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acerace · 3 years

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...you have opened my eyes to a vast universe of VintageBeef lore that I was unaware of. I knew about the New Hermit Order, of course, and the UHC invention, and I've watched a few of his CTM things but -- I will take all the info and lore you feel like giving out because Beef is amazing and my knowledge is so small.

Vintagebeef my beloved <3

So the thing is, right, until about 2016 I only watched two (2) youtubers- Vintagebeef for Minecraft and aDrive for Pokemon (and funnily enough both of them are named Dan irl). So I've watched most of Beef's videos over the years and have a general knowledge of most of his stuff, except because it's been like a decade I don't remember where most of the lore comes from XD

The thing with him is that he doesn't do Lore tm the way other mcyters often do lore- he doesn't have an extensive RP series to draw from like Grian, doesn't have a solo world with steadily increasing amounts of lore like Etho or Zisteau, and while he's played on SMPs and been involved in storylines before it's not really the focus of his episodes unlike with Evo or Legacy or Empires

So where does that leave us?

IRL, Beef always has multiple series running at the same time. Often he's playing on an smp while doing a singleplayer, often modded, series as well as a CTM or modpack with a group of friends. For example, right now he's playing on Hermitcraft, doing weekly Pixelmon and Building a Zoo episodes, and a CTM map with Slip. And to me, this translates to one thing: Beef is an adventurer. He travels frequently- he explores a world and when he decides he's done, he leaves for the next one. That's the basis of my personal interpretation of his series and his character for my writing.

Ok so reading this back, this got extremely long and didn't explain much in the way of lore, somehow? If anyone has any additions to add please do so, I am very definitely leaving out a lot and would love to see what other lore people remember and are using for Beef! I didn’t include the Hermitcraft stuff since my memory of season 4 is blurry (his base was themed after the Martian, that much I know, and he and Iskall were buddies :D) and most of the s5 NHO lore is best watched from Bdub’s perspective from what I remember, and the only s6 stuff is a single line in Hermitgang and then the Area 77 arc with its possibility of an NHO reunion which we did not get rip. And s7 of course had the cloning machine and also the Podzol Party as the main lore. So all the original rambling is still below the cut though it is very long, and I'm gonna bullet point the main stuff here instead:

Actual canonical things:

Invented UHC and was the only survivor of the first ever uhc (Mindcrack UHC s1)

Married to an ender dragon (one of the UHCs I think), later father to a different dragon (Mindcrack season 3? I think?)

Might not have legs if you choose to take that joke as canon (Mindcrack s2)

Was a wizard (RAD)

is a zookeeper (Building a Zoo)

Had a wife and kids (Sims in Minecraft)

Part of the Trial of the B Team court case (Mindcrack)

NHO founder, founder of the Podzol Party (Hermitcraft)

Created a cloning machine that sort of works (Hermitcraft)

Played the Forest which is I believe the first time he and Keralis played together (look up the trigger warnings for this one, it's a horror game)

Was the creator/owner of Sourceblock SMP (featuring some familiar faces if you know Legacy, Empires, or MCC) and there is literal magic from a mysterious sourceblock of water that teleports people and summons mobs and probably more stuff that I haven't seen yet since I'm still watching it myself

Things you can infer:

Good with animals (Life in the Woods, Pixelmon, Ark)

Is a car nerd (irl and all of the car games he's played)

Is a highly experienced adventurer who has traveled through dozens of worlds both vanilla and modded, across multiple dimensions (Twilight Forest, the Aether, the Betweenlands, Limbo), completed dozens of monuments, fought in blood sports, survived apocalypse after apocalypse, tamed dinosaurs, and played a lot of prop hunt and golf with your friends

If you're looking for what to watch for lore purposes, I'd say the Mindcrack UHCs and Team Canada's RAD series are pretty good, definitely Sourceblock and HC s5, plus the Diversity CTM maps and Ruins of the Mindcrackers maybe? And Mindcrack Prank Wars for the chaos and the origin of Team Canada. And if you can handle horror than the Forest is fun and if you don't do horror you can watch the Pojkband play golf or prop hunt they're hilarious I love them sm I want a Pojkband reunion So Bad

Beef's first series was a singleplayer series in beta 1.4_01 though he had played the game extensively before that, and was a big fan of Guude, having watched his own Minecraft videos. The series was functionally a hardcore one where if he died Beef would delete the world and start again! I haven't actually Watched this series so idk if he died or how often lmao. When Guude made Mindcrack, which was btw one of the very first Minecraft SMPs, he also hosted a competition for people to join, and Beef submitted a video (which is still viewable on his channel I believe!) and won, and was added to Mindcrack in season 2 :D (fun fact, Guude said that even if Beef hadn’t won he would have added him anyway)

Two running jokes emerged from Mindcrack- pulling a Vintagebeef and Beef doesn't have legs. The first is a reference to Beef dying of fall damage (I believe the exact instance was him trying to jump into his swimming pool and failing spectacularly) and after the incident, every time someone died of fall damage they were pulling a Vintagebeef. The second joke comes from Guude, who joked that the reason Beef wasn't going to a convention was because he didn't have legs, and then he pranked Beef's base by building a giant pair of legs at the entrance to his castle so you had to walk between them to get into the base. This joke has long since died and both Beef and Guude feel pretty bad about it iirc because there were people who genuinely thought Beef was disabled and were emailing him supportive messages and stuff oops. So if you go looking on the Salad or find old Mindcrack fics, you might see references to Beef having prosthetic legs!

Mindcrack also brought about the creation of several Player groups- Team Nancy Drew, Team Canada, and GOB to name a few relevant to Beef. Team Nancy Drew consists of Beef, Pauseunpause, Guude, and Baj, who formed to investigate a prank on one of the members but I forget who. They're named Nancy Drew after the detective! Team Canada also formed in retaliation to pranks, with it consisting of Beef, Etho, and Pause, the three Canadian members on the server (not including Adlington who moved to Canada but never joined the group). There was also a Team America who pranked them with American flags everywhere. GOB is Guude, OMGChad, and Beef, who played stuff like the Ragecraft, Pantheon, and Monstrosity ctms together but that's way down the line lol

Team Nancy Drew is also notable for inventing UHC. It was Beef's brainchild but it was the four of them who first played it! The first UHC had the four of them working to kill the dragon with no natural regen, with everyone dying but Beef, who "won" the UHC. The second uhc was still dragon focused and iirc is where Beef married the dragon? Memories are hazy but they do kill the dragon in this one I think. UHC was then revamped as a pvp event and became a regular Mindcrack game every few months, featuring most of the Mindcrackers and several special guests, including Dinnerbone, who as we know Thanos-snapped Doc's arm out of existence as a result of Doc killing him in one of them

In one of the seasons of Mindcrack, Beef invited swedish Mindcracker and good friend Anderzel to go caving with him and invented ABBA Rules caving, where the winner takes it all. ABBA Rules is a game where each ore (and also dungeon loot like nametags) is assigned a point value and the person with the most points at the end wins and gets to keep all the stuff collected from the game.

In Mindcrack season 3?, Beef punched the ender dragon in an... awkward area, so when the dragon died and left the egg behind, Guude said Beef was the father of the egg XD I don't remember if I watched s3 so I have no idea if anything Happened with this concept but *history of the world voice* you could make lore out of this!

So Team Canada has played a Lot of CTM maps (which fun fact were pretty much invented by another Mindcrack member, Vechs, with his Super Hostile series! Super Hostile has a bunch of things called "Zistonian", which are references to another Mindcrack member Zisteau, who has a very wild singleplayer series with even wilder lore but I digress). In Ruins of the Mindcrackers, they had a running joke that Beef was Etho and Pause's mom, which is a joke we can leave in the past actually /lh. They also played all the Diversity maps, Sky Factory, Terra Restore, Uncharted Territory uhhh and a couple more ctms and adventure maps! Each map kinda has its own story so in Diversity 3 for example they were trapped in a simulation? I think? Team Canada also recently played the Roguelike Adventures and Dungeons modpack, aka RAD, in which Beef was a wizard with a magic staff that could do anything from summon lightning to control hostile mobs.

Sourceblock SMP is a vanilla survival 1.14 series that ran for one season and the series starts with each of the Players being drawn to a strange sparkling water source that, once they touch it, brings them to the Sourceblock world. It also summons a giant zombie at one point. There's probably more lore for this series but like I said I haven't watched it all the way through yet

He has a Patreon server called VintageCraft and has done a series or two on there as well, and played a few UHCs with them, so lore that how you will!

Beef also played a few popular mods, notably Pixelmon, Life in the Woods, and Feed the Beast, with LitW being singleplayer and the other multiplayer. He's also recently played the Zoo and Wild Animals mod a lot. He did a short series with the Minecraft Comes Alive mod where he married one of the villagers and had two children, so that's canon now :D he’s played a Lot of Pixelmon starting when the mod first came out iirc (he chose Turtwig in his first series and built a Grass gym, then made a Normal gym in another series in uhh 2016) and he still plays to this day. Quite a few Hermits played on his Pixelmon servers with him, like Wels, Etho, Iskall, Stress, Slip, Zueljin, and also Guude and Phedran (a Mindcrack adjacent player and creator of the LitW modpack) and a few Mindcrackers on the older servers

Mindcrack and friends played a lot of other games too- 7 Days to Die, Ark Survival Evolved, Unturned, to name a few, so you can pull a lot of lore out of these as well. Speaking of friends and non-Minecraft games, Beef teamed up with Pause, Keralis, and Slip (a former Hermit) to play the horror game the Forest, which saw them stuck on an island trying to survive against terrifying mutated human... things. They played it a few times as the game updated but as afaik it's the first time Beef played with Keralis and possibly Slip and since the game starts with the Player's airplane crashing, that could totally be how Beef first met them in-universe

I... think? that’s everything I mentioned in the tags? There is probably way more stuff I’ve forgotten that stems from inside jokes and things that happen within each series, but I hope that was a) helpful and b) at least somewhat comprehensible lmao

#hermitcraft #mindcrack #vintagebeef #mcyt #long post #asks #redwinterrises #that was so many words #kudos to anyone who reads the whole thing lmao

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moviewarfare · 3 years

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A Review of “Raya and the Last Dragon (2021)”

Raya and the Last Dragon is an original (oh thank god) Disney animation movie that was overshadowed because it's $30 on Disney+ and it came out the same day as the WandaVision finale. I was intrigued to watch this because of it being focused on Asian culture and the fact that it wasn't going to be a musical like Frozen. It felt like the Disney Animation Studios were going to do something different and I liked that. The premise "Long ago, in the fantasy world of Kumandra, humans and dragons lived together in harmony. However, when sinister monsters known as the Druun threatened the land, the dragons sacrificed themselves to save humanity. Now, 500 years later, those same monsters have returned, and it's up to a lone warrior, Raya (Kelly Marie Tran), to track down the last dragon and stop the Druun for good". So is this a great surprise or a very unwelcomed one?

I want to get this straight off my chest but I love that this focuses on Southeast Asia culture. It's nice to see it get more representation in mainstream movies. I also really love the world-building with the Dragons, the overpowering evil force the Druun and the 5 tribes. It feels familiar such as in Avatar: The Last Airbender but in Raya, the world is still different enough to set it apart from others. It is such an interesting world that I wouldn't mind more movies or shows set in this universe.

The animation is very breathtaking and gorgeous. It's very colorful and there are different variety of locations from the bustling city of Talon and the snowy plains of Spine but all of them are visually stunning. I also have to praise James Newton Howard for the score is as there is some rapid music for the more intense scenes and some uplifting scores for the more hopeful moments. The entire score feels like it represents the world of Raya and southeast Asia perfectly and it elevates the movie to another level. It also has a great song in the credit "Lead the Way" by Jhené Aiko. There are also some surprisingly great hand to hand combat and swordplay that would put a fair amount of action movies to shame. It's genuinely got some exciting action sequences!

The titular character herself Raya (Kelly Marie Tran) is also excellent. She's a fierce and courageous warrior princess with some swagger but is flawed in not trusting people and not believing the world can become united again. She never gets to the point of unlikeable and to a certain extent the movie shows she's right in some ways. I thought the dragon Sisu (Awkwafina) might be unbearably annoying from the trailers but she is pretty fun to watch. Raya's developing friendship with the contrasting view of Sisu is enjoyable and Sisu encouraging Raya to change is convincing. Namaari (Gemma Chan) the "villain" is also wonderful and her rivalry with Raya are some of the best parts of the movie. What makes Namaari work as a character is that she is not evil but also flawed like Raya but both have common ground with each other. Throughout the movie instead of wanting Raya to win, you want her and Namaari to solve their conflict and trust one another. The other supporting characters are hilarious and loveable as well. Boun (Izaac Wang) is funny as the owner of a shrimp boat restaurant, Tong (Benedict Wong) is a scary warrior giant with a heart of gold and there is a toddler con artist, need I say more? Every voice actor in this movie does a phenomenal job in their role, especially Kelly Marie Tran as Raya which is just perfect casting.

However, I do wish it explored the supporting cast a little bit more through something like a flashback because they just feel like they're along for the ride than significantly important. Furthermore, the story is very predictable and there is genuinely no surprises as it hits a lot of the clichés which is slightly disappointing. The movie also has a surprising amount of exposition throughout the movie instead of just at the beginning which slows the pacing.

Overall, Raya and the Last Dragon is one of the best original Disney Animation movies in a long time. It's filled with amazing visuals, great characters, exhilarating action sequences, a beautiful score and terrific performance from the voice actors. It just does a lot right. I loved the movie and hope Disney does more movies like Raya and The Last Dragon. Just don't do a $30 premium service and just make it available with Disney+ like Soul okay?

#movies #movie review #Disney #marvel #star wars #disney animated films #raya and the last dragon #asia #asian #kelly marie tran #awkwafina #gemma chan

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ammocharis · 3 years

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100 days of writing

I'm super late for this but I'd like to take a shot at a couple of questions provided by @the-wip-project (check it out, it's awesome!) and blabber about my Avvar headcanons and worldbuilding ideas. I want to flesh out their culture as much as possible in my fics.

Day 14

Do you have figures/creatures of folklore in your WIP? If not, can you think of something that would fit?

Day 15

Does your WIP have fairytales? Do your characters tell mythical stories to each other?

I'll tackle both of these prompts at the same time since they cover related topics. I think that coming up with fairytales, legends, mythical creatures, etc., is vital for a work of fiction that focuses on worldbuilding. From the dawn of times, people have tried to explain the world around them through tales - the laws of nature, the migration of tribes, the behaviour of animals, everything was given meaning.

These stories were exchanged between cultures, transforming as they passed from mouth to mouth, but the common elements can still be recognized. I believe that this human need for making sense of the world through stories is worth exploring, either in original fiction or fanfiction. One of my favourite parts of learning about a new fictional universe is discovering what kind of stories formed among its cultures. Do they prefer one style over another? What are the common themes? And so on, and so on.

In the case of Dragon Age, I already have the groundwork laid before me, but there's always so much more that can be done. The Avvar lore contains some beautiful examples of fictional mythology, and I want to build upon that.

Now let's move to the actual headcanons.

