#i'm excited to watch the next episode even if i'm only really getting half the impact from the dialogue | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

Visit Blog

Explore Tumblr blogs with no restrictions, modern design and the best experience.

Fun Fact

1,644 Tumblr posts in 1 second.

#i'm excited to watch the next episode even if i'm only really getting half the impact from the dialogue

sm-baby · 6 days

Note

Most exciting part of the trailer for the next TADC episode for you?

More so an Analysis rather than things I'm excited about X3

I watched the sneak peek on loop I can process everything! Waahh!! I'm so excited for episode 2 💞 only a few weeks away! 💕

youtube

I wanna get this out of the way, I love Lizzie Freeman and Alex Rochon's Improv work on this promo 😭 they were really put in a booth together, were told to say things to promote episode two, and came up with that 😭 Genius.

The environment work is GORGEOUS! I love the look of everything, the world-building, the colors! It looks like a full-fledged movie guys! Absolutely beautiful and WONDEROUS work from the Glitch team-- it's so beautiful for half a year of work??? God damn!!

Haha! As an in-universe creation, Despite his little gags, Caine is genuinely such a good AI to make something so cool!

You'll also notice that Ragatha is taking charge of talking with the princess! That would make sense for such fellow beautiful well-mannered women!

More on them later at the end! :3

Dream sequence theory

Also, we all agree that these ones are all part of a dream right? Pomni is panicked, the strange sort of "slow woozy wobbly" animation exactly like a dream... even the dolly zoom!

Then she is sent to the cellar with a an abstracted arm, but that shouldn't be the case since Caine could easily fix an abstracted arm with a snap of a finger.

And then she wakes up, freaked out!!

Wahaha! Shout out to the Showtime server for pointing this out while we were discussing!

This is either and "end of episode prize" from Caine, or he jumps in mid-episode to hand them a helpful item, ooorr he's telling them that that's their objective for the adventure :3

also!! people have pointed out that Zooble isn't with the carriage with the others! Either this means that Zooble was given a surprise roll in the adventure, or she's off to have a fun solo adventure with Caine! Ohh! How exciting!

Zooble is a favorite character of Goose's, so to learn more about him and why Goose loves them so much would be so exciting!!

Whats up with Jax?

hunched down, writing in the sand, hugging his knees, this topped with Goose's two-word description of the next episode to be "I"m nothing"... Oh Jax is gonna have a MOMENT...

We all know that no one likes the dude and he's going to get worse. I'm unsure if this will make me like the guy, but I'm optimistic!

I'm open to understanding and seeing another side of him that would make me like him! I already quite like how this scene is framed, how lonely he looks, the acting in these few seconds already tells me what kind of guy he is.

...despite one of the gummis being tied up in the corner

If i had to hypothesize, this probably stemmed with Jax acting out, you know, the usual "being a nuisance" to make everyone miserable,

Then It escalates

This gets on Ragatha's nerves, first starting out as a silly "haha cute interaction" between them and it escalates while the episode goes on where Ragatha genuinely gets mad at him and tells him to stay put while they do the work.

Speaking of Ragatha, She seems to be quite fond of the Princess! There is a part of me that wonders if she wants to sort of-- "prove" herself in a way, as a leader or otherwise. Ragatha does give me the "smart yet nice kid in class that everyone copies off of" energy... TwT This poor woman.

I don't know, just the way The Princess bends down and holds her hand, it's sort of sweetly mentorly or motherly in a way. I'm not saying this to infantilize Ragatha, I respect her so much as a mature 30-year-old adult, I say it as a testament to The Princesses' character. Princesses, Queens, and any sort of royalty have been characterized as the sort of "mother/father of all" sort of character type, which is sweet! And would be quite interesting!

I know that people are quick to do the shipping with these two, but I kind of like the idea of Ragatha wanting approval and validation.

BUT THATS JUST A THEORY!! A FILM THEORY!!! ANDDD CUT!!

764 notes · View notes

immaturityofthomasastruc · 7 months

Text

IOTA Reviews: Action

So, this is a interesting one to talk about. Not only is this the first episode in all five seasons to not be written or directed by Thomas Astruc in any capacity (though the other three writers on his team, Melanie Duval, Fred Lenoir, and Sebastien Thibaudeau still wrote this one), not only is it not connected to the ongoing plotlines of Season 5 in any way, but this episode was made with the help of the Breteau Foundation.

For those who don't know, the Breteau Foundation is an organization that works together with schools by giving children access to technology for their lessons, helping them with their psychological needs, and teaching them about ways to protect our environment. This episode was even made available on the Breteau Foundation's website for free in addition to educational materials meant to teach kids about recycling.

Yeah, when we were kids, we got excited whenever the teacher played an old episode of The Magic School Bus or Bill Nye the Science Guy in class, but nowadays, TV shows are producing episodes of their shows specifically so they can be shown in class. And I'm not talking about those half-assed science lab worksheets with pictures of SpongeBob on them either.

The point I'm trying to make is that there was clearly a lot put into this episode, and it's all for a good cause to help teach children about how to protect the environment in order to ensure a better future... and of course, I'm still going to make jokes about it, because I'm just some schmuck on the internet who isn't backed by a major educational foundation.

Let's get into the 27th episode of Miraculous Ladybug's fifth season: Action

We start off with Marinette and Adrien heading over to the Liberty so they could be told about the pollution in the Seine River by their class' resident environmental activist, Myl—Nino, I mean, Nino. No joke, Nino gets more lines in this episode than Mylene does, even though ever since Season 2, Mylene has been established as the one to protest polluting the environment. I get that she already had a lot of screentime in an earlier environmental episode (Mega Leech), but why would you have Nino be the one to help spearhead this protest instead of Mylene? Hell, the plot of another episode started from him trying to get him and his friends out of helping Mylene plant trees for the environment (Party Crasher), so this makes even less sense.

I should also get this out of the way by pointing out a few continuity errors in the episode. For one thing, Marinette is stuttering around Adrien when she had mostly gotten over that issue after “Derision”, Kagami is now one of the avatars for the Alliance rings, something that had been established in “Revelation”, and the episode mentions that the Alliance rings are made of plastic when the season finale shows that they're actually made of metal. I don't want to harp on this too much, as this episode obviously wasn't meant to really tie into the main plotline so it would be easier for kids who aren't familiar with the show watching this episode, seeing how this was meant to be viewed as a standalone story. Besides, compared to other plotholes in the show like the ones I'll cover next time, these are fairly minor.

Nino tells Marinette and Adrien, and by extension, the audience, that the Seine River is full of pollution, and the Liberty has recently been converted into a makeshift water treatment plant. The problem is that with a recent increase of plastic in the Seine, it's becoming harder for the Liberty to filter out all of it. Hey, here's an idea: Maybe don't set up your homemade water treatment plant in the longest river in Paris.

The reason for all the new plastic comes from a recent ad campaign promoting some vending machines that sell these paper fans that were designed by Gabriel and are sold by a man named Bertrand King, who looks like a cross between Willy Wonka and Colonel Sanders, down to having a southern accent in the English dub.

Nino suggests that Adrien talk to Gabriel himself, but as usual, Adrien doesn't think he'll listen, so the kids decide to go to Bertrand King's company while picking up an order for plastic containers for the Dupain-Chang bakery... even though I'm pretty sure most bakeries store pastries in paper instead of just plastic.

Nino has the others dress up in disguises, but like most of his plans this season, it fails miserably, so Marinette comes up with a little story about Adrien meeting up with Bertrand. The kids make an impassioned presentation to Bertrand, asking him to help change the way he operated his business like making his fans out of more biodegradable materials. Surprisingly, the man whose entire livelihood revolves around selling plastic doesn't want to listen to the people saying everything his company is doing is wrong.

Bertrand: This is all intentional. It's the wonderful cycle of throwing away and buying again that makes my fortune. If people didn't throw away and buy new items again then I, Bertrand King, would no longer be the King of Plastic! So, there is no way any of this is changing.

Wow, a rich person in Miraculous Ladybug turning out to be a total jerk? What an unexpected turn of events.

Bertrand points out how much plastic is used in everyday society, using pens and the Alliance rings as an example, and seeing how we cut to the next scene afterwards, we can assume he had them thrown out. Oh, come on, you couldn't even parody The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air like you did during “Migration”? The kids then try to go to Andre and Gabriel for help protesting the fans, but because one's a corrupt politician and another helped make them, they won't do a thing. Marinette tries to ask Nadja, the local news anchor, but because the ad revenue from Bertrand's company funds the channel she works for, she can't do a thing or else she'll be out of a job.

