a couple of different Pokemon books (not the manga, though), and 2 of the movies, along with the OSTs for B/W, X/Y, and ORAS! I don’t have much as far as clothing goes though, except for my “Gotta Catch ‘Em All” scarf and a Pikachu hat I got at an old anime store at the mall that has since closed. That’s probably all I can remember right now!

SpIn #2 - Steam Powered Giraffe

SPG has been a special interest for about 4 years now? Anyway, they’re my #1 favorite band and have literally saved my life. Watching Bunny Bennett’s (who plays Rabbit) vlogs about her transition, along with listening to the song Transform that she wrote (waaay before they just made it a single) really helped me accept myself and come out.

They also came at a time where I was struggling emotionally a lot, and I remember being stuck in the ER hooked up to an IV, and my mom played some of their albums for me to keep me calm and grounded. More recently, I saw them perform at Anime Midwest last year, and when they performed Transform (which neither me or my friends expected), we were all hugging each other and crying tears of joy (my friends are trans as well, and have also been touched by Bunny’s vlogs).

Their songs (not including the sad ones) make me really happy as well, and Make Believe makes me stim a lot in particular! I also got to sing Honeybee as part of a voice coaching summer camp I took last year, and it felt really good to do it! I really recommend listening to them, especially if you like steampunk and/or you’re looking for trans artists to support!

SpIn #3 - Little Shop of Horrors

So this is more of a fairly recent one, compared to the first two. This special interest mostly applies to the 1986 movie, but I’ve seen the stage musical as well! The music, the cast, the plot, it’s all *chef’s kiss*. But for real though, my two favorite things about the movie are the practical effects and the endings.

With the CGI fresh hell we got with CATS, you may thing, “wow, special effects were so much better back then”. Except here’s the thing, they were practical effects. Audrey II is (I believe) entirely puppetry, not CGI. The same applies for the musical as well! It really culminated at the end of the film during “Mean Green Mother from Outer Space”, when Audrey II is at it’s biggest and most elaborate. Speaking of that scene, I much prefer the director’s cut over the theatrical cut. I know that the happy ending is much better for Audrey and Seymour, but “Don’t Feed The Plants” is an absolute banger, and I get a good cry out of it too.

I heard they might be making a remake of the movie, which I’m hesitant about, again, seeing how CATS turned out. We can only hope that they listen to the fans, and make the right decisions when it comes to making it.

SpIn #4 - Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure

Ok, so this is one of those aformentioned “is it a SpIn or a hyperfixation” moments. I’ve been hyperfixated on JJBA for the past 6 months and I’m physically unable to shut up about it XD

I’m about to start watching part 4 of the anime, I just need to set aside time to do it. I watched it a tad out of order, my ex told me to skip part 1 and watch a synopsis of it, so I started with part 2 (I’m a huge part 2 stan btw), got to part 3, was confused by everything going on with DIO, so I went back, watched part 1, and then resumed part 3.

As I mentioned, I’m a huge part 2 stan, so I currently have several part 2 character cosplays in the works. This includes (but isn’t limited to) Caesar, Suzi Q, Playboy Bunny Caesar (inspired by a piece of art that @tinypalettes drew), Tequila Joseph (but like,, actually decent drag), and Cleric Suzi Q from the JJBA D&D session me and my friends are having. I also want to do a drag/latex DIO look, along with maid DIO inspired by an old JUMP cover and a fanfic I read the other day.

I get a little nervous about doing/going to JJBA events at conventions because I’m worried about running into my ex, but knowing that I have supportive people with me helps a lot.

SpIn #5 - Homestuck/Hiveswap

So this is another one of those “SpIn or hyperfixation” moments as well. I’ve been into Homestuck since late 2016, but I’ve never been super involved in the fandom. Like, yes, I have a moirail and I’ve been in and hosted panels at conventions, but I’ve encountered some toxic people in it, so I try to distance myself.

I will say, however, that Homestucks are loyal to their fandom, and will buy merch if they like it. When I say that, yes, I mean myself, but it’s mostly about my Etsy customers. If you look at my sales history, the majority of it is quadrant necklaces, almost always the moirail ones. I get some orders for horns and pillows too, but not as often as the necklaces. When it comes to exhibiting at conventions, it depends. I normally don’t put Homestuck stuff out on the table because it’s such a niche, but when I do, people will usually buy a lot at once. For example, at Wizard World Madison in 2018, one guy bought $50-60 worth of Homestuck sprites from me. That weekend was the best I’ve ever done, and I haven’t come close since. My Etsy store started out as just me making Homestuck sprites for me and my friends too, so I’m glad that I was able to expand and give others what I like as well.

I’m also involved in a Hiveswap YouTube musical, and I’ve made a lot of good friends through it! We’re on hiatus right now, but we should be starting up again soon! I also have a lot of Homestuck cosplays! I’ve done Karkat, John, Jade, Nepeta, Trickster Nepeta, Karkat Peixes (a bloodswap), and I have a lot more that I want to do!

SpIn #6 - Danganronpa

So Danganronpa is (probably) one of those last “SpIn or hyperfixation” things. I’ve been into Danganronpa since 2018 (I think?), and DR:AE is my favorite (mostly because I’m a Kotoko and Toko kinnie oof-)!

Right now, my only Danganronpa cosplay is Toko/Syo, but I’m working on a couple of j-fashion (particularly menhera and fairy kei) inspired looks to do with my moirail (who was the one who got me into j-fashion), and just some Amazon/eBay cosplays as well! I’m also working on a Future Foundation Toko cosplay to do with my moirail so we can do Tokomaru together (though most of it is thrifting and clothes I already have)!

I own DR1, SDR2, and DR:AE on my computer, but I don’t play them much. The second trial in DR1 gives me panic attacks because of the whole breaking of trust thing (I’ve heard the audios and I just,,, break down), I haven’t touched SDR2 yet, and I’m sucky at the controls for DR:AE. However, I’ve watched the anime and I’ve seen let’s plays, so I have a feel for what’s going on, though I may not remember it all correctly since I haven’t watched them in a while.

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So that’s most (if not all) of my special interests! I probably forgot some, but it’s getting late and I need to pack for my Mom’s and go to bed. I hope you all have a good night!

#30daysofautismacceptance #2020 #autism #autistic #actually autistic #autistic characters #autistic character of the day

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cherryeol04 · 4 years

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Action | Ch.5

Genre: Humor, Romance, Slice of life?, Crackheadedness Pairings: BaekRen, MinRon Work Count: 2K Summary: From the moment he was casted, Ren wasn't sure if he had what it would take to be a pop idol. Losing faith in himself, he was going to give up the future he had always wanted, but one person stood by his side and renewed his faith. After a hot debut and rapid growth of stardom, Ren started to notice that maybe this person, his close friend, was something more. But how could a straight man even remotely think of a homosexual relationship? Warnings: Homophobia, some smut (chapters will be marked) A/N: I wrote this series back in 2012 and used OCs and over the top writing style for arguments. Whoops. Lmao it’s pretty decent though, so I hope you enjoy!

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Baekho’s POV

I couldn’t stop staring. Minki…he was just so damn adorable. More so now that he had a new image. I honestly hadn’t thought our relationship would have worked, but when he agreed to form our alliance, everything just fell in place. Though I have to admit, it was a bit depressing knowing that Minki thought so little of himself. He was a talented performer, which was not something I would lie about. He was a complete package, like the rest of them. The other just didn’t believe in himself. I have no problems being around and giving the other encouragement, but sooner or later, Minki needs to learn it all on his own.

I grinned, laughing when Minki feigned being hurt at being pushed by Minhyun. It was part of their dance, but it was still so funny. After giving him our little talk, the other opened up more. He was being playful, smiling, cracking jokes. This was the Minki that I knew on a personal level. This was my friend. If only the world could see him like this. I feel that this Minki won’t translate on camera.

“Oi! Baekho! Come reign this creature in!” Jonghyun called, arms wrapped tightly around his waist. They were spinning in circles, carrying on. If it weren’t for the fact I was watching them to begin with, I probably wouldn’t have answered. Being called Baekho, I wasn’t used to that yet. It was my stage name and for the most part, we all agreed to call each other by our stage names (for those that had them) while in the company of others or on tv. But in the privacy of our dorm, we didn’t have to do that.

“I’m coming,” I said as I walked over. Jonghyun or JR grinned and let go of Minki, sending the other twirling and stumbling towards my way. Reaching out, I grabbed him, pulling him close. The other’s laughter was so light, and beautiful, it made me laugh.

“Well hello there,” I said as I stared down at him.

“Hey.” He greeted and smiled. Pulling back, he fixed his clothes before looking around. “Who would have thought that this would be so fun?” he asked and looked back at me.

“It’s a riot,” I said. A grunt left me as I felt a sudden weight on my back. Looking back over my shoulder, I stared at Aron as the other was grinning before looking at Minki.

“Still looking good Minki,” Aron said.

“Ren.” He corrected. “It’s Ren in public.” He said.

“Oh, sorry princess. My bad.” Aron laughed and dodged a punch the other tried to give him. “Hey, Baekho.” He said and stared at me. “So how about we go hang out after the shooting?” he asked.

Hang out? I knew what that meant. That was code for ‘please help me with my Korean’. The other didn’t like to talk about his inability to speak Korean; so instead, he created code words and body language so that I knew when he needed help in explaining or understanding.

“Sure.” I was easily agreeable. Aron was one of my favorite people to hang out with. He could be…interesting. Plus, he was also helping me with my English.

“Oh, I want to come,” Ren said as he moved closed, listening in on our conversation.

“Ah…well….” Aron said, rubbing the back of his head. He was obviously trying to figure out a way to turn Ren down without hurting the other’s feelings. That would be hard. Ren could be as sensitive as he was feminine.

“No!” Minhyun suddenly spoke as he joined us. “Ren, let’s go out. I saw this really cool pair of jeans.” He said and smiled. “You might like them. Didn’t you say you wanted new pants?” he asked.

“I did,” Ren said, pointing his finger at the other, nodding. “Alright hyung, let’s go shopping then. Oh, let’s see if JR hyung wants to go too.” He said and turned, heading out to find our leader.

Aron and I shared a look and shook our head.

“Women.” We muttered before laughing. The producer called us to come back. The set had been changed and it was time to perform the next part of the music video. It was a lot of hard work, but in the end, I know it’s going to look amazing. Nu’est is going to be a household name soon, this I believe.

~*~*~

“So…” My eyes stared intently at my hyung. We had been sitting in the café near the studio for half an hour, just sipping our drinks. Aron wanted me to help him with his Korean, or at least, that’s what I had thought. That’s what the code word had meant. But the more we sat there more I was starting to think that maybe he wanted to talk about something else. But what? That’s what confused me.

Aron looked up at me, his face reading uncertainty. This didn’t have anything to do with Korean, I could see that now. Something was bothering my hyung and he looked like he wasn’t sure how to begin the conversation.

“Hyung?”

“Oh, this is hard.” Aron finally spoke. Leaning forward, he rested his elbows on the small round table. One hand rubbed his face as he let out a heavy sigh. “It’s awkward too.” He said.

“What’s awkward?” I asked. I was curious now and once I took an interest in something, I was like a cat, trying to find out what it was, even if it meant getting in trouble.

Aron’s head rose once more and he stared at me. “I don’t know if I should tell you. It might…ruin our friendship?” He said it like a question. Ruin our friendship? What could possibly do that? I wasn’t a superficial, callous, shallow person. I liked people for who they were, not how they looked or their certain views on subjects. You can’t pick and choose parts of people that you like in them in order to be friends. I know that you get what you see, you have to take the person in as a whole, or you might as well not be friends at all.

“Hyung, I don’t think there is anything that could ruin our friendship. Now, tell me what’s wrong.” I told him gently. I flashed him one of my friendly smiles and that seemed to get him to relax a bit, and even smile back some.

“Well…I like this person.” He started. Oh, it was a love problem? Well I know I haven’t been in love, but I’ve had my fair share of crushes in my life, maybe I could help.

“Oh? What’s her name? Where did you meet?” He shifted and I could tell I said something that bugged him. But what had I said?

“Well, we met during trainee days.” He answered. Oh! It was someone we worked with. Alright, so that’s good. There were many pretty girls that we danced with. But, maybe it wasn’t one of them. It could be an idol already. There was a long list now and started going through them mentally, trying to remember if Aron ever worked with them.

“And…it’s not a female.” I paused in my thoughts. Did I just hear that right? The person wasn’t a girl? But a guy. A guy….a guy……

“You’re gay?” I asked. That was a lot to try and wrap my head around. I never thought of Aron-hyung as gay. He was manly, strong, handsome. He flirted with girls all the time. Then again, he flirted with a lot of people. I thought it was just part of his personality. I saw him flinch at my question and I sighed. This is what he was talking about ruining our friendship. Korean people, they were conservative. Even if there were gay Korean’s, it’s not something that was spoken about or relationships that were even perused. Most just pretended it wasn’t there. Aron wasn’t from Korea initially. He was Korean-American, and in America, they were more liberal in their views, which was fine and good. More power to them.

“Hyung, it’s alright.” I had to reassure the other that this wasn’t going to change anything between us. Well, it would if it were me that Aron liked. I don’t like guys and I know I won’t, not even if the guy was my closest friend and we fit so well together. It just wasn’t happening. And I hated the thought of hurting my hyung like that. “This isn’t going to change us. But you do know…I don’t like guys right?”

Aron stared at me in bewilderment before laughing. Shaking his head, he reached out and patted my shoulder. “You think so highly of yourself.” He teased. “It’s not you, don’t worry.” He said as he sat back. Taking his drink, he sipped it again before setting it down. “To answer your previous question…I’m not gay completely. I do like girls, but I like guys.” He said.

“Oh, so your bisexual,” I said and nodded. That made more sense. Which was good, everything was right in the world again. Aron really was someone who liked women. I was going to tell him if he was strictly gay than he deserved an Oscar because he was a great actor.

“Yeah,” Aron said. “I’ve always liked girls more than guys, but lately…” he trailed off. I nodded and reached out, taking his hand.

“Who has stolen my hyung’s heart?” The curiosity was killing me! I was trying to think of what man could have caught Aron’s attention. I really didn’t even know the other’s type, but we were around handsome men for a while, it had to be someone. Aron was silent for a while, staring down at the table, fidgeting. The other was fighting himself, so I squeezed his hand gently, giving him reassurance.

“You won’t tell?” he asked.

“My lips are sealed.”

Aron sighed and nodded. “Alright. Well, it’s Minhyun.”

I had to sit back, my eyes wide. Minhyun? Well that a surprise. The thought of Aron liking Minki had come to mind; he was always flirting with the other, more than anyone else. But Minhyun? I didn’t see that one coming.

“So then, really?” I asked in awe. “I can’t…I just can’t see that. Minki maybe, but…Minhyun?”

Aron snorted. “I know. I thought maybe if I flirted with Minki, I would get Minhyun to notice me, you know? Like get-“

“Jealous?” I finished and laughed. “Hyung, he’s got to like you too in order to get jealous. Do you even know if he likes you?” I asked. Aron shook his head and I sighed. “Alright then.” I ran a hand through my hair before fixing it once more. Damn, I always forget I can’t ruin my look. Noona would be so mad at me later. “So we’ll have to find out then,” I said.

“No! No, you can’t find out.” Aron said.

“Why not? I’ll ask him what he thinks about you.” I said.

Aron raised a brow, shaking his head. “That makes no sense. If he doesn’t like me, and if he’s not even gay, then he’s just going to say we’re friends. That does not solve this problem.” He said with a huff. The other was right, it wouldn’t solve anything. But then what were we going to do with the situation?

“So then?”

“Just forget it. I just…needed to tell someone.” Aron said as he looked away. “It was eating at me.”

“Ah.” So Aron trusted me enough to come to me and let me know a deep dark secret of his. That made me happy. I would be there for Aron through this. And I was going to make it my mission to get them together. People can be swayed to be gay right?

“Don’t worry hyung, Baekho’s here for you,” I said with a grin.

‘Thanks.” Aron said and rolled his eyes. I scoffed, resting my hand over my heart, feigning hurt.

“I love you too hyung,” I said and he laughed. Yes…Aron was definitely interesting.

Tags: @starryseung @lordseochangbin @channiesmixtape @straysrachaa @felixsanxchatbot @jisungsjheekies

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xoruffitup · 5 years

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The Report & Marriage Story: Adam Driver at TIFF

(If you just want to skip down to one/both of the film recaps, scroll on down to The Report and Marriage Story bolded headings. :)) There are some pics and vids down there too!)