An idea I took further is the existence of a Great Serpent. According to one Avvar legend, when the serpent Nathramar engaged in a battle with Korth, they destroyed Mount Belenas, living only a vast crater behind, which the Lady of the Skies filled with her tears, creating a lake that eventually became known as Lake Calenhad. I wondered: "Why not include more of these gigantic serpents in Avvar legends?" So I went ahead and thought up a few more of them. They are large, snake-like creatures whose powers relate to water, storm, and lightning. I took some inspirations from the Slavic żmij/zmey.

"When the world was in its infancy, the Great Serpents still roamed the vast skies and deep waters. Hreggamar, the most boisterous of all creatures, decided to challenge a mighty dragon-mother to a duel. He was certain he would win, for he had learned her weakness while he was wandering through the clouds one day. Hidden by mist and rain, he entered the Mother's territory and sneaked upon the dragon-lair to eavesdrop on her plans…”

(The rest is under the cut because I have a lot of HCs.)

I find it compelling to imagine that the Avvar would tell stories in which the Great Serpents are responsible (in one way or another) for the creation of lake and seas.

It happened countless moons ago, before any human tribe wandered into the south. The time had come for Sundramar, one of the Great Serpents, to shed his skin. He rested his head at the coast of the ocean and stretched his long body across the earth. The end of his tail reached the land of many rivers, far away from the salt waters. Sundramar was eager to leave his old skin behind and emerge even greater than he already was. The sun would rise and set many times before his labour was over.

These Great Serpents are also supposed to hint at elven lore, which mentions some curious "giants of the sea" and Mythal transforming into a serpent to fight Andruil (the latter is probably an intentional parallel to Nathramar).

Another aspect of Avvar mythology I'd like to explore is the astronomical myths. The Astrariums presented a couple of brilliant stories, like the legend of Sindri Sky-Breaker, but I need more. Sun, moon, and star constellations are popular subjects of tales, and there's a very good reason for it. Their movements in the sky used to be the main way of tracking time and location, so they would often be anthropomorphized.

Were you ever disappointed that the two moons of Thedas receive so little spotlight? None, to be precise. There's just one offhand comment in The World of Thedas, stating that the holiday of Satinalia gets its name from the second moon, and that's it. Thedas could as well have only one moon because it's never shown again, neither in graphics nor in text. Well, I'm convinced that having two moons in the sky would have a huge impact on cultures forming in such a setting, so I decided to address it. In my headcanon, the second, smaller Thedosian moon is only visible for a part of the year. It appears in the sky at the beginning of the 11th month and vanishes a month later.

The Avvar myth that I came up with explains this phenomenon in the following way: the two moons are siblings, Hjuki and Bil. Hjuki is the older brother, and he provides illuminations for the world throughout the entire year. His younger sister, Bil, is just a child, so she needs more rest, but she joins her sibling in the sky each year, just before the winter settles in for good. Their joined effort helps make final preparations for the season of ice, such as protecting one's shelter from cold. In exchange for more light, every creature gains an additional shadow, which is associated with several superstitions.

(Side note: Yes, I borrowed the names for Hjuki and Bil from Norse mythology, but the legend is brand new, made to fit the two moons situation.)

I'm planning to invent some new constellation patterns, putting the stars from astrariums into different shapes. The constellations are arbitrary after all, and I'm pretty sure the Avvar came up with their own patterns before they were subjugated by the Tevinter Imperium.

Speaking of astronomy and time-tracking, there's another crucial aspect I aim to explore in my writing - the celebrations of solstices and equinoxes. For each of these events, I'd like to come up with a legend explaining why it occurs and what makes this time of the year unique. For example, the summer solstice is the day when the Lady of the Skies becomes the closest to the Mountains. Her light almost touches the ground. It's a moment of great joy, honouring life, warmth, and love. During the celebrations of Summer Solstice, it's customary to perform a dance telling the tale of how the first two creatures met - a beast of the sky and a beast of the earth - as it could've happened only when the Sky and the Land were close to each other.

I also used this opportunity and included yet another element of Slavic folklore - a parallel to the fern-flower, a magic flower which blooms only one night in the year, on the summer solstice. For the Avvar setting, I reimagined it as a fire-bloom, a plant connected to the goddess of fertility, Rilla of the Fireside.

An ancient legend said that Rilla of the Fireside cherished red foxes, for they reminded her of a burning hearth. One day, another god, Ahren Eagle-Eyed, wished to catch Rilla’s attention, but the goddess refused to abandon the woman who requested her help as she had wished to become pregnant. The patron of fertility turned a deaf ear to Ahren’s pestering and remained inside. She had promised she wouldn’t leave the fireside until her purpose had been fulfilled. After many unsuccessful attempts, Ahren thought of another approach. He decided to lure Rilla away with trickstery. He took the shape of a fox and arrived at the doorstep of the household that Rilla was protecting. Despite her fondness for red foxes, the goddess wouldn’t be fooled. She didn’t let the Eagle-Eyed hunter inside the house. She said that she would only open the door for him if he offered his aid to the mortal woman she took under her wings.

In the Avvar culture, there are skalds, professional keepers of stories who make sure that oral tradition is preserved, but of course, they're not the only ones sharing stories. On a long winter night, what better way to pass the time than exchange a tale or two?

#100daysofwriting #wip #worldbuilding #avvar #my avvar headcanons #dragon age

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btsslowburnfic · 4 years

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BTBY Chapter 7

Series Summary: For Namjoon, the moment he set his sights on being the #1 rapper, he pushed the symbol to the side and hated it. Love should be chosen, not forced on you. He didn’t believe in fate and this mark on his wrist was a big “fuck you” to all that." Chapter Summary It's award show night! Also, your secret comes out.

Previous Chapter found here

The group gathers around and watches their red carpet interviews which they react to with a mix of pride and cringe at different moments. The BTS production team shoots footage of them doing this and getting their hair and make-up done and then stops rolling. You are still scrolling through your phone over on the end of the styling counter when you hear the door open and close and a voice cut through the air.

“What the fuck [Y/N]?” You know who it is but you are absolutely shocked that these words are being directed at you. You turn to see Xavier coming over towards you with a look of rage on his face. Ice runs through your veins. He has never yelled at you like this. You guys have had disagreements over the years but nothing like this. In fact no one has ever yelled at you like this before. “Did you just turn down a summer tour with Imagine Dragons?”

You sit your phone on the counter and try to swallow even though our mouth has gone completely dry. “I did. I don’t get why it’s such a big deal though. Other offers are going to come along. Calm down.” you try to get him to chill out even though he is absolutely livid.

“They’re my favorite band. Did you even look at the tour schedule? They’re actually going to Hawaii. HAWAII.” he emphasizes. You notice that everyone in the greenroom has gotten quiet and they are all trying to be polite and not stare, but it’s a small room.

“Dude. I hear that you are upset, but it’s not a big deal ok. Other bands travel. We have a show to get through tonight.”

“Why did you say ‘No’? Especially without asking ME first? Why do you think you can just make all these decisions without me!” Xavier is so angry he doesn’t even look like himself. You want to tell him why you turned it down but you don’t want to make him feel bad. This is all spiraling out of control. You take a deep breath.

“I don’t have to check with you before making a decision about who I work with, ok? Can we please just get the band we ARE working with ready for the stage and move on with our evening. Please?” you are trying to keep your calm but you are starting to shake from having your best friend scream at you at you.

“What the fuck is wrong with you,[Y/N]? I thought we were a team.”

Namjoon couldn’t take it anymore. Taehyung tries to keep him from getting up but he throws his hands to the side and marches up, inserting himself between you and Xavier. “The deal from that manager was for her. Only her. They didn’t want a choreographer. That’s why she turned it down. She’s trying to be a good friend to you so stop yelling at her.” his voice boomed over the room.

Xavier stood there for a moment, taking everything in. His best friend being upset, the performer he looked up to admonishing him, and then turned and realized the whole room was looking at them.

You hold your hand in front of your mouth, surprised at how the past five minutes has gone by. You are still in shock that the whole thing has happened. “RM,” you gently touch his back. He turns his head and looks down at you, “Thanks.” You move so you’re next to him, facing Xavier. “I didn’t want to make a big deal about it. Can we please just get back to focusing on the job we are supposed to be doing right now? Other offers will come our way for both of us. Ok?” you pat Xavier on his arm to comfort him. He’s been your best friend for five years and you’re sure this has to be super embarrassing for him.

“Yeah, ok,” he says, you can see the tears in his eyes that he’s trying to not let fall. “Just uh, give me a minute, yeah? Excuse me,” he says more to RM than you and he exits the green room.

You are still shaking a little. You let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding. “Hey” you hear Namjoon’s deep voice quietly behind you and feel him gently touch your shoulder. It suddenly feels like your entire body is being wrapped in a giant warm blanket. “Are you ok?”

You turn towards his voice. “Not really.” you sigh deeply. “But, we have a show to put on and I hear you guys are supposed to win tonight. So let’s put this stupid shit behind us and move on with the evening.” you plaster a smile on your face and gently shake his hand off you. “Thanks again. I do appreciate it. Can you please apologize to the group? This whole thing is so embarrassing.”

“Yeah. I’ll take care of it. Why don’t you go take a walk?”

You avoid eye contact with the rest of the room as you head out towards the hallway. You decide to go sneak a peek at whoever is rehearsing right now. You’re glad your group went earlier in the day. Still, it was the least they could do since they had fucked up your rehearsal times yesterday.

To your surprise you turn to see JHope standing to your left. “Holy shit!” you yell. He scared you. He shrieks back at you and then laughs. “Sorry,” he holds up his hands.

“JHope. Need anything?” you smile at him.

He looks at you thoughtfully. “Just one thing.” he says and before you can even guess or ask what it might be, he grabs your arm and pushes up your dress sleeve, to look at the glowing mark on your wrist. You instinctively pull it back and up to your chest. He smiles at you and raises his eyebrows. “Yep.” He turns and walks back towards the green room. That little shit.

Tonight is not going how you planned it. These past 2 days are not going how you planned. And while it was nice that RM stood up for you back there you can’t help but wonder why. Probably because he was the leader of the group and things were getting out of hand. You think back to his hand on your shoulder and the way he stood up for you and feel tingly. Nope. Nope! You shake your head as though you can physically get the thoughts out of your head. Ugh. You really need to find Xavier to check on him. ----------- JHope walks back into the greenroom with a huge smile plastered on his face. He had suspected since yesterday afternoon that something was going on and now he had confirmed it. He goes over and whispers to Taehyung who smirks at this news. They had stayed up last night talking about this possibility and were feeling very proud of their deductive reasoning skills right now.

Jimin and Jungkook were having their hair touched up at the moment while Namjoon was scrolling through his phone. Jin was on facetime with his girlfriend over in the corner, occasionally turning the phone around to show her the organized chaos of the greenroom. Her group hadn’t broken out on the international level yet

Yoongi walks over to Namjoon, “So you’re sure our choreographer and Director are coming back, right?”

Namjoon scoffed, “Of course they’ll be back. Well, [Y/N] will be. She’s a professional.” Yoongi eyes him suspiciously. They hear a knock at the door. Without [Y/N] there to liaison, the task falls to Namjoon to go answer it. He rolls his eyes a bit, can’t they just get ready for the show??? And goes to answer it.

“Yes?” he asks, a man standing at the door with a few legal size envelopes.

“Oh, sorry to bother you. Just dropping these off for [Y/N] to look over. Is she here?”

“She stepped out for a moment, I’ll take them for her,” he responds and lets the man hand him the envelopes.

“Thanks. Good luck tonight. My daughter is a huge fan,” the man says.

“We’ll do our best,” Namjoon flashes his trademark dimples, closes the door, and takes the envelopes and thoughtfully sits them down under your clutch.

He looks over to see Yoongi smiling with Taehyung and JHope like they are plotting something. Which is never a good thing for him. Why can’t this show just be over? He sits down in his chair as a make-up artist comes over and starts to do some touch ups.

You come back to the room. No luck finding Xavier so far. You shoot JHope a glare causing him to laugh and hide behind Taehyung who flashes you a boxy smile. Oh God. Do they all know? Just get through tonight. You make your way to the back of the room to your purse so you can text Xavier and Joe.

“A courier stopped by for you,” Namjoon mentions from the chair in the space next to your stuff. “I put the envelopes under your purse.”

Apparently you should hang out with him when there are crowds of people around because he’s actually nice to you then. “Great, thanks so much.” you respond while digging your phone out. “Did Xavier come back here?”

“Nope.” Namjoon responds with an edge to his voice. Now that you think of it, he probably won’t because in addition to being embarrassed, he’s probably afraid of RM. You sigh. This goddamn day. You send off some messages to him and Joe telling them if you don’t see them before the show you will meet them at your seats. In the nosebleed section. Where they keep the staff.

You feel eyes on you and you see three of the members staring at the two of you interact but trying not to stare. You don’t dare say anything to him right now with so many hair and make-up artists surrounding you. You type into your phone, “BTW JHope knows. He came up and saw my soulmark. I’m guessing he also told the others since they look like a bunch of high school girls right about now.” “Hey, can you look at something for me?” you ask him as you hand him your phone. He gives you a confused look but takes it anyway. He reads the message, looks over at your wrist which is currently covered by your long sleeves. He starts to run a hand through his hair but stops himself since it was just styled. He types something in and hands it back to you.

“How? Your wrist is covered. Also Maybe you should get some concealer. Hasn’t your boyfriend noticed?”

You roll your eyes and type “He literally walked up, pushed my sleeve out of the way, laughed at me like a schoolgirl, and left. I haven’t seen my boyfriend since this happened. In case you haven’t noticed, IVE BEEN WORKING :/ “ you thrust the phone back into his hands as you begin to tear open the envelopes.

He reads the message and then turns to glare at the three gossips who make eye contact with him and scatter. “Sorry. I literally have 6 children. Well 5. Jin takes care of himself.” he hands you your phone back and continues to scroll through his.

You look over the contents of the first envelope and smile. As predicted, these are formal bids for summer tours. And this one is for a director and a choreographer. The tour doesn’t go to Hawaii, but you can always save up and just go with Xavier and Joe for fun. You open the other two proposals and look over the salaries, hours, and cities.

“What are those?” RM asks casually.

“These are formal bids for summer tours. This awards show is kind of known for where people look for summer work, so a lot of Producers come with bid sheets. I usually only accept written bids. Mr. Salontes caught me off guard earlier because we ran into each other. I hate networking and verbal offers; It’s too much work to keep track of all the ass kissing so I just send out my resume ahead of time and receive written bids on awards night.” You put the documents back into the folder.

“Anything good?”

“Yeah. They’re all good groups. I’ll let Xavier pick. He has to work around Joe’s schedule and cares more. I just love traveling so I’ll go wherever.”

“You aren’t going to check with your boyfriend?” He raises his eyebrows. Why does he care so much about your boyfriend?

“No. Not really. I mean, I had this job when we started dating. He knows I go on tour in the summer so it’s not like it should be a surprise to him, you know? It’s my job and it’s literally my favorite part about it.” you shrug your shoulders. “I don’t suppose you have a girlfriend?” you ask.

He scoffs,” Definitely not.”

“Well if you did, would you stop touring or ask her where you were allowed to perform?”

“Definitely not.” he repeats.