This leads to the kids deciding to do the sane thing and HACK THE NEWS BROADCAST SO THEY CAN MAKE A SPEECH ABOUT POLLUTION.

Because it's not like Marinette and the others could have just gone to another news network with this story or uploaded it to the internet instead, right? And sure, scowl at the camera while you're giving this presentation too. That won't make you look like a bunch of eco-terrorists at all. The kids give a presentation about how dangerous plastic is, and how people can use fans made of more biodegradable materials like bamboo instead. Also, we get cameos from Jess, Aeon, and Fei, but they're pretty much there just to remind viewers that the New York and Shanghai specials happened.

Of course, the episode's following RWBY Volume 8 logic, so rather than view them as a bunch of lunatics who hijacked a news broadcast, the public immediately turns on Bertrand's company, arguably faster than what happened with Andre in “Mega Leech”. Speaking of, Andre and Gabriel change their opinions to make themselves look like they were always against Bertrand, and seeing how this episode aired after Season 5 ended, didn't really sit too well with viewers.

Bertrand calls out Gabriel for lying, but Gabriel doesn't care, secretly using this as an opportunity to akumatize Bertrand into King of Plastic through his pen.

King of Plastic has a pretty underwhelming design. It's clear that the intent was to make him look like plastic, and there is a noticeable reflection on his body, but other than that, it doesn't really fit the anti-plastic moral. I think maybe if they did more to make his movements seem more stiff like a living doll, or at least make him look less like he's made of candy, it could work more. The Miraculous power this time is the Bee Miraculous' Venom, which he can use through one side of his lance to stun any victims so he can use the other side to turn them into plastic statues. It's sort of like the dollmaker episode of Arrow, only we don't get to hear the sound of anyone's esophagus hardening.

King of Plastic makes short work of Andre and the local police squad, and Adrien is forced to put teaching Marinette Mandarin on hold so he can transform into Cat Noir, while Marinette transforms into Ladybug as soon as she's alone. After he transforms Adrien's bodyguard into a plastic statue, King of Plastic fights Ladybug and Cat Noir, eventually transforming Cat Noir's staff into plastic too. Even though he was originally akumatized to get revenge on Gabriel, King of Plastic leaves the Agreste Manor and heads to the Liberty to get revenge on Marinette and Adrien's friends instead... for some reason. Even the episode points out how weird this is.

Cat Noir: Didn't you want to take revenge on Gabriel Agreste?

Ladybug: He probably has more than one enemy.

After following King of Plastic there with Cat Noir, Ladybug summons her Lucky Charm, getting a plastic bag. Because it's already made of plastic, it can't be transformed, which gives Ladybug an idea. She tells Alya to activate the Liberty's water treatment function, intentionally overloading it before Cat Noir Cataclysms the engine. This jettisons the collected plastic and overfills the deck of the Liberty, trapping King of Plastic so Ladybug can break his lance. So in an episode meant to teach kids about how dangerous plastic is, the day was ultimately saved by plastic. I'm sure that won't confuse any kids watching this in class.

Ladybug de-evilizes the Akuma, tells Bertrand about how dangerous plastic is, and he immediately vows to change his company's ways before Ladybug gives him a Magical Charm as useless as a plastic toy before she uses Miraculous Ladybug to fix the damage.

The episode ends with Bertrand funding the repair of the Liberty before vowing to change the way his company operates, as do Tom and Sabine, who now sell their products in eco-friendly containers. Unfortunately, with all the renovations being made to his company that come with moving away from plastic, Bertrand had to stop funding this groundbreaking cancer research institution in America in order to prevent his company from going bankrupt.

Anyway, this episode was pretty good. I honestly didn't have a lot of problems here. The plot was pretty straightforward, the themes of how easy it is to perpetuate companies that damage the environment were handled pretty well, and the main characters were pretty active.

Even the greedy corporate asshole meant to be a stand-in for real life executives was handled pretty well, having some quirks that make him stand out while showing how ignorant he is to the situation without making him completely insufferable. This episode could have easily gone the Captain Planet route with Bertrand, but they showed he wasn't intentionally endangering the environment because he felt like it, but rather, because he cared more about his company making money, even showing him ultimately realizing the error of his ways.

If there's one problem I had, it's with the way the Akuma fight was resolved. I get that any other Lucky Charm wouldn't have been immune to King of Plastic's plastic powers, but I feel like weaponizing the plastic the heroes spent most of the episode fighting against in order to stop the Akuma sort of muddles the message the episode is going for. It's not the worst way to resolve an Akuma fight, but it just bugs me personally.

While I still think “Mega Leech” did a better job with the environmental message, overall, this episode did a pretty good job teaching the moral it set out to teach.

THE BIGGEST IDIOT OF THE EPISODE IS... ANDRE (THE OTHER ONE)

Shockingly, nobody really acted that stupid this episode. Yeah, the kids were pretty naive thinking they could make Bertrand change his company's way of production, but still took action when that didn't work. Andre, on the other hand...

While Gabriel and Nadja had their own reasons to support Bertrand (Gabriel for Monarch reasons and Nadja for financial reasons), the only reason Andre went along with the fans polluting the environment was because they happened to have his image as one of the designs, and when the public started to turn on Bertrand, Andre acted like he always opposed him, and when confronted with an akumatized Bertrand, begged for his life like a coward and said he would reinstall the fan vending machines. While I guess it's better than having Chloe be the primary supporter of Bertrand's company, I need to reiterate that this aired after the last few episodes of Season 5 tried to place Andre in a more sympathetic light.

171 notes · View notes

uravitypng · 1 year

Text

𝐈 𝐓𝐀𝐋𝐊 𝐓𝐎𝐎 𝐌𝐔𝐂𝐇: 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐓 𝐎𝐍𝐄

pairing: kaminari denki x reader, hanta sero x reader

word count: 1.8k

warnings/contents(for part one): angst, petnames (denki calls you babydoll), written with a chubby reader in mind /// minors do not interact (in later chapters there will be smut and explicit content!!) - smut, fluff and more in later chapters !!

a/n: this is my first series! i'm not sure how many parts this will have but if you wanna be updated i could add a taglist! thank you @tsukkisloser, they suggested i post two versions, by saying that gave me hundreds ideas to where the story could go and i decided to combine all the the ending ideas into plot points, making my series more developed! i'm really excited for this fic and i hope you all enjoy it, it's going to fun! <3

summary: it's terrible when you're in love with your best friend. it's terrible that he's in love with someone else.

part two >> | masterlist (check out my poll for this chapter!)

You're Denki's best friend and you've always been since you both were little, you were attached to the hip, and went everywhere together, both of you went to UA together. Everything used to be okay, Denki was just Denki, your best friend, but luck never took a liking to you and years later you've realised you're in love with your best friend, you always have been.

You're in love with your extremely attractive and all around amazing best friend.

Denki has consistently flirted, he's flirtatious in nature, you never had a problem with it until you you both grew up a bit, until UA. Until Jirou. Denki still flirted with everyone but he always spoke about Jirou to you and it grated. Sure he'd find people attractive before and he'd have liked people in the past but with Jirou it felt never ending. Everyday he talked about her, something about how funny or cool she is, half the time you doubt he even realised he was being so obvious when talking to you about her.

You knew it shouldn't upset you, there was no reason why it should but it did. He never flirted with you, and you never cared about it before, but why did he never pay any attention? He hit on every one else. You were always right there and he never spared you a second glance.

You became bitter, and you really tried not to, you tried your hardest to smile through every time Denki gushed about her but it was so god damn hard.

After blowing Denki off one night, out of exasperation, you end up in Sero's room, he's always had a very good read on you, and can tell when you're pissed off and normally he knows what its about too. "Has Kaminari messaged you tonight?" He slips into conversion while briefly looking at you before the next match begins.

"Yeah, but i'd rather be with you," you shrug back, trying to sound as casual as you can. In all actuality you would rather be spending your time with Sero so you're not lying, just hiding your irritation. It's always so easy with Sero. It use to be that way with Denki but not so much recently, you'd prefer to spend your night relaxing instead of getting Denki gushing in your ear about Jirou again.

"Hmm, I'm flattered." He looks up to smile at you. If only you were into Sero instead. You two spend the night together, playing mario kart and watching x-files.