So my friend Sarah and I spent just over 24 hours in Toronto, and it’s no exaggeration to say that during those 24 hours Adam made us feel the entire spectrum of every single possible human emotion. The Report was a nerve-wracking, intelligent, quick-witted political drama set at a break-neck pace of horrific headline after shuddering truth after sickening revelation. Marriage Story was nothing short of a masterpiece - delivering laughs, heartbreak, emotional turmoil, tears, and aching poignancy. I’m not usually one for romantic or real-life dramas like Marriage Story, but damn if that film wasn’t literally one of the most moving and powerful pieces of cinema I’ve seen in recent memory. The Report rises to the same standards, but for completely different reasons.

The films themselves are so incredibly well made in terms of writing and production, but seeing Adam in two major leading roles back to back that couldn’t have been more utterly different in tone or persona was nothing short of flooring. I know this, and of course most of you reading this also know, but GOD it isn’t even possible to fully describe the breadth and sheer force of Adam’s talent. The performances were light years apart, and yet both seared with completely unique energy that just radiated off the screen. I’ve watched almost everything Adam has appeared in, I know he’s the best actor of his generation, and yet he still manages to completely stun me with his seemingly never-ending ability to reveal an entirely different way of being in a new role. Beyond simply an accent or posture, Adam has this unparalleled ability to not only embody a completely novel persona each time, but to then completely naturally reveal that persona’s deepest, truest essence with the smallest facial twitch, turn of his head, or break in his voice. Watching him in a fresh role is literally like discovering a new facet of the human experience.

Watching these superb films in a setting like this massive film festival, where the audience was riveted and excited to engage with the content, elevated both of the viewing experiences to monumental heights. THEN, there was the fact that before and after each screening, Adam and the rest of the main cast members would come on stage with the director to speak about the film and answer questions. This of course meant – being me – that even the slightest glimpse of him would send me into silent fits of glee and awe. So combine being in Adam’s presence repeatedly and for rather long stretches of time with the emotional hurricane powerhouse of not just one but two film epics, ANNND yup it was a recipe for Biggest Emotional Rollercoaster Trainwreck Ever Known To Man. :’)

I did (somehow) manage to keep myself together! Enough so that I asked Adam a question during the Marriage Story Q&A! ;_____; (Sarah was trying to film covertly so needed a second to achieve that zoom action!)

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I couldn’t even tell you how it’s possible to string two coherent words together while speaking to 6’2” of well-dressed Talented Babe who’s fucking radiant in person, because it’s literally like an out-of-body experience where some alter ego screaming ‘TALK! TO! HIM!’ just takes over my body while the rest of me is floating off into the stratosphere!!!! (Skip on down to the Marriage Story movie analysis for more info on what I was asking about.)

Okay so let me back up and go through the day chronologically so I have SOME organization for my fangirl thoughts!

I got into Toronto from a 14-hour bus ride at 8:30 AM; Sarah got in on a flight at 9:30. We met up at our hotel and went straight to the theatre where the premium screenings would be taking place. We were able to get front barrier spots along the street and who soon arrived but none other than….!

Our lord and savior Rian Johnson, all hail! He directed the movie Knives Out that was playing at 11 AM in the same theatre. We took turns grabbing coffees because brrrr the Toronto morning was a bit nippy. The Report screening was scheduled to start at 1:45, but none of the cast had shown up yet as of 1:00. Shortly after, big cars started to pull up and Annette Bening and Jon Hamm arrived! We started nail-biting a bit at this point, because we needed to get into the theater 15 minutes before the movie started otherwise they might give our tickets away to people in the Rush Ticket line, but Adam hadn’t arrived yet and there was a chance he would sign for the barricade when he did. But once it started ticking below 15 minutes and still no sign of Adam (tension was real – the whole crowd would go quiet every time a car pulled up, then all sigh in disappointment when someone other than Adam got out), we called it and went to join the Ticketholder line to enter theatre.

WELL, good thing we did! Turns out Adam arrived late and had to rush inside right away, and we had the very serendipitous timing of walking past the secret elevator entrance up into the theater RIGHT when the elevator doors opened and Adam appeared, walking out and into the theater auditorium!! My heart slapped me in the face a bit (a lot) when we caught that glimpse of him so close up. I know there are plenty of pics now but he looked sO striking and sleek in that understated, classic blue suit. He’s SO taLL and still so massive when he’s a few feet away, don’t worry guys he looked plenty healthy even if without the Kylo Ren bulk <333 IT WAS GREAT. I COULD CRY ABOUT JUST THAT MOMENT. God help me with everything that would follow :’’’’’)

Before The Report started, Director Scott Z Burns came on stage to give a brief introduction. This was the first time the film was screening outside of the US and he was very much looking forward to the response and a wider dialogue about the issues raised in the film. He introduced the cast, and was joined on stage by the producer, Jon Hamm (who came on stage in a very silly fashion – see vid below), Annette Bening, and then Adam. And damn if that man didn’t look even MORE drop dead beautiful up there in stage lights. Be still, my heart.

…fat chance of that happening, because my heart was about to rev up into breakneck pace for the following 2.5 hours of the film.

The Report (We’re about to get very spoilery, fair warning!)

Movies are often called “important.” This one is more than that; it is imperative. The tragedy that will plague this film is that much like the staffers of the Senate and CIA that bicker back and forth throughout the decade chronicled in this movie; unproductive bickering will continue between those who appreciate a difficult truth-seeking film like this, and those that will disparage it knowing only the bare minimum of its premise. The latter will do so because of their unswerving understanding of American Patriotism to mean that America comes first, that there’s no justification more ironclad and unquestionable than national security, and America wins no matter the cost.

But. If by some miracle, the people of that latter group could be corralled into watching this film, it just might change their minds.

This movie is difficult. It is horrifying, at times nauseating. It challenges you as the investigations and counter-investigations build over each other, as the conflicting characterizations of the Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EIT) program multiply, and yet even for all that, its takeaway hits you with clarity that is both sobering and impartial.

“National security” rationales were a chimera for barbarisms that achieved nothing. The US government tortured, degraded, and murdered prisoners at its mercy for no demonstrable reason or result. One of the most on-the-nose scenes where all the many moving parts of this complex, dirty history come together is when Dan meets with a New York Times journalist in his car towards the end, as he debates giving his report to the press to release when he fears government red tape will never let it see the light of day. The reporter asks him something like, “Why did the CIA keep doing it, if it wasn’t working?”

After two head-spinning, sickening, revelatory two hours, Dan compresses it all down to something like: “After 9/11 everyone was scared, and the CIA used that fear to act with impunity. They resorted to illegal means to try to keep some control of the situation. They knew it was wrong, and they knew it wasn’t working, so they became more desperate for results to justify it. And it was easy, because the detainees looked different than us. They spoke a different language than us, with different values.”

And so it spiraled to darker and darker depths, in which one failure to produce information by dubious means was taken to justify the next escalation in interrogation techniques.

This is where I need to warn everyone that this is not easy viewing. This film doesn’t let you shy away from what these interrogation techniques really meant. It doesn’t sanitize. You will see waterboarding happening. You will see people naked and chained in cells. You will see glimpses of even worse depravities. And then you will see the psychologist contractors who came to the black sites and claimed with utterly clueless, infuriating impunity that no, they’d never interrogated a terrorist before; no, they didn’t know anything about international law or the rights to trial and legal counsel. (“You think he’s getting a trial?” one said skeptically when his techniques were questioned.) But what they did know was the human brain and how to break it down. Then, you will see the CIA top brass back in DC who never saw with their own eyes even an instant of the abuses they were blithely and sanctimoniously sanctioning.

This film poses the question of how one defines American Patriotism. Chances are, you’re not going to be much moved by the CIA staff’s understanding - who say in defense of their tactics, “It’s only illegal if it doesn’t work.” Then when it doesn’t work, who go on to baselessly credit their EIT program with the intelligence that led to Bin Laden’s capture.

Then, we have Dan Jones/Adam. Dan Jones, who spent literally five years of his life in a basement bunker researching and scraping details together about a program the CIA did everything they could to keep under lock and key. He persevered when the CIA refused to provide any documents, communications, or witnesses; when the CIA denied that they themselves internally questioned the effectiveness of the program; even when they accused him of stealing the documents he finally managed to get his hands on. When the real Dan Jones was brought on stage after the film ended, he received a minutes-long standing ovation that couldn’t have been more deserved.

Most of the audience would probably find it difficult to identify with that understanding of patriotism that claims “It’s only illegal if it doesn’t work” and “Shouldn’t we be grateful just for the fact that we live in a country where a report like this can be written?” (claimed by Jon Hamm as Obama’s Chief of Staff, when pressed by Bening’s Diane Feinstein about releasing the report before the mid-term shift of the Senate going Republican.) What’s much more moving is Feinstein’s rejoinder that “I want to live in a country that publishes this report.” Or the coup-de-grace scene towards the film’s end that incorporates real footage of John McCain’s speech on the Senate floor against the EIT program, when he introduced the McCain-Feinstein bill that would ban the practice. When McCain called on the US to be better than its enemies, and to maintain a standard of honor worth defending.

Dan puts it painfully aptly in the full monologue teased in the trailer: “They say they saved lives but what they really did was make it impossible to prosecute a mass murderer, because if what we did to him ever comes out in a court of law, the case is over. The guy planned 9/11… (continued from memory) … but instead of spending the rest of his life in jail, we turned him into the strongest recruiting tool for our enemies.”

These moments of Dan’s desperation to make others see the truth so glaringly, shamefully obvious to him are when he delivers his most biting rejoinders. As he questions John Yoo’s legal justification in the Torture Memo of the interrogations not amounting to torture so long as they don’t cause “lasting harm”, Dan points to the detainee who died under the conditions of his confinement and demands, “So how long is he going to be dead?!”

Okay so FINALLY, here’s where I turn to Adam’s oh so stellar performance. Adam mentioned in both the Q&A after this screening and in a previous interview that he had to learn the appropriate sense of “decorum” from Dan Jones that would befit a Senate staffer. Adam nailed it. He was playing a relatively low-ranking staffer, grappling with issues of abuse and mismanagement that would have incriminated all manner of public figures miles above him. He had no real power to do anything about the horrific truths he was unearthing, and yet there were too many moments when he seemed to be the only one who truly understood or cared for the truth. Adam played this tight-knit, occasionally fraying sense of necessary professionalism with just the right amount of restraint and understatement. His performance was never boisterous nor melodramatic. And yet, the ever more desperate edge to his dedication couldn’t have been more palpable. Adam’s performance delivered every bit of impact commensurate to the towering gravity of Dan Jones’ investigation.

And yet, for every bit that Adam’s performance remained appropriately understated (it never felt like anything but a true-to-life depiction; hardly ever making you aware you’re watching a dramatization), the depth and nuance in its subtlety was nothing short of masterful. His brief but singeing moments of frustration are short-lived but strike deeply. What really struck me though were two particularly powerful #King of Microexpressions moments.

When the threat of criminal charges for hacking into CIA records is raised against him and he sees a lawyer for the first time to assess his options. After he has to face the fact that this is more complicated than his repeated assertion that “I didn’t do it. I didn’t do it.” He’s quiet for a moment, then asks in a soft, defeated voice, “How long could I go away?” The camera zooms close on Adam’s face when the lawyer responds “twenty years.” Adam’s face barely changes, and yet you can see that number settling into him with pained horror alongside incomprehension. It’s one of those moments where without saying anything, without barely even a gesture, Adam renders his character so desperately empathetic. As the viewer, you realize at that moment you’ve been building an irresistible and compelling emotional connection to him since the second you saw him the first time, and he didn’t even make you aware he was doing it.

The shot in the trailer of him sitting at a desk between the two giant stacks of his report papers. This is when the Senate Intelligence Committee is taking a vote whether to recommend the investigation for further action. I’m pretty sure Adam didn’t say a single line in this scene. Senator Feinstein called the Committee to vote, and as the voices around the table chime “aye” or “nay,” the camera does a slow pan on Dan sitting there, listening with his hands folded. You can barely trace the shifts in his expression. You can barely see anything discernible in his face, and yet simply by the way his shoulders move, the way his jaw shifts every so slightly, and the way he blinks – you’re right there on the edge of your seat with him. You can feel in your very soul his repressed, barely-controlled sense of desperation as the report that’s become his life’s work is put to a vote of either life or death.

Guys, just in case you didn’t realize this by now… Adam is a wonder and it simply defies my understanding how everyone in the whole world hasn’t come to consensus by now that he invented acting and everyone else can just go home and let him play every role ever.

Okay now the one kind of amusing bit in the film! Sadly most audience members won’t get the same kick out of this that we will, but Joanne is in the film playing a CIA staffer. She and Adam share one scene, in which she walks up to him and says, “Your face and your report are bullshit.”

INCREDIBLE. Roast your man, Joanne.

Although the movie tries to tie things up with the McCain-Feinstein anti-torture amendment that ended the EIT program and shows a quote by George Washington before the credits (in what to me seemed a bit of a forced attempt to put a comforting lid on everything) what left me feeling most helpless and frustrated was seeing how partisan politics repeatedly derailed meaningful action against the EIT program throughout the entire span of the film, and knowing full well that that’s exactly how DC still operates. There’s a scene where the timing of publishing the report is being debated. (“If we push this now, the Republicans will pull gun control. What if they pull healthcare?”) And to me, the most infuriating part is seeing the ethics by which our government runs constantly reduced to mere bargaining chips.

It seems there are no absolute lines of the permissible and impermissible. As we see, the CIA got away with torturing unarmed prisoners for years because they disguised it behind code words, wrapped it in nonsensical legal jargon to authorize it, engaged in some serious doublethink and called it a day. Constant debates that twist and manipulate the issues at stake can reduce every law to subjective application. Fallacies in logic and gruesome vengeance disguised as national security measures are defended without shame. The same modes of thinking that started the EIT program and sustained it for year upon shameful, unsuccessful year continue spinning the wheels of today’s destructive and shortsighted policies of self-interest and American exceptionalism.

OKAY, I’m off my soapbox now. Promise.

But last thing. Think about this for a crazy minute: Dan Jones’s report in full was some 7,000 pages. The only version that was ever published was heavily redacted down to a few hundred. What an incredible feat of scriptwriting that a five-year investigation that produced 7,000 pages worth of text was condensed down into a 2 hour movie.

((Also – I kept thinking at regular interviews during the film that holy shit this is giving me such strong vibes of my Presidential staffer Ben in my modern politics AU and I LOVED IT. I’m so extra inspired to press on writing!!))

End Spoilers: The Q&A afterwards! After the audience spent a few minutes giving Daniel Jones his much-deserved minutes of applause, the panel moderator started with a few questions, and here Jon Hamm and Annette Bening immediately started messing with Adam. (It’s clear they’re all buddies who love each other and I appreciate it so much :3) Whenever questions were posed generally to the cast, they would both immediately start passing the microphones down the line towards Adam, knowing full well that he wouldn’t want to talk but nudging him to do so anyway >:)) At one point he wound up with two microphones at the same time and started desperately shoving one back at Annette! For one question, before the microphones could be thrust upon him, as soon as Jon looked over towards him Adam sidestepped back behind the group and turned to start feeling the screen like he was looking for a way out. Lskdjflaskj DORK <3 Annette immediately teased him like “There’s no door, Adam!” and then on a later question that was also posed to “the cast,” Jon and Adam both started pretending to look for a door together. :’)

When responding to a question about what drew him to the role, Adam made a really interesting comment about Dan as a character who “gets the instructions for something to build, and it turns out he was building his own gallows.” (Video below!) He also spoke a bit as to the fact that he was intrigued to create a clear depiction of the internal effort to fact-find and implement accountability about such a contested, tangled issue for which a whole PR campaign existed to defend, even with misinformation.

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Have I mentioned how GOOD he looked in that suit?! Somehow he looked extra tall, I thought. And again, I know people are concerned about how thin he is right now, but he really looked fine!! His face is definitely a bit thinner, but his face shape has often changed along with his physique whenever he’s buffed up or down. He still looked plenty solid and very very damn pretty. >:3

Being the adoring fangirls we are, we’re well familiar with Adam’s ~discomfort or stiffness when he’s forced to be in public and speak at things like this. (We love one (1) awkward antisocial man.) During this panel, even though his answers had his usual introspection and self-deprecating, unconscious charm, he seemed to have an extra air of seriousness/attentiveness to him when listening to others’ comments or to audience questions. While he was giving the serious topic every bit the gravity it deserved, he also seemed to be conscious of not seeming partisan to any particular political outlook? I mean, the audience would often clap when someone on the panel said something about how the takeaways from the film are still relevant to the dysfunction and hypocrisy in today’s political climate. Adam would join in the clapping, but something I’ve always respected about him is that he never infuses his persona opinions – whatever they may be – with discussion of his work or his approach to it. I think it takes a lot of hubris and self-awareness to maintain that distinction, and resist the temptation to use a public platform to advance your own opinions. But he never seems remotely interested in any such thing. AITAF advocacy is maybe the closest, but even in that context he remains very restrained.