You raise your eyebrows at him. “I didn’t think so. It’s the same thing.” you start scrolling through your phone to see who else you know that posted they were here tonight. An alarm goes off. “Alright guys, 10 minutes. 10 minutes until you’ll be seated. At 6:45 I will come get you and you will come change and be on stage at 7:15. One of your categories is next so you won’t come back and change until after the announcement. I’m sure you will do great!”

You look in the mirror and touch up your own make-up a bit.

“So pretty,” you hear RM say under his breath as you catch him staring at you. You’re not sure if you were meant to hear it and try your best to keep your face neutral. You put your make-up bag into the company box along with your clutch and lock it up.

“Do you guys still get nervous at these things or is it just like a normal day for you?” you ask RM, relaxing with your back against the wall.

He smiles, “We definitely still get nervous. Even if we think we are going to win and even if we have performed a song hundreds of times. We want to do well for our fans and for each other.”

“Well if practice was any indication I’m sure you guys will do great.” you say as you check your watch. “5 minutes” you yell into the green room. “When do you guys fly out?”

“We’ll leave for New York tomorrow morning, stay for two days and then back to Seoul.”

“Cool cool.” you say as your small talk ability is starting to wear out.

The time has finally come and you gather the group together to escort to their seats. They randomly get distracted by saying their “hellos” to other artists but you have worked in enough time that you should still be good. You show them to their seats in the second row, left side.

You pull RM over a bit so he can hear you over the guys being all excited and taking pictures of them in front of the stage. “Ok, do not leave the seats until I come get you. The show runs over some times so don’t assume that because it’s the original time I told you that we will actually go at that time, ok? If I had to guess, we will already be ten minutes behind when I come get you and 20 minutes by your performance time.”

“Got it.” he looks over to the other guys who are goofing off and taking a bunch of selfies.

“Good luck!” you tell him as you turn to grab an earpiece from the sound booth and get to your seat.

“Hey! [Y/N]” you hear someone say to you. You turn back and it’s Jimin. “Take our picture?”

“Sure,” you respond, walking over and getting his phone. “Alright guys, together.” You take several photos as they keep switching positions every few seconds. What a bunch of pros.

“You guys make that look easy,” you say as you hand the phone back to Jimin. “Alright, see you soon!”

You start to once again make your way to the sound booth when you hear another voice calling your name, “Hey!” you look over and see Seth Ayers, another Director. He has just got his artist escorted to her seat.

“Hey!” you lean in for a polite hug. “How are you?”

“Good, good. You look nice.”

“Thanks. You too. It’s always so fun seeing everyone in their fancy clothes,” you laugh. You suddenly feel rage in the pit of your stomach. What the hell? You take a few deep breaths.

“Who’s your date tonight? Xavier?” he asks

“No, Good guess though,” you smile, “Xavier brought his boyfriend. I’m flying solo this evening.”

“Oh. Well, if you need an escort to any of the after parties just let me know.” Oh God, was Seth hitting on you!? Ughhhh. Awkward. Time to mention your boyfriend. All of a sudden you feel breathing on your neck. “Ahhh. Hey there.” you say as you turn and see RM lurking.

“I’m so sorry to interrupt. I forget, what time are you coming to get us?”

You smirk at him. Jealous. He was Jealous. “No problem. 6:45.” you turn back to Seth. “I’m not going to any after parties this year. We’re having a small gathering at the studio afterwards. Good luck tonight! It was nice to see you” you flash a smile and start walking with RM back to the front of the theater.

“You forgot what time?” you whisper.

“Yep.” he says cooly.

You roll your eyes. “Huh. Ok. Well You.” you take him by the shoulders “Stay. Staaaaay. I will be back sometime later this evening.” You jokingly move him and place him right in front of his seat. “Got it?”

“Yes, I think I understand.” he smiles. Ahhh Dimples. Staaaahp.

Will you ever get to your earpiece? Make it to your seats? There is half an hour until the show gets started and they are setting up for the opening act. You massage your temples. Let this day end.

“Picture?” you hear JHope ask as he walks over with his camera. “Ok!” you put back on your enthusiastic facade.

“Selfie?”

“Oh ok sure.” you stand next to him and take a few pictures. Once again that low lying rage fills your stomach. Jesus. How can a person who doesn’t even want a soul mate get so damn jealous?

“Stop it.” you say to him.

“Stop what?” he responds. You give him a hardcore mom look.

“Yeah ok. Whatever,” you say.

“Now, you two?” JHope asks and you almost object but you don’t want to be rude. You stand next to RM and give a half-ass smile. More of a smirk really.

“Ok. For real. I am Going now. Good luck.” you say as you turn and finally get your hands on the damn earpiece. NEXT CHAPTER

#bts fanfic #bts rm fanfic #bts rm x you #bts au fanfic #bts fanfction #bts namjoon x reader #bts rm scenario #bts rm x reader #rm x y/n #rm x reader

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appleb18 · 4 years

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I Wanted Believe in Steven (A Critical Steven Universe Post)

Steven Universe, a popular show that has won the hearts of so many people. It had good songs, talks about mental health and relationships, a lovable cast of characters and it’s revolutionary for representing LGBT. As the show finally wraps up with Steven Universe: Future being the series finale, I want to say this… I used to believe in Steven Universe. I truly got into it when it first came out and then I started to appreciate it more as the show progressed even with the flaws. However, as time moved on, the show’s flaws have outweighed the strengths, making my enjoyment decline and become critical and nitpicky towards it. So I believe it’s time to point out the many problems with the show.

The Glory Days of Steven Universe

Before I begin ranting about the show, I want to talk about when I actually liked Steven Universe back in seasons 1-3. It was when everyone actually enjoyed the show before it went downhill.

- So before Steven became really annoying, I actually liked him when he was developing in season 1. He was very immature at first but he gradually grew. He became a member of the Crystal Gems and finally summoned his shield.

- Peridot’s redemption was handled very well and I enjoyed her character throughout the whole show.

- The show once balanced filler and plot.

- I enjoyed the Crystal Gems chemistry back in seasons 1 - 3. They acted like a family with Garnet being the wise guardian, Pearl being overprotective, Amethyst laidback and Steven maturing.

- The songs are great.

- The messages are relatable such as “Love Letter.” Garnet tells Jamie that love-at-first-sight doesn’t work. It takes time and a lot of work. You must know the person first before you begin to love someone.

Those are the reasons why I enjoyed the show back in the day. Now it’s time to talk about how the Crewniverse messed up everything.

Inconsistencies. Are. Everywhere

Steven Universe is well known for having no consistency and that’s one of the major problems with the show. While I can forgive season 1 animation because let’s face it, not every show has good animation like Phineas and Ferb. Though having characters go off-model consistently gets really irritating to watch. It’s irritating because most of them are professional storyboard artists and yet they’re doing a very sloppy job.

The reason behind unprofessional animation is Rebecca Sugar wanted her crew to have artistic freedom and have their own stylistic choice. They can draw whatever they want as long as the viewers can recognize the characters. There are many problems with this.

While it’s nice to see the artist's own style it doesn’t work with a cartoon that’s story-driven. You’ll probably argue that some shows like Adventure Time and American Dragon go off-model. However, it’s just redesigned and they stick with it till the very end of their respective series.

Also, shows like Ren and Stimpy and Flapjack go off-model because for comedic effect.

So stylistic choice doesn’t mean artists can draw whatever they want. It means that a character has their own style.

Terrance and Philip from South Park

Elmore characters from The Amazing World of Gumball

Each of them has a unique character design. It’s not the Korean animator's fault for it, they’re given what the Crewniverse drew, trace it and just animate it and they can’t fix their errors. What makes it upsetting is that animation pilots and shorts made by a single person or independent team with very little funding have more consistent and appealing animation than Steven Universe.

I ain’t an animator, but I know when animation goes off-model. Sadly, it’s not just inconsistent art that the show suffers from, but inconsistent writing and discontinuity as well.

Such as in “Are You My Dad?” Aquamarine and Topaz knocked out Steven and then she abandoned him while they took Lars, Sadie, Onion, Jamie, and Connie. Then in “I Am My Mom” they lure him and The Crystal Gems out for information to find Greg. So if you wanted to get information to find him, why didn’t they just grab him when he was knocked out?

Also, why did Aquamarine agree to Steven’s terms? Her wand is the most broken weapon in the show. She could’ve grabbed everyone including The Crystal Gems.

Garnet couldn’t tell Steven about her future vision because it wanted him to go more? If she just told him about Greg's capture, he would have understood. Also, she gave him future visions in “Jailbreak,” “Snow day” and “Future Boy Zoltron.” Why didn’t she do that for that kind of situation?

The Crystal Gems, who have special abilities, summon weapons and powers that fought Gems and Corrupted Gems and yet they were beaten by a freaking Steven Catus, Really?

We saw Lapis control the freaking ocean in “Mirror Gem”, “Ocean Gem” and “Why So Blue”, so why didn’t she use that to remove the injector?

After 6,000 years of waiting for Pink Diamond, Spinel got news about her Diamond and that she gave up her physical form to give birth to Steven. It changed her appearance from happy go lucky to edgy. Now she wants vengeance. So I’m wondering how was she able to get an injector and a scythe, then go to Earth in under a few hours?

In “Giant Woman,” Pearl explains that two gems have to decide to fuse together and they have to sync with each other to do it. In “Change Your Mind,” Steven fuses with the Crystal Gems midair while they are in their gem state.

How the hell did Connie get affected by Blue Diamond’s pathokinesis when Lapis Lazuli arrived in “Reunited”?

She was fine when BD did it the first time.

Mean Lapis and Bluebird are still on the loose. I know most shows leave things unanswered but you can’t leave two villains out there. They can still do harm to others

I really wish the Crewniverse showed more professionalism because there are so many errors in the show and some of them are so simple to fix, yet they don’t and that’s what I call lazy.

The Cast of Characters Don’t Do Much

I used to like the cast of characters, even the humans I enjoyed watching. When season 4 - Future came in, they got ruined. Most of them don’t do much in the show. I feel like they got sidelined because the Crewniverse had no idea what to do with them.

Let’s first talk about The citizens of Beach City and how they are the most boring characters in the show. At first, they weren’t so bad because they did have a role to play in the story like when The Cool Kids talked to Steven about his mother when he found out that she was a war criminal and he blamed himself for his mother not being around anymore. They also helped him not get scolded by The Crystal Gems when they found Peridot’s escape pod.

There’s even some slice-of-life episodes that I did enjoy watching such as

“Sadie’s Song”

And “Historical Fiction”

But now they don’t react to any Gem situation anymore. They just stand around and serve no purpose to the plot. Look at “Future”, throughout the whole epilogue mini-series, the humans didn’t do a dang thing in the series. For example, The Cool Kids, Lars, Sadie, and Shep don’t talk to Steven about his mental health when he was about to crush them with his force field. It just makes it feel that they don’t care about him or oblivious about that experience

Then they didn’t do squat when Steven became a monster and I know they're just humans but their friends and the show focus on them a lot, so they have to use them. It made me wonder why they even focus on them in season 4 and season 5 if they're not going to serve their purpose in the story.

Now let's talk about the more interesting characters and how the Crewniverse wasted them. Many Gems and few human characters (Lars, Greg, Connie) get them characters to grow, face struggles and have moments that can make a character likable. After all that, the Crewniverse had no idea what to do so they just left them.

Peridot’s redemption was well written. from season 1 - season 3. From a villain that has unknown technology and feels more alien than the Crystal Gems to a member of the Crystal Gem. As much as I love her development and she’s my favorite, however, she doesn’t do much in the show. Most shows that give a lot of development to a character are part of the main cast but in Steven Universe's case, she gets put in the barn with Lapis Lazuli and does nothing. She’s never involved in major story arcs such as she didn’t come along to help Steven to get his dad back in Zoo Arc and didn’t help with beach city citizens getting kidnapped in Wanted Arc.

Even in the Pink Diamond Arc, she has no part to play. All she was in that arc was a punchline and a hyperactive character with no defining moments. While it’s nice she has a new outfit, it doesn’t change anything.

Peridot had the potential to be a really great character but she got wasted because they had no idea what to do with her.

Pearl and Garnet never got their own character arc. When they fused with Steven to become Rainbow Quartz 2.0 and Sunstone it was rushed. I know they didn’t have time to do their arcs but if they cut townie episodes and focused on their bond it would’ve felt more impactful for him to fuse with them. Season 4 could’ve been Garnet and Season 5 could’ve been Pearl. Just look at Amethyst where she finds mutual respect and love for Steven and that’s really great to see. With them, we don’t have a moment like that.

A good example of using characters is Regular Show. They used their characters pretty well, giving each of them a good amount of screen time.

Benson’s drum solo

Getting to know more about Skips history

Muscle Man setting his ashes free at Great Trucker Graveyard

High Five Ghost reunited with his love interest

Pop’s proving that he’s part of the guys for Guys Night

Rigby graduates high school

Mordecai painting for Benson

And what I like the most about is they all have a moment together as best friends. Such as in “Parkie Rewards,” although Benson doesn’t win an award, the gang made their very own award and paper trophy. Benson made a speech about how he appreciated his staff workers.

I really wish Steven Universe had something like that and I really wanted to see more of Lapis, Garnet, Amethyst, and Bismuth but sadly the writers aren’t giving them much to do anymore.

A Shift of Pacing

Steven Universe really wants to tell a story like most cartoon shows are doing such as Over the Garden Wall, Adventure Time, Owl House and many more. They keep adding episodic episodes in the middle of unresolved conflict and have the concluding rushed. An example of this is the Cluster arc.

Peridot tells The Crystal Gems that the Cluster will emerge at any time… AT ANY TIME! So the gang planned to create a gem drill to destroy it to save the Earth. So instead of working on the drill, they kept delaying it like

Garnet told her story to Steven of how Ruby and Sapphire met

Celebrating Steven’s birthday

Peridot processing on becoming a “Crystal Gem”

I know Peridot was working on the drill and I like Peridot’s redemption but it’s a life or death situation. You can’t do other things when the Cluster can emerge at any time. The way they resolved the arc was really rushed. The Crystal Gems finally locate the whereabouts of Malachite and so Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl go to Watermelon Island and fuse to Alexandrite to defeat her. Then the Cluster emerges and it’s up to Steven and Peridot to deal with it. Instead of destroying the Cluster, he talks to it and it stops itself from emerging by bubbling itself. The way the writers conclude the arc was so anticlimactic and rushed. It ended two major plots, Malachite and Cluster in two episodes and Steven just talking to it was ridiculous. The Cluster arc should’ve at least had two episodes and Malachite should’ve come after the event because she was briefly mentioned in three episodes.

Adventure Time has a mini-series that primarily focuses on plots. It resolves conflicts and it doesn’t waste any time such as Islands, Stakes, and Elements.

People tend to blame the network for the inconsistent schedule and hiatus. While it may be true, however, it’s not really a big issue with the show. Gravity Falls isn’t consistent with its schedule but it has better pacing than Steven Universe. From Nov. 26, 2014 - Feb 16, 2015, the ep “Northwest Mansion Noir” was released, another month of waiting for “Not What He Seems.” Then we have to wait for four months, July 13th, 2015, for “The Tale of Two Stans.” Then there’s Steven Universe where we have to wait for six months for the next episode and it is just Towney episodes and it doesn’t even matter to the plot. So I pretty much don’t understand why people are complaining about the Steven Universe hiatus when Gravity Falls, a well-written show, has a hiatus as well.