You take notice that the room is really bright, you swear it was dark only a second ago, and you hear yawning behind you. That makes more sense you fell asleep in Sero's room. It's not the first time it's happened, but it's not particularly frequent, Sero does keep a blanket in his room especially for you though, which you always thought was nice. What's nicer is Sero must have laid you down with the blanket after you fell asleep, you're fairly certain you fell asleep propped up against his wall as the last thing you remember is the climax of the episode you were watching, you don't remember how it ended, you'll have to ask.

"Heyo," you say, softly, still waking up.

Sero makes a noise of acknowledgement, as he starts stretching. "We'll probably miss breakfast if we don't get up soon," Sero says gravelly voice from behind you, the contrast between his morning voice and his regular is something that always makes your face heat up a bit.

This time you hum to let him know you've heard him and start getting up. A couple minutes later you're out the room, albeit tired.

You two seem like one of the last ones up and you can tell Bakugou's been up for awhile by the way he's already shouting, how does he always wake up so early?

"I have no idea how that guy has so much energy in the mornings." Thank fuck for Sero who always matches your energy and knows what you're thinking.

"Speak for yourself, he's already made pancakes and man that guy can cook," you hear Denki say from behind you. He's so enthusiastic in the morning and you can practically hear his grin, you just groan in response. You see Sero smirk from the corner of your eye.

"Do you wanna go out today babydoll?" Denki asks, still too tired to engage in full blown conversations you nod and lean back so you're leaning on him. "We can go to the arcade or something, after you've had some caffeine of course." You turn to the side to look at him and stick your tongue out. Even though you were actually waiting to get something to drink so you can properly start your day, Denki knows every little thing about and that's very comforting when you've just woken up. Safe to say you had a good time with Denki that day.

.·:·.✧ ✦✧.·:·..·:·.✧ ✦✧.·:·..·:·.✧ ✦✧.·:·..·:·.✧ ✦✧.·:·.

Seven years later, you're outside that very same arcade after patrol on your way back home. You can't wait to get back and relax, you haven't eaten all day, you slept in late which is no surprise and had to miss breakfast. Even now as an adult you are definitely not a morning person.

"I'm home!" You call out, Denki must not be in due to the fact he hasn't called back to you as loud as he can like normal. He's probably at Kirishima's or something. When people ask why two successful, up and coming heroes are living together, they normally fill in the blanks themselves. 'They have enough money to buy their own place, so they must be dating, they're choosing to live together.' Crappy tabloids and internet sleuths are always jumping to conclusions.

They're technically not completely wrong about the fact that you both are quickly jumping the charts every year and have plenty to spend on your own places but you have chosen to live with Denki in this warm, comfy little flat but you are just friends, even if you wish there were something more.

After graduation it made the most sense for you to live together, according to Denki, and you'd much rather live with Denki than by yourself so you agreed, years flew by and you still lived together. The idea of moving out never crossed your mind, you like living with Denki, you love it, even if sometimes he forgets to take clothes into the bathroom when showering and he walks out with just a towel on or comes into the living room late at night drinking orange juice from the carton, only leaving a drop left and not buying another one.

He's your best friend and you love him, You've matured together and seen each other grow and you're so proud of the people you've become. Whenever you praise Denki too much though it definitely gets to his head.

After leaving UA it's been a hell of a lot harder to keep in contact with everyone, there's a group chat but it's pretty dead, and even then you haven't opened the last three messages that came through last couple weeks, if it was important Denki would mention it, you'll get round to it eventually. He's always been on top of communicating with everyone, he's always been the more sociable one. Now everyone's gone pro it's harder to find time for each other and have schedules that match up with others. That's why you're so lucky you have Denki.

Although it's not just Denki you've stayed in contact, luckily Kirishima lives close by and so does Hanta so that's good. You're fairly certain you and Denki are the only ones from your class who are living together, every other hero you know lives separately that's makes you pretty special in your eyes. It must be pretty lonely having no one to come home at the end of the day, you know you definitely would be lonely if you didn't have Denki.

You make yourself some dinner and message Denki after asking where he is. You're not ready to call it a night yet and it would be nice to spend some time with people after a tiring day. Denki's at Kiri's, so twenty minutes later you're at Kiri's too.

When you get through the door, you're immediately greeted by Denki's voice accompanied with Kirishima's and Hanta's laughing, and in ten more minutes you're all squished together watching some shitty show in the background that you have no interest in, listening to Hanta and Denki passionately argue about what star wars film is better, they're absolute idiots. According to Hanta, Phantom Menace is the best one because Jar Jar Binks makes his first appearance but Denki says its return of the Jedi because it's the one where Leia has the gold bikini on.

Even though it sucks that you don't see all your friends as often as you like, you feel like you, Kiri, Denki and Hanta have grown even closer, which is weird because you honestly didn't think you could grow closer with them. They were both some of the closest friends you made during your time at UA. Half the time you still end up falling asleep next to Hanta even now, years later, when you're shattered after work, with Hanta by the side of you. That's where Sero's been for years, by your side, that's where Kiri's been too. It dawned on you one day that not only do you have Denki right beside you always, they've been there too and you're very thankful for them.

"Anyway, Kirishima can I turn this shit off and put something actually interesting on?" Hanta turns to asks Kirishima, how does this man always know what you're thinking.

"Go for it, dude."

"What's the point, it's just background noise anyway," Denki complains.

"Yes, but highly annoying background noise. I suggest anything other than this," you say back.

Denki shuts up after that and they let you pick something.

You must have fallen asleep for a some time as Denki's crouched down beside you, tucking some hair behind your ear, whispering to you, "let's go babydoll, let's get you home." You mumble something unintelligible and start closing your eyes again. "I know babydoll, you're tired but you gotta get up. You can't sleep on Kiri's floor again, you're going to hurt your back. I would carry you but I don't want to hurt you while climbing any stairs. Can you get up for me?" He helps you up and and wraps his arms around your soft waist. "Good girl, we'll be home soon, I promise." you're too tired too think, and too sleepy, not even acknowledging Ejirou and Hanta on your way out, they're used to your hazy states and find it rather endearing. Walking home is a blur, Denki's got his arms around you, keeping you warm and stable. You trust Denki to get you home safely as you close your eyes again, not looking where you're going, pulling yourself even closer to him and burying yourself in his neck, his warmth and smell keeping you cosy and relaxed.

590 notes · View notes

sirfrogsworth · 6 months

Text

Review of Blue Eye Samurai on Netflix

There are some spoiler-ish things below, but I think most of it is in the trailer, so I don't think I will ruin anything. I'll warn you during the most spoilery section, though the show makes the "twist" pretty obvious from the beginning.

Premise

Blue Eye Samurai is a Kill Bill-style revenge tale that takes place in 17th century Japan. The samurai is half white/half Japanese. The show states that no white folks were allowed in the country back then, so the samurai tries to conceal blue eyes with some sweet BluBlocker™ orange glasses. The Samurai is displeased to have white heritage and decides to try and kill all the "white devils" hiding in Japan.

Will some reactionaries complain there is a show all about someone trying to murder white people? I have no idea. But they're all bad white people, so I'm hoping it won't become a thing.

My Hot Takes

A few episodes meandered a bit, but I enjoyed the series as a whole quite a bit. If nothing else, the sword fights were epic and bloody. I would have watched it for that alone. And there is some gorgeous art direction where they really take advantage of the 2D styled, 3D animation. Plus, Japan is just really pretty. There is also a puppet show that was brilliantly mixed in with the story and the way they animated it was next level awesome.

They fell into cliche a few times. I think they were trying to do homages and tributes but ended up in Derivative Land and some of them felt a bit cringe.

They used "Battle Without Honor Or Humanity" which is that rousing instrumental song from Kill Bill and it was way too on the nose. Like, yes, this show is obviously a 1600s version of Kill Bill, but you're not supposed to make it that obvious.

Also, there was a Metallica song that equally made me roll my eyes and think, "That is badass" so I give them a pass on that one.

And there were a few sections where it felt like you were watching someone else play a video game. I don't know how else to describe it. As if the narrative melted away and suddenly a bunch of Prince of Persia obstacles appeared.

That said, the story was enjoyable, the actors were great, the characters were interesting, the animation was solid, and the fight choreography was top notch.

The nice thing about animation is you don't have to do any jump cuts during the action, so you get to really *see* the fights develop. Thankfully they didn't make use of a lot of impossible-in-real-life camera moves, so it all felt very grounded. As if these fights could actually be filmed in live-action. I suspect they may have even used motion capture or closely adhered to reference footage. Most of the non-fantastical choreography felt like something a stunt performer could actually do. They even had some legit Japanese samurai-style sword fighting moves before it got to the "John Wick with a katana" part of the show.