Did I mention he looked Beautiful like a damn vision? ;____;

Okay so leaving the theatre, my and Sarah’s heads were reeling. There was SO much to process and discuss from the film, we were grabbing onto our favorite lines and moments to recall, which launched us into discussion about political affairs today, interspersed with the occasional “Can you BELIEVE Adam’s Power in that one scene?!” and basically it was my absolute favorite kind of impassioned conversation ever. <333

Time was ticking though, and just before 5 we needed to head back to the theater entrance before Marriage Story started at 5:30. Okay and here – as if we hadn’t already endured enough emotional walloping today – came two massive emotional rollercoasters right after the other! With how little time we had between the films, it was difficult for us to get into the red carpet crowd just beforehand. But as we turned the corner, we heard shouts of his name and !!!!!! there he was outside signing!! Bless his heart, he was across the street from the theatre signing for the long line of people on the other side who I hadn’t seen anyone go over to that morning. :’) Sarah and I ran over to try to join the end of the line and he almooooost got down to us, but it was a little too dicey with the line being kind of chaotic where the barrier ended. But WE WERE SO CLOSE TO HIM. HE WAS RADIANT EVEN WHILE LOOKING ADORABLY SLIGHTLY GRUMPY WHILE HE UNCOMPLAININGLY TOOK PHOTOS AND HE’S THE BEST AND MOST EXQUISITE EVER

I can just imagine in his head like halfway down that line: “oh god this was a mistake. Adam what did you do.” <3333

Emotional rollercoaster moment #2: Because Adam and ScarJo were both out signing, the sidewalk right in front of the theater had been barricaded off. This meant that we weren’t allowed to enter the theater until they both went inside, which only left us a few minutes to spare! We rushed to the entrance, but alas there was a problem with scanning our tickets, so we were told to go to the Box Office to get them reprinted. We’re already on edge, afraid we’re going to miss the beginning of the film, when the woman at the Box Office tells us she can’t reprint the tickets because the name on them doesn’t match ours. (We bought them from a resale site so of course it didn’t…)

Even after showing her every email we had documenting payment and that the tickets were transferred through an official sale site, she remained adamant it was policy that she couldn’t print the tickets. Clearly, we were kind of devastated for a moment there, thinking we’d just paid way over face value for these tickets that weren’t even going to work. But Sarah, bless her soul, had the idea to leave, then go back in through a different door with a different ticket scanner person. The tickets still didn’t scan correctly, but we told the woman scanning that we’d already ambiguously “checked” with the box office, and honestly I think she was just a very nice person and could sense our Desperation, so SHE LET US IN. Woman – wherever you are right now, know that we love you and are forever indebted to you. ;___;

By the time we got to our seats, Noah Baumbach was already on stage introducing the film. But luckily we were in our seats, we had caught our breath and clutched each other in rejoicing relief before Noah introduced the cast and brought Adam and Scarlett on stage. Queue lots of enthusiastic applause! Someone in the audience yelled, “We love you Scarlett!” There were some whoops through the theater, then someone else yelled, “And we love you too, Adam!” and he did an adorable awk wave of appreciation and have I meNtiOnED this giant of a man is the softest and most precious being to ever grace this world????? And I’m not sure if it’s come up yet or if maybe I haven’t mentioned? But I really really really love him? ;____;

Thank gosh Sarah caught it! Painfully presh video of our painfully presh man!

Marriage Story: (Again, there will be spoilers)

Oh god, okay. This one was a beast of massively epic proportions that I was not nearly prepared for. It takes you on an intense fucking ride that spans every possible angle of passion between two people, ranging from love to hatred. To be entirely honest, I had gone into the day more excited for The Report because the subject matter was of such interest to me, and because I’m not usually one to really enjoy real-life dramas all that much.

But this fucking movie was Exquisite from the very first shot. The film opens with the “What I love about Nicole / What I love about Charlie” voice overs, and within the span of mere minutes you already feel deeply for these characters. You already feel as if they’ve been your close friends all your life, and instead of just entering your awareness abruptly – they’ve lived entire lives with ups and downs, mistakes and successes for as long as you can remember.

The movie is a sweeping epic, and yet remains achingly resonant and relatable. Charlie and Nicole’s relationship is passionate, fiery, and riddled with both miscommunications and repressed resentments. You rarely see a (doomed) love study played out with such complexity and fireworks. And yet, their frustrations, desires, and victories/losses both large and small are completely credible. Relationships are messy, and this film doesn’t shy away from their absolute darkest and even cruelest corners - even while maintaining sparkling moments of human connection that somehow survive alongside even the most difficult challenges.

The film is a brilliant study of contradictions. As Charlie and Nicole move through the divorce process, their control over it and the very narrative of their own lives becomes appropriated by their respective lawyers. The beginning of the film showed us the tenderness and deep understanding that exists between these characters, so the stories the legal teams spin seem ridiculously far afield from reality. The beginning of the film brought us into a rich world between these characters that was natural and so effortlessly believable (long, uncut monologues of dialogue; characters wandering from room to room as they talk – It’s masterfully and deceptively purposeful filmmaking that completely hides all trace of itself). Then later, listening to the lawyers concoct disingenuous legal narratives to “win” rather than tell any truth of reality is a towering contrast. The lawyers seize on the smallest tiny things Nicole or Charlie did in previous scenes (Nicole finishing a bottle of wine in one night with her family; Charlie forgetting to strap in their son’s car seat once) to paint them as habitual alcoholics or neglectful, absent parents. As the divorce proceedings escalate, things become distorted past recognition – twisted into abstracted and even absurd depictions of these two characters, between which we simply can’t decide whom we feel more sympathy for.

And then, following a gloves-off divorce hearing couched in legalese where neither side gives any quarter, you have a scene that’s quiet and effortlessly heartwarming. Nicole calls Charlie because the power’s out at her house and could he try to fix the power box in the front yard? He comes over, he works on the box, they pass their sleeping son between them (“Maybe he should just sleep here?” “But it’s my night.”), and then they both have to manually pull the gate on the driveway closed from either side – Nicole inside, Charlie outside. They look at each other as they pull the gate, perfectly in sync and their gazes locked, until the gate slides closed in the inches just between their faces. The movie is littered with these tiny gorgeous moments that just tear at your heart.

Or, the moment in the middle of negotiations between their lawyers when everyone decides to pause and order lunch. Charlie is handed the menu and he simply stares at it helplessly, uncomprehending because he’s still trying to work through the shock of their new reality that was just being argued over by the lawyers with such casual cruelty. Everyone stares at him for a long minute, until Nicole gently takes the menu from his hands and says, “I’ll order for him.” She knows just what to order – a salad with a specific type of dressing – and he quietly, almost absently agrees, “Yes, I’ll have that.”

The film takes pains to be even in presenting both sides of the story, and giving Nicole and Charlie equal screen time. I spent the entirety of the movie switching my sympathies back and forth between the two of them. By the film’s end, I understood both of their positions and experiences completely, as well as how much their perspectives on all they shared had come to oppose each other. Even though it’s impossible for either us or the characters to understand how they developed such divergent perspectives on their marriage, all parties involved have to face just how irreconcilable their grievances have become and how differently they each view the fundamental shortcomings of their marriage.

Being the annoying feminist viewer that I am, I was completely absorbed by Nicole’s monologue early on, the first time she meets with her lawyer (Laura Dern). She comes clean with the whole account of how she feels no control over her own life, and the longer she spent with Charlie and living in Charlie’s world, the “smaller” she was becoming. She felt that he didn’t respect her interests or her undertakings, when they weren’t connected to his theatre company. In essence, she feels she never got to be anything other than what he made her.

With that background of her position, I absolutely wanted Nicole to build her own life apart from him and find her own sense of personhood. One where she makes her own decisions and follows her own passions. In her recounting, she keeps saying that she’s used to part of her feeling “dead inside,” in terms of not feeling truly engaged with or in control of what she’s doing with her life. Taking a television acting job in California – separate from Charlie’s theatre company where she was the star under his direction, where he called the shots and she supported “his genius” – was the first time she did something bold for herself. This was also after repeatedly expressing to Charlie that she wanted to spend more time in California (where her family live), and Charlie never seeming to seriously consider the idea. Nicole felt she didn’t really have a voice, living shrouded in Charlie’s shadow.

But also being the annoying Adam fangirl I am, I was drawn in by Charlie’s charisma, by his effortless and guileless charm. I may have “sided” with Nicole towards the beginning of the story, resenting the small ways we could see that Charlie might have unconsciously been controlling (“Did you change your hair? I like it better long.”), but as the story progresses, so does Charlie’s unraveling. His world begins to crumble and fall apart before his very eyes, and even though he tries his best, he’s unable to do a single thing to stop it. Once Nicole gets her high-powered, cutthroat lawyer involved, things escalate beyond all control at breakneck pace. Suddenly he finds himself having to hire lawyers he can’t afford just to prevent the possibility that their 8 year old son Henry might move permanently to California with Nicole and Charlie might not get any custody; or that Nicole will take most of their shared assets and he’ll have nothing left to fund his theatre company with.

Neither of them mean for the negotiations to reach some vindictive heights, but suddenly they both find themselves fighting just to be able to live the life they each think is theirs.

Charlie finds himself having to move temporarily to California and rent an apartment so he can see his son and so Nicole’s lawyers can’t try to depict him as neglectful. We know he’s anything but. The first scenes in the film showed him being so patient and good with Henry that we could just about cry at the injustice.

(There’s the most darling scene at the beginning where little Henry comes into their bedroom, pokes Charlie saying “Dad? I had a nightmare.” Charlie gets up and comes to lay down in Henry’s bed with him. When he tries to get up, Henry asks him to stay, but there’s not really enough space for both of them in the bed so Charlie shifts to sleep on the floor. Queue a shuffling sequence where Henry goes to sleep on the floor next to his dad, Charlie goes up into the bed when it’s empty, then shortly thereafter Henry climbs up on top of Charlie so they both fit in the bed and fall asleep there. Yeah, MY HEART.)

As the accusations start flying when things are on the line during the divorce proceedings, this huge element of performativity comes into play. In a way it’s fitting, since they both work in theater, but these roles of enemies they suddenly have to perform is also terribly heartbreaking. (Also going back to the contrasts I mentioned earlier between the true essence of their relationship and their easy, ceaseless intimacy; vs the cold-hearted narratives forced on them both through the divorce proceedings.)

But in some ways, they’re not just playing the roles. There are two sides to passion, and just like they once cared about and loved each other so intensely (in some ways, they still do), there is also a shadow side to emotions of that intensity. In a catharsis that is much-needed after the austere, inhumane ways their relationship problems were discussed through their lawyers and absolutely devastating to watch in its destruction, their belated attempt to “talk” escalates into all-out war. “Talking” was the route Charlie first wanted to take – no lawyers involved – but which Nicole spurned. I was frustrated with her throughout the film for never fully communicating with him her expectations regarding their separation, but upon further reflection I understand that she might have feared that if they managed it on their own, it would turn into him managing it and her voice would once again disappear. Something along these lines rushes out during this scene of purging their demons and years of budding resentments and secrets all in one near-fatal blow.

(I’m about to quote a few sporadic lines I remember, but I have to say watching this scene with no idea of the savagery that was coming delivered absolutely lethal power, so I kind of advise not knowing the specific lines? Plus they’re a hundred times more powerful on screen, with these top-tier actors delivering them with every bit of feeling they possess. Skip to after both sets of ///// if you don’t want to know! But quoting here for those who don’t know if/when they’ll see the film ☺ These are definitely not in order and they jump around but whew, every moment when they were screaming these lines is simply unforgettable.)

/////////////////

Charlie: “Oh you just like to play the victim. We were happy. YOU were happy. Until you decided you weren’t anymore.”

Nicole: “You are just like your father!”

Charlie: “Don’t you EVER say that! Don’t you ever compare me to my father. You’re the one just like your mother. And your sister - you’re the worst of all of them combined.”

Nicole: “You slept with Donna!”

Charlie: “One time! Because you stopped having sex with me! For a whole year you shut me out and I didn’t know what to do. And after I gave up so much for you.”

Nicole: “Oh what you gave up?!”

Charlie: “I was in my 20s! I had my first solo work, I was successful, I wanted to fuck everyone but I didn’t. Because I loved you and I didn’t want to lose you. But I- I missed out on so much.”

Nicole: “You are SO selfish, you can’t even separate anything else from your own self-interest! You can’t even see me as something separate from yourself!”

Charlie: “So you hate me! You wish you’d never married me, fine, but god this last year it’s like you hated me!”

Nicole: “And I did! I do! (Screaming helplessly) I can’t believe I have to know you for the rest of my life!!”

Charlie: (Savagely snarling) “Maybe you don’t because I hope you get sick and die. I hope you get hit by a car tomorrow!”

///////////////

This scene escalates and escalates until they’re both in these uncontrollable, violent piques of rage. Charlie punches a hole in the wall, and things simply get uglier and uglier until they are screaming at each other the most horrible things each can think of with every bit of vitriol they can possibly muster. The build up in the scene is masterful, and the performances are simply stellar. You can feel that they are pissed as all hell at each other – that this is literally years of unspoken, repressed feelings all being torn out. But you can also feel that both of them are in such awful pain. Both of them are actively bleeding as the scene progresses, but it’s because both of them still care so much. It’s because there are still feelings there, and there always will be no matter what either of them do. That’s why the emotions are so desperate and searing off the screen.

After Charlie spits the final horrific line in her face, he sinks to the floor and weeps for it. It ends with her comforting him, and him putting his arms around her knees.

And – just fuck me up completely, why don’t you – if you thought that scene was the biggest beating your heart would have to take in this movie, THINK AGAIN BUDDY.

Because. Whew. My god. Words are going to fail me in describing this scene but I’ll do my best to go for it.

Months have passed since their fight, and grab every box of tissues in existence, because here’s the rumored scene where Adam sings “Being Alive” from Company. Now, I had somehow completely forgotten about this going into the film. So when Charlie stands up in the cabaret restaurant with his theatre group back in New York and starts jokingly singing the words when the pianist starts the song, I was just like ‘oh haha he’s singing! Wow!’

Charlie moves to sit back down after the first verse, still mostly fun and games…. But then the words draw him back as the song continues. He gravitates towards the small stage and the microphone, and little by little the joking edge melts away. Emotional gravity rises behind his voice little by little, until suddenly the words are loud and ringing and gorgeous, and there is palpable heartbreak in his eyes as the words begin to take the exact shape of all he has lost.

Now, we’ve heard snippets of Adam singing in Hungry Hearts and Inside Llewyn Davis and even briefly in Burn This. But. People…. You have never heard or seen anything like this. I don’t even mean from Adam. I mean… in your life. I mean: This scene literally stirred such a profound reaction in me; I didn’t know it was possible for an actor to evoke feelings like this. And imagine, this was on-screen performance. The entire theater applauded when the song ended, and I was in tears.

The song encapsulated in truly heartbreaking beauty the revelation Charlie was having of all he once had – every part of love that is both good and bad; cherished and difficult. And in possibly the most tragic contrast of the whole film: He is singing about love making it worthwhile to be alive – of how he’s now essentially left searching for what will now make his life worth living; while across the country Nicole is finally feeling “alive” for the first time, after years of being plagued by the feeling of part of her being dead beyond reach.

Yeah. I could spend thousands of words just trying to describe the devastating power and beauty of this scene, but no matter what words I use or how I phrase it, I’m going to come up short. It’s simply beyond description. Adam is beyond description. You’d think because I literally couldn’t love him more if my life depended on it that I couldn’t be so stunned by new demonstrations of his talent??? But jesus CHRIST. This man is a force that defies comprehension. To my ear, his voice sounded strong but untrained, and that was what made it so heartrendingly magnificent. In the held notes, his voice will crest into the gentlest vibrato as his emotions build, and I couldn’t tell you whether it’s the song that Adam disappears into, or if it’s Adam purposefully weaving every single element at play here into the most moving minutes of performance you’ve ever seen. Either way: The scene will ruin you utterly, and you will love it beyond comprehension.