They could’ve had a well-written story if only they weren't so focused on the human side of Steven and cut most of the filler out.

Action Doesn’t Have Consequences

In most shows, movies, and video games, characters will make rash decisions that have other characters disagree and even have a bit of a falling out.

Look at Gravity Falls “Land Before Swine.” Stanley doesn’t like Mabel’s pet pig, Waddles, and he left him outside when there was a Pterodactyl in town. Stan left Waddles unattended and caused him to get captured.

Soos messed up a lot in the episode. Without thinking, he barged in as Dipper developed the film which ruined a good picture of the dinosaur.

He tries to be optimistic when Mabel finds out Stanley left him out however it ineffective when he ravels the yarn back up and thus cut the clear path and accidentally break the lamb

To prove their worth is by Stanley fights the pterodactyl to save Waddles

And Soos and Dipper make up when he apologizes and he admits he made mistakes. Dipper and Mabel then took Soos advice to follow his lead and walk in a straight line as for dinosaurs' eyes are so far apart and that it can’t see in front of itself and the plan went well.

So with Steven Universe, most characters in the show have done pretty terrible things and the show never atoned for their actions.

In “Island Adventure”, Sadie trapped Lars and Steven on an island by hid the Gem portal with leaves so she can hit on him. Although she saved his life by poofing the gem monster with a pointy stick, it doesn’t help the fact that she trapped them for a month! It is also idiotic that the show treats Lars as he’s the bad guy where in reality, Sadie is!

Amethyst, although I do like her character development in the show, however, she did pretty a messed up thing and they never resolved it. In “Maximum Capacity”, Greg finds out that he’s missing the fireworks and Amethyst shapeshifts from Steven to Greg to cheer him up. She changes back and gets mad at him for not spending time with her. So she shapeshifts to Rose Quartz/Pink Diamond which causes Greg to look away and it’s the second time she has done it, and then Steven comes in to stop and question both of them. Amethyst feels guilty and left. So in order to make things up, she came up with an idea to clean that the Crystal Gems can clean out Greg storage. So this is really messed up. She shapeshifted as his wife and not only it scarred Greg but Steven as well and yet the writers never decided on how they can properly make it up. That’s so horrible.

Lapis Lazuli took the Earth's water, almost killed Connie, broke Peridot's tape recorder and called it garbage, and she took the barn. When she finally comes back to help the Crystal Gems to fight against the Diamonds. Her response to everyone was “hey”. She never apologized for anything she has done. I know she has PTSD but it doesn’t excuse her actions.

The only character that actually feels guilty and has to make amends of her wrongdoing is Pearl. She deceived Garnet by keeping rebuilding Gem communicator so she can fuse with her to form Sardonyx to make herself feel better. Steven and Amethyst find out and spill the beans which gets Garnet mad and Pearl feels guilty. In the last episode of the Sardonyx arc, they get trapped by Peridot. When they were about to get crushed, they two finally talk and Pearl apologizes to her and calls herself “just a pearl” and Garnet tells her you are your own gem and that makes her feel better and fused to Sardonyx once again.

Now it’s time to talk about the second major gripe with the show that everyone has and it’s the Diamonds being redeemed. The Diamonds are tyrannical fascist dictators that caused genocide many species, colonized many worlds, corrupt gems, shatter gems that don’t obey, have an army, gems that are off-color are put to the underground, and force fused shattered gems into a Cluster. After what they have done, you think they need to pay, right? Unfortunately, since Rebecca Sugar said ``there are no villains' ' and the show is about empathy, the Diamonds, especially White Diamond, get a clean slate. So it’s fine to have a villain be sympathetic and have a sad backstory, it makes them more human but having them redeemed is something you should never ever do, especially what they’ve done. They have very little screen time to show their development and have doubts about their empire.

Then they made them worse when in Steven Universe: “The Movie” and “Future”

In Steven Universe: “The Movie”, The Diamonds become clingy aunties to Steven and tell them don’t do evil things anymore like calling other species “equal lifeforms”, disband their arms and not shatter gems.

In Steven Universe: “Future”, The Diamonds abilities have a completely opposite effect towards Gems such as

Yellow Diamond’s ability to change from poofing gems to fixing

Blue Diamond’s ability to change from sad blue orbs to happy blue clouds

White Diamond's ability changed from manipulation to control her for a brief moment.

Having them become good and having emotions won’t cut it. They can’t atone for what they’ve done for the past millions of being fascist dictators and just saying “I’m a good Diamond now” can’t wipe away their past actions. It doesn’t work like that!

My Little Pony Friendship is Magic, A SHOW FOR LITTLE GIRLS, have a better-written villain redemption than Steven Universe and I ain’t kidding. Discord was the main antagonist for “Return of Harmony”. All he wanted to do is cause chaos. He was defeated by the mane six at the end of the second part of the episode.

In season 3, “Keep Calm and Flutter On”, Discord was reformed by Fluttershy because Princess Celestia believes he can be a good ally and knows that she can do it.

Throughout season 4, everyone still doesn’t trust him even though he’s friends with Fluttershy.

In the season 4 finale, he sided with Tirek and he betrayed them because he thought he’ll be rewarded for it.

Then he was betrayed by him. After Tirek and Twilight fought, she gave up her magic to save her friends, including Discord. It made him realize that friendship is more precious than anything of what he’ll give him and that’s when he’s been fully accepted as a friend to the mane six.

I also want to talk about Rose Quartz/Pink Diamond. While many fans in the community and the Crewniverse always point that she’s terrible and I agree she is. Such as leaving Spinel for 3,000 years, cracked her first Pink Pearl, abandoned her Diamond duties to be free, started a Gem war that cost many Gems to shatter to pursue her own goal, bubbled Bismuth, gems got corrupted, and left Steven with the burden. It is indeed bad but when compared to the Diamonds, she’s more of a saint than them. At least she does develop, doesn’t shatter gems and save the Earth from the Diamonds.

With story pacing being all over, villains and even characters aren’t paying for their actions and a cast of characters aren’t doing much, what’s the most problematic of the show? Well, it’s a combination of all my problems into one and that is…

Steven “Center Of” Universe

The major problem with the show, the one that brings down the show a lot and it’s Steven Omnipresence. First off, I don’t mind when a show has a protagonist point-of-view like Ben 10, Phineas and Ferb, Over the Garden Wall, etc. As long as it's written well and keeps the story moving, it’s fine but with Steven Universe, it has tons of problems. Steven's point-of-view is the cause of all its flaws and I can’t stress it enough about it.

So let’s first talk about the obvious one and how it’s only Steven's perspective. The problem with this is we only see things if Steven is there to witness it. The show introduces a fascinating world of Gems and yet the show doesn’t dive into that because Steven doesn’t care about and all he does is hang around Beach City. Steven will never explore unless he chooses to and some major plot points are offscreen which you should never do, especially it’s a story-driven show. An example of this is “Wanted Arc’” and yes I’m using it the third time as my example because it really is a terrible arc. When Steven comes back home, he had some information about Homeworld, discovered that there’s a mystery about Pink Diamond shattering, Off Colours, Steven can bring back people from the dead and Lars in space. With all that, what does Steven do? Nothing. Throughout his adventure in space, he never mentions it to the Crystal Gems and instead of that being the main focus, it’s townies and Connie. While Steven is doing Beach City fluff, Lars is actually progressing the plot by him developing and escaping Homeworld with the Off Colours. I truly wonder why the Crewniverse believes that Beach City is more important than Gems?

They got interesting lore and I truly want them to explore it more but they had to waste all that and have the most major plot points be offscreen for Steven's perspective.

The second problem with Steven p.o.v is his contestant presence. The show will always be about him, no other characters get the spotlight or do anything unless he’s there. There’s rarely a scene that doesn’t have Steven and it’s frustrating when there’s a well-rounded cast of characters that I want to see more than him. We’ll never see them interact with other characters nor explore different parts of the world. Other shows have done it such as

Amazing World of Gumball - “The World”

Adventure Time - “Varmints”

Avatar: The Last Airbender - “Zuko Alone”

Rick and Morty - “Tales From the Citadel”

Imagine how great it will be if explore more of the cast like

Uncorrupt Gem characters and Curley Lapis going by their day in Little Homeschool.

Lars becoming a space pirate

Lapis and Peridot becoming friends

Pearl meeting up with Mystery Girl

Volleyball recovering from her trauma

Ruby and Sapphire being their own individuals

They got a lovable cast of characters that I want the show to further explore and yet the Crewniverse don’t do anything with them and that’s such a missed opportunity.

Then the third most egregious problem with Steven p.o.v is he’s the communicator. The show tries to message that talking things will work but no one really talks to each other unless it’s Steven. Characters barely make their opinion or a chance to speak for themselves while Steven's opinion will and shall always be in the right and we barely see characters talking to one another. Examples of these are…

When Steven bubbles Bismuth, Pearl and Garnet don't say a thing and just let him. They don't question why he did or lash him out for it. They just went along with it. Steven decided to unbubble her in “Made of Honor “ for a wedding without talking to anyone else about it and again, they still haven’t asked questions and they just went along with it.

In “Reunited”, instead of Crystal Gems look at each other to find their strength like Garnet telling Pearl she’s her own Pearl, Pearl telling Amethyst she’s isn’t an accident, and they tell Garnet that she’s a great leader, Steven has to remind them what they are supposed to be.

Blue and Yellow had issues with the Gem Empire but too afraid to say to White Diamond. Until Steven arrived and that’s when they tried talking to her.

The Diamonds become good because Steven tells them being a fascist dictator is bad and they agree. They disbanded the Gem Empire and changed their abilities to help Gems under two years.

Steven made Pearl talk to Amethyst.

The message the show tries to tell that people should communicate is completely flawed because rather than have other characters improve their lives by talking to one another, they made Steven the messiah that every character looks up to. Steven will change your mind and you have no choice in the matter.

Conclusion

With the end of Steven Universe, I want to say that this show could’ve been better. Steven Universe was created by Rebecca Sugar, a former storyboard artist for Adventure Time and the one who mainly writes episodes about Marceline and wrote songs for the show. When she announced that she's left AT to make her show, I was excited and had such high hopes for it. I really want this show to succeed and it could’ve been the next Adventure Time, My Little Pony Friendship is Magic or Gravity Falls but sadly it failed to do so. The show flaws outshined it the strength by it was handled unprofessionally, wasted their characters, the pacing is all over the place, no character pay for their past actions and Steven’s point-of-view. I don’t think it’s the worst show I’ve ever watched nor a masterpiece, it's just a disappointingly average show in my personal opinion. I hope Rebecca Sugar and her crew not just see this as their progressive show by representing LGBT and messaging but also see what they would have approved of on the show and how they could’ve made it better. I had a lot of good memories when I first watched the show. It had the potential to be better but it never filled the promises they made.

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tsuraiwrites · 4 years

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Fic: An (Un)Civil Debate

@kyogre-blue prompted: ' ....Dragon Age. Something to the tune of "fuck the Chantry"’

set sometime during the 2nd act of DA2

“Fuck the Chantry!”

A silence descends over the room in the wake of Hawke’s shout. Varric places his cards facedown on the table, ready to heave Bianca over his shoulder at a moment’s notice, because Hawke’s tone is nearly violent.

This outburst has been coming for a long time, and damn it but Varric wasn’t paying attention to the remark that broke the drake’s back, too busy fending off Isabela’s attempts to peek at his cards.

Sebastian sputters, “W-what-”

Hawke growls at the stunned man, standing up to lean over the table in Sebastian’s direction. Merrill, seated beside Hawke, takes Hawke’s daggers from the back of his chair and puts them on her other side, just out of his reach.

“Fuck. The. Chantry,” he enunciates, just as angrily as he had the first time, but not nearly as loud.

Varric’s just glad they decided to play Wicked Grace in Hawke’s mansion instead of the Hanged Man; this definitely isn’t suitable for listening ears.

Hawke tries to play his cards close to the chest, always speaking around his true feelings on the Chantry, mages, the aristocracy, and the various soirees his mother drags him to that any idiot could tell Hawke hates. That is, Hawke tries, but Varric long-ago noticed the way his shoulders tense anytime someone so much as brushes against those topics.

Sebastian opens his mouth, likely to protest, but Hawke cuts him off again.

“I’ve tried to be diplomatic about this, but I can’t listen to another word about the ‘will of the Maker’ and the good the Chantry does.”

Hawke’s voice has crept to a lower register, but it no longer looks as if he’s readying to spring across the table to strangle Sebastian. Varric moves his hand away from Bianca, suddenly itching for quill and ink. He settles for memorizing the conversation as best he can.

“The Chantry has giant golden statues and marble tiles while people starve in the Alienage, Darktown, in broad fucking daylight in Lowtown. The Chantry is the reason my family had to flee our home in the night, three times. The Chantry is the reason my sister is locked in the Gallows with the likes of Ser Alrik, under threat of Tranquility at any time! And that’s naming just a few of their sins.” The last word is almost wry. Hawke pauses and sucks in a breath, leaning his closed fists on the table.

He hasn’t broken eye contact with Sebastian the whole rant.

Varric meets Merrill’s wide eyes when he glances around, but Fenris and Anders are both focused on the interplay between their friends. Isabela leans elbows on the table, chin her hands and obviously enjoying herself.

“Tell me I’m wrong,” Hawke dares him.

“Hawke,” Aveline starts, probably to try to defuse the situation, but Sebastian is quick to respond, his shock melting into bafflement. The accusation has obviously unbalanced him; this is the first time he’s been the subject of Hawke’s anger.

“Ser Alrik was an anomaly-”

“Now you’re just repeating Elthina! ‘The right of Tranquility saves lives!’” Hawke practically spits, his face flushing. “I find it interesting that’s the first thing you argued. Not going to tell me it’s the Maker’s will that the poor are dying in the streets? That the Chantry can’t use a portion of their shitload of gold to actually spread that Maker’s love to the ones who need it the most?”

“The Chantry does a great deal of charitable work for widows and children. I know you’ve seen this, Hawke,” Sebastian tries, tone conciliatory.

Varric winces when Hawke scoffs. “Fat lot of good that charity did for my family when we were eking it out in Lowtown. The Chantry sisters still won’t look a refugee in the eye unless they come with tithes in hand. The only public clinic in the entire city is Anders’ and Darktown is crawling with homeless orphans. I haven’t seen much of that charity.”

“...No institution is perfect. The sisters do what they can with what they have, but they can’t be everywhere. I don’t understand, you’ve never been this vocal about your issues with the Chantry-”

This time it isn’t Hawke that cuts Sebastian off, but Anders.

“Just because he doesn’t say anything doesn’t mean he agrees with the Chantry propaganda you spout all day!”

“Neither of them were talking to you, mage,” Fenris interjects, his gaze bouncing between Hawke and Sebastian.

The Chantry brother, apparently thinking Hawke can be reasoned with, starts to speak again.

Isabela blows a raspberry, loud enough it cuts through the growing tension like one of her knives. “As much fun as I’d have watching you dig yourself a deeper grave, Sebastian,” she gestures at the small pile of coins in the center, “we do have a game of cards I was winning – I’d like to get back to emptying your pockets.”