Back in the day, samurai duels were more akin to jousting than fencing and usually only lasted one or two moves. It can be pretty exciting as long as you build tension and anticipation. But if every sword fight in the show was like that, it would probably get boring. But it was still nice to see it toward the beginning.

So the quality was a bit roller coaster-y at times, but I think it was a solid first season. And I am really hopeful they get a chance to smooth things out in a second. But it is Netflix, soooooo...

As far as content warnings, there is a lot of blood and sex and nudity. Women are very subjegated and some of those depictions are rough. There are some brutal torture scenes. And I think there is implied rape, but it isn't made super clear.

The nudity was surprisingly balanced which felt refreshing. So get ready for boobies and floppy cartoon peens. All the genitals get screen time.

Quick aside about erotic scenes...

There has been recent discourse about nudity and sexy time in media. My biggest issue has always been that men's bodies are rarely shown aside from the patoot. It is never balanced and I always felt uncomfortable with that arrangement. I know movies are a bit stuck because the MPAA has decided dicks in a sexual context are an automatic NC-17. But even in newer HBO-type content where they do show penises, they are usually prosthetics. Hyper real fake dicks on top of real dicks that probably cost tens of thousands of dollars to develop and apply.

Like, the folks with boobs don't get expensive prosthetics. Only the most famous actresses can opt for a body double. For years, if an actress wasn't willing to get naked they would just say, "Well, I guess we'll just have to find another actress."

And now if a guy doesn't want to get naked, apparently the response is, "Don't worry, we'll raise Stan Winston from the dead so he can make you a perfect megadick."

Women are usually asked to do the brunt of the nudity and I have long felt that wasn't fair and it was exploitative whether intentional or not.

I just think if you are going to ask actors to be vulnerable, everyone should do it or no one should do it.

I also think we need to see more normal non-porn genitals. Like, you can't brag about your progressive all-inclusive nudity if you slap a giant fake wang on every time.

/end tangent

And now, the spoilery part...

The big twist, which is really only a big twist for a character in the show and not the audience, is that the Blue Eye Samurai was born a girl. To avoid capture and death they essentially hid in a different gender identity. And I'm trying to decide if this is a trans story or not.

Sometimes it felt like the show was bluntly saying, "She's a girl. See, she has boobs and no penis. And we make a big deal about her getting caught naked. It's like Mulan!"

But then the show kinda/sorta implies that while identifying as a man was a tactic at first, the Blue Eye Samurai came to feel much more comfortable as a man most of the time and only revealed their feminine attributes to a select few. They also had a binding scene which felt like intentional trans imagery.

Since there wasn't the same concept of trans-ness in 1600s Japan as we understand it in modern times, I'm having trouble determining if this is just an homage to Mulan that wasn't thought very deeply about, or if this is allegory exploring a trans identity.

It is unclear if the identity was chosen purely out of necessity or if there was more to it.

Was it like... they tried on a coat because it was cold, but then they really liked how it fit and made it an essential part of their wardrobe?

Or was it just pure pragmatism? If they don't wear the coat they will die from exposure.

I'm worried they wanted to stay close to that line where they could say it wasn't a trans story if that ended up being more convenient. I don't know. I'm fine with allegory and I really enjoyed how they did it with Nimona, but this felt more deliberately ambiguous and it frustrated me a bit. It would be nice if we could just have blatant trans stories that didn't need to hide in ambiguity to avoid controversy. But maybe there were more obvious things I missed and my confusion is unwarranted.

I also think an argument could be made for ol' Blue Eye being genderfluid. Actually genderfluid would make a lot of sense. Their masculine side is the stoic warrior and their feminine side is their vulnerability, love, and humanity—reserved only for those most trusted. And when the two blend and they are a warrior woman they get super horny. So the entire spectrum is there.

I'm sure there will be a long complicated video essay analyzing this gender dynamic.

/end of spoilery section

In any case, I think if you liked Kill Bill, this might be a show that interests you. It has much less cultural appropriation and blatant stereotyping. No Pussy Wagon, but there is a cool horse. And they did use an all East Asian voice cast, so that representation was cool. And the co-showrunner was Japanese, and I think that influence definitely made a difference.

I give Blue Eye Samurai 7.5 Froggies out of 10.

#long post #blue eye samurai spoilers

41 notes · View notes

thegeminisage · 2 months

Text

it is time for. NOT a tng update. but a ds9 update!!! wednesday* we watched "emissary" and actually i'm not clear on if we watched both parts or just one since my website is wonky but either way whatever we watched FUCKING RULED. i'm dispensing w the normal bullet points so i can ramble as much as i want

*it was last night actually but it took me all day to type this up so i'm scheduling it to go up later. it got looooong lol

the first most striking thing i noticed about ds9, or at least the first half of what we watched, is that it FEELS like a video game. someone tell me if this is insane. you're playing as sisko. you get flashbacks of his backstory, you get thrown into this starbase that's in shambles and it's Your Job to fix it up. you go around meeting all the secondary characters who will be in charge of this or that gameplay aspect or upgrade system or shop: kira, o'brien, quark, odo, jadzia, julian, etc. the FOLEY in this was insane. all the noise in the back CONSTANTLY suggested a lively and whole universe outside of our direct line of focus - it felt so alive in the way not even the enterprise in tos did. i could picture myself in the opening gameplay/cutscene like slowly walking my character through what will become a hub area that i gradually upgrade over time while kira or o'brien narrates the list of problems. you're starting at the bottom rung and expected to fail, but you can FEEL the potential even in just one brief walk through the promenade. IS THIS INSANE? it feels like an insane thing to say. someone PLEASE write in if you have ever had similar feelings. if they haven't made a ds9 game yet, they should.

i also notice that not only is the quality of the ds9 episodes worse than that of tng and tos - no one has remastered them into 1080p, apparently - but the lighting is very different, as well. it felt WEIRD to see picard and the enterprise D shot this way. but it also lends, perhaps unintentionally, perhaps not, a really gritty atmosphere to what is normally a very clean universe. i guess since we mostly see it from the inside of starships, it would feel like a sterile place to us, but you know how everyone always compliments star wars on how lived-in it feels? the buttons are wearing, sand is stuck in their fancy thingamajigs, etc? this was how ds9 felt to me.

okay. the characters. let's fucking get into it. what's so fun about ds9 in general is that in all other trek shows i have picked out my specialest little guy in 5 seconds flat. tos was spock EASILY. tng i knew it was data before i started. i already know seven's gonna be my favorite voyager character, but i have NO IDEA!!! who my precious little baby in ds9 will be. what a fun surprise for everyone involved. if anybody wants to place bets go ahead.

like, i thought tng had a pretty solid lineup (hence my eternal frustration with its wasted potential) but they're not anywhere as eclectic as ds9's core cast. iirc, sisko and o'brien are the ONLY humans who for once are outnumbered by trek's cool aliens. i'm saving sisko for last because that was the part of ds9 that touched me most profoundly, but for o'brien - it was a little sad to see him leave the enterprise, because picard was right, it WON'T feel the same without him, but i'm really excited to see why everybody says he suffers more than jesus and to find out if the eyepatch is a permanent thing or if it's just mirrorverse fuckery. either way, i win. like, o'brien is cool, and i always miss him when i don't see him in tng, and i'll continue to miss him in tng from here on out, but he could never shine in that show. it's too stiff and too reluctant to put its characters through any real development. it's a shame they can't ALL move to ds9, tbh.

the next person we met was kira, who was WONDERFUL. it took me a minute to warm up to her, not because there was anything wrong with her, but because i figured at first glance she was ds9's version of ro laren, the obligatory bajoran cast member to connect us with the bajoran/cardassian plot - which would of course be good because ro is awesome, but it's not necessarily anything new and i already love ro. BUT I WAS WRONG! kira's personality is very distinct from ro's; really the only thing they have in common is not liking cardassians which lmao Yeah. my favorite thing about kira is that she smiles when she's upset or angry. that's Such an acting choic, to have her grinning at the cardassians when she's almost certain they're about to blow her whole space station to smithereens. all love light and respect to ro laren my beloved, but i think i actually like kira BETTER.

odo: WHAT is that thing he can do oh my god...is this a changeling?? i got that result in a star trek quiz once. i really loved when he snuck aboard the enemy ship posing as a bag to hold gambling winnings. i was like oh they showed us the bag to show us it will get stolen soon BUT NO it was odo!!!!!!! such a fun surprise. the exposition on his backstory was a little slapdash but i enjoyed it all the same, i cannot wait to learn more

i was most nervous to meet quark because i hate hate HATE the ferengi in tng, but he was actually so entertaining! like, you're never gonna be able to entirely remove the antisemetic undertones from the ferengi as a whole, but he was smart, practical, and endearingly longsuffering. i love his wryness and deadpan humor. i have a feeling he is gonna be so much fun to torture lovingly.

meeting julian bashir felt like meeting a famous person. for the longest time all i knew about ds9 was that cardassian guy wanted to FUCK that gay little doctor, so it was a little hilarious that in his first scene he was asking a woman* out on a date. sir do you not know you're gay?? even funnier was the fact that out of everybody in the pilot he had the least lines. we barely know him, but we finally met him. relatedly, i can't to wait to meet more cardassians, especially The cardassian. so far, they're still all gay.