I know a clip of this scene will certainly hit the internet as soon as the whole film becomes available, but god I almost wish that everyone has to watch it in context with everything that’s come before it. Because knowing every bit that Charlie has suffered along the way, understanding the way his heart is continuously breaking with each of the words-…. God, it’s too much.

Next up on Adam Driver Eviscerates Your Heart And You Thank Him Profusely For It: The scenes where he cries are just as painful as you think they’d be. Probably even more so, because he’s a talented jerk like that who takes no pity on us at all.

The first major crying scene is when he and his lawyer go off into a side room during a break in the first meeting on divorce terms. It’s just dawning on Charlie that Nicole probably has no intent to bring Henry back to New York, and unless Charlie does something serious, Henry might never live there with him again. While the lawyer’s talking, Charlie silently lowers his head, and suddenly the tears just rise up over him. It’s quiet and he only shakes slightly, but god do you feel for him.

The second time is…. lord, yet another moment that’s utterly heartbreaking and yet one of the most beautiful moments of film you’ve ever seen. This is the final scene in the film, and it references back to one of the first, where Charlie and Nicole try to go to a divorce counselor, who requests that they each write down the things they love about the other and then read them aloud. These are the lists each of them voiceover in the trailer and that play at the film’s very beginning. But during this session, Nicole refused to read her list aloud, because she didn’t “like what she wrote.” So Charlie never heard her list about him.

In this final scene, Charlie hears Henry reading something aloud in his bedroom. Henry had been struggling with reading, so Charlie immediately comes in to listen and help him. Charlie sits down on the bed with him, and realizes what it is Henry’s reading. Charlie helps him with the words he can’t pronounce, and then halfway through Henry hands him the list. “You finish reading it, Dad.”

Charlie continues reading the list, and it goes on much longer than the version we heard in Nicole’s voiceover. As Charlie’s reading aloud, Nicole appears in the doorway and begins to listen without Charlie realizing. He manages to read it all relatively evenly… until he reaches the end.

“I fell in love with him…” Charlie stops suddenly, and in an instant his mouth is trembling, the tears are brimming over, and he is fighting desperately to hold back the onslaught of tears in front of his son, even as it overtakes his entire body. Finally, he is able to finish: “I fell in love with him seconds after I saw him, and I’ll always love him. Even if it doesn’t make sense.” In the door, Nicole fights off her own tears.

This film is cinema at its very best. I know this is an incredibly bold statement, but: It just might be Adam’s best role to date.

End Spoilers: Q&A!

I WAS STILL SO STUNNED BY THE SINGING SCENE THAT I ASKED ADAM ABOUT IT AND JUST TO ROUND OUT FROM THE HAND TAKEN VIDEO ABOVE THIS IS THE OFFICIAL ONE AND THAT’S ME YOU CAN JUST BARELY HEAR AT 17:45!!!!!

youtube

CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT HAPPENED??? BECAUSE I CAN’T AND I WAS THERE. BYE I think I’m having an out of body experience taking in the fact that I’m watching this vid of Adam WATCHING ME OMG HE WAS SQUINTING INTO THE AUDIENCE TO SEE ME AND LEANING FORWARD TO HEAR ME SOMEONE HOLD ME I’M WEEPING HE WAS TALKING TO MEASKDFJALKSFJ

Ahem.

From Noah’s comments throughout the panel, it was amazing to hear how much of this movie was truly a collaborative process between him and Adam. In many ways, Noah built this role and film around Adam. He said that he and Adam had focused on the scene of him performing “Being Alive” very early on, and Noah structured the script to work towards that vision. Though he already had the idea of working in themes of performance and theatre, it was Adam’s idea to make Charlie a theatre director. I absolutely love hearing that Noah essentially wanted to make a film where elements of who Adam is in real life or his interests in what he wanted to play in a character were built into the heart of the script.

Someone asked Noah why he likes dysfunctional families so much and he replied “What other kind are there?”

Most of the other things said during the Q&A had already been echoed in other interviews. Plus I sometimes have trouble processing memories while Adam’s talking/standing in front of me because slkdjflsakjfdklsf just taking in the sight of him is a fucking lot to process :’’’’’’’)

“A fucking lot to process” is actually a perfectly apt summary of the day in its entirety! When Sarah and I got back to the hotel, we discovered it had a jacuzzi on the rooftop! That was truly the best soak ever, to soothe away the emotional overload and talk through all of our many, many thoughts on the two stellar films we’d just had the privilege of seeing.

Writing through this entire massive thing was also a huge help to work through all my complex feels about these films. As you might have gathered, I can’t recommend them highly enough. And as you also might suspect – Adam is an absolute force to be reckoned with in both. Seeing two of his most powerful performances ever back to back (and then getting to hear him talk about each in person!) was truly an experience I’ll never forget.

A massive thank you to anyone who persevered through reading all that!! I love writing analyses not only to work through my emotional response to sweeping works like this, but also to remember every bit of the impact. Give it a share if you don’t mind helping a girl out? :) I’m not on twitter at all so it’d be much appreciated!

(...have I mentioned I love Adam and I’m in awe of every single thing he does? Shower this man with Oscars already?!)

#Adam Driver #TIFF #driverdaily #Toronto International Film Festival #The Report #Marriage Story #TIFF 2019

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botslayer · 4 years

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Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019) review (Long)