Sebastian’s jaw clenches, but he relaxes again an instant later, with a calm expression Varric can see right through. He obviously wants to say more – though whether platitudes or arguments Varric can’t tell.

“Very well,” he says. “I am willing to drop the subject.”

For now, is largely implied.

Hawke finally straightens, turning to walk away from the table for a few paces before he spins on his heel and marches right back. Dog doesn’t so much as twitch when Hawke steps inches away from where the mabari drools on the rug.

“Fine,” Hawke says, finally sitting down with a huff. He picks up the cards he dropped and stares at them, not quite calm but no longer blazing with anger.

Awkward silence only hovers in the air for only a few moments.

“Well, that was interesting!” Merrill chirps, leaning toward Isabela. “I can’t remember, is it better to have two angels and three knights, or two knights and three angels?”

Most of the table groans and folds.

edited 10/9/2020

#fic #dragon age #fuck the chantry #this was a fun challenge #thanks for the prompt!#not beta read #dragon age 2 #male hawke #sebastian vael #varric tethras

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steve0discusses · 4 years

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Yugioh Ep 29 S4: Joey Wheeler, Dead Again

It took me kind of a while to get around to recapping again, been some drama on this end due to a couple natural disasters all happening in conjunction with eachother, but thankfully we are back in the green (sort of) there’s still wildfire smoke out my window but at least...at least the fires aren’t getting any bigger.

And it’s a shame we didn’t get to it sooner, because this episode has so many wild things in it, I don’t even know where to start. There was a lot of dueling, so I didn’t have to cap a whole lot...but even within such few caps, there’s some stuff to talk about. Like first off, the Kaiba’s inability to walk five feet without getting attacked by someone.

Seto still winning Brother of the year award even after nearly shooting his bro with real ass lightning. Because remember, this lightning is 100% real. None of these are holograms.

And by the way, a “hologram” just grabbed Mokuba with real ass hands and Seto was like “Clearly still a hologram!” Because that is how deep his denial runs.

Anyways, this is where the Kaibas will be until the remainder of this episode, so we’ll just leave them where they are.

(read more under the cut)

Back at the duel between Mai and Joey, we’re slowly working out what it is the Orichalcos even does.

We have had very little indication you can break the Oricalchos control on people’s minds up to this duel, but because Joey showed heart and bravery or whatever--he’s been slowly chipping away at Mai’s crusty, neon green, outer shell.

(I had a littttle bit of a hunger for some Taco Bell Baja Blast, not gonna lie. A little bit tempted because of that weird color. And now that I’ve eaten popcorn, I am 80% itching to drive to Taco Bell and make some mistakes. But I won’t.)

Comparing this to Pharaoh and Kaiba and their Oricalchos duels (even Rex and Weevil’s) it kind of makes you wonder why this never happened.......to anyone else? I mean, obviously it’s plot reasons, but it would have been a little neat to have some character development for the other villains.

But this unnecessary duel to the death between Joey and Mai spends most of the time screaming about how deep and real their love friendship is. Just a whooole bunch of aggressive friendzoning for the lady who just aggressively hates everyone.

(Haven’t seen much of Yugioh Abridged because it’s spoiler territory but everyone who retweets Joey stuff puts “Brooklyn Rage” in there so I have learned the lingo through osmosis.)

So because, someone’s absolutely going to die, lets start going through all of the flashbacks to remind the audience to feel something when they biff it. Lets recite the times we all spent with Mai.

Remember how they brushed Mai under the rug for 3 seasons, and now that they actually need her, they’re shooting themselves in the foot because there’s actually very little evidence that they like eachother at all?

But they do show those few times they hung out: the camping trip where they almost got burned alive by PaniK, that time that Joey caught her smelling her own cards, that time that Yugi had a panic attack because he was convinced Pharaoh would murder her during a card game, that time that she almost got hit by a fireball and then Joey jumped in front of her.

PS, that fireball scene--they keep going back to that fireball scene but they cut out the part where, yes, Joey jumped in front of her--but then Yugi jumped in front of Joey, and then Yami took over and was like EFF YUGI DAMN IT while he got pegged with fireballs. Like...c’mon, Yugioh, there was a lot of fanservice in that particular episode, and you’re leaving out a majority of the ships.

Partial truth, Yugioh--you’re telling partial truths. If we’re saying friendzoning is a good replacement for some sort of romance, then this show is just a giant geometric shape of “who might possibly like who if they weren’t so addicted to friendship.” This show has “friendship” as the underlying tagline of every episode with every person.

In the process of removing romance--they accidentally made SO MUCH MORE romantic implications in this show. I just feel like this backfired in so many ways. Or...maybe this was exactly what they wanted. And by “they” I mean that one writer who stans Seto Kaiba in the back--just sitting there in the corner of the writer’s room tapping his fingers together and cackling like an evil villain. He knows what he did. Genius mastermind, slipping in his favorite ships by making every ship Yugioh-legal.

And, also the Joey/Mai duel was a lot of this type of questionable content:

Joey Freakin Wheeler.

So I forgot if I mentioned this, but my bro had this friend in college who go struck by lightning not once, but multiple times in his life. He lived in like Virginia or North Carolina--one of the monsoon States, and he’d go on this hike to the top of this mountain--and on two different occasions at the same spot, he got stuck by freakin lightning. So like...Joey Wheelers do exist. There are people out there who just...

They’re just lightning rods wherever they go and their brain is somewhat scrambled eggs because of it.

(PS fun fact I googled just now because I couldn’t remember which state Virginia was, a Virginian by the name of Roy Sullivan was supposedly struck by lightning 7 different times and survived all of them. The more you know. ((PS still on the Google deep dive and the same guy also claimed to have been attacked by a bear 22 times (he’s a park ranger, so that checks) and once he was attacked by a bear immediately after he got struck by lightning which is like some pretty pro strats by said bear.)))

But like...kinda weird that Joey’s now kinda into this, and got super into it during a lovers friendship quarrel.

Anyway, all things come to an end, so Mai decides after enough cards have been played and Joey is clearly about to die...maybe it’s time to just accept not being 1st in the world in cards. Which...would have meant she should have been playing Yugi during this duel but, wtv. She clearly wants to be mad at Joey, specifically.

And I think the show didn’t do such a good job explaining why she was focused on Joey and not any of the other duelists until the very end, but we’ll get there. We’ll finally get to an explanation of why she was so fixated on Wheeler, we just have to wait for him to die first.

Because after the lightning strikes, and after putting so much effort into punching Valon right before this...Joey is too sleepy to continue.

So he’s just gonna die here instead...

2nd time he’s passed out in a duel by the way. Remember that Joey almost beat Marik, but was too damn sleepy after the electrocution? Same situation here. Look at that parallel.

Reminder that Joey STARTED this duel.

It’s like when you’re playing a game with a toddler and then it just passes out halfway and without any warning with it’s face just flat into the carpet.

Anyway, Mai grabs him in her arms sobbing all over him like she just did with Valon and it’s like...damn, this girl can just turn it off and on huh? Like she’s only 100% or -100% when it comes to the relationship meter, huh? No in between?

Mmmm cue that irony that Yugioh loves so much, this entire duel was unnecessary, because all you had to do was yoink that necklace.

Really the solution to dealing with a lot of assholes in Yugioh, to be honest.

This really is what Seto says in the show, by the way--a glitch. I like that Seto does not accept that dragons can feel sadness, and is just ITCHING to patch that out in the next release of duel monsters. I imagine that he’ll make a meeting once this is all over with his code team and at the top of the list will be the demand “Make The Dragons Stop Crying.” triple underlined, bold, and in bright red font. The entire code team will side eye eachother, unsure if this is a literal bug or something that Seto just hears all the time but no one else can hear.

So back at the Joey death fort, Mai decides to finally illustrate with words why she had to go so hard on killing Joey wheeler.

It was because she saw his kindness and his help as a weakness and a failure on her part. Mai, who always wants to be independent and in charge, could not accept that someone else had saved her or would want to save her. Which was apparently why she decided to peace out back at the end of the Marik arc.

It’s a bit of a complicated character for a kid’s show, I’m not sure how many kids understood the pride situation here, but it’s nice they stuck in something that wasn’t just “I want to be the best.” It was more that she didn’t want to be helped in order to become the best.

(PS, there’s this flashback scene where Joey’s like “bye” as she drives away and it was unintentionally a very awkward and funny cut and I may grab that little quip. I have to cap a couple of animations, tbh, I haven’t done that in a while)

So, now that she is fully recovered, she decides to complete the parallel of when Joey saved her in a death coma and now she will do the same (although it is SLIGHTLY different since in this version she kind of absolutely killed Joey Wheeler but...still works). She decides to do the job these stupid boys have not been able to do for the entirety of this season.

(these boots are REALLY well drawn, by the way. OBSESSED with Mai’s boots.)

If only she swooped up Pharaoh and just stuck him on the back of her bike to get this final fight going.

But Pharaoh’s too busy getting lost in San Francisco, and stumbling upon Joey’s dead body.

That this is the season where Yami can do nothing right and it just keeps happening.

No idea how we’re going to resurrect Joey in so short a period of time, but we’re completely out of spooky necklaces, so I guess we can’t do the Pharaoh solution to just...stick him back in there.

Anyways, I’m off to recover from the trauma of my house burning down last week, so I’m gonna go eat a pint of ice cream while I dream of a life before quarantine (was there a time before quarantine? I honestly don’t remember)

If you just got here this is a link to these in chrono order.

https://steve0discusses.tumblr.com/tagged/yugioh/chrono

#ygo #yugioh #recap #episode recap #photo recap #Yugi Muto #Joey Wheeler #Mai Valentine #Tea Gardner #Tristan Taylor #Dartz #The Kaiba's #they were there for a few seconds #and just a million flashbacks to make my life as a recapper much much easier #S4 #Ep29

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natsubeatsrock · 4 years

Text

Guide to Avoiding Fairy Tail Criticism

Fairy Tail is far from a perfect series. I'm not here to argue otherwise. I've made plenty of critiques about Fairy Tail over the years and I've been a strong proponent of people being allowed to say things they don't like about the series.

Though, as I watch the fallout of Hbomberguy's video on RWBY and how its fans are dealing with it, it's hard not to think about the stupid things people have said negatively about Fairy Tail. This series has its fair share of stupid, bad faith complaints repeated by critics over and over. While I've talked about some of these in the past, I think it's worth talking compiling a list of things that people who hate Fairy Tail say that I can't take seriously.

"Fairy Fail."

Let's just get this one out of the way. It's not clever in any way. I can't believe this has become as popular an insult as it has. I've seen so many people jokingly refer to this series with this name. No one who unironically uses this is genuinely interested in engaging the series on fair terms at all.

More than that, it's not even true. Despite any issues regarding the series, Fairy Tail is still a fairly popular series with fans, especially outside of Japan. It's one of Kodansha's most successful IPs of the 2000s. The fact that people put it on the same level as Shonen Jump's Big 3 is impressive. If this is what a failing series looks like, I can't imagine what success would look like for Mashima.

"Mashima didn't plan anything."

This is one I've fallen victim to in the past. To be fair, Mashima hasn't been the best at explaining this to his fans. For critics, it's easy to see that Mashima says he comes up with plot points as he goes. Of course, the reason this is a critique is that this is as far as many go.

As Mashima explains it, it's not that Mashima didn't have any plans for future events for the series and how future events would go. While he didn't start the series with many concrete plans aside from the basics, he has had plans for how the series would go. But rather than being fixed plans, Fairy Tail's decisions have been more fluid paths Mashima chooses to go down as the series continues.

This isn't a bad way to write a story. As a story progresses, you may realize that certain ideas may be less possible than others or things you've planned at the start make less sense than you originally thought. Again, the critique could be that Mashima's style of writing is responsible for some of the series' weaker moments. However, it's wrong to say that Mashima shot from the hip every week, as some people have described his writing. Luckily, Fairy Tail is the only series Mashima has written this way. Both Rave Master and Edens Zero have been planned more from the beginning.

"It's like One Piece, but worse."

I've seen it thrown around that Fairy Tail looks like One Piece. If that's all there was to it, I don't think this would be on this list. Despite what people tell you, Mashima was never an assistant for Eichiro Oda. Mashima got into the landscape without being anyone's assistant. That's easy to dismiss.

However, I've seen people argue that Fairy Tail is a poor attempt at trying to copy One Piece's formula. Ignore for a moment that Edens Zero is closer to following that model and even it isn't a copy. Or that every series this side of Dragon Ball has been accused of being similar to it and people have been doing the same with series after Naruto.

The focus of Fairy Tail isn't similar to that of One Piece. There is no grand treasure or giant goal that the series revolves itself around finding. A lot of the main conflicts to Fairy Tail present themselves less as threats to the individual goals of characters or but to the guild's existence.

"There is no point to Fairy Tail."

I've talked about this one in the past. One thing you'll see people say regarding Fairy Tail is that there wasn't a goal the series was getting to. People will often make the poor comparison to Bleach in this regard, despite Bleach's focus being Ichigo's growth towards being able to protect the people that care about him.

This is a point that even fans of the series miss. I've recently been describing Fairy Tail as a series told through the lens of its main characters about the guild. The focus isn't on how the Fairy Tail guild grows towards being the best, especially since they start at the top. We're meant to watch the characters in the guild as they interact with the world around them and the other guild members.

If that sounds like a weird way to run a series, it's not. Durarara has a similar setup but splits the focus from one core group of characters to several groups and individual characters split up across its main city. Its plot focuses on how each different group connects with each other in ways they don't know and we can't expect as viewers. I wish people would engage Fairy Tail criticism on this level because there are ways to criticize in its implementation of this. However, people see that there's no "I'm gonna be Hokage" or "I'm going to find the One Piece" plotline and think that the series has no point to it.

"Natsu/Lucy is a bad protagonist."

This is related to the last point. The series is less about how Natsu or Lucy achieve their specific goals and more about the guild after they meet each other and start working together. If the series were about those things, we'd get more time focusing on Natsu's search for Igneel or Lucy's growth in the guild. Once you understand what the series is about, the focus the series takes makes sense.

However, I want to spend some time explaining the functions that either character. Again. While the series is, for the most part, told through Lucy's perspective, Natsu is the main driving force of the series. The comparison I've been making for years now is the Sherlock Holmes stories. If Natsu is Sherlock Holmes, Lucy is Dr. Watson. Mashima's referred to both as the main character and the argument could be made that this focus expands to other main members of the Strongest Team.

"Juvia had no arc."

Yet another one I've been responsible for sharing. I've had a weird arc over the past few years of writing about Fairy Tail going from tacit defense to reluctant attacks to my current stance of nuanced critique. However, I've never been a huge fan of how Juvia's been written, despite liking Juvia herself. It's been thrown around that Juvia didn't have a real character or arc, especially outside of Gray.

Juvia's arc involves coming to experience love better. She goes from learning to love other people as friends to engaging with romantic love. She even gets the opportunity to share that love with others. While the focus of that arc becomes centered around Gray, it's not as if Juvia becomes less loving of others or that her arc focusing on Gray makes no sense considering he started her on the path of becoming more loving.