*jadzia!!! gnc/trans queen! the trill stuff is SO interesting and watching that worm slither in and out of people during those flashbacks was so wonderful but also made me wince. i love that she used to be an old man and the jokes about it are actually really funny without feeling transphobic or anything SO FAR. who knows if that changes. i feel like we haven't gotten much yet from her either but i cannot wait.

SISKO. damn. where do i even...first of all, he should be allowed to bite kick kill picard. i say this as someone who experienced a genuine THRILL of pleasure upon seeing picard's borged self again. i loved that whole thing, i'm obsessed with the borg. that it comes back in this small way in ds9, and has such a HUGE impact on the storyline, was so so so fucking good. i always say tng tells and not shows, but even after just knowing sisko for a few moments i felt keenly how much it devastated to find his wife like that and THAT WAS JUST FROM THE FIRST SCENE. and it only gets better! he's a great dad. he's FUNNY. he is not above manual labor. he wants to tear picard limb from limb. and he exists HERE.

the wormhole alien sequence was. so good. it was SO GOOD. explaining linear time to aliens. the aliens using his memories to talk to him. HE EXISTS HERE. back and back and BACK to finding his wife in the rubble because HE EXISTS HERE. he CHOOSES to exist here. he existed there when he applied for a transfer to earth. he existed there when he confronted picard. he never left the ship because HE NEVER LEFT THE SHIP. they dragged him out but they COULDN'T DRAG HIM OUT. he exists here because he won't leave her to exist here alone because damn it we can't just leave her here. that was the most insane series of events i ever watched. like, because at first you DO think it's the aliens taking him back there BUT IT'S HIM. HE IS DOING IT TO HIMSELF. when the penny dropped i got literal chill bumps and when the aliens said "it's not linear" and he, openly weeping, replied "it's NOT linear," i genuinely, truly, shed a tear along with him. TNG COULD NEVER. none of those miserable fucks EVER cry!!! sisko did it in the god damn pilot!!!!!!!

and like, the fact that he can choose to stay at the space station at the end, to shake picard's hand, to exist SOMEWHERE ELSE. AAAAAUGHGHGHG

i really loved the final confrontation, too. kira is so so so so good, again, i LOVE that she smiles when she's angry, when she's sad, and it's not a fake smile, it's genuine and honest emotion, and she's genuinely and honestly going to start eating the cardassians for sport if they don't leave her alone. it was very scrappy, them pretending to be bigger and badder than they actually were because they had no other choice. you get the feeling everybody on the station and indeed the station itself is barely holding together, and what little togetherness is present comes from sheer spite.

anyway, absolutely 10/10. i was so worried ds9 wouldn't be good but it not only met my most furtive hopes it surpassed them with flying colors. it's gonna be REAL hard to go back to tng after this.

#personal #star trek blogging #ds9 lb #what an exciting tag to finally get to use!

24 notes · View notes

room-surprise · 4 months

Text

Delicious in Dungeon Anime Season 1, Episode 2 Review

Spoilers for season 1, episode 2 below the cut! There may also be mild manga spoilers so proceed with caution.

This episode was great! I think it was a big improvement on the first. Honestly no real complaints... I do kind of wish both Marcille and Chilchuck could have had stand-alone episodes dedicated to their character development, to allow for a deeper focus, but I understand why they didn't do it, and the pacing was still excellent. I do still sometimes feel like the show is in fast-forward at times, because with 3 meals in one episode, it feels like the characters finish eating, and we jump cut to them saying that they're hungry again, without anything to help really impress upon viewers that time has passed. Makes it feel a bit like we're reading a collection of short 4-panel gag comics instead of a continuing story… which, early Dungeon Meshi DOES have that as part of it's format, but it changes with time, as we get into longer individual stories.

During the Basilisk/Doni and FIonil section, I really do miss some of the dry humor from the manga. ("Hurry, he's getting cold!" "Move him closer to the fire!") The hilarity of slowly preparing a meal while someone is dying of poison has unfortunately been lost, which makes Doni and Fionil much less memorable characters…. But it benefits the other 2 stories in the ep to have more time so I think it was the right choice to make. It also gives people something to go back and read the manga for, since it's a little different! If you're reading this and you're an anime only, consider reading the manga while you watch the anime! I promise it's worth it. I'm excited about next week because I think they'll devote the entire episode to Laios and the living armors, which is me and my spouse's favorite early DM storyline, and the part where we both said "Oh, I LOVE this manga..." and got really invested. It's 2 chapters in the manga so it could be an entire episode…. which also would make sense, if that's why they needed to crunch 3 chapters into episode 2. Just like the first episode, animation was fantastic, and as usual the weakest points are when characters are just walking or talking and not doing much. Everything more dynamic is just bouncy and adorable and full of life. Very rarely is anything animated in a dull or flat way. They're doing their best to use "move a drawing around" or "zoom on a drawing" for comic effect and I think it's working well so far. There's some great animal animation in this episode, the bat flying around and the basilisk chasing Marcille in particular. Translation was better this time around, no dumb modern or game references in the dub ("newbs" "as if" etc.) … But there are differences between the subtitles and the dub script that change how easy it is to understand what's happening. When Senshi tells Chilchuck to cut up the giant bat, the subtitles make it hard to understand what he's telling him to do, and the dub makes it a lot clearer. In the subs when Senshi calls Chilchuck a half-foot child, the subtitles say "I'm not a child" and the dub says "I hate it when people call me 'kid'"… The latter is more interesting for keeping the mystery going for things that happen later in the story. If the show continues like this, I think the English dub may be the more satisfying way to watch it (even though the Japanese performances are great), mostly because the subs are very literal and sometimes miss things that the English dub somehow manages to include. And for some reason Netflix isn't including translation of Japanese signs on-screen during the subtitles, but they DO provide them when you watch the English dub. A lot of Dungeon Meshi's humor is sometimes in those background signs so completely missing out on them sucks. Anyway those are my thoughts for this episode! See you next week Meshiheads.

#dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #dunmeshi #my stuff #chilchuck #chilchuck tims #marcille donato #marcille #dungeon meshi spoilers #spoilers #anime #anime review #review

28 notes · View notes

lovergirly · 1 year

Note

jenna being extremely stressed bc of filming and having breakdowns and male reader comforting her. just basically loads of fluff

hii!! i tried to keep it a little more gender neutral, but i hope you enjoy! i also didn’t go in depth with her having a breakdown. i hope you enjoy <3

Getting the role of Wednesday Addams was both a blessing and a curse for you and Jenna. You were extremely proud of her and excited to see her finally get the recognition she deserves, but you also saw first hand the amount of stress she was under.

from the filming to the fencing lessons to the cello lessons. it was becoming way to much for your girlfriend.

Now you're currently sitting on the couch in your shared apartment while Jenna was trying to make up a dance for the fourth episode of Wednesday.

"Y/n! does this look stupid?" she then starts the music and starts to do a dance.

"No, I think you look beautiful."

"I just can't believe I waited this late. I'm going to embarrass myself on television!" You could tell by the way that she blurted out those words. She was starting to get worked up. Without giving you time to raise her spirits, she goes to do the dance again. Only this time her mind blanks out and she forgets the moves half way through.

embarrassed tears leak from her eyes as she starts rambling, "I'm not cut out for this y/n! I am going to disappoint everyone and ruin the character. I have no idea why Tim would hire me to play Wednesday! The whole fan base is going to make fun of me so much! I-"

you cut her off "Jenna stop saying all of that about yourself right now. You must know none of that is true. You're an amazing actress and you wouldn't have been hired if Tim didn't think you were cut out for the role. You're overworking yourself. you need a night off." you go to place a gentle kiss on her lips then run off to the kitchen. You put a microwavable popcorn in the microwave and finally get a blanket so you guys can enjoy a nice movie.