Star Wars has a place in all of our hearts, I think. This series has had literally galactic-scale highs and lows. Be it the video games, the movies, the comics, the novels, what have you, Star Wars is one of, if not THE biggest sci-fi universe in the world and one of the most important in all of nerd culture. After the controversial madness that was EVERYTHING about The Last Jedi, I felt the need to see this one. How does this new Trilogy end? Is it any good? Well, let's dig in. 1. Technical aspects The movie looks good for the most part. It's a lot of good CGI and descent puppetry, a lot of explosions, and a lot of color. All the places that the movie goes do feel genuinely unique to one another, so points there, I guess. But it has some serious issues with the editing. The editing is god awful for most of the movie, the camera flips around too much, I think. I don't want constant tracking shots but they keep jump-cutting all over rooms and very suddenly for scene transitions. There are a fair amount of wipes but only one scene transition actually stood out to me at the very start of the movie, everything else was kinda dull. This has to be addressed, Carrie Fisher is still in this movie. What they did was cut snippets of her head out of unused footage from Force Awakens and Last Jedi, then put it relatively well over the face of a body double. This allows her to exist in the movie but it isn't good. From an ethical standpoint and from how it affects the flow of her scenes. Her tone of voice doesn't feel right for any of the scenes she's in and her answers to what people say are usually just kinda weird, as well as what people say whilst responding to her. 2. Acting and characters (very lite Spoilers) The acting in the movie is okay generally. It's nothing to write home about though. It's solid and generally does the job but the characters themselves are a different story. One problem is that the movie introduces a shit ton of them, including but not limited too, (Spoiler warnings for this paragraph), Zorii Bliss, An old Spice running friend of Poe's who is trying to ape a Mandalorian (Like the society) vibe in the look of her outfit but doesn't do it well. Babu Frik, her tiny alien boss and a surprisingly tech-savvy little so-and-so. D-O, a small droid consisting of a cone head and a single wheel, voiced by JJ Abrahms. And Jannah, who like Finn, is a rogue Stormtrooper from the first order. Everyone and everything else introduced are just more generals for the "Final order" (A rebranding of the First Order) and a bunch of background aliens and stuff for the resistance. The main problem with these characters is none of them have time to develop because of how many are introduced. They try with Zorii, bless them, but her scenes are too short so her character doesn't "Develop" it just starts at one point and changes at the drop of a hat. And the returning Characters honestly aren't handled great either. Rey is okay for the most part, but Finn contributed just about nothing, Poe wasn't worth much more than a ride between planets, Kylo Ren goes back to wearing his old helmet for some reason and again, seems to change without much provocation. Leia's death is weird and kinda pointless, although I'm happy they won't do what they did again. The only consistently good, solid characters in the movie were the droids (Especially C3PO) and Chewbacca. Characters with very few lines or who literally cannot speak. That's such a weird thing to say, honestly. 3. Plot and thoughts as we go (Heavy Spoilers) A transmission has gone all across the galaxy, Emperor Palpatine lives. Kylo Ren is hunting for a "Sith Wayfinder" and Rey is training under Leia to become a better Jedi. Kylo finds the Wayfinder and goes to a sort of hidden Sith planet whereon he meets Palpatine, here it is revealed that Snoke was a clone made by Palpatine's servants, "The Nights of Ren" and that Palpatine was "Every voice Kylo heard in his head." (Not too subtle change into Darth Vader's voice as he speaks.) Kylo and Palpatine have a short exchange where the younger pledges both his and the First Order's services to him, in exchange, Palpatine will add a whole new fleet of Star Destroyers to them. Star Destroyers he literally just summons up from the ground. Hangar bay doors don't open, these things just slam up from the ground like titans of myth rising from ancient slumbers. And while that might sound cool, it comes with a lot of issues. For starters: Who made these things? The Knights of Ren? How old is that organization, then? How old are these ships? Why don't they have hangar doors overhead? Hell, we learn later that these things will bolster first Order forces by "Ten thousandfold." How many of these things are there? How many ships does the First Order (Now "The Final Order") have at this point? Anyway, back with the resistance. After a cameo by the best fictional game in the series, Holochess, we find that they're getting information from an ally I never caught the name of, flanked by some sort of weird alien on the ship who's apparently on a first name basis with Finn and Poe. We also learn the Final Order has a spy and a decent chase scene ensues. All well and good, but all this and the conspicuous lack of porgs makes me wonder how much time has actually passed between this movie and Last Jedi. Especially when we cut back to Rey who is trying to hear the voices of past Jedi but just realizes she can't and immediately drops the meditation in favor of running a training course. She ends up getting distracted while running it and accidentally drops a tree on BB8. She says to Leia that she will one day earn the right to use Luke's lightsaber... But it broke in the last movie. Again, can we please get a time stamp? Poe, Finn, Chewbacca, and their crew return, whereupon there's a kind of funny back and forth about what Rey did to BB8 and what Poe did to the Falcon during the chase. The highlight of which is "At least BB8 isn't on fire!" "What's left of him isn't!" During this breif stop, we learn that The Final Order is broadcasting their plans, in sixteen hours they will lay waste to entire worlds because as it turns out, the new ships that Palpatine gave them all have planet-destroying laser weapons on the bottom. A Fleet of Star Destroyers, each with Death Star-grade power. That's definitely upping the anti, I suppose. During this, we also learn that the "Wayfinder" Kylo went after is important because its the only way to find the planet Palpatine is holed up on, a world called "Exegol," you won't find it on any other maps. So the crew goes on a quest to find a man in service to the Sith, a bloke named "Ochi" who was last spotted on a planet called "Pasaana" because for some reason, Luke and Lando Calrissian were tracking him. The movie doesn't explain why they were after him, nor why they seemed to abandon the search. (Or when any of that happened, for that matter.) Our heroes journey to Pasaana where, as it turns out, there's a festival happening. One that celebrates family and ancestry. Cue the best comic relief in the movie, C3PO, as when Poe expresses that he isn't psyched about working with a crowd of people all around him, C3PO expresses elation, "We are very lucky, it only comes once every Forty-Two years--" Etc. Honestly, C3PO is the best part of the movie. As the resistance crew goes about the Festival, Rye gets a necklace from a local who asks for her family name, not just her given, but Rey just says she doens't have a family name. Kylo contacts Rey with their weird psychic bond they had in Last Jedi, and they have an interesting exchange about the last movie and her wanting to take his hand at the end but deciding against it, and how when he offers it this time, she will take it. He steals the necklace Rey got from off her throat because as established in TLJ, he can do stuff like that. He has Final Order members analyze the necklace and learns of the planet Rey and her cohorts are on while they gad about the festival looking for any sort of clues or leads. They end up getting found by Final Order Troopers, but saved by Lando, apparently, Leia told him where they were. They mention the resistance could use his help, but he just says that his flying days are behind him before he sends them off. The gang is followed by Final Order troopers, resulting in a chase scene, one I quite like. The Final Order has jet troopers now, and the crew basically just have their sidearms as weapons, having stolen vehicles from the locals. It's a very intense action scene, even when the crew crashes into "Not-quite-quicksand." Everyone starts sinking in and Finn says he's always wanted to tell Rey something. What it is goes unanswered as he sinks down. The lot of them have fallen into a cavern of some sort. They explore the cave until they find two things, Ochi's land cruiser, and Ochi, who as it turns out is long dead, nothing more than bones and whatever he had on him at the time. Rey digs through his body and finds a scary-looking dagger that has most definitely been used for some less than savory deeds, Rey sensing the negative force energy off it. 3PO tells them that the inscriptions all over the dagger are in Sith Runic. He CAN translate it, but he can't say it aloud. It has to do with Old Republic regulations on translation modules. They keep the dagger, at least. There's also a giant serpent, one the cast calm into letting Rey get close, whereupon we learn she has the ability to force-heal injuries. The snake lets them out and she explains that it's basically channeling some of her own life force into whatever she's healing, and when she sees Ochi's ship, she's unnerved. She knows it from the day her parents left her. Some true madness begins to unfold as Kylo shows up in his ship and Rey cuts one of the wings off, forcing it to crash. Chewbacca is captured and ostensibly killed accidentally by Rey because she summons force lightning and blows his transport's engines. There's another brief exchange with Kylo about him seeing the lightning for real, thus her capacity for darkness, before Finn and Poe tell her they NEED to leave. They do and Kylo radios for pick up as the Final Order literally toes the Millenium Falcon into a Star Destroyer. It is here we learn that Kylo knows about the spy in their ranks and that Chewbacca survived. While they waddle about in Ochi's ship, thinking of a plan, C-3PO reveals that there IS a way to get a translation out of him. Essentially they need to do a factory reset. This means 3PO will lose all memories of his friends and life. But what is that compared to a galaxy dominated by fear? Poe knows the man for the job, trouble is they need to go to a world called "Kijimi" where Poe made a booboo before joining the resistance. But again, literal planets worth of lives are at stake, so he swallows his lack of pride and they go. A not bad tracking shot of Poe creeping around the streets and finding it crawling with Final Order troopers later, his mistake comes up to him. Both her pistols drawn, and one to his head. We learn that "Zorii" and Poe's old outfit were spice runners, and their old friend "Babu Frik" is the guy they'll need to crack 3PO's head open. Babu only sees people who are part of the crew, which Poe no longer is. They eventually convince her and the other spice runners to let them in. There's a genuinely heart-wrenching moment where 3PO goes completely silent before the process gets going and he says he's just taking one last look at his friends. Meanwhile, we see Poe and Zorii on top of a building, Poe mentions how no one came after the last movie, their distress call was for nothing. Way to invalidate the most controversial movie in the series, you dolts. Also, Zorii seems to have changed for no reason. She went from not wanting to look in Poe's general direction to inviting him out to her new life as a farmer on some rock at the fringes of the galaxy. Poe turns her down because he has a war to fight, whether or not he wins. She gives him a First Order Captain's badge, which would allow docking in any Final Order ship or planet because the rebranding is only so recent, I guess. C-3PO gets rebooted and the crew learns what the inscription on the dagger means, but again, the cost is 3PO's memory. He reboots and introduces himself as "C-3PO, human-cyborg relations, who are you?" Babu introduces himself and Rey fixes the wheel on a robot found on Ochi's ship, a little cone head thing we don't learn the name of until about an hour later, "D-O." At about this point, Rey realizes what's in orbit just overhead, Kylo's flagship... And Chewbacca inside. The crew boards the ship to free Chewy and get the Falcon back, along the way, Rey mind tricks a couple of troopers, the crew shoots a few dead, and then she goes off on her own, trying to find something. Her scenes on the flagship are pretty awesome, as she enters Kylo Ren's quarters and starts not only talking to him again but also fights him. This leads to some very interesting cinematography, a fight where when they accidentally break things in their respective locations, they appear in front of the other, so for example, Kylo is in the streets of the city the crew was in, specifically a market in it. He cuts open a pot full of berries/nuts and they all appear on the ground in his chamber while Rey is fighting him. It's pretty impressive. During the fight, we also learn A. the real reason Rey's parents sold her: Protecting her from her grandfather. B. Who this grandfather is. The Emperor. Rey is seriously Palpatine's granddaughter. C. Rey's parents died protecting her. Kylo learns she's in his quarters when she accidentally destroys a podium, on which was resting Darth Vader's semi-melted helmet. From there, it all spirals out, Ren has them lock down the ship, Rey snags the dagger and Chewy's gear, Chewy, Finn, and Poe are caught, only to find out that general Hux is the spy who saves them When his motives are questioned, Hux says he doesn't care if the resistance wins. He wants Kylo to lose. Rey and Kylo have one more confrontation before the falcon shows up and Rey literally leaps into space to get on the entrance to the falcon. Where Finn is. Audibly screaming at her. Y'all can say what you want about a downward bombing in space probably not working very well in Last Jedi, but this is a whole new level of bullshit. Rey leams OUT OF A RAY SHIELD into the vacuum of space. I don't care that Leia survived being out way longer in TLJ, at least she wasn't audibly saying things as she went, at least it felt like she was in space instead of just a big random fall. Also worth noting, to ver their escape, they blast the bad guys with the Falcon's engine trails, this burns or knocks back all the Troopers but Kylo, who is standing roughly the same distance as at least two of them, and Rey, who is closer than ANY of them are unaffected. This one moment is more agitating to me than most of The Last Jedi, honestly. There's Wardian grade plot armor, and then there's this. The crew gets away and Hux is killed by another general because he figured out that Hux was the spy, they end up at another planet because of the inscription and the Falcon crashes, drawing the attention of "Jannah" and her random tribe of people. They resolve to fix the Falcon while waiting for the water to calm, something they at once have zero choice or time for. Turns out the Sith Wayfinder is on a hunk of the second Deathstar. Rant to come. While waiting for the water to calm and repairing the Falcon, we learn Janna is a rogue Storm Trooper, just like Finn. Her entire company was meant to open fire on civilians, but ALL OF THEM refused. Finn mentions he didn't think there were others but I have to question where Jannah's entire unit gets off doing that. How did all of them fight their programming? Moving on, BB8 raises a concern, he hasn't seen Rey in a while. Turns out she stole the rogue trooper's sea skimmer and rides the waves JUST right, so she can make it to the chunk of Deathstar. I was never big into the idea that Rey was a Mary Sue until this happened. I was willing to write everything else off up to this point but NO. She has NEVER used something like this. She spent most of her damn life on a planet with NO water and no point actually drove anything like this save for the land boat she stole from the natives during the festival but even then, it didn't have the quirks this thing had (It's a repurposed ship of some sort, she needs to constantly raise and lower an arm of the ship to reduce drag, I suppose.) I know this seems like the most random thing to officially stand in that camp, but what's that old saying about straws and camel's backs? Rey goes to the shard of the Deathstar and starts exploring, it's full of old classic Storm Trooper outfits, mostly helmets. She goes to the Emperor's old throne room and through an old door, she ends up in a kind of trippy, maze-like space until she finds the Wayfinder and faces a seemingly Sithified version of herself with a dark robe and a collapsable double-sided lightsaber. This version of her fights her for all of four seconds and is never seen again because normal Rey flees out of the room and into Kylo Ren's waiting gaze. Now, my question is WHY would Palpatine keep one of these things on the Deathstar 2? In case he wanted to go to Exegol? Why not keep it in a more remote location than about thirty feet to your left? It's an ancient Sith artifact, you'd figure he'd be more protective of it. But nooo. So Kylo breaks the Wayfinder Rey found, wasting all of our time, before engaging in a lightsaber fight on the outside of the ruins. Finn and Jannah catch up to see this but can't do anything, partly because if they don't hug the ground, the turbulent water below will likely send a wave up just high enough to knock them into the ocean, Rey and Kylo, however, are clear I guess because they have higher ground away from the tides, they still get sprayed a lot. The fight ends with Leia dying from using what's left of her energy to reach her son, Rey stabbing and then healing Kylo before she leaves in his ship. The crew, save for Rey, and Jannah's rogues join up with the rest of the resistance where they find out what happened, and Chewbacca loses it. The Wookie collapses to his knees and starts screaming and wailing, beating into the ground, etc. He's lost all his human friends, 3PO's mind is wiped, the only things left from the good old days are R2 and the Falcon. This is a genuinely harrowing moment for longtime fans, I think. Meanwhile, Rose Tico shows up for the second time this entire movie, the first time being her explaining why she can't go with, she has lines that could have been given to almost any rando in the resistance which is honestly a shame. Then we cut to Ahch-To, The planet Luke exiled himself to in Force Awakens and TLJ, to find Rey burning Kylo's ship and very nearly, Luke's lightsaber. Luke's ghost shows up, catching the saber, and giving her a pep talk, telling her he knows now that exiling himself was stupid and that she needs to face the darkness in herself and the galaxy head-on. That delusion she saw getting her Wayfinder wasn't the first, she's seen herself ruling at Kylo's side as the empress, but given Luke's Pep talk, him showing her a spare lightsaber that used to belong to Leia, and the fact that Kylo had HIS Wayfinder in his spare ship, Rey agrees to continue fighting the good fight. But how will she leave the planet? Luke's force ghost raises Red five from the ocean. I'm not kidding, he literally just force lifts it with some show-offy joy. That thing has been waterlogged for how long? Even assuming Rey could fix it, where the hell is she getting fuel for it? Back with Kylo, we see him gawking out over the sea, a familiar old voice starts talking to him. Han Solo's ghost shows up and they start having a heart to heart oddly reminiscent of the one they had in Force Awakens. Han says he knew his son was in there somewhere, and when Ren says "Your son is dead" Han says "No, Kylo Ren is." In that spirit, I will now refer to Kylo as "Ben" for the rest of the review. Ben throws his lightsaber into the ocean and is left to his own devices by his dad's ghost. The resistance somehow knows that there are radio towers on Exegol that help the ships navigate through the constant storms and rain, Poe and Finn organize a plan, to distract the ships while a ground force attacks the tower and Chewbacca will go off and send another distress signal, allowing others to join the battle if they can. They come up with this because D-O has the plans for the ships and the like stored in his head if memory serves, and also 3PO gets his memory back, R2 had a back up, wouldn't you know it? The Resistance charges into battle against the Final Order over Exegol, And thus begins a fun clusterfuck of lasers and explosions. As one expects from this trilogy. Now, the first order has this actually brilliant moment when they realize they can shut down the tower, and start broadcasting the same helpful signals from one of the ships themselves. Which they do, this allows them to down some Resistance ships before Finn sees what's happening and has them do a ground invasion style attack ON that ship. As in they deploy troops over the top of it ON HORSEBACK. Honestly one of those things that's so loveably stupid. They end up in conflict with a bunch of troopers on top of the ship as they look for weak spots to plant bombs or the like. Rey, meanwhile, has snuck into the Emperor's hiding place, just as Ben lands on the planet. There's a lot of running around on all sides, dogfights under and around the larger ships, Ben fighting knights of Ren with just his bare hands and the Force, Rey being lured into Palpatine's grasp, Finn and Jannah's group shooting at troopers and passing ships as they look for weak spots. It would have all been fairly tense if the editing wasn't done by a coked-up squirrel. Almost nothing feels impactful in the fights, there are too many cuts in scenes largely about singular or just two characters. There are good elements to all this but I didn't care enough about most of these people. for it to mean much. Also worth noting: not much can be done. They've already lost so many pilots, soldiers, and fighters, Finn and Jannah's group haven't fulfilled their goal yet, Palpatine is giving Rey a very "Let the hate flow through you" speech about how it's all pointless and her friends are doomed, but if she kills him, and becomes the empress, the Final Order will be hers to control, she agrees for a moment, letting a bunch of the Knights of Ren and Palpatine begin ritual chanting as a horde of them look on, Poe is out of hope. Rey is about to give in and Ben is surrounded with no weapon. All hope is lost... Until Rey enters another sort of shat with Ben and gives him the lightsaber she was moments ago going to kill the Emperor with. Ben strikes down his aggressors and makes his way to Rey and the Emperor, they slaughter the knights in the immediate vicinity. While that's happening, an entire fleet of random people shows up to help the resistance. Zorri and Babu are right next to the Falcon, which contains not only Chewbacca but Lando. The fight begins anew as Finn and Jannah blow the antennae in the ship they're on and cripple the Final Order Fleet. Now all the Resistance has to do is blast the planet-killing lasers and the entire ship they're rigged up to will also be destroyed... Which makes some sense but is still a pretty massive design flaw. Down with Rey, Ben, and Palpatine, the youngsters try to strike the Emperor down, only to basically have their life forces partly fed upon. Ben goes flying down a naturally formed cave shaft, presumably to his doom. Palpatine has regenerated from the life steal thing and sits on this massive stone Sith throne just under the battle in the sky, and in a moment so absurd I was dumbstruck when it happened, sends lightning up into the sky. A massive MASSIVE pillar of it, so massive that not only does it reach the sky, but when it does, it fans out and strikes dozens, if not hundreds, of resistance ships, taking them right out of the sky. This guy is over a hundred years old, several of which he was DEAD for and for some reason now, he has power I would only be able to describe as "Godlike" for no damn reason. I forgot to mention earlier that he didn't live through being exploded in ep 6. He brought himself back to life somehow, just wrote it off as his access to the dark side. He still looked terrible though, like he was actually a corpse with rotten hands and pure white eyes and all that. But somehow, two random idiot children's life forces, nowhere near in their totality, are enough to rejuvenate him and give him power unseen by most of the deadliest Sith in all of Star Wars. Vader's apprentice from The Force Unleashed wasn't this fucking OP. The worst he did could be chalked up to gameplay, this one-man lightning storm bullshit is actually canon, though. So this creates a problem: How does Rey defeat someone with the power of a god on her own? She ignites Leia's old lightsaber from when Luke was training her and then redirects the Emperor's lightning back into his face, destroying his head. From there, the Final Order's fleet is destroyed and Finn and Jannah are rescued from a fiery death as the ship they're on starts crashing to the ground, I guess being the only surviving members of their attack squad. Ben climbs out of the shaft and gives his life force to bring Rey back from the dead, they share a kiss and Ben dies, allowing Rey to flee in the Red Five, much to everyone's relief. There are celebrations and hints of things to come, including Lando taking Jannah with him on adventures through the stars, Rose hugging some dude who ISN'T Finn, much to Finn's annoyance, and Zorii and Poe exchanging wordless gestures. The final scene is Rey going to the old Skywalker Moisture farm to burry Luke and Leia's lightsabers just outside the house. How she knew where the farm was or why she buries them is anyone's guess. She pulls out a new lightsaber, a Yellow one. Which... Okay, I guess but where did she get it? Did she make it? How? Where? Did she just find it somewhere? How? Where? But anyway, an old woman comes walking by and mentions that the hasn't been anyone at the farm in so long and asks Rey who she is. Rey says "My name is Rey." "Rey Who?" Luke and Leia's force ghosts appear and smile at Rey. She proudly announces that she is "Rey Skywalker." And her and BB8 watch the suns over Tatooine set. The end. 4. A Nitpick? Some of these are just little things I couldn't find a good place to put elsewhere: In flashbacks, we see Luke training Leia a bit, in those scenes, her lightsaber is green. In the modern-day, for whatever reason, it's blue. I'm not sure if that's an oversight or not. Also worth asking: Where is Luke's personal saber? I did some research and he apparently reclaimed it at some point in the EU (Which is no longer canon) but even in Last Jedi, the last we see of it is him almost using it on a young Ben Solo. Where the hell did it go? 5. Conclusion I see this movie has it’s good bits but it isn't enough to make up for how shoddy the overall product is. There are too many new characters to let even the pre-established ones breathe, let alone each other, the editing was total garbage to the point where I genuinely got a headache, the plot invalidates both episodes eight AND six, while itself being kind of terrible... Nothing can kill Star Wars for me. This movie certainly tried. TL;DR: Do not watch this trash, I don't care if it's your first Star Wars film of if you're a long-time viewer, it isn't worth your time or money. Merry Christmas, everyone, and have a happy new year. (FTR: This is something I stole from my own deviantART, I’m not plagiarizing shit, I’m just copypasting myself and adding edits if I see hiccups in the future.)

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rebelsofshield · 4 years

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Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker-Review

After two great but flawed films, the third trilogy of The Skywalker Saga comes to a sputtering dud of a close in a disappointing, if occasionally fun, film.

(Review contains minor spoilers)

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A message has been sent out to the galaxy from the seemingly dead Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid). Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) anxiously searches for the potential rival to his rule while also planning to turn this new player to his benefit. However, in order to defeat Palpatine, he will need to officially complete his goal of turning Rey (Daisy Ridley) to the Dark Side of the Force. Meanwhile, Finn (John Boyega) and Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) work desperately to lead the scattered remains of the Resistance to victory. As the threat of Palpatine and his new fleet of super powerful ships becomes clear, a team forms to desperately search out a way to locate and destroy this new Final Order before it is too late.

The Rise of Skywalker arguably had one of the most difficult tasks of any Star Wars film. Not only functioning as the end of this particular string of films, this final installment of The Skywalker Saga is also burdened with bringing some sense of closure to the succession of plot threads, character arcs, and themes that have been seeded, toyed with, and explored since the first film debuted in 1977. It’s an incredibly hard challenge and it is easy to understand the amount of pressure that must have been on writer and director JJ Abrams, co-writer Chris Terrio, and the whole cast and crew to stick the landing.

From the outside, Abrams seemed like a logical, if safe, pick for the job. The Force Awakens, while it relies heavily on familiar imagery, is a well-paced, very fun film that is buoyant with heart, humor and an incredible ensemble of characters. After Rian Johnson’s delightfully strange, esoteric, and daring The Last Jedi, offering another fun romp to round out the trilogy seemed like a comfortable, if not especially brave, way to end a series of movies that was mostly chugging with momentum and heart. A plan may not have been evident, but having had delivered two films that were still among the strongest in the saga, a road map may have not been needed.

The Rise of Skywalker, however, proves to be a long, loud, and fumbling film that somehow goes out of its way to highlight the weakest aspects of this trilogy in a sloppy and uneven package. There is fun throughout, and on a surface level, much of it is a perfectly serviceable experience, but it sits as one of the most crowded and confused Star Wars experiences in recent memory.

Much of this comes down to Abrams and Terrio’s cluster crash of a script. The decision to return Palpatine as a form of connective tissue, bringing the Dark Side threats of nine films under a single roof, is not an inherently bad one. Ian McDiarmid’s wonderfully campy master planner was easily one of the strongest parts of both previous trilogy cappers, Revenge of the Sith and Return of the Jedi, and returning once more to his grand schemes, cackles, and monologues felt like it could have been a smart move to creating closure and consequence. Palpatine ultimately becomes symbolic for many of the larger sins evident in The Rise of Skywalker. His much hyped return is revealed in as purely flippant a manner as possible and his galaxy destroying resources are hand waived in with just as much nonsense and confusion. He exists purely as a scary, familiar plot device and nothing much more.

It becomes representative of a larger film narrative that feels more and more hacked together and confused the more one thinks about it. The Rise of Skywalker’s first thirty minutes are a chaotic nightmare that feel edited together with little thought to cohesion or comprehension. The audience is given no time to linger on a single scene and we hop from location to location with little thought or understanding as to why or clarity of transition. It’s a film that begins at a sprint and wants you to hear everything it has to say while it hurtles forward at top speed. The beautifully orchestrated first third of The Force Awakens that lovingly introduced us to an incredible new cast of characters feels like a far gone thought and the emotional start to The Last Jedi’s own ensemble saga feels all the more impactful. The Rise of Skywalker barely gives the viewer time to breath until close to the end of its first act and by then it will have lightly already bludgeoned many into indifference.

Much of the first half of The Rise of Skywalker plays out in a series of fetch quest related set pieces that range from fun to nonsensical, but it’s ultimately this portion as we head into the film’s playful middle where it is at its strongest. After spending two films mostly apart, Rey, Poe, and Finn finally get to spend time adventuring together and despite the lack of context, this trio of adventurers really sing as a group. The banter, chemistry and cooperation between this makeshift team is the film’s clear highlight and is a testament to the groundwork done by both prior films and the strength of these performers. Anthony Daniels’s C-3PO also gets some of his meatiest and most emotional material to date and Abrams smartly plays the shiny protocol droid as a mix of heart and humor.

All things considered, the individual character arcs for each of our central three heroes are threadbare but populated with great individual moments and asides. Isaac gets to lean into Poe Dameron’s swaggering heroism to an even greater degree here while also building on, ever so slightly, the developments to his person experienced in The Last Jedi. His occasional butting heads with the far cooler minded Rey is a nice touch, but his chemistry with Finn is a forever highlight, even if a much teased romance between the two never manifests. A connection to Poe’s past, Zorii Bliss, is a great new inclusion and is played with gruff seriousness by Kerri Russell of Felicity and The Americans fame. Yes, there are hints of a romantic connection between the two, but nothing serious occurs and hopefully leaves room to keep our famous Resistance pilot among our potential queer characters.