As much as I should sympathize with this argument, it's become a lot more annoying to see this kind of argument levied towards female characters. You're not seeing people argue that Jellal's change is too focused on Erza. I'm not even saying this as someone who loves how this has been played out in the series. It's just annoying to see at all.

"Watch Craftsdwarf's videos on Fairy Tail!"

I've talked about a few of the issues I have with the series already, but I keep seeing this brought up. I'll give credit where it's due. Craftsdwarf's "Overly Long Analytical Tirade on Fairy Tail" does make good points about the series. And considering it's broken up into different parts, it's more digestible than that rant about RWBY. I'm a big fan of the kind of media analysis videos and I've often linked some of my favorite videos in my posts here.

However, Craftsdwarf's videos aren't perfect. The videos come at the series from a hilariously uncharitable point of view, resulting in repeating many of the points I've already mentioned in this post. Their analysis of both Fairy Tail and Rave Master is often shallow and ill-formed. It might be helpful to watch the series to see a negative perspective about Fairy Tail. However, I worry that the points made in that series will be the foundation of future criticism of this series.

“Fairy Tail is the worst (popular) battle action shonen.”

It’s funny seeing this one levied towards plenty of series that aren’t Fairy Tail. People say this about Dragon Ball. People say this about the Big 3. People say this about other hits in Weekly Shonen Magazine like Seven Deadly Sins and Fire Force. People say this about the current popular stuff from WSJ like MHA and Black Clover. Fairy Tail is far from the first or last series to get this complaint.

Even ignoring how hilariously hard this is to quantify as objective fact as opposed to personal preference, I’ve noticed that most of the people making this claim don’t do the work to understand why things they don’t like happened. To be honest, I don’t know too many fans who are willing to do the same. A lot of fans have the infuriating mindset of “it’s bad, but I still like it”.

Despite whatever anyone tells you, Fairy Tail has internal logic outside of “nakama power”. Characters face genuine loss and win for logical reasons. Even if it’s not as consistent as fans would like it to be, I don’t think the anime/manga fandom is worse for this series being as popular and beloved as it is.

Let me know if I forgot any or if you’ve heard another one.

#fairy tail #to be clear #i haven't seen hbomberguy's video #not because i don't watch long form criticism #he's not doing it in good faith

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letterboxd · 3 years

Photo

The Package.

As the bonkers genre thrill-ride Shadow in the Cloud blasts into the new year, writer and director Roseanne Liang unpacks her love of Terminator 2, watching Chloë Grace Moretz’s face for hours, and the life lesson she learned from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon’s Cheng Pei-Pei.

Roseanne Liang’s TIFF Midnight Madness winner Shadow in the Cloud landed with a blast of fresh genre energy on VOD platforms on New Year’s Day. It’s A-class action in a B-grade body, cramming plenty into its taut 83 minutes, including: a top-secret package, a freakish gremlin, a hostile bunch of Air Force dudes, outrageous stunts, dogfights and a fake wartime PSA that feels remarkably real.

Throughout, the camera is focused mostly on one face—Chloë Grace Moretz’s, playing British flight officer Maude Garrett—as she tackles all of the above from a claustrophobic ball turret hanging under a B-17 Flying Fortress, on a classified mission over the Pacific Ocean during World War II.

While the film’s tonal swings are confusing to some, schlock enthusiasts and genre lovers on Letterboxd have embraced the film’s intentionally outlandish sensibility, which “makes excellent use of its genre mash to create an unpredictable, guilty pleasure,” says Mirza. Fajar writes that “it felt like the people involved in this project knew how ridiculous it is and gave a hundred and ten percent to make it work. Someday, it will become a cult classic.” Mawbey agrees: “It really goes off the rails in all the best ways during the final third, and the last couple of shots are just perfect.”

Chloë Grace Moretz and her top-secret package in ‘Shadow in the Cloud’.

To most of the world, Liang is a so-called “emerging” director, when in fact, the mother-of-two, born in New Zealand to Chinese parents, has been at this game for the past two decades. She has helmed a documentary and a romantic drama, both based on her own marriage; a 2008 short called Take 3, which preceded Hollywood’s current conversation about representation and harassment; and Do No Harm, the splatter-tastic 2017 short in which her technical chops and fluid feel for action were on full display, and, as recorded in multiple Letterboxd reviews, established her as one to watch.

Do No Harm scored Liang valuable Hollywood representation, whereupon producer Brian Kavanaugh-Jones brought Shadow in the Cloud to her, thinking she might connect with the material. “It did connect with me on a level that is very personal,” Liang tells me. “As a woman of color, as a mother who juggles a lot.” She says Kavanaugh-Jones then went through the process of removing original writer Max Landis from the project. “He felt that Max was not a good fit for this project, or for how we like to run things. We like to be respectful and courteous and kind to each other…”

In several interviews, Liang has said she’s comfortable with film lovers choosing not to watch Shadow in the Cloud based on Landis’s early involvement. What she’s not comfortable with is her own contribution—and that of her cast and crew—being erased. While WGA rules have his name attached firmly to the project, the credit belies the reality: his thin script, reportedly stretched out to 70 pages by using a larger-than-usual font, was expanded and deepened by Liang and her collaborators.

Writer-director Roseanne Liang. / Photo by Dean O’Gorman

That team includes editor Tom Eagles, Oscar nominated for Jojo Rabbit, actor Nick Robinson (the titular Simon in Love, Simon) and Beulah Koale, a star of the Hawaii Five-Oh series. The opening newsreel was created by award-winning New Zealand animation studio Mukpuddy, after a small test audience got weirded out by the sight of a gremlin in a war film, despite well-documented WWI and WWII gremlin mythology. It’s an unnecessary but happy addition. The cartoon style was inspired by Private Snafu, a series of WWII educational cartoons scripted by none other than Dr. Seuss and directed by Looney Tunes legend Chuck Jones.

But the film ultimately hangs on Chloë Grace Moretz, who overcame cabin fever to drive home an adrenaline rush of screen craft, in which the very limits of what’s humanly possible in mid-air are tested (in ways, it must be said, that wouldn’t be questioned if it were Tom Cruise in the role). Liang would often send directions to Moretz’s ball turret via text, while her cast members delivered live dialogue from an off-set shipping container rigged with microphones. “I just never got sick of Chloë’s face and I’ve watched her hundreds, if not thousands of times. You feel her, you are her, she just engages you in a way that a huge fighting scene might not, if it’s not designed well. Giant empty spectacle is less interesting than one person in one spot, sometimes.”

Ambitious and nerdy about film in equal measure, it’s clear there’s much more to come from Liang, and I’m interested in what her most valuable lesson has been so far. Turns out, it’s a great story involving Chinese veteran Cheng Pei-Pei (Come Drink With Me’s Golden Swallow, and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon’s Jade Fox), whose film training includes a tradition of remaining on set throughout filming.

Roseanne Liang on the set of ‘Shadow in the Cloud’.

That meant that, during filming of Liang’s My Wedding and Other Secrets, Cheng would stay on set when she wasn’t required. “In New Zealand, trailers are a luxury,” Liang explains. “I said ‘Don’t you want to go to the trailer that we arranged for you?’ ‘No, I just want to sit and watch.’ ‘Why do you want to watch it, you’ve seen it hundreds of times!’ And she said ‘I learn something new every time’. To Pei-Pei, the secret of life is constant education and curiosity and learning. Movies are her work and her craft and her life, and she never gets bored. If I can be like her, that’s the life, right?”

Speaking of which, it’s time we put Liang through our Life in Film interrogation.

What’s the film that made you want to become a filmmaker? Terminator 2: Judgment Day is the movie that is at the top of the mountain that I’m climbing. To me it’s the perfect blend of spectacle, action design, smarts and heart. It poses the theory that if a robot can learn the value of humanity then maybe there’s hope for the ships that are us. That’s perennial, and possibly even more pertinent today. It holds a very special place in my heart, along with Aliens, Mad Max: Fury Road, Die Hard, La Femme Nikita and Léon: The Professional.

What’s your earliest memory of watching a film? I have a cassette tape that my dad made for my grandma in 1981 (he’d send tapes back to his mother in Hong Kong). I was three years old and he had just taken us to see The Empire Strikes Back in the cinema. And he can’t talk to my grandma because I’m just going on and on about R2-D2. I will not shut up about R2-D2 and he’s like, “Yes, yes I’m trying to talk to your grandmother,” and I’m like, “But Dad! Dad! R2-D2!” So it’s actually an archive, but it’s become my memory.

What’s the most romantic film you’ve ever seen? Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. It’s not the sexiest, but it’s the most romantic. That last scene, those last words where she goes “But you’re gonna be like this forever and I’m gonna be like this forever…” and he just goes “okay”. That to me is one of the most romantic scenes I’ve ever seen. It is a perfect movie.

And the scariest? If it’s a horror movie, the most scared I’ve been is The Ring. I was watching it on a VHS and I was lying on a beanbag on the floor and I was paralyzed with fear. I couldn’t move, because I felt that if I moved she’d see me! Also, American Psycho just came to me this year. I caught the twentieth anniversary of that movie, which is a terrifying film, and again, possibly more relevant now than when it was made. The scariest film that’s not a horror is Joker. It scared me how much I liked it. When I came out of the movie, I was like, “I’m scared because I kind of love it, but it’s horrible. It’s so irresponsible. I don’t wanna like this movie but goddamn, I feel it.” Like, I wanted to go on the streets and rage. In a way we’re all the Joker, we’re all the Batman. That duality, that yin and yang, is inside everyone of us. It’s universal.

What is the film that slays you every time, leaving you in a heap of tears? This is a classic one, the opening sequence of Up. The first ten minutes of Up just destroy me every time. I also saw Soul a couple of days ago and I was with the whole family and I, just, if I wasn’t with the whole family I would have been ugly-sobbing. I had a real ache in my throat after the movie because I was trying to stop [myself] from sobbing.

Tell me your favorite coming-of-age film, the film that first gave you ‘teenage feelings’? Pump Up the Volume. Christian Slater! Off the back of Pump Up the Volume, I fancied myself as a prophet and wrote a theater piece called Lemmings. Obviously the main character was a person who could see through the façade, and everyone else was following norms. “No one understands me, I’m a prophet!” So clearly I have this shitty, Joker-style megalomaniac inside of me. It was the worst play, and I don’t know why my teachers agreed for us to do a staging of it!

Christian Slater and Samantha Mathis in ‘Pump Up the Volume’ (1990).

Is there a film that you and your family love to rewatch? We’ve tried to impose our taste on our children, but they’re too young. We showed them The Princess Bride—they didn’t get it. We literally showed our babies Star Wars in their cribs. That’s how obsessive Star Wars fans we were.

Name a director and/or writer that you deeply admire for their use of the artform. I have a slightly weird answer for this. Can I just give love to Every Frame a Painting by Tony Zhou and Taylor Ramos? They are my film school. I was thinking of my love of Edgar Wright, but then I thought of their video essay on Edgar Wright and how to film comedy, and his essay on Jackie Chan and the rhythm of action and then their essay on the Coen Brothers and Shot Reverse Shot. I must have watched that 30 times ahead of the TV show that I’m making now. I started out in editorial and Tony Zhou is an editor and he talks about when to make the cut: it’s an instinct, it’s a feeling, it’s a rhythm. I realized the one thing in common that I could mention about all the films I’ve loved is Every Frame a Painting. It’s their love of movies that comes bubbling out of every single essay that they made that I just wanna shout out at this part of my career.

Were there any crucial films that you turned to in your development for Shadow in the Cloud? Indiana Jones was something that Chloë brought up—she likes the spiffiness and the humor of Indiana Jones. Sarah Connor was our touchstone for the female character. For one-person-in-one-space type stories, I watched Locke quite a lot, to figure out how they shaped tension and story and [kept] us on the edge of our seats when it’s only one person in one space. In terms of superheroes, I came back to Aliens. Not Alien. Aliens. You know, there are two types of people in this world—people who prefer Alien over Aliens, and people who prefer Aliens over Alien. But actually I think I vacillate for different reasons.

Can there be a third type of person, who thinks they’re both great, but Alien³, just, no? Maybe that’s the best group to be in. We don’t need to fight about this, we can love both of them! I was having an argument with James Wan’s company about this, because there’s a rift inside the company of people who prefer Alien over Aliens.

Okay, program a triple feature with your film as one of the three. I don’t know. Ask Ant Timpson!

I’ll ask Ant Timpson. [We did, and he replied: “Well, one has to be the Twilight Zone episode with William Shatner: Nightmare at 20,000 Feet. And then either Life (2017) or Altitude (2010).”]

Thank you Ant! I used to go to his all-nighters as a university student. He is the king of programming things.

Jake Gyllenhaal in ‘Life’ (2017).

It’s strange that we never met at one of his events! Ant would make me dress up in strange outfits and do weird skits between films. (For those who don’t know, Timpson ran the Incredibly Strange Film Festival for many years—now part of the New Zealand International Film Festival—and still runs an annual 24-Hour Movie Marathon.) So what’s a film from those events that sticks in your head as the perfect genre experience with a crowd? It was a movie about a man protecting a woman who was the girlfriend of a mafia boss: A Bittersweet Life. Not only does it have one of the sexiest Korean actors, sorry, not to objectify, but also I actually screenshot a lot of that film for pitch documents. And, do you remember a crazy Japanese movie where someone’s sitting on the floor with a clear umbrella and a woman is lactating milk? Visitor Q by Takashi Miike. I remember just how fucking crazy that was.

Finally, what was the best film you saw in 2020? I haven’t seen Nomadland yet, so keep in mind that I haven’t seen all the films this year. I have three: The Invisible Man, which I thought was just amazing. I thought [writer-director] Leigh Whannell did such a great job. The Half of It by Alice Wu, a quiet movie that I simply just adored. And then the last movie I saw at the cinema was Promising Young Woman. The hype is real.

Related content

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Up in the Air: The Letterboxd Showdown of Best Airplanes in film

Follow Gemma on Letterboxd

‘Shadow in the Cloud’ is available in select theaters and on video on demand now.

#life in film #letterboxd life in film #female director #directed by women #52 films by women #action film #action genre #chloe grace moretz #wwii film #ww2 film #terminator 2 #chinese new zealander #cheng pei-pei #tom eagles #jojo rabbit #female action hero #letterboxd

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fanpom-imagines · 5 years

Text

Imagine being a descendant of dragon slayers in Westerns and Jon asking for you to help with the White Walkers while Daenerys wants you to bend the knee as well. (Part 1)

Masterlist (Part 1) [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4]

Fandom: Game of Thrones

Words: 1675

Warnings: sassy reader and impressed Sansa

Gifs aren’t mine.

(Edited: Decided to make this into a series of sorts)

(Female Reader)

“The world really must be coming to an end.” I said as I looked down at the King of the North from my seat in my throne. King Snow just gave me a look of puzzlement as he didn’t not understand or expect my reply, so I carried on. “So what I know so far is that this self proclaimed Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, Breaker of Chains, the Unburnt, and la la la something Targaryen, wants my people’s and I’s assistance?”

“Yes, your Grace,” Jon nodded in conformation.

“Do you understand how absurd that sounds to me?” I asked him as I raised a brow.

Jon looked around and then back at Ser Daavos who looked about as clueless as him.