"What movie do you want to watch?"

she looks at you with such adoration in her eyes, "as much as I love you, I really don't have time for this. I have the dance-"

"don't worry about that for right now. i'll even help you make it up later. for right now let's watch a movie."

she gives in and cuddles on the couch right next to you.

"i don't deserve you, y/n"

you turn to face her and plant a kiss on her forehead, "you deserve the world jenna."

#jenna ortega x reader #jenna ortega #wednesday addams x reader #wednesday #vada cavell

174 notes · View notes

ursaribbon · 10 months

Text

What Modern Pokemon Means to Me

I've felt this way for so long, and I can't just not talk about it anymore. I'm hoping to find more people who feel this way, and I think Tumblr is the best place to do so. (cw: su/c/de)

In elementary school, I was cheerful and loud all the time, and people thought I was weird for it. I had been told my whole life that I was so unique and special, and since I only got that validation from adults, I would do everything in my power to get more validation by doing whatever adults told me to do and valuing whatever they told me to value. I was almost blindly obedient, and I sought academic validation. I started masking my ADHD. I was so stiff on the outside that I rarely cried anymore, especially at things other people would cry over. I felt like there was something wrong with me, or that I really was emotionless.

When puberty started and genetic mental illnesses came into play, I became a husk. I never displayed emotion, and people called me a zombie. I was frustrated. What did they want from me if I couldn't be loud or quiet? Classmates would ask me unprompted if I was depressed, exchange an amused look with their friends if they were paired with me for a group project, and whisper about me when they thought I couldn't hear.

Since I was a preteen, I would continually push away the people in my life because I had mental health issues that made it draining to talk to people. I wanted to spend all my time alone because I wanted to rest--I constantly wanted to be left alone in silence because everything going through my head was already too stimulating. My younger brother, my biggest supporter, would try asking me to play with him or try to talk to me about something he was excited about, and I pushed him away every time. He thought it was because I was tired and lazy all the time, because that was what I told him. He began to resent me for always leaving him alone, and even though I never tried explaining myself or even going to him for support, I thoroughly believed it was my fault for leaving him behind.

People who make fun of "teenage angst" are just making fun of themselves for what they see as "dramatic" looking back. It's easy to forget that regardless of what hormones generate them, feelings of depression are real and harmful. It felt like no matter where I turned, there was no light to overcome the darkness.

Gens 7 and 8 of Pokemon have gotten me through the worst of my teenage and pre-teen years. I had been following the Gen 6 anime by the time it was ending, and I was so excited for the next chapter of Ash's journey. I remember going around school telling everyone, "ASH LEAVES KALOS ON THURSDAY! NOVEMBER 17!!!" Not many people wanted to hear it, but for what felt like the first time in forever, I didn't care. I was already known as a zombie at school, and there weren't many things I unapologetically loved so much.

I was in middle school when covid hit. During online school, I felt lonely, scared, and sad. I had the rest and lack of stimulation I had always wanted, but I didn't realize how much it helped to be at school where I was forced to interact with other people. When I was really alone with my thoughts, I couldn't find a reason to live anymore. I was having s//c/d/l thoughts. One day during my lunch time, as I nibbled at my sandwich with my head down on the desk, I decided I may as well catch up on the latest episodes of Pokemon Journeys.

The Beautifly episode was playing, but I was only half paying attention, barely able to focus on anything. Ash had misheard and thought they were going to watch Beautifly hydrate, and Goh had a short fantasy about a Beautifly laying on the beach with a cup of juice before realizing the mistake.

He phrased it something like:

"Yeah, they look so peaceful when theY HYDRA-HOLD ON!!!!"

And I just died laughing.

I knew the joke wasn't funny. The funny part was Zeno Robinson's delivery. I must have replayed it ten times. It was the first time in months that I'd felt like everything was okay.

I even showed the scene to my brother. We both laughed at it for at least ten minutes. It was so nice to share something with him.

I became a bigger fan of the show, and started shipping Ash and Goh. It wasn't because Goh was flamboyant, although I won't deny that many fans assert him to be a certain sexuality based on how he presents himself, which is stereotyping at best and homophobic fetishization at worst. I ship the characters because I think they're compatible and are just cute together. That was when I found the Satogou Discord server.

I had never really had online friends like the ones I had on that server. For what felt like the first time, I had found people I could talk about anything with for hours. While progress wasn't a straight line, I was beginning to have s//c/d/al thoughts less and less because the people and media in my life filled me with light to overcome that darkness.

And then episode 62 aired.

In that episode, Goh's Sobble evolves into Drizzile. It was so excited to be an Inteleon that it didn't realize there was a middle stage in between. It couldn't even use Water Gun properly anymore, and other Pokemon made fun of it for that. It began isolating itself, and when Cinderace forced it to come out of its cave, it ran away in tears.

When Goh finds Drizzile, he tells it about his own childhood, when he was pointed out as being different for reasons even he didn't fully understand. When he asked himself "Why?" he only felt frustrated. This is what he tells Drizzile:

"I don't understand, but that's okay. And I don't need immediate answers, either. ... I'm fine if you just want to be who you are. ... If it helps you to nest, just do it. And if at some point you feel like being with a friend..."

"...I'll be there whenever you need me."

I didn't cry. I almost cried, but I didn't. And I didn't need a reason why anymore. Anyone else may have cried. I might have been a zombie or a husk for not crying.

...Maybe it was because I wasn't overwhelmed by what was going through my head anymore. It made me remember what I had been through, but the way these characters reached out to me was so much more meaningful than anything that came before.

The media that allowed me to laugh and to live and to make friends with ease once again provided light to me, not blinding me, but providing for me a moment of clarity.

I know not everyone likes the newer seasons of Pokemon. It doesn't fit the formula that provided light to those who have been fans for a longer time, and believe me, I understand how important these things are, but goddamnit, it's one thing to dislike a piece of media and an entirely different thing to continue arguing when you find out it means something to someone else. I respect those who don't like the newer seasons, and I won't tell you they're better than the ones that came before because, at least to me, they simply can't be compared to each other.

I know not everyone likes Goh, but I miss him so much for what he represented, and I can't thank the creators of Pokemon 2019 enough for what they went through to make what they did.

79 notes · View notes

twig-tea · 6 months

Text

Current Tag Game

Tagged by @waitmyturtles @lurkingshan and @wen-kexing-apologist!

Current Time: 12:27 PM

Current activity: Taking a lunch break from work between back-to-back meetings (during which I sometimes post to tumblr when they are not useful meetings lol).

Currently thinking about: Balancing work stuff with Palestine stuff with Shadow theories! Also trying not to think about medical news I am waiting for....my brain is a stressful place rn.

Current favourite song: So I fell down a TXT FreeFall rabbit hole; fell in love with Skipping Stones, which then led me to the artist who created that song, Hanroro, and am now obsessed with one of her other songs, "Even if you leave,". Her tone, mood, just everything. Obsessed.

youtube

Currently reading: These days I only read fanfic and nonfic. Oh and the Batman: Wayne Family Adventures webtoon lolol Shoutout to Yeaka on A03 who (among other things) writes pitch-perfect Ustukushii Kare ficlets that get me through the day; here's the one I read most recently.

Currently watching: lol here we go (in no particular order but semi-ranked in terms of how much space they are taking up in my brain?):

Shadow the Series: binged all 7 eps yesterday, eagerly awaiting the back half!

I Feel You Linger in the Air: finale this week; this one was really hard for me to watch at first due to the the sexual assaults in the first four episodes, but it's a really gorgeous piece of work and I'm glad I stuck with it (I did have a real moment to myself where I thought if this pattern was going to continue I would have to drop it, but luckily it did not keep going). There are a few powerful scenes that I've written about separately that will live rent-free in my head.

Kimi ni wa todokanai / I cannot reach you / won't get through to you: I'm watching this one grey thanks to the incredible sub work by @lurkingteapot (follow @kiminaisubs!) and am absolutely loving it. These are such wonderful characters. It's so interesting to be watching this at the same time as the next one, because the similarities and differences make comparing the two a richer experience watching both!

Kimi to nara koi wo shite mite mo / If it's with you: Amane has rocketed up to one of my favourite characters of all time. Love how the family stuff is integrated into this show. I think I actually like this show more than I cannot reach you, but I've been providing the minimal insight I can into drafts of the subs for the other show so have been thinking about it more.