Finn was maybe the one character who did not get to live up to his potential in The Last Jedi. After The Force Awakens turned him into a charismatic but engagingly flawed co-hero, his story of finding purpose couldn’t help but feel like a weak link in a strong chains of subplots and it certainly didn’t help that it included the much maligned Canto Bight sequence. While Finn doesn’t experience as much of a clear character arc here, John Boyega certainly gets much more to do. As the emotional heart of the team that keeps Poe and Rey connected, Finn becomes an important balancing act to the crew and is privy to many of the film’s emotional moments. A smart move sees Finn bonding with another newcomer, Jannah, played by Naomie Ackie, who shares a similar past. The conversations between these two make for some of the film’s best moments and Jannah, along with Zorii, escape the film as its two best additions. There is even a subtle but very interesting development for Finn in this film that doesn’t get highlighted as much as it should, but will delight fans of the character. I won’t say more than that.

It’s ultimately Rey where The Rise of Skywalker heads into murky water. Dasiy Ridley has always been a talented performer and this film easily marks her strongest performance in the saga. Ridley brings nuanced and complex emotion to her close ups and manages to oscillate between playful heroism and conflicted personal drama with great skill. After years of (incorrect) criticism that Rey was a character that was played too safe, The Rise of Skywalker takes great pains to push her into uncharted waters and uneasy futures. It is here that The Rise of Skywalker consistently makes its largest storytelling missteps. One significant reveal is likely to produce audience eye rolls and feels like a betrayal of some of its predecessors’ most thoughtful themes. Ridley does her best with these moments and they do lead to some beats of weighty character conflict, but they feel like an ultimately safe and simultaneously sloppy route to take her character and it ends up bringing much of the film down with it.

The Rise of Skywalker leans even further into Rey and Kylo Ren being dyads of both ends of the Force, but it’s ultimately Kylo that ends up being the most disappointing of the central characters of this trilogy. After spending two films being an unpredictable and intriguingly unhinged antagonist bursting with moral confusion, Abrams saddles Adam Driver’s Dark Sider with a mostly clear plot trajectory that lacks a fair amount of the nuance that made the same character such a magnetic part of the past films. He is privy to much of the film’s best action beats and one sequence in particular that functions as a creative escalation of the Force bonds from the previous film is some of the most inventive stuff in the movie, but it isn’t enough to really sell the final steps of his character journey. That being said, there is one, potentially very pandering and indulgent moment that mirrors The Force Awakens that comes across with great emotional vulnerability due in large part to Driver and his co-star’s performances.

The old guard are given surprisingly little to do here. After spending much of the press tour discussing Carrie Fisher’s posthumous role in the film, the end results end up being something of a mixed bag. Having Leia be a central part of the narrative is welcome and it’s nice to get a proper goodbye to the character, but the artificiality of her inclusion is far from seamless and often times is more distracting than it is moving. Billy Dee Williams’s long awaited turn as Lando Calrissian proves fine, but doesn’t amount to much of consequence. He feels like a stand in for all of the original trilogy characters that are inaccessible to this film’s plot. Luke’s return is serviceable as well and is competently acted but is directly tied to some of the wonky storytelling choices made with Rey and is often peppered with disappointing bouts of misguided nostalgia and fan service.

The Rise of Skywalker is a very big movie. There’s quite a lot going on and many players, new and old, don’t get their fair share. It’s hard not to be a little angry that after the abuse hurdled at her for over two years, Kelly Marie Tran’s Rose is given such little to do that she might as well be a bit player. The same can be said for Maz Kanata or any of the other supporting characters of the trilogy. The elusive Knights of Ren finally appear to do little more than stand around and look cool and their one action sequence is a titanic disappointment. The always petulant General Hux is sidebarred as well, but has a rather fun bit of character development that lets him leave the trilogy as a strangely despicable but enjoyable secondary villain.

As an action spectacle, The Rise of Skywalker is occasionally fun but frequently hollow. The early and middle portions concerning our heroes out running and sneaking past First Order forces prove to be the most successful and fun. Abrams injects some of these bits with clever uses of mobile cinematography and an Indiana Jones-esque chase sequence on the sands of Pasana is pure fun. The large Return of the Jedi meets Avengers: Endgame finale feels empty and weightless though. Despite the massive scale demonstrated, it all feels mostly hollow and heavy on effects and explosions. Because it is so predicated on the earlier mentioned loose and bizarre plot choices, it’s unclear what we are supposed to be feeling as we head into this chaotic showdown. Strangely enough, Abrams skimps on the cameos for our big rallying cry. For a film that rarely shies away from fan service, the one moment that seems primed for it is barely utilized.

Even John Williams feels tired. While his score blends together themes from all eight films with mastery, there isn’t much new to really give the movie its own identity outside a briefly heard finale piece.

The Rise of Skywalker isn’t awful. It has moments that are quite strong and more often than not it opts for surface level fun rather than daring choices. However, it’s moments of sloppiness and baffling script choices make its safer moments all the more frustrating. It is not the worst of Star Wars franchise, but it is far, far from the best and it’s hard not to leave the film disheartened, not necessarily by the events of its story, but rather that after all the love and adventure, it ends on such a half-hearted stumble.

Score: C+

#Star Wars #The Rise of Skywalker #review #reviews #JJ Abrams #Chris Terrio #Daisy Ridley #John Boyega #Oscar Isaac #Carrie Fisher #Mark Hamill #Billy Dee Williams #Naomie Ackie #Kelly Marie Tran #Kerri Russell

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daddysfangirls-marvel · 5 years

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Still the same man

Request

warning: angst, rejection, and just more angst

Summary: Bucky Barnes x (Romanoff) reader. (AU where the end of civil war never happens and Bucky came back with Steve) Bucky is settling in and trying to distance himself from the winter soldier. But when he finds a woman that makes him feel something he tries to ask her out but he is confused as to why this woman hates him with a passion. ( y/n was tortured by the soldier for days and was beaten half to death by him. She still suffers nightmares of him) ( y/n is Natasha’s little sister) (Codename- red sparrow). Will bucky be able to forgive himself once he learns what he has done will he ever be able to separate himself from the soldier. Will he be able to live with seeing the aftermath of his handiwork

Note: This is not a series and never will be

He was in the far back corner of the room by the window with a book in his hand, he was still on page one an hour later. In front of him sitting on the couch was (Y/n) and Peter she was helping him with a school history project. Steve was nowhere to be found and Bucky wasn’t reliable with the gaps in his memory and (Y/n) was a history nerd and loved arts and crafts so she was happy to help. (Y/n) was a sweet person with a kind heart always offering a helping hand to anyone and everyone, Everyone but Bucky.

For some reason (y/n) didn’t like Bucky and took it upon herself to avoid him at all cost.

At first, he thought she was scared of him he tried to came himself seem kinder, nicer, less of a threat. It wasn’ t until Natasha said something that he realized she wasn’t scared of him she just downright hated him. She hated his very existence and everyone knew this but no one said anything to him and they refused to tell him why she hated him. He was just running around clueless falling for a girl who wished he’d take his final breath already.

Not begin able to get to close to her without pissing her off Bucky took to watching her from afar. Watching her help Peter treating him like a little brother helping when he needed it and teasing him when every she could. Her tease Rhodey in the most little and adorable ways. Seeing her smile as she and Wanda exchanged secrets in their minds. Betting on her constant competitions with Clint and Sam. Teaching Vision human things and stocking the pantries with Thor’s snacks. Irritating Steve and Tony into headaches. Actually understanding everything Bruce talks about. And successfully shaming and guilt-tripping Natasha with her infamous pout. She seemed to get along with everyone but him.

Bucky was only half paying attention as Steve explained what the next mission was Sam and Bucky assignment and (y/n) was just suddenly added on. Everyone else was out of the game as they had all come back from separate missions and needing a few nights rest, or a few months in Bruce’s case he looked like a wreck. He didn’t understand why (y/n) was here she and Bucky never did missions together unless the whole team was involved.

“Sam, (y/n)”

“What about me?” Bucky asked.

“You’ll sit this one out. You’ll be back up if necessary. You guys get going.”

“What?!” Steve quickly left the room trying his best to get away from Bucky or at least create some distance between them and the others for when this pops off. “ STEVE”

“Bucky”

“Why am I being left behind? I’m capable I can work, what’s up?”

“ (Y/n) is more suited for this mission. She’ll get it done faster and better.”

“Wouldn’t have both of us on the team be better than just one.”

“Bucky”

“No I don’t understand I know she is avoiding me but why is everyone trying so hard to keep her away from me? What did I do to her that has all you ready to jump up as a barrier. I don’t understand and I’m tired of tiptoeing around it. You know how I feel about her and you know how hard I’m trying. Tell me something” Steve sighed heavily honestly it wasn’t his place to speak.

“Natasha. If you want to know what’s up with (Y/n) talk to Natasha. She won’t give you everything but she’ll give you enough for you to understand.”

Bucky Glared at his best friend as he walked away. Even his best friend was against him even though he knew how he felt about (y/n). This just wasn’t fair.

Bucky wasn’t a complete douche bag so he waited for a full day before approaching Natasha looking for answers.

Bucky found Natasha in the kitchen making lunch for herself as she hummed a tune to herself and smiling. Bucky pulled up a seat at the counter in front of her slowly she eyed him as he took his seat.

“What can I do for you Barnes?” straight to the topic he liked that.

“(Y/n), your sister, she doesn’t like me. I’ve been trying to find out why but no one will tell me and she won’t give me the time of day. Maybe you know something, you can tell me something, I like your sister and-”

“You shouldn’t,” she said her smile fading “ It’s just a waste of time you should stop and find someone else.”

“What have I done? She is good and kind to everyone but me. She hates me, Why?”

“It’s not that you don’t know it’s you don’t remember and she does. She doesn’t hate you she’s terrified of you... You might have changed but you still share the same face as the Soldier and she can’t get over that.” Natasha said as she glared down at the sandwich she made. She was no longer hungry her appetite was gone. She put the sandwich in the refrigerator, maybe it would return later. She was angry she decided going to the gym would help despite her still-healing injuries.

“What did he- What did I do?”

“It’s not my story to tell. But honestly, you should stop trying to force some type of relationship on to her she’s been hurt enough.”

Bucky really took Natasha’s word to heart. He began to create a distance he assumed (y/n) needed or liked and kept everything as professional as he could at the distance he created. Everyone noticed the distance he created. It wasn’t like he isolated himself but he did somewhat schedule his time with others making sure whenever he was around (Y/n) wasn’t and if she was there were a great distance and several people between them. Although they didn’t say anything they were happy with this new development and to have more time with (y/n). (Y/n) was also grateful but couldn’t bring herself to approach him for thanks.

Bucky had just returned from a two weeks long mission he was completely exhausted and beat down he planned to take a shower and go straight to bed but sleep would not come. With his hair in a messy wet bun, he shuffled his way to the kitchen thinking a cup of tea might help. Stepping out of the elevator he heard voices, he assumed everyone was asleep, going around the corner he finds that the tv is still on and someone is on the couch. Looking forward he finds (Y/n) curled up on the couch with one of Natasha’s thick fluffy blankets draped over her. He decides to ignore her to let her sleep rather than disturb her.

He was about to walk away but (y/n) started to squirm and whimper in her sleep and a few seconds later she was full-on sobbing in her sleep. Bucky thought about calling someone else to come help her but he didn’t want to wake anyone up and she looked like she needed help now. Sighing heavily he walked over towards her and began shaking her gently.

“wake up, wake up, (y/n) wake up”

(Y/n) suddenly opens her eyes gasping for air once she sees Bucky kneeling in front of her she screams and crawls away from him. Bucky throws his hands up in surrender and backs up.

“I’m...” Bucky gasp as he eyes trails down to her legs and arms which were visible due to her short and tank top. (Y/n) has never worn shorts or short shelves in front of the team ever and now he knew why. She noticed his staring when she realizes what he was staring at she quickly covers herself. “ That was me, right?”

“...yes” she whispers as tears start streaming down her face

“When? Why? how?”

“My sister was in the Red Room Program I was part of a branch Program Red Sparrows we worked closer to home we started out younger too. When Natasha escaped she came and got me but a little while later they came and dragged me back. I had to be punished for leaving and becoming a traitor. They had you punish me. They figured I was close to You because Natasha was but I wasn’t. I didn’t know you .”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry” Bucky falls to his knees in front of the coffee table and puts his hands together as if he was praising as he continued to apologizes and cry. (Y/n) stands up wrapping the blanket around herself but the image of her scared skin is already imprinted in his mind.

“I know you are. But it doesn’t make the scars, nightmares, and trauma go away. Sorry Doesn’t fix everything and it definitely can’t fix this” She walks past him the blanket brushing over his shoulder. She stops in front of the elevator and speaks but doesn’t look back. Bucky is quietly crying on the floor.

“It’s not you, it’s your face..if that makes sense.”

He listens as the elevator doors close leaving him alone again. The light of the tv cast shadows on his skin. He looks down at his hands his left hand a brand new hand-fashioned by the scientists of Wakanda and from the brilliant mind of Shuri. It was fresh it was new it had done no wrong. Then his right hand, his right hand still here and just as stained as his left once was but he couldn’t change that. It didn’t matter if he changed his arm, the side he was fighting for, or his name at the end of the day in the eyes of those he hurt he was still the same man. And he couldn’t change that ever.

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itsclydebitches · 3 years

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RWBY Recaps: Volume 8 “Fault”

Hello, everyone! We’re not even bothering with an introduction today, let’s just get straight to the only thing that matters.

HERE HE IS, THE MVP OF THIS EPISODE, OF THE WHOLE VOLUME, THE SERIES, THE ONLY ONE I CARE ABOUT RIGHT NOW

I’m joking… but only a little. In all seriousness we will get to Ren, but you all want to hear a funny story first? I somehow got it into my head that there was no RWBY episode this week—the holiday and all—so I poured all my meta time and energy into a ridiculous Ironwood analysis as a placeholder, only to wake up this morning and find the strongest (and most complicated!) episode this year waiting for a recap. Like some sort of grimm nosing into my inbox.

Okay, so it’s not a funny story, but if RT would just do a better job with their website my life would be a whole lot easier.

So here we are, taking a look at the episode “Fault.” Quick question, is every episode this volume going to have a one-word title? It’s not a criticism, I’ve got nothing against a punchy name, I’m just curious since RWBY has never done that before. If anything, they’ve gone more for symbolically significant phrases like “A Brawl in the Family,” “Players and Pieces,” and “The Lady in the Shoe.” I wonder what sparked the change.

Anyway, we open on Robyn laughing about some story she’s told, something about Joanna losing a fair fight for the first time, presumably to her. This is what we’ve learned about Robyn since this volume started: she refuses to acknowledge that she had a hand in Clover’s death; she was asked by Blake and Yang to keep the Amity secret but, according to May, couldn’t keep her mouth shut about it; and she tries to cheer Qrow up by bragging about her own skill.

Alrighty then.

Obviously, this little story fails to land. “Tough crowd tonight.” Robyn looks to Jacques as well as Qrow when she says this and since she clearly doesn’t care about cheering him up, she must want to get a rise out of him. Create something, as she says at the end of the scene, that’s exciting. Robyn just really loves to start fights. Against Ironwood, Clover, bickering matches with Jacques—stories told about winning them! If she’s not fighting someone she’s not interested.

Qrow does eventually give the smallest smile though and Robyn cheers. “Did I win?” They both quickly grow serious again though and Robyn says she’s “sorry for what happened. It wasn’t your fault.” Her apology would mean more if she was apologizing for her actions, not providing a generic ‘Sorry for your loss’ like she had no hand in this.

Qrow then insists it was his fault… but, of course, not for the reasons why he’s actually responsible (also, didn’t we do this two weeks ago?). For starters, Qrow blames his semblance for everything that went down, despite the fact that his semblance is not responsible for him breaking Clover’s aura, or Tyrian stabbing him. The most we’ve seen his semblance do is cause minor mischief, which in and of itself is absurd considering we’re meant to believe that it has kept him from his family most of his life, and informs choices like whether he’ll travel with the group in Volume 4. Still, it’s not unexpected that he would blame his semblance and think that having friends is a “childish dream”—depression is one hell of a liar—but rather, it’s frustrating that no one is helping Qrow see the truth of the situation, both the good and the bad. He certainly doesn’t need Robyn providing generic platitudes that absolve them both of their choices.