I sighed out and answered my own question for him, “My people are descendants of dragon slayers and have had quarrels and wars with the Targaryens for years. They are dragon riders while we are dragon slayers yet you stand here before me expecting me to fight along a woman who’s people had almost eradicated mine and had sent us into exile on an island where we could barely survive?”

Jon looked shocked, but then he quickly pulled himself back into his warrior like stance and told me, “Your Grace I am not asking you to forget your rivalries with the Queen I just ask for your alliance during this war against the dead. Winter is Coming and it seems like it’s going to stay for a long time.”

He definitely had a way with words. No wonder he was crowned as the King of the North, and I do have to admire the fact that he laid down his crown in order to gain an alliance with the Targaryen girl in favor of his people. I contemplated his words for a few minutes and I could feel the air of anticipation rising around me.

“My people and I will help to protect one another from the dead.” I told him and I could see a slight wave of relief in his eyes as he heard those words.

“Thank you, your Grace, we-” I cut Jon off before he continued.

“Thank me when we win the war,” I smile at him and stand up. The two of us bow to one another and he leaves to gather his things and I then start to already pick out men I’m going to bring along with me to officially band together this alliance with the queen.

On the next day the men I had order to come along, King Snow, Ser Daavos, and I made our way to Winterfell which took a few days as we had to use our ships to sail to the mainland. Not a long trip as our island, Ossēnagon, was only around a day and a half away from Westeros. Over the course of that day I asked Jon about the North and what he had been through since I had only heard tales and wanted to know if they were just rumors or if they were truth, and over the course of our trip I came to respect him, yet I did not trust him, but he was a noble and honest man and I admire that in him. It’s a shame he’s not a King no more.

When we had made it to Winterfell Jon showed my guards and I where to stay and then bid me a good night and told me that the next day the queen would like to speak with me. I thanked him and bid him a good night as well.

I fell asleep wondering about Westeros. I never stepped foot on the Land of the Seven Kingdoms before. I had gone to Essos before to see the Free Cities and to gaze upon the Giant guarding Braavos and to gaze around and see all the different people and cultures, but that was when I was younger. Now the whole worlds at war and I have no family to guide me. I envied that about Snow. He had lost a lot, but he still had his family left. Then my mind wandered to the Queen. She had lost her whole family like I had. I guess we are not so different after all, it seems. Yet I still bared hate for her, but my people didn’t come first, and I swore a vow to keep them safe even if it cost me my life and or my legacy.

I woke up with a knock on my door. It was one of my men telling me that the queen will want to see me in about an hour. I replied that i’d be ready and got into my clothing and ate the food they had brought me about thirty minutes before my expected official arrival in front of the Queen.

I heard another knock not soon after finishing and saw it was one of the Queen’s Unsullied. I’d only heard tales about them, and while we were walking rather than my mind being occupied with meeting the Queen I was more focused on the fact that if it was true about them having their parts cut off. That must be very painful, but it also is most likely the reason they’re fearless.

As I walk through the doors into a room where the Queen, King Snow (well he’s not a king anymore, but he still seems to me as one), and a woman who I assume is Lady Sansa Stark are sitting next to one another behind a long wooden table with Ser Daavos, a young girl who stood up proud, a woman with dark frilly hair, a boy sitting in a chair with a wheels to push it with eyes that seemed to stare into ones’ soul, and a man small of stature who, stood behind them while what I assumed to be the lords and ladies of the North and the Southern Houses that the Queen has convinced to have the join their forces were sitting on both sides of the room.

I had to admit they did seem stern and intimidating; the Queen especially, but of what I heard of her past I could understand why.

“It’s a pleasure to have you, Lady (Y/N),” the Queen greeted, which I didn’t not one bit like. She referred to me as Lady, not Queen or your Grace where as Jon Snow had. Now I’m starting to doubt that Jon had told me the whole truth when he had showed up at the doorsteps of my castle.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Lady Daenerys,” I shot back my smile slightly moving into a smirk.

I saw, who I assumed to be Lady Sansa Stark, smirk at my reply while I heard a few murmurs coming from both sides of the room and I also saw the slight, shocked eyebrow raise from Jon Snow. Daenerys on the other hand was not pleased.

“You forget yourself, Lady (Y/N),” Daenerys warned, but I just replied.

“No, you forget yourself, Lady Daenerys. You and I are both Queens of equal status. So if you regard me as Lady I shall also refer to you as Lady.”

“You dare say such things to me in my kingdom?”

“Last I checked a Lannister still sits on the Iron Throne.” I replied to her sharply and the whole room went silent. Daenerys may not have shown that she was furious, but her eyes defnitely did.

“I hope you realize, zaldrīzes ossēnagoner, that I am of dragons blood and my fury is just as vicious as a dragon’s, if not more.” Daenerys warned, and by now she was standing glaring daggers into me which I rivaled with my own glare.

“Do not forget, zaldrīzes kipagīros, my people bathed in dragon blood, and we’ll gladly do it again,” I told her and I saw a Lady Sansa and the girl behind her smirk. I heard some shouts come from all around and anger starting to be fueled by my comment

Before Daenerys could reply Jon quickly stood up to stop this argument before it became any worse, “Your Grace and My Queen we are not here to fight one another we are here to defend our people. So for the good of those who you’ve sworn to protect please put them aside for at least till the end of this war. Because right now anyone who is alive is an ally and should be regarded as such because that is the only way our world has a chance at survival.” Again the whole room fell silent at Jon’s command, and that snapped both Daenerys and I back. As everyone goes back to their original seats and the room once again seems to calm down lady Sansa starts to speak.

“Your Grace it is a great honor to have you here, I am Lady Sansa of House Stark. We ask for your assistance and alliance in this war, and I assume you my brother has explained why,” she motions to Jon and I nod in conformation, “So then I won’t bore you with the details, but we do ask you to agree to this alliance and its terms in front of not just us, but the people as well.” She says gesturing to the people around her.

I look around and then I look back to the three sitting in front of me. Lady Sansa seems to have some form of respect for me, Jon’s eyes on the other hand are filled with hope, but also worry, while Daenerys’ eyes stare at me coldly with slight waves of anger swirling around within them.

“I accept this alliance and will grant you the support of as many men as I can supply and anything else that will help you win this war. I swear by the powers of Ice and Fire.” I vowed as I bowed as well as spoke the motto of my house: ‘By the powers of Ice and Fire.’

Talglist:

@bee-wrecker @boogiebunnies @precious-bands-love @supernaturaltrashy@immortal-imagination @mikariell95 @saoirsewhittle @jinx-is-fire

#game of thrones x reader #game of thrones imagines #game of thrones imagine #daenerys targaryen #jon snow #sansa stark #got #got x reader #got imagine #female reader #jon snow x reader #jon snow imagine #daenerys targaryen x reader #daenerys targaryen imagine

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of-wrens-and-whirlwinds-blog · 4 years

Text

Summer Day

Commissioned by the awesome @wombatking! I really hope I did your prompt justice! Commission info is here!

There were always going to be bitter days, but time with Samantha was usually less so.

Cassie woke at exactly 6AM without needing an alarm, and knew that this morning was going to bitter. The afternoon was her date with Sammy, so that would probably be alright; but she woke angry, and when Jenny, the carer her mom had hired, came in to help her get ready for the day, she couldn’t help scowling.

“Bad morning?” Jenny asked sympathetically, pulling back the blankets and checking the bed bag.

“Yeah,” Cassie muttered. She couldn’t take her anger out on Jenny, because she was nice, and knew her job, and never made Cassie feel bad about her lot in life. “Do I have any sores?”

Jenny checked her arms and legs quickly and thoroughly before starting the stretches. “Nope, and none beginning. We’ll check your back in the shower.”

Since today was going to be special, Cassie wished desperately to fuss, like she had before the jump. But Jenny didn’t fuss, and when Cassie got snappish, Jenny raised her eyebrow and said dryly, “Wow, I didn’t know it was your wedding today.”

Cassie stopped snapping, blushing. Who would want to be long-term with a quadriplegic person? she had once asked Jenny angrily. Who would want to tie themselves down to this?

Jenny had just shaken her head and replied, You never know.

That was before Samantha had told Cassie very firmly that unless something truly divisive came up, she was going to stick by her.

Cassie’s mood improved when Jenny and her mom helped her get dressed. Mom was still weird about this stuff, and cried over small things like Cassie never winning dance awards anymore, but she was mostly over herself. Cassie was forcing herself to be, if not cheerful, then at least calm, and that had seemed the help the whole house.

Today, she wanted to wear pink. So Jenny brought out her pink clothes and when Cassie had decided on an outfit, Jenny and mom helped her dress, like a life-size doll. It was embarrassing, but it got less so as the weeks passed. Almost a year, now.

Cassie really couldn’t believe it, but here it was. Almost a full year.

“Do you want help with your hair, baby?” Mom asked, looking worried.

“Nah, it’s fine. Sammy’s gonna help me.” Cassie couldn’t decide if it was humiliating or fun, that Samantha was so good at doing her hair. On the one hand, it felt nice, because Samantha was so gentle. On the other… well. Cassie looked down at her arms and willed with all her might for the left one to move. It didn’t. As usual.

At least Dad had sprung for a nice chair. A motorized one; the physical therapist had called it a “sip-and-puff” which Cassie would have found hilarious if she weren’t bound to it completely. But she was getting really good at driving it without having to think too hard about how to turn a corner or how to go up the little lip at the bottom of the front door. Mom still hovered, but Jenny, an experienced nurse, didn’t bother.

Meals were always soured by the fact that she needed help. Before, she could shovel a bowl of cereal in her mouth in a few minutes and be out the door; now she had to eat at the pace Jenny set, and couldn’t even feel if she was hungry or full. Well, it was nice to never feel hungry; but at the cost of not feeling anything else? Not worth it.

Still. She ate, and managed to get Mom to talk about things other than doctors. Then she went and practiced with that new software, Dragon, since she would still be expected to turn in essays in school. She refused to be home-schooled. She had nothing against home-schooling; but the thought of being stuck in this house, only allowed out with Jenny or mom like a dog on a leash, made her angry. She was going to do as much as she could to cling to normalcy.

Noon hit and her phone buzzed a text alert.

Jenny picked up her phone and gave her the mouth-stick that she still wasn’t that familiar with, and Cassie eagerly unlocked the phone and opened messages.

Sammy: I’ll be over soon! Shoes are on!

Cassie hit the heart emoji three times and then send. Jenny smiled as she took the stick back. “Soon?” she asked.

Cassie nodded, grinning. “Can you help me get my shoes on?”

Samantha was getting used to the giant van instead of Cassie’s mom’s dinky sedan, but it still made her stomach twist.

Oh well. She smiled as she parked and got out. She had brought those butterfly hair clips that Cassie had been eyeing at the mall on their last date, and a new pinky-peach lipstick. It would match her favorite heels.

Samantha knocked smartly on the front door. Cassie’s mom answered, plastering on a fake smile. She still didn’t approve of Samantha, but honestly, that was her own problem. Samantha just smiled and said, “Hello, Mrs. Shapiro. Can I come in?”

“Yes, of course.”

All awkward conversation was stalled by Cassie zooming out of the living room and halting sharply just a few feet away. Samantha closed the rest of the distance and hugged her, delighting in the soft scent of eucalyptus from Cassie’s hair and ignoring the stiff plastic smell of the chair. “Got you a present,” Samantha said as she let go, and took the packet with the lipstick and clips out of her packet. The look of delight on Cassie’s face made Samantha’s tummy flutter.

“Oh gosh, they’re so cute!” Cassie gushed. “Aren’t those the ones we saw at the mall?”

“Yep. I doubled back when I brought you home.”

Cassie laughed and Samantha smiled wider.

Cassie was one of those people who had a vanity in her room with all her makeup and hair stuff there. Samantha was glad of it these days; more room to maneuver. She was still so excited that Cassie trusted her to do her hair, and Samantha took care to make sure she never regretted it. It helped that Cassie’s hair was absolutely gorgeous, thick and strong, gold like wheat in the sun or watered honey or—

“Are you going to braid it or keep brushing it until the beach closes?” Cassie asked, bringing Samantha back to the present.

“Oh. Yeah. Sorry.”

Cassie smiled at her in the mirror, and Samantha smiled back, shyly.

A few gentle curls at the side of Cassie’s face, the rest braided and gathered into a flat bun, and the butterfly clips in a vague ring around Cassie’s head, like a crown. Samantha had often thought of Cassie as a kind of royalty, and the accident hadn’t changed that thought. Makeup next. Samantha had been a disaster with it before Cassie first helped her with highlight and glittery eye shadow; now she knew exactly how to do Cassie’s makeup, and there was definitely a tenderness and level of trust in applying lipstick that made Samantha blush.

“You’re so cute,” Cassie murmured affectionately when Samantha lifted the applicator.

“And you’re the most beautiful,” Samantha retorted quietly, blushing harder.

Cassie laughed. “How long until this dries?” she asked. “I need to kiss you thank-you.”

Samantha shrugged. “Not long, I think.” She licked her thumb and gently corrected some eyebrow pencil. “There. Good. Gosh, you’re beautiful.”

“You said that already,” Cassie replied, grinning and blushing.

“Well, you are, so there.”

They were going to visit the beach. Not the sand, the chair wouldn’t work on sand; but the dock, definitely. They would get ice cream and judge old men on their dress-sense and maybe meet up with that nice older lady who wrote Harlequin novels and was so absolutely filthy that she put Samantha and Cassie’s classmates to shame. She was fun, though. And Samantha would get to see Cassie smiling at the sunset.

Cassie’s mom asked worriedly if they were sure they didn’t want her or Jenny to come to. Cassie frowned and said “No, we’ll be fine.”

“Call if you need anything,” Cassie’s mom insisted, then got out of the way.

Samantha helped with the ramp and securing the chair in the van, then leaned up and kissed Cassie quickly before getting into the driver’s seat. Cassie giggled and Samantha blushed.

The whole drive, they talked about Samantha’s latest research hole, butterflies and moths. Cassie laughed more than she did in public. That made Samantha happy.

There was a handicap spot open at the beach parking lot. Samantha swooped in quickly, and when a little old lady slammed her horn at Samantha, she ignored it and just got to work helping Cassie out. The horn-blaring stopped when Cassie came into view.

“Mean old tart,” Cassie muttered.

“She just didn’t know,” Samantha replied, and slid Cassie’s sunglasses on her face. “Better?”

“Yeah. Let’s go!”

Cassie enjoyed the fresh air and smiled at the happy children, and ignored the stares. Samantha walked close, less out of obnoxious hovering and more out of shyness. She was getting more outgoing, but sometimes she just wasn’t really very extroverted. That was fine, though Cassie desperately wanted to hold her hand.

“Ice cream first?” Cassie asked brightly, smiling up at Samantha. The other girl smiled back, blushing. She’d only braided back the front locks of her hair, leaving the rest fiery and wild, and it showed off her adorable freckles.

“Yeah, that works,” Samantha said. “And then we can check if there’s anything new at Gigi’s giftshop.”

“Oh, yes, perfect!”