One Room Angel: very excited for this one, the humour is pitch-perfect and the themes are my cup of tea. I love supernatural stuff, and mysteries especially around supernatural mechanics, and psychology, and self esteem issues. and all that good stuff.

Kinou nani tabeta / What Did You Eat Yesterday?: Love that this show has retained the heart and quality of the previous work. Loving this a lot. It's not higher on the list only because I don't need to think about it a lot, it's SO legible, and so well done.

Mr Cinderella 2: I am having a FANTASTIC time with this show lol it is such a pulp; there is high drama, paranormal elements (rituals and potions), insidious psychological tricks, and really solid relationship writing. This show starts with the main couple together, and shows how they deal with all of these external forces--which works for me in a way it doesn't with Kiseki below because their response as a couple at first is to unite and shore up; they support one another through it. It's when they start trying to handle things on their own (and this is justified by the narrative) that things fall apart.

Kiseki: Dear to Me: Like everyone else, I have fallen in love with Ai Di the murder kitten. I think the mains aren't resonating with me as much because their problems are all external rather than internal, and they keep trying to handle them individually (i.e. without ever working as a couple to face these issues), but they are also very pretty and I appreciate all the lap-sitting.

Absolute Zero: Honestly I now watch this show with annoyance like "What are you doing with this scene, New Siwaj? Why?". The mechanics of the show are still interesting but I am mad at it so I now approach those questions with annoyance rather than interest lol

Venus in the Sky: I liked this one way more than I thought I would; it's miles better than Check Out and far more coherent. It's a decent pulp!

My Universe: I'm a bit behind on this one but mostly caught up now (one story behind); the quality of these stories varies wildly but it's an interesting short story format! I'm keeping track of thoughts for all of the stories and will do a post when I'm done if anyone wants to know which are worth watching (since they all stand alone)

My Dear Gangster Oppa: This just got started; the first episode was pretty! I think it's going to be a solid and enjoyable pulp lol

You Are Mine: This one I am not enjoying. Too much boss-using-his-powers-over-his-subordinate-to-force-proximity-and-not-actually-communicating, and the women pushing this male secretary at his boss as fodder really sits wrong with me.

Dangerous Romance: I have very little sympathy for the rich boy who doesn't think through the consequences of his actions or the people who enable him, and I'm annoyed that the Sailom character we got at the beginning of the series who was self-aware, confident, clever, and had his priorities straight seems to have disappeared. There is no internal consistency in this show.

Taskmaster series 16: I love this dorky show from England lol comedians are given absurd tasks and then are judged; it's got a very strong undertone-turned-overtone of kink, and yet is family-friendly, and I find that fascinating. What a good show lol

Current favourite character: HMMMM. Amane from If It's With You comes first to mind, to be honest. He's gay, he fucks, he has self esteem issues but he's working on them, he's brave enough to be honest to his crush even though he's been burned before, and he asks for what he really wants, and then hold hope that he might actually get it. And his behaviour around his crush is relatably cringe. I LOVE HIM. [@wen-kexing-apologist wrote this before I saw yours but YES, sad boy hiding behind happiness is THE BEST]

Current WIP: I have 4 asks that I have in my drafts that I owe @wen-kexing-apologist, @mynameisnotthepoint (this wasn't really an ask per se but it was an excuse to gush so I'm taking it), @wanderlust-in-my-soul, and @waitmyturtles. I have been working on all of them and do still plan on answering them! I also have a draft re: Hidden Agenda the novel vs the show that I realllllly need to just stop fussing with and post.

Tags: Tagging folks I've chatted with recently! @dribs-and-drabbles @my-rose-tinted-glasses @slayerkitty @neuroticbookworm @lurkingteapot @crowie @visualtaehyun @belladonna-and-the-sweetpeas @sorry-bonebag @thewayurant

31 notes · View notes

popculturebuffet · 5 months

Text

Scott Pilgrim Takes Off Review: That's How It Could've Happened, But How About This?

WARNING: SPOILERS FOR SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF AHEAD. IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN AT LEAST EPISODE ONE, TURN BACK. SERIOUSLY DUDE. DO IT NOW. IF YOUR COOL WITH SPOILING YOURSELF, ROCK ON.

Hello all you happy scottaholics. I"m back in the saddle again. For those just tuning in i'm Jake, I review stuff.. and a few years back I reviewed the entirety of Brian Lee O'Malley's masterpiece, and the movie as a chaser, having been a fan of Scott Pilgrim since my teens but only having just revisited it at the time I started my retrospective. It was a wonderful journey that made me appricate one of my favorite comics even more and gave me a ton of my best running gags. You can find links to each review HERE in one masterpost.

So naturally when the anime was announced last year, I was entirely on board: I loved this story in all three of it's major forms and was excited to see it again, maybe updated a tad. I was also curious if the story would get a setting update, what would change , and what subplots we'd FINALLY see on screen after the film had to trim a lot thanks to half the series not being finished yet and a tight two hour run time. I was cautiously optimistic when the cast was announced as while I was happy to see the massively talented breakout cast of the film return and get another shot at the characters, I was worried it'd just be the movie but animated.. which thankfully turned out not to be remotely true once trailers came out. Instead they'd simply get a shot at playing the characters again but this time with diffrent characterizations. I coudln't be more stoked.

As it turns out though.. O'Malley had zero intention of telling the same story again. In fact, he almost DIDN'T sign on despite getting the juciest of offer, with the anime's studio, Science Saru, wanting their next project after their breakout hit Devilman Crybaby to be Scott Pilgrim and coming to O'Malley Directly.

The problem wasn't the offer: O'Malley, unsuprisingly, was a fan of Science Saru, who in addition to Devilman had also made Space Dandy and the early pilot shorts for OK KO. The problem was O'Malley.. really didn't want to simply retell scott's story a fourth time. It was a story that was personal, deeply loved and made his career.. but after a movie that everyone knew and love and a video game that was so well loved it was many's holy grail for a rerelease for over a decade after it was delisted, he didn't know how to take the story in a new direction and didn't want to do the story again if it was simply going to be a rehash: people could read the book sometime or watch the movie if they wnated Scott fighting the exes.

Thankfully for us, Brian brought up the offer to his good friend BenDavid Grabinski, a tv and film writer. BenDavid was a huge fan of Scott Pilgrim and thus when the idea came up coudln't help spitballing ideas. And one stuck: What if Scott LOST that first fight. It was naturally just a joke.. but like when Superman died.. it's one that had some heft to it. If Scott were gone what would happen to everyone else? How would Ramona react to his loss? Was Scott really gone? how would his friends go on without him... and what would happen to the exes now they weren't guaranteed to die in a fist fight and the entire problem with Gideon's whole plan was laid bare?

These questions and more are answered as Ramona gets to the bottom of what REALLY happned to scott, who unsurprisingly is not dead and even more unsurprisingly the truth is all kinds of bananas. The story of a human tire fire learning to be a better person and not runa way from his problems... becomes the story of a much more composed tire fire learning she can't run away from her problems after she chases after what might have been, forced to get closure with most of her exes as she tries to hunt down the ex that never was. Along the way there's messy bisexual love triangles, movie rental melee's, Tony Hawk style antics done on swarms of paparazzi ninjas, the greatest musical of all time, the rise of Matthew patel, the fall and re-rise of Gordon Goose, explosions, cameos, and more as Ramona Flowers gets it together while Scott Pilgrim takes off, resulting in one of the best animated series of the 2020's and possibly the best of a very stacked 2023. So take off with me as we press start on a fresh new take on one of my favorite franchises under the cut.

Ramona Flowers Gets It Together

This one's going to be a LOT to unpack, and the best place to start is with our new lead: Ramona Flowers. Ramona has never been unimportant to this franchise: after all it's her exes that make up the fight of the week each volume and who give the franchise it's hook, and in the comics she develops alongside scott: As I said in my reviews, Ramona develops alongside him, having to learn to not keep people at arms length and to not run away, nearly running away from everything before coming back, realizing Scott's worth it. Through each other, they grow stronger.

So with Scott gone... Ramona is forced to grow all on her own. If she wants to date Scott, SHE has to fight this time, and she can't run like she tends to. In the comics, she had to scrap with Envy and Roxy, but all the weight to evolve as a person was put on Scott: Ramona had a stable job, was content in her life even if her friend group was basically "Whoever scott happened to be friends with", she was seemingly all together until the last three volumes slowly chip away at that and reveal she's just as bad at staying and improving instead of noping the fuck out of an intense situation as scott. She has to evolve.. but her getting better isn't the point till the climax of the story. It's a lesson in how while a relationship can HELP you grow, ultimately it's on you to: Scott grows because he stops running and embraces his evil self and thus the memories of all his fuckups, embraces that he could sometimes be shitty so he can learn past it. Ramona has to choose to stand and fight gideon and let go of hte hold he has on her, to let go of running and embrace what she has.