You know what the worst part is? The two kind, level-headed adults with enough distance to help Qrow acknowledge his mistakes while also correcting him about his misconceptions… are Ozpin and Clover. The former is still ignored by the cast, the latter barely got to be a character before he was killed.

Qrow goes on to say that he “made a deal with the darkness and [Clover] paid the price.” I’m sorry, what does that mean?? Outside of referencing his team-up with Tyrian, that’s the most dramatic, nonsensical thing he could have said. Qrow doesn’t admit to the team-up though, rather he starts blaming Clover for his own death.

Precisely like a good chunk of the fandom has done 🙃

He says that Clover just “wouldn’t let up” (translation: he wouldn’t agree to let me go when I was under arrest) and that they could have “worked together against Tyrian if Clover had just—”

There’s a lot to cover this episode, so I’m not going to dive into another explanation of all the justified reasons why Clover didn’t trust Qrow in that moment and why Qrow was the one who “wouldn’t let up.” If you’re interested in that rundown, head here.

Side note: can RWBY please stop with the weird mouth closeups? I’m begging the animators. Especially when so much else in this episode is gorgeous.

Yes:

No:

Robyn’s response is to make it all about her. I say, as a hypocrite, because my instinctual response in comforting someone is to also bring up a way that I might, sort of, know what they’re going through. It’s something to work on and, as always, I’d be more receptive to Robyn’s attempts if she weren’t failing so spectacularly in every other aspect of her characterization. Case in point: she says that having a truth semblance tends to make people push her away, but we’ve never once seen that. We’re introduced to Robyn as she’s adored by Fiona. The people celebrate her. Yang and Blake trust her immediately, for no reason, and comment on how useful her semblance is—they’re not concerned with it. Ironwood likewise works with her and allows her to use her semblance on him in public, at least for a time. May spoke fondly of Robyn last episode. She just finished a story about Joanna… where is this pushing away you speak of, Robyn? I really wish RWBY would consider things ahead of time and actually show them to us, rather than just having characters announce that they’re (supposedly) there.

Nice symbolism though with Robyn touching the electric bars and pulling her hand back. You reach out, you get hurt, curl in on yourself, blah, blah, blah. Too bad it’s not a moment attached to an actual struggle of hers.

Qrow buys it though, saying he’s never thought about it that way before.

You know, I get why a lot of people in the fandom hate Clover. I can’t even claim I’m much interested in him as an individual. I’m sick of straight, white, able-bodied men getting the spotlight, which is one of the things that drew me to RWBY in the first place… so theoretically Robyn should be the better choice for Qrow’s BFF, right? Especially in a world where FairGame only existed in RT’s social media queerbaiting. Give us the badass gender-bent Robin Hood instead of the boring military man!

On paper it sounds great… which is why it’s astounding that RT bungled that so badly.

Qrow never finishes his thought about Clover because the Ace Ops come in to return Watts to his cell. Interesting. The writing has definitely made Ironwood stupid, but perhaps not as stupid as he could have been? If he got Watts to hack Penny (we don’t yet know what’s going on with her during all this) and then promptly shut him away again, that’s just about the best way you can follow up on your worst decision.

Harriet spots Clover’s pin and tells Qrow “You don’t get to keep that,” but then doesn’t take it from him. See, that right there is a better motivation for potentially opening the cell. Qrow says he didn’t kill Clover, Harriet shoots back that his blood was on Qrow’s blade (again, focusing on the wrong way that he’s guilty), Robyn challenges her to get the truth via her semblance… and Harriet considers it? Why? She’s not the one struggling with her loyalty here, that’s Marrow, yet he’s the one who has to pull Harriet back with “What are you doing?” when she looks at the keypad. Have Marrow almost be swayed by Robyn’s taunting, or have Harriet almost open the door because she’s furious and desperate to get Clover’s pin back. Either one of those would make more sense than this.

Also, no one checked Qrow during his arrest/before he was thrown into his cell?

Also, note that Marrow uses a nickname here—“Hare”—so I’m continually unpersuaded by the ‘They’re not friends’ claim. Yes, Harriet hits his shoulder on her way out… and Ren will later scream at Jaune about cheating. Harriet being in a bad mood because their leader was just murdered isn’t evidence that they’re not close, no more than Ren responding to Everything Traumatic Ever is evidence that he doesn’t care for his friends.

Also (x3), Robyn calls Harriet “mohawk”?? Can’t this woman come up with a single good insult?

As the Ace Ops leave Robyn lays back down on her bunk, exactly as she was before, and says, “Well, that was almost exciting.” Kind of like this scene! Luckily, the episode is about to get a whole lot better.

The music immediately picks up as we segue to Ren, Jaune, and Yang chasing after Oscar. On the whole I really enjoyed this scene, largely because it shows the group doing their best—in a way that feels persuasive. I’ll admit that others have a point about them just standing around while the Hound changes form—yet still failing because, you know, our villain is actually powerful! However, there are, as always, some nitpicks.

One of the first bits of dialogue we get is Ren noticing that the bikes can’t stand being in the cold for very long. It bugs me that bikes suffer more from the cold than the civilians do. To say nothing of the fact that it once again doesn’t amount to anything. Their bikes carry them through the whole battle and Jaune looses his because of a grimm. Then Yang manages to fix the totaled bike with a single part, despite the continued cold. Why bother introducing this as a problem when it’s meaningless each and every time?

The three do demonstrate some great teamwork though. When Yang yells that she wishes one of them could fly, Jaune uses his shield to launch Ren at the Hound… so that he can get dragged through the air, hitting rocks. This poor guy. I like that though because no, these teens shouldn’t be perfect, strategic masterminds and yes, they’re in the kind of situation where they just have to try something and see if it works. Jaune can’t think ahead to what Ren will do once he grabs the Hound, they just have to get him to that point and go from there. Which they do. Ren snags a boulder to slow them down further (that’s smart) and Yang goes higher to fire at the Hound’s face (don’t hit Oscar he doesn’t have aura!!). They’re at a crazy disadvantage here and still trying their best to get our boy back.

The overall tone is… fine? Again, love supportive Yang—that high five with Jaune was wholesome—but it continually feels weird to get that when Oscar is in the literal jaws of death here. On the whole though the scene keeps to the action and seriousness of the situation, which I appreciate. We’ll talk more about tone during the outpost scene.

It's looking like they might be making some sort of headway when the Hound lets out a roar that, as Yang puts it, calls for backup. 1. Yay giving this grimm even more power to mess with the cast, 2. Holy shit there are so many grimm around. See, scenes like this is why I’m side-eyeing the anti-army rhetoric in the show (a stance I’d otherwise agree with 100%). Because do you see how many there are? That’s not Salem’s army, that’s just the normal grimm hanging out around Atlas. The cast is screwed if anyone were to, say, order them to attack the kingdom…

Kudos to RT for bringing back the centipede grimm though. I honestly thought they’d just be a one-off action sequence in Volume 7.

While everything is falling apart Ren catches a glimpse of Oscar, complete with rosy cheeks to make him look super young, and the sight fills him with

He starts climbing towards the Hound and we cut away.

Meanwhile, Jaune’s bike is hit with some of the centinel’s acid (again, not the cold causing problems) and he takes a tumble, managing to keep his feet before Yang snags him. Moments like that really do show how far he’s come and I’m glad we got to see such a moment in an episode where his cheating was brought up. Jaune then uses his shield to fly over one of the dragon-y grim, but... wait. The shield is flexible?

Literally what is the point of that? As a shield, I mean (it clearly works fine as a ramp). If you can just tip it over like that then so can the grimm or another fighter. Forget how tiny the shield is, all a monster would have to do is boop it and it would fall over. In fact, it probably should have with the grimm scratching at it before. Seems rather useless, unless you’ve got writers crafting convenient situations. Also, does Jaune have multiples of this thing? He picked it up before, but there’s no way he found that one again. Idk, I’m really not feeling this addition to Jaune’s arsenal. Better to give him a range option so he’s more versatile.

Still, they fly over the grimm and the two let out a sigh in synch. Whatever else we might have to say about this volume, RT is definitely giving us different interactions and team-ups. Well done there. Why, Jaune and Yang have managed to survive all that together!

Oh wait, never mind. They’ve gone off a cliff.

Honestly, I’m shocked they actually went over. I thought Yang would stop in time, or we’d have a classic moment of them tumbling off the bike and ending an inch from the edge, maybe going off slow with time for one to hang on. But nope, they plummet and it was done with such confidence by the camera that for a split second (the illogic of killing them both off aside) I thought that was it. They’re done for. Lucky for them, Ren catches them at the last second, managing to snag Jaune’s sword and them and immediately use his semblance so the grimm doesn’t eat them. That’s skill, baby!!

But you can see why he’s pissed, beyond just the fact that his semblance is holding this group together. It’s not Jaune and Yang’s fault that there was suddenly a cliff, but last we saw Ren he was heading towards Oscar. He had a plan. Granted, not one that was likely to lead anywhere given the Hound’s power (and the plot needing Oscar to reach Salem), but that’s not the point. He was pulling himself towards their kidnapped friend and then at the last second had to cut himself loose to save two others. This moment wasn’t anyone’s fault, but it would take someone with no emotions at all not to be frustrated by it.

So we leave the trio literally hanging out and return to Ruby’s group who is threatening kids!

Seriously though WTF, Weiss? Look, I haven’t always been kind to Whitley. In fact, I think there’s a Volume 7 recap where I really laid into him for his attitude and for supporting Jacques. But then—with the help of some friends and other anon perspectives—I thought about it for a hot second and considered how little power this child has. I was wrong to blame him for so much given the various circumstances here. It took, like… five minutes of thinking, and that’s for a fictional character, not a real life brother. Weiss clearly hasn’t given her brother five seconds of thought. He’s in the same abusive household that she was. He wasn’t blessed with combat abilities and a semblance to easily escape. He didn’t have Weiss there to guide him like Winter guided her. He had to watch BOTH his sisters abandon him to Jacques… so when exactly was he supposed to learn to be better? Why would he be inclined to? Weiss was an entitled racist when she got to school and needed new friends to show her a new path. She admitted as much last volume! Yet the fact that Whitley is completely alone in this house while their mom locks herself in her room to drink doesn’t register at all? This woman, an adult out to save the world as we’re frequently told, never once considered what it took to get her here and realize that Whitley has had none of the resources she did?

I want to emphasize that Weiss threatens him with her weapon. It’s not just that she’s dismissive of him and his plight, she’s also happy to use violence if Whitley doesn’t do exactly as he’s told. Violence… against her brother… who is a child… without any training. Again: WTF, Weiss? You know how I was praising RWBY last episode for not having the group beat up the Atlas personnel? Yeah, we get this instead.

Then she tells him to go to his room??

Speculation is that Whitley is about 2-3 years younger than Weiss. Or, to put it another way, roughly the same age as Weiss’ leader, Ruby. She’ll follow Ruby unquestioningly into world-changing decisions, but sends her brother to his room like a toddler? Which is it, RWBY? Are 17 year-olds leaders you should listen to, or babies who must leave the room while the grownups talk? He certainly can’t be any younger than Oscar, so again, she’ll fight beside him, but treat Whitley like this? Whitley isn’t exactly going to offer help in a respectful, eager manner, but that “Fine. What do you expect me to do?” was incredibly open given his situation. He was willing to help and that was the perfect opportunity to have him, you know, do something. Something small and innocuous that wouldn’t threaten the team if he betrayed them, but kept him around so he could talk to someone. But nope. Weiss just sends him to his room after criticizing him for not understanding that they’re “busy trying to save Atlas.” Weiss, what does Whitley know about all that? He’s locked up in this manor after your father was arrested and the one news clip we’ve seen said that no one knows why Ironwood recalled his forces, or what’s up with those grimm overhead. She’s acting like he should have any idea what’s happening right now.

Also, all of this is coming on the heels of Willow begging Weiss not to forget her brother, so that’s just great. RWBY has the rest of their time in the manor to fix this, because if Weiss comes out of that scene having only been handed the means of arresting Jacques… that’s just bad all around.

Finally, should we talk about how strange this choice is? Last episode we saw the group flying away and I assumed it was them leaving Atlas to go back to Mantle. It certainly looked that way, but now they’ve decided to stay until Nora is awake. Why? Isn’t it more dangerous here? I mean, they didn’t know the staff was gone and there are still arrest warrants out. Was Weiss just going to threaten anyone who dared report her? Where are these shields Ironwood spoke of? Have they gotten through them somehow, or are they currently trapped in Atlas?

This is “Oscar is in the slums, leaves the slums, learns they’re going to the crater, but the slums are actually the crater, so we’re heading back now” all over again.

The one good thing about this scene is that Blake and Ruby talk! …for about two seconds lol. Eh, better than nothing. Blake says that if Ruby is worried about Yang she could try calling her. Ruby has, and Yang isn’t picking up.

Does Ruby think she’s in danger or ignoring her? Unclear. We, however, know that Yang is now lost in the middle of nowhere with no reception and no transportation back to Mantle. The three of them start trudging towards an outpost Ren spotted, needing to find shelter “before this weather drops our aura levels completely.” So what about everyone without aura?? I wish that I could check off the bingo space again because this is ridiculous.

Ren, once again, isn’t in the mood to talk, but unlike Jaune, Yang can’t leave something alone. So she coaxes him to tell him what’s wrong and you know what? She does a real good job at first. She’s encouraging, but her voice is level and she doesn’t come across as accusing. Well done, Yang.

Things quickly fall apart though as Ren says EVERYTHING I’VE EVER WANTED TO SAY TO THIS GROUP. Holy shit, everyone, let’s count ‘em up:

Nothing is going smoothly so let’s stop pretending it’s all fine

Oscar has been horrifically kidnapped that’s #bad

This is not a normal part of being a huntsmen

We don’t know the first thing about being huntsmen!

Every time we’ve had to make real decisions we got them all wrong, yay us

We’re trapping a city here for Salem to destroy whenever she feels like it, yay us x2

Our leader is barely more than a kid and one of us cheated our way here

People are going to die because of us

“I’m just saying what nobody else wants to”

Yang’s response? Incredibly weak imo. Just as weak as the fandom’s has been since this conflict started in Volume 7. Her argument against letting Atlas go is that Salem won’t just let it fly away with her whale… but no one knows that. She’s certainly just letting it sit right now! Assuming that something won’t work because you expect the worst is not a compelling reason not to try.

Her argument against their ineptitude? They saved Haven, took down a leviathan, and got the lamp to Atlas. Let’s break that down a little more.

Did they fight well at Haven? Yes… overlooking that Weiss would have died if not for a timely semblance reveal. But the real point here is that they “saved” the school by getting the Relic. Problem is, they never won the relic, it was handed to them. Literally. They retrieved it not because they were capable of overpowering Salem’s forces and a Maiden, but because Raven decided she’d rather her daughter be a target than her. That doesn’t tell us anything about the group’s skill, only about Raven’s flaws.

They took down a leviathan… after drawing it to Argus in the first place. That’s kind of an important detail when Ren is trying to make the point that their decisions suck. Also, how did they take it down? Using Ruby’s silver eyes, which only worked because Jinn randomly decided to let her stop time. Oh, and also using the rest of Cordovin’s mech that they hadn’t yet destroyed. Again, nothing about that fight demonstrates their skill, only others’ abilities, resources, and the strange favoritism they benefit from.

Getting the lamp to Atlas. Well, you drove Ozpin away who was your ticket across the border. Then Maria told Ruby how to save you all from the Apathy (and Ruby herself was the only one able to resist long enough to demand you get the Relic back in the first place). You started that leviathan fight and ended it surrounded by Cordovin’s fleet. So how did you get to Atlas? Because she let you cross. How did you reach Ironwood? Because he dropped your arrest. Yang stopped Adam, yes, but that was its own, separate fight. Regarding the “getting to Atlas” point they botched that up completely.

Basically, this resume of victories is unpersuasive, to say the least. Yang highlights the end goal rather than acknowledging Ren’s point: have we, as individuals, actually made things better lately?

They absolutely have not.

Note how, in contrast, Ren includes himself in this criticism. He doesn’t just lay responsibility at Ruby and Jaune’s feet, he’s second on the list for being underprepared. For messing up. He’s just an “orphan from nowhere” and this tells us that, unlike Qrow, Ren is actually concerned with this problem and his own place in it. He’s not just blowing off steam and running from his responsibility. Rather, he’s making important points here yet, as he says, no one else wants to listen.