They strolled down the boardwalk, talking. Samantha had started researching all kinds of bugs, but was also researching plants, and Cassie loved to watch Samantha’s face light up as she talked about specialized relationships between insects and plants. They reached the ice cream shop without incident, and Samantha bought two bowls of vanilla ice cream, one smothered in chocolate and the other smothered in caramel. They claimed one of the few tables and Samantha fed Cassie her ice cream slowly, both of them giggling. With helpers at meals, Cassie felt a deep resentment; when it was fun with Samantha, who legitimately only saw her as a girlfriend, not someone to take care of, it was a lovely time.

Little kids were staring. Cassie ignored them, and focused on telling Samantha about all the advancements Jenny had told her about. How her uncle had bought her speech-to-text software, and she was getting better at it, and how eventually her mom was going to replace the creaky shoddy temporary ramp with a nice solid one with proper tread. Samantha was encouraging, and never got uncomfortable or tried to turn the subject. This was Cassie’s life, now. There was no point pretending it wasn’t.

They were just starting to talk about the coming school year (gosh it was so cute when Samantha put her chin in her hand like that and just looked at Cassie) when an older woman walking by asked, in truly confused tone, “You’re going to school? Like that?”

Samantha tensed, her fingers curling and her face going hard. Cassie smiled at the lady sweetly, putting as much anger into her eyes as she could.

“Yes, I am,” she said. “I don’t see why I shouldn’t.”

“Well, you—I—” The woman realized she had well and truly fucked up, and flushed, looking guilty. “I’m sorry,” she muttered, and hurried away.

“Bitch,” Samantha muttered at the woman’s retreating back.

Cassie didn’t reply.

Gigi’s giftshop wasn’t as crowded as usual. There were new gewgaws on display, though; pottery, mostly, probably made by Gigi’s siblings’ children. There were some very nice stone-chip bracelets, and Cassie insisted on purchasing two matching ones. Samantha blushed and was very tender, fastening the bracelet around Cassie’s unresponsive wrist.

They went to grab snacks as they slowly went down the boardwalk, looking out at the ocean and the beach. It was getting cold; people were packing up and leaving. They paused by the rail, to watch the sunset. Cassie’s breath caught in her throat at the fiery sky touching the dark ocean with brightness. The raw glory of another day by the ocean seized her throat, reminding her that there was more to this world than one small human body, one small human life. The reds and oranges looked like Samantha’s hair. The blue waves looked like her favorite necklace, the once Cassie had made for her three days before the accident. Cassie looked up at Samantha, and caught her staring at Cassie with the tenderest expression. A bit excited, a bit reverent, a bit hopeful, a bit sad—and so loving that Cassie felt like crying.

The sunset played golden on Samantha’s cheek and woke the amber highlights in her hair.

“You’re really beautiful,” Samantha said softly.

“Not as beautiful as you,” Cassie replied, just as softly.

Samantha didn’t want to go home. She wanted to stay over at Cassie’s and cuddle and watch dumb Netflix shows. But her own parents were expecting her for dinner, and Cassie admitted that her mom was going through a weird phase of keeping mealtimes strict, and she wouldn’t have planned for a fifth person at dinner.

So they drove back to Cassie’s, talking softly and sparingly. Samantha greatly enjoyed the quiet times, just being near Cassie with nothing to do or say. She wasn’t sure if Cassie liked those times, but she snatched them when she could.

It was very selfish of her. But she told herself it wasn’t as selfish as forcing her company and talking on Cassie when she was quiet of her own volition.

“I want you to stay the night,” Cassie said very softly, when Samantha had parked the van.

“Our parents will be annoyed,” Samantha pointed out reluctantly, turning in her seat to look up at Cassie. Her curls had straightened from the dampness of the sea air, but they still looked adorable on her, as did the mulish look. “And I didn’t bring any pajamas.”

“You can borrow mine,” Cassie replied. “And mom and dad can get over it.”

Samantha thought for a moment, looking into Cassie’s face. And she realized that Cassie was more important than the scolding she’d get from her own parents.

“Okay,” she said. “But I’m not explaining to your mom why I’m still here. She’s scary.”

Cassie laughed. Samantha couldn’t stop a grin. “Fair enough! Let’s get inside. What do you want to watch after dinner?”

#writing #commission #there was so much to the prompt that I couldn't fit in I'm mad it was all so AWESOME #romance

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frozenartscapes · 4 years

Text

AN: I don’t entirely know what this is. I’ve seen a few au fics with Byleth becoming a dragon because of her connection to Sothis, and I just thought... What if...

---

It was said that dragons were fearsome beasts. Their thick scales were nearly impenetrable. Their claws could slice through any armour. The fire so hot and filled with magic that only the purest of souls could face it and survive.

There was a reason she was called the Immaculate One.

But dragons were also misunderstood. Humans saw them as terrifying monsters, and while that might be true of some dragons, it didn’t serve as a worthy label for all. While some dragons seemed greedy, hoarding large masses of gold and jewels, others barely held onto anything. While some terrorized the land, others preferred to stay hidden. Dragons, in a way, were very much like humans.

But if there were one fact about dragons that was universal, that spoke for every one of the creatures, big or small, aggressive or passive, it was this: all dragons would risk heaven and earth to protect their greatest treasure.

Just what that treasure was, however, was entirely up to each dragon.

---

They ended up facing Rhea alone. The rest of the Strike Force was held back, keeping the few remaining Knights away. The last thing they needed was a rogue Knight interfering in their fight with a dragon.

Byleth ran to her right, while Edelgard kept left. Together they charged, their weapons glowing with energy. Rhea roared furiously, attempting to swipe at them with massive claws. They both dodged and managed a solid blow each to the dragon’s thick hide.

Rhea roared again, pain evident this time. Before the pair had a chance to regroup, Rhea whipped her tail around. Neither of them could prepare for the blow, and they were both sent flying backward to the ground.

Edelgard slowly pushed herself up. Aymr had been tossed a little further away. She must have lost her grip on it when she hit the ground. Thankfully, she still had her shield, and used it to lift herself to her feet with a grunt.

“You,” Rhea growled viciously, her distorted voice reverberating in the Emperor’s damaged ribcage.

Edelgard braced herself, head snapping up to look for the dragon. There was a brief moment of relief when she realized Rhea wasn’t focused on her.

Panic suddenly rushed in when she realized who was the dragon’s focus.

“Give her back!” Rhea roared, stalking toward Byleth who was still struggling to stand. Edelgard remembered, now: Byleth had pushed her aside just before Rhea’s tail hit...

Byleth, while still on one knee, merely met Rhea’s eyes with a defiant glare.

“Then I will take my mother back from your ashes!” Rhea shrieked, rearing her giant head back. Energy gathered in her mouth, fire and magic growing bright and hot and deadly.

Edelgard didn’t think. If she had, her brain would have told her what she was doing was the dumbest thing she could have ever done. But Byleth wasn’t going to be able to dodge the attack in time, and the Emperor still had a shield.

Just before the dragon fire could consume Byleth, something stopped it. It streamed out on either side, heating the air and charring the ground, but something was diverting it. And that something was a five-foot-tall, furiously determined woman armed with nothing but a shield.

Edelgard felt her feet beginning to slide in the dirt, but she kept pushing. The heat was near unbearable. She could feel her skin and hair beginning to burn. She could barely breathe, the air more like fire in her lungs. But Byleth was still behind her. And Edelgard would not lose her again.

The bronze and gold of her shield were beginning to melt. She was frankly surprised it lasted this long. Rhea was pushing, but she was beginning to fade. Just...a few more...seconds...

The shield finally gave, being ripped apart by all that magic and heat. Edelgard had only enough time to close her eyes before being consumed by the dragon fire. Byleth, acting solely on instinct dove to the ground and rolled, getting singed but avoiding the worst of it. Rhea gave up not long after.

“El!” Byleth screamed, only just realizing what had happened. Her grip on her sword tightened, and suddenly the only thought in her head was that that stupid dragon had to die.

But then a noise. A groan. Followed by a weak, “My...teacher...”

Byleth looked behind her, and spotted a darkened figure several feet away. Forgetting Rhea, Byleth raced over to her. Edelgard was already pushing herself to her feet. She tossed the handle of her shield - still warped from the fire - away. Her brilliant red armour had been charred black, and much of her hair had been stained grey from ash, but otherwise, somehow, she was fine. Just weary.

“How did you survive that?” Rhea demanded furiously as Edelgard reached for Aymr - which she had been conveniently thrown closer to - and stood up to face her, “No human can survive a blast like that!”

“I don’t want to make it sound like I’m agreeing with the dragon,” Byleth uttered frantically, “But... El...”

“I’m fine, my teacher,” Edelgard replied between heavy breaths, “I can’t explain it. I don’t think I ever can. But all that matters is I’m still standing now.”

Byleth swallowed hard before resolve took hold once again. “Then let’s finish this.”

---

“Now that it’s over...”

“I told you already, my teacher, I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine.”

Edelgard was about to argue but a wave of vertigo swept over her, forcing her to grab onto the desk in her tent. They had returned to their base camp after securing Fhirdiad, Rhea defeated and the Knights surrendering. Everyone was a little worse for wear, but none quite so much as the two who had taken on the giant dragon. Neither had wanted to leave the other alone, so they had both decided to return to Edelgard’s tent together.

“You’re paler than normal, El,” Byleth said, her face contorted by worry. It was more emotion than either of them were used to, given recent developments, but that wasn’t the most pressing thing at the moment.

“I’m just tired, Byleth,” Edelgard sighed, “I has been a long day for all of us.”

Byleth frowned and pressed a hand on Edelgard’s forehead. Her frown only deepened. “You’re burning up,” she said.

Edelgard swatted the hand away. “You just came back from the dead! You don’t get to start fussing over me like this when it should be the other way around,” she complained, pouting a little in the way Byleth secretly adored.

“El... You jumped into dragon fire...”

“Don’t tell me you wouldn’t have done the same.”

“You should be dead, Edelgard.”

“But I’m not. I’m here. You’re here. We’re both here now, together, and nothing is going to change that again if I can help-” She gasped suddenly, wincing and grasping the side of her head in pain.

Byleth opened her mouth but Edelgard beat her to it. “I must have struck my head. It’s just a headache,” she said quickly.

Byleth crossed her arms. One look into the Emperor’s stubborn gaze and she knew this was a fight she wouldn’t be winning any time soon. “Fine,” she relented, “Just...just get some rest.”

“You’ll stay, won’t you?” The shift in Edelgard’s voice was almost painful. How it went from strong and confident to timid and small, like a child afraid of the dark, was too much to bear.

Byleth smiled. “Of course.”

She helped Edelgard take off the horned crown that had become tangled in her hair, and then the pair settled under the covers on the bed.

---

Byleth awoke first. El was still asleep beside her, her breathing level and her face relaxed. It was still dark in the tent, but she could see that El had more colour in her complexion again, and Byleth sighed in relief. Maybe she had just been tired last night.

It was just...seeing her disappear in that fire...

She shook the thought away. Carefully, she reached out and ran a hand through Edelgard’s hair. They had only just recently begun sleeping together, more out of necessity than anything. El’s nightmares had picked up significantly after facing Dimitri and Byleth’s company had been the only thing that helped. Byleth didn’t mind. If anything, she adored it. And now, with her heart beating and emotions flooding into her mind, it felt almost overwhelming. All the warm, happy feelings as she held El tight. Like she was being smothered in pillows.

El’s hair was always so soft compared to her own. Byleth loved running a hand through it. She especially loved the way El would melt into it, even when asleep. A little smile would form on her face and she’d let out a soft, happy sigh.

But then Byleth’s hand was stopped by something. She frowned in confusion, feeling out the hard, ridged object in El’s hair in the dark. It was cool to the touch, smooth, and curled around El’s forehead. It tapered off to a point, almost like...

Had El put her crown back on during the night?

Byleth sat up and reached for the nearby lamp. With it lit, the first thing her eyes landed on was the Emperor’s golden crown, still exactly where they had left it on the desk the night before.

Byleth felt her newly beating heart stop, just for a second. Huh. So that’s what people are talking about when they speak of shock...

She peered down warily at the sleeping Emperor. And she couldn’t stop her jaw from dropping.

They looked almost exactly like the crown. Perhaps a little less shiny. And they swept out a little further from her head, and stood a little taller. They were also sharper.

“El,” Byleth whispered urgently, shaking the Emperor’s shoulder perhaps a little harder than she wanted to, “Edelgard, wake up!”

Edelgard groaned and reached up to rub the sleep out of one eye. To Byleth’s relief, nothing else about her had really changed. Her eyes were normal, albeit a little droopy from waking up before she was ready. Her skin was the same. No scales or any other worrying signs. Hmm... Were her ears a little pointy? It was hard to tell.

But really, it was just the...the...

“What is it, my teacher?” Edelgard asked. She was staring at Byleth with concern, a frown already working its way onto her face as she noticed her distraught advisor.

“Um... You, uh...” How exactly does one tell someone these things? Byleth was absolutely certain that if there was a way, she’d be the last person to know it. At a loss for words, she merely mimed with her fingers, bringing her hands up and tracing out the shape from the sides of her head.

Edelgard tilted her head slightly in confusion. Slowly, she followed Byleth’s vague instruction by reaching up to her own head. When her hand met it, Byleth figured El thought the same thing she had, because lilac eyes suddenly flew to the desk where the crown still sat.

After that confirmation was made, Edelgard shakily began to investigate, carefully working her hands along the smooth surface to the very tips of both growths. She paused a little to poke the tip of one with her finger, flinched, then pulled her hand away to reveal a dot of blood on the tip of said finger. So they were apparently really sharp...

Edelgard met Byleth’s eyes again and there was a solid minute neither of them said anything. They merely stared at one another, unsure of what to think, feel, or say. Edelgard broke first, though, and the usually articulate Emperor of Adrestia barely managed to stammer out:

“I...um... I appear to have... Horns.”

---

AN: I have no idea where to go from here or if I even should. I just liked the idea of Edelgard being able to turn into a dragon. Nothing would piss Rhea off more, and Edelgard probably wouldn’t be thrilled about it too much, either. But it would maybe give me an excuse to write a post-war interaction with El, Byleth, Seteth and Flayn. Because if anyone would know what exactly happened...

Also all the shenanigans. Edelgard not used to having horns (because she could take the crown off if she ever needed to and you can’t exactly do that with something growing out of your head...). Maybe her ears change into something more like Sothis’ (Elfgard?). As a result, her emotions end up being more obvious despite her best efforts because her damn ears keep giving her away. Maybe she gets fangs. Maybe the state of her appearance actually hinges on emotion and feeling certain things makes her more dragon or human. All of the Black Eagles reacting differently. Some of them take it well. Some do not. Some ask if she’ll give them rides on her back when she learns how to fully transform (Caspar... Byleth...).

I don’t see her turning into a full-sized dragon. She is still human, after all. My only explanation I can think of right now is that by choosing to save Byleth - El’s treasure - she demonstrated having the heart of a dragon so she didn’t die by the dragon fire. Rather, it sort of... Changed her. But she’s always been protective of Byleth and now even more so. And all her Black Eagles. Her treasure.

I don’t know. If anyone would like to contribute to this, I’d be happy to talk about it. @patricia-von-arundel, what do you think about this?

#fire emblem #fe three houses #fanfic #au ideas #edelgard #byleth

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