Here without Scott and only the vauge mystery of a guy she dated once, Ramona instead has to confront herself: many a character question her doing this. While it starts simple enough with just Julie questioning it, because Julie hates scott as much as I hate the comics version of her, we get harder questions from Kim, whose dated Scott and knows how insesntive he can be, and Lucas who KNOWS Ramona and knows her style is to run. That a happy ending isn't as easy as finding scott again andmaking out intensely. Ramona has to make her own happy ending.

As a result instead of being the sneaky deutratonist or a prop depending on the version (I Love the movie but man do they not do her well), Ramona has to confront her past on her own, and instead of just getting cathartic punchings, she has to actually.. TALK to her exes and resolve things like an adult. And you can imagine how much she likes the prospect of that.

And this flip in how the story works.. is brilliant: It allows us to get to know Ramona: We're seeing things from her perspective instead of Scotts so we see her way more vunerable, genuinely shaken by Scott's "Death", obssesed with solving his kidnapping, and forced to confront her past. Granted like the books we also get to see the lighter side: Ramona is still the straight man to a lot of the cast especially her exes. She and Kim are the sanest one's here and Kim is often out of focus, leaving Ramona one of the few rational people in a sea of gloriously goofy nonsense. Yet we also see her own intrests: she's a columbo fan, turns out to be a natural for stunt work, and has a meticulous routine for her hair dye. We also find out she's a blonde which is only TECHNICALLY cannon to this version.. but fits too well as her hair color to work.

We get to see Ramona not as some ideal to chase slowly turned into a person but just.. a person. Funny, aloof, kind, easily baffled... this is easily my favorite verison of her. Granted it's not exactly ac ontest: The comic's version is great and this simply takes the best of that and fleshes her out, the video game is a 16 bit brawler, and the movie... well look I like the movie, but the film version is a nigh emotionless prop that barely gave Mary Elizabeth Winstead anything to work wtih forgetting ramona HAS emotions who instead of simply having her emotoins amplified is outright brainwashed. I used to think Kim got the shortest end of the stick but doing this review.. no it was Ramona. Ramona got screentime but had any personality stripped. Thankfully both Ramona and Mary Elizabeth get a second shot on the screen here.

Mary Elizabeth's performanc ecan't be overstated: she nicely ballances Ramona's stocisim, something key to her charcter as her main problem is distance, that she puts up and that she creates by running away, with the emotoin peeking up just underneath to say hello. IT's a truly great performance and I hope she'll consider doing more voice acting, she's an natural.

And this is great as Ramona's quest eventually leads her back to scott.. and to an ending that's both profound.. and pokes some holes in the series itself.

The Adventures of Scott and Scott

So turns out Scott was kindapped by of ALL characters, Robot 01, the Katanagi Twin's robot minion who shows up for one fight in the comics and video game and then explodes real good. Here he's their little robot son.. and how Scott got kidnapped.

But thankfully the culrprit isn't the Twins. I would've liked for them to get more to do, more on that later. THeir involved, having leant their robot boy to a friend since , as a robot who can't eat, Robot 01 has never had meat and has no human limits and thus is the strongest robot vegan who ever existed.

God I love this stupid reveal. Anyways, turns out Scott's kidnapper.. is SCOTT. Specifically a version of him who did the usual story, won, had a happy ten years with Ramona, then it fell apart after an argument which he assumed ended in divorce.

This is another twist that was brilliant.. I thought Scott's kidnapper was another scott, but I assumed a clone situation. I never thought FUTURE Scott but it's such a brilliant move. We see a Scott who won.. but who simply didn't let the lessons he learned stick. It's easy to learn something about you sucks, I have many a time.. it's harder to make the changes stick. I can't tell you how many ephnaiinies i've had only to end up back where I started. Some change has stuck with effort, but it's not easy. You have to constantly work at it, to grow. And it's easy enough to backslide.. and thus sadly easy to buy that this verison of Scott , when hit with his relationship not working, spiralied instead of working at it , not helped by Old Ramona, their words not mine, ghosting him.

He's a ghost of Scott future, every bad thing about the guy amplified: he's oblivious, thinking his newest band is going anywhere with his gloriously crappy music video, and refusing to accept it was his fault, throwing a tantrum when Young Scott states the obvious solution: just tell his younger self some of his fuckups and hopefully that'll right the relationship. Instead Future Scott goes for the solution that's easiest and laziest: use time travel to undo his relationship. And naturally this being Scott he got this stupid idea from taking a joke Wallace told him seriously. I love Wallace's "Buddy I was kidding".

I also love the performance here. Rather than use Michael Cera , Future Scott is voiced by voice acting, comedy and beard legend Will Forte. Forte's goofy nature, penchant for playing man children blind to their own flaws, and deadpan deliveries make Future Scott work. He's deeplys ad, but also deeply hilarious, sharing some of Scott's weird intricates like assuming because Future Wallace's husband works for nintendo he gets all the video games for free and making a virtual boy scrapbook of his relationship.

He's still throughly Scott.. just one who can't get past himself, requiring Scott and Future Wallace to go to Future Ramona for help. Shockingly.. she's more than willing too: While she still has Ramona's own problem of running away at the first sign of trouble, she does still LOVE this idiot, she just dosen't know how to fix it and knows she can't talk him out of this, so she sends scott back to be with his ramona... well rides him back leading to some awkward selfies.

But naturally for this tale, Scott coming back.. dosen't fix things. And not just because his older self put anti kissing nanites in him.

Scott has grown some from seeing what he could be: He apologizes to Knives, in a scene that I truly love.. mostly for this line "Apparently a 23 year old dating a high schooler is frowned upon by society".

And I have to stop for a minute to give ALL the props to Michael Cera. He already had done plenty awesome this year as the boy of the year

He didn't need to go for two but he did. Cera wasn't at all bad as Scott the first go round: the character was different, a bit less goofy but still awkward as hell and oblivious to his own flaws: the core was there. Here .. Cera is playing the character as on page, if slightly amped up: Goofy, excitable, trying to ignore his painful past and flaws, charming.. all the good and bad of scott is bubbling around this guy. And the line deliveries my god: we have instant classics like "I'm using the world wide web" "The place where they make the video games", the instantly memetic sonic scene (Which would be me trying to flirt with a girl, ngl), and the above frowned upon line. Cera just bubbles in this roll, sliding into who scott is: Loveable but a total mess who needs to get his shit together and has made some grave mistakes.

Granted they also take steps to make sure Scott's relationship with Knives as judging from interviews, O'Malley is kinda tried of the take that scott pilgrim is a bastard man. I mean he is, but it's less that Scott has some shit to work out and need to be better and more that everyone acts like this is a new discovery. As the author himself said it's there on the first page and a good chunk of chapter one is the people who know him best asking what the hell is wrong with him.

Granted this is mixed with Stephen hooting and hollering as much as he can with his stoic personality, Neil being in awe and asking if they'd "done it yet" and Wallace being tempted with the idea of a high schooler himself, though I get the impression he never seriously considered it. So it is muddled slightly.. but not NEARLY enough.

I do get it with the movie: the movie.. outright portrays Knives as a legit love interest, and while it ages Scott down, it's not enough to make that not blehhhh and the game has Knives end up with Kim, which younger me didn't get was still pedophilia. So I do get it as while the comics make it clear this is messed up, it got muddled.. but it's also still a pretty weak gotcha when the source material has always said "This is wrong" They even bring up trainspotting for fucks sake, which I haven't seen but is a pretty good indication O'Malley knew what he was doing.

So here they make it clearer that while Scott's still stringing this poor baby girl angel baby along, he dosen't really consider it a relationship, or just dosen't want to and after seeing what he easily could be even with Ramona, apologizes way sooner. So they did make strides to make things a bit clearer here if only so another version didn't miss the point.

So one rant later while Scott and Ramona think things are wrapped up.. it's just not that easy. You can get closure, we'll get into the exes more shortly, but it dosen't mean your done or done growing... or that the past is done with you. Or future in this case. Like I said, Old Scott/Future Scott put nanintes in scott and after figuring out the exes aren't involved, the two get kidnapped along with the exes , knives, pretty much anyone who can throw a punch.

The kidnapper is naturally