And that’s why the scene ultimately sucks. “But, Clyde! It’s a speech straight out of your metas!” Yes it was and it was beautiful to witness, but the problem is that Ren’s supposed to be wrong. Jaune glares at him before leaving. Yang clenches her fists and asks if he just wants to push everyone away. He’s left hanging his head. Then later they talk about how “broody” he is and provide advice about how to stop doing that. The takeaway here is not, ‘Holy shit, Ren is right and we should rethink our choices,’ but rather that Ren is wrong and needs to come over to their ‘correct’ perspective.

I love that this was laid out. I love that the group is actually fighting for once (way better than Ruby and Yang’s ‘fight’). I also love that we finally see what’s bothering Ren… but we all know this isn’t leading anywhere. The scene ends with Jaune dismissing everything by stating that if Ren doesn’t want to be a huntsmen, fine, but he has a job to do. Ren is supposed to feel guilty here for… telling the truth? Jaune is supposed to look like the hero for soldiering on with his responsibility while moody Ren drags behind. The scene is great, but the purpose of the scene sucks.

Actually, I’d like to talk about a portion of the outpost scene real quick. Skipping ahead, because we really see here how little RT believes the words that they’ve put in Ren’s mouth. Jaune admits that he’s right about cheating into Beacon… but nothing else. Indeed, that “mistake” is swept away because he’s earned his right to be here now. You shouldn’t care about that anymore! Ignoring the point Ren was making about how much they’re in over their heads. Yang apologizes to Jaune on Ren’s behalf, making it clear that she cares more about his potentially hurt feelings than any of the points Ren made. Remind you of anything? Like oh, say, that time Yang cared more about Jaune’s feelings than whether he’d hurt Oscar after slamming him against a wall? All of this despite the fact that Yang JUST accused Ruby of the horrible situation they’re in. Now Ren acknowledges that they’re in a horrible situation and Yang… doesn’t care?? Again, RT is good at giving us the pieces we want, the surface level stuff, but is rarely able to combine it into something fulfilling. If anyone actually takes Ren’s stance seriously, changing their ways rather than talking him out of it, I’ll be shocked.

Especially since the real nail in the coffin of this scene is Jaune telling him that “The more you hide from what you’re feeling, the more alone you’re going to feel.”

Jaune………..buddy……….pal…………were you asleep during that scene? Ren DID tell you what he was feeling. For the first time he did come clean about everything he was experiencing and you both rejected him for it! He’s not pulling away because he’s hiding from what he’s feeling, he’s pulling away because he did show it and both his friends reduced it to “pushing [them] away.” Which is it, Jaune? Should Ren be more open, or should he stop saying things you don’t want to hear? It’s a more complicated version of telling your parents about your interests, them mocking those interests, and then they’re surprised when you don’t share things with them again. I mean, the gall of Jaune to reject everything Ren said in the moment, ignore it after he’s calmed down, and then lecture him about being hiding his emotions.

Jaune and Yang (and the story) don’t want Ren to say what he really thinks, they want him to say what they think. Ren should speak up, but only if he’s going to agree with them.

So Ren sits out in the snow because potentially dying from cold is better than staying in a room with Yang and Jaune. I can’t really blame him lol.

One last thing about the fight scene. Remember how May was put in her place last episode for not using Penny’s name? Well, Yang doesn’t either. Granted, “the Maiden” isn’t as overtly insulting as “tin can” (or whatever it is May said), but it amounts to the same thing: both are replacing Penny’s individual identity with her status as a tool they can use. May sees Penny as the cool tech girl who can get them into the military base. Yang sees Penny as the cool magic girl who is the answer to all their ‘How do we win this?’ problems. Everyone is using Penny. Ruby to launch Amity, Ironwood to open the vault, but you know RWBY will never have a scene where Penny corrects Yang about her name and Ruby looks on, smug. Because the group can continually make the same mistakes as the adults/antagonists around them, but aren’t called out on it in the same way. Ren calls them out and he’s told he’s wrong.

Anyway, the tl;dr of this scene is that Ren is the best. Too bad the story doesn’t realize that.

We then move to my poor Oscar who wakes up looking at his own feet, Ozpin’s voice is as reassuring as it can be under the circumstances. “Oscar? Don’t panic. We’re going to be okay.” I mentioned two weeks back that I hoped the show would explain why we didn’t see Ozpin try to take control during the Hound fight and we still don’t have an explanation, so that’s disappointing. This line is all we get from Ozpin because that’s the norm now. We moved from him being written out of the story entirely to having one or two lines an episode (excluding a speech meant more for the audience than the characters). So, improvement? But a lackluster one, I think. Especially given that he is the focal point of this entire situation with Salem.

I’m avoiding the elephant in the room though. Oscar’s torture is horrifying. In the sense that it should be horrifying. Salem might still inexplicably not be attacking Atlas—and what she’s after at any given time might be getting more and more muddled—but she’s absolutely terrifying here, which is what we needed. The mix of assault with that nurturing tone is just skin crawling. “My long lost Ozma. Found at last” while she (I think?) shows images of their daughters. Honestly, I only heard that from friends, didn’t catch it myself, but then my eyes are shit to begin with. I couldn’t see a thing in this shadowed shot.

(It’s like watching Game of Thrones all over again.)

Oscar tries to pretend to be Ozpin and he does a damn good job with “I’m sorry the reunion isn’t living up to your expectations.” It’s not enough to fool Salem though. She says he’s “not him” yet and I’m again reminded that the show continually references this merge without showing us any change. They’re apparently closer to one person now, but they still speak as individuals. Oscar has Ozpin’s magic, but hasn’t used it, even when his life was on the line. The closest we get to evidence that the merge is underway is that Oscar attempts to lie about knowing Jinn’s name… but what the hell else is he supposed to do here? I suppose he could go the action hero route and shout that she’ll never get the answer out of him, but trying to lie is by far the safer option. That doesn’t tell us that he’s becoming like Ozpin, or even that they’re truly “like-minded souls” as Salem claims. It just tells us that Oscar has two braincells to rub together and can say a short sentence without totally giving himself away. Maybe the kid played a few rounds of Remnant’s Among Us.

This moment highlights another justification for Ozpin’s secrets though. He lives an existence where he is not in control of his own (“own”) body. At any point the host he’s with could falter, fail, turn on him, and in doing so give crucial, world ending information to the enemy. It’s already happened on a small scale, with Oscar successfully taking control, stealing the Jinn information, and giving it to the group. Now here he’s being tortured. How long can he last? Will Oscar give up Jinn’s name? If Ozpin didn’t have the location of the Relic locked up tight in his own consciousness, would that information be lost too? I’m not looking to blame Oscar for anything here—I don’t want to imply that this situation is karma for him taking Jinn’s name, or some such nonsense—I just want to acknowledge that this is the sort of stuff Ozpin has to worry about. If he shares these secrets then that’s more fallible people who are capable of giving that information to Salem. If he keeps them…well, he’s the only one who has to keep his mouth shut during a torture session. His host might want information about the Relics, there’s an argument to be made that they’re entitled to them, but if I were Ozpin I wouldn’t want to take that risk either. The question has essentially become, “Would I trust a 14 year old to keep quiet while tortured by a witch?” Maybe Oscar will! He’s enough of a BAMF to manage it… but that’s still not something I’d want to bet on. Better that Oscar simply doesn’t have that information to give Salem, period.

So obviously this “working relationship” that Salem wants isn’t going well. When Oscar lies she jumps straight to torturing him.

This was legitimately hard to watch and I’m torn about that. On the one hand it’s what I wanted: a scary, powerful Salem who uses the tools at her disposal to get what she’s after. That’s great! Yet I’m still reminded of how far this show has gone to literally beat up the child of the group. Oscar is the one punched into a tree, attacked by a friend, shot by an ally, the star of the show’s most horrifying kidnapping, now the first to be outright tortured by Salem. I don’t really have a point here, I’m not looking to level any specific accusations at RT, I’m just commenting on the pattern and acknowledging that it makes me uncomfortable. There are parts of a story where you’re supposed to be uncomfortable—like the villain torturing a hero—and then there are parts where you’re uncomfortable because the writers seem overly focused on showing images of a specific kid suffering and that’s… weird.

I’m not sure what to make of that just yet.

Anyway, Salem’s magic here is surprisingly pretty. Pretty and painful, but I expected more red and blacks, perhaps some spikey imagery, so the rainbow was an interesting surprise. Given the amount of pain Oscar is in, I suspect too much of that would kill him, so Salem calls in Hazel to continue the interrogation. The first few hits he deals are for Haven, the others for his sister.

See, this is why RWBY needs to actually embrace its “life isn’t a fairy tale” theme. You cannot show me child torture in one week and then move to Ruby “We’ll win because we’re the good guys ^_^” Rose the next. The whole reason why Ironwood (and Ren now) was right is because this is the shit reality they’re dealing with. You didn’t run when you had the chance and now Oscar (and Ozpin) is being tortured. You keep talking about saving Mantle, but the only reason why they’re not already dead is because the writing randomly turns the cold danger on and off. This mix of horrific, real world danger and unjustified confidence doesn’t work.

…also, I officially don’t want any redemption arc for Hazel. This guy is beating on a child because he’s convinced that he’s Ozpin, blaming Ozpin for his sister’s decision, all while forwarding a genocidal maniac’s plans. Hazel and his ridiculous shirts can just get on out of here, thanks.

Finally, I just want to say... this is the woman a lot of the fandom defended. This is the woman you wanted raising those girls and blamed Ozpin for trying to escape with them.

This is how Salem treats children.

Oh, and all of this is without his aura because it just broke. So Oscar is in serious, non-fantasy trouble here.

Someone please rescue him soon 😭

We finish up with some frankly boring stuff with the rest of the villain cast. We learn that the Hound is an “experiment” and a new one given that Cinder has never seen it before. Salem’s dialogue is admittedly great—“Do you hear that, my pet? She thinks. She wants.”—but Cinder just rehashes everything we’ve heard from her before. She wants the Winter Maiden power. She has trouble remembering that she’s playing at Salem’s slave. She even rehashes the exact same line, “Without you, I am nothing.” Why are we wasting time on this when we had that tantalizing backstory before?

Bleh.

Salem tells her in no uncertain terms to stay put.

So Cinder immediately leaves LOL.

She just wants to “check on” Amity tower because she “knows those kids” in ways Salem doesn’t. I’m admittedly slightly confused as to how Cinder knows to go there? Did she believe Ironwood’s lie that it was finished even though it apparently IS finished now? Has she overheard something? I’m not sure. Frankly, keeping track of that stuff in RWBY is headache inducing, so let’s just roll with it.

Neo, the only one with a brain around here, makes it clear she thinks Cinder is an idiot for going. Emerald, always the Cinder fan, offers to go in her stead. She’s been working on her semblance, so I expect we’ll see something cool with that soon. They head off, apparently not worried about what Salem will do to them when they get back.

Which is when we move to the outpost for our final scene, most of which I’ve covered. I only have two more things I want to bring up here.

The first is the tone. As said earlier, the tone of the Hound chase wasn’t horrible, but I find myself disappointed in the overall attitude of Jaune and Yang. Yang is making jokes about how they can’t fly, high-fiving Jaune, and they’re both shrugging off Ren’s concerns. Jaune says he won’t be able to sleep due to worrying about Oscar, but neither of them act particularly worried. Which isn’t to say they need to be sobbing the whole time or whatever, just that Ren is the only one who feels real here. They may not agree with his stance about everything else, but they’ve all experienced the same event: watching a grimm that can morph, talk, and think horrifically kidnap a teammate. Shouldn’t there be more emotion attached to that? Things have gotten better with Oscar than they’ve been in the past, largely due to details like Nora’s hug at the beginning of the volume, but let’s be real, they’re still not perfect. Do we think Jaune and Yang would be this nonchalant if Ruby were kidnapped that way? Say all you want about Ruby being her sister, or others being teammates for longer, but the fact remains that Oscar has been taken to Salem herself and the only one reacting to that in any meaningful way is Ren.

Who they say will “brood himself to death.” That right there. The one guy freaking out about your kidnapped friend should not be described as “brooding.”

All of which segues into my second point, namely that Yang doesn’t seem to care about Ruby anymore either! She asks Jaune, “Do you think she thinks less of me?” for not going to Amity and when Jaune reassures her that Ruby will always love her, Yang’s response is, “Yeah… Ruby.”

She was thinking about Blake.

The kicker? I thought she was talking about Ruby too. Because Ruby is her sister. Because she and Ruby had the fight (“fight”). Because Ruby was trying to call her to check in. Because Blake and Yang didn’t even acknowledge that they went on different missions here. I thought Blake was like Jaune, not really taking a side and just heading with Ruby because the team is splitting down the middle. Where did this worry come from?

And I want to praise RT here (I really do) because I can see the effort. I said Blake and Yang needed to spend time apart, they have. I said they needed to work through their co-dependent identities, now Blake is reminding Nora (and theoretically herself too) that someone you love is just a part of you. I said that the group couldn’t be a hive-mind, now there’s disagreement. I said the show needs to make Blake/Yang canon at some point and you can’t do that if they don’t talk about and to each other. So I fully admit that this is everything I asked for… so why does it feel so badly done? No matter how many boxes it checks off, it’s still a moment where we thought Yang was finally worrying about her sister again—like she used—and then it’s ‘Sike! It was really just about Blake! Again. Yang is worried about a problem that was never even introduced.’

I suppose that’s why it doesn’t work for me. Yang and Ruby had the falling out, but Yang and Blake, somehow, become the focus. Is it really so hard to write Yang as a sister and a potential love interest? Yang apparently can’t care for Ruby and Blake, Weiss can’t care for her team and her brother, Ruby can’t care for Mantle and Ironwood… it’s like each character gets one (1) thing to put their emotional energy towards at any given time and that’s it. That’s all they get.

On the flip side, this is why Ren feels like a person this episode. He cares about Mantle, and the future fight, and their past mistakes, and his place here, and the problems within the team, and Nora… He feels like a well-rounded person! vs. Yang and Jaune who don’t even consider his perspective, vs. Yang having a fight with her sister but only cares about Blake. They’re one-dimensional in comparison.

It is, as always, disappointing.

As the group “broods” then the camera shows us a piece of the ice nearby, slowly cracking as Jaune says that “Things always seem to get worse before they get better.” Well, that’s unexpected. I didn’t think our opening would be literal. I’ve been worried about Atlas falling on everyone, not everyone falling… to whatever is underneath the kingdom as a whole. Is the kingdom falling apart? Or is something waking up and moving towards the surface? If RWBY can reproduce the characterization we got with the Hound, I wouldn’t be opposed to another leviathan grimm rising from the snowy deep to assist Salem…

Though how the fuck group will survive everything and that, who knows lol.

And that’s our episode! Issues aside—most of which have been ongoing issues. We knew they were there—I think this was our strongest episode so far this volume. Well done! There are still problems, no doubt, but at least I was only bored for a small portion of that 20 minutes. Let’s just keep heading in that direction.

Exciting Saturday, huh?

Regarding bingo updates:

RWBY actually re-used a grimm I thought they’d abandoned, so well done there.

No civilians around for the giant grimm army to attack, so that was fine. Kind of strange though that they completely disappeared after the Hound left.

The timeline is starting to get wonky. For example, what kind of stakes am I supposed to expect when Cinder decides to head to Amity? Is it currently empty? Is Pietro there? Has Penny made it yet? I said weeks ago that RWBY would need to follow multiple groups to fill out fourteen episodes in just two days—and they’re definitely doing that—but that means we don’t have a clear sense of what events are happening simultaneously and what are meant to be linear.

No Winter or Ironwood this episode.

Watts is back with Jacques! Potential for team-up 2.0? That will admittedly be hard with Qrow and Robyn there, unless those two escape.

(Oh yeah, I thought Qrow and the others would be held in the military base and Ruby would find him during her heist… but she doesn’t even care that Qrow is in jail.)

Maria is still a ghost. If we hit the halfway mark with her not doing anything I’m calling the space.

I definitely wouldn’t call this cliffhanger needless. That’s actually a cool way to end things, even if Jaune’s line was pretty on the nose.

Neo may be getting closer to backstabbing Cinder if those expressions are anything to go by.

Still waiting to see if Amity works.

And finally, drumroll please! …

“More obvious Blake/Yang implications without confirming a relationship.” Yup, I’m marking that this week. After Blake’s ‘just a part of you’ comment and now Yang only being worried about her reaction? Definitely calling it. If RWBY confirms a relationship this volume I’ll eat my words—and some celebratory cake — but until then salt prevails. Especially after the fiasco that was Supernatural.

Still no bingo. Ah well, maybe next week lol.

Until then! 💜

[Ko-fi]

#rwby #rwby spoilers #rwby volume 8 #rwby fault #rwby recaps #mymetas

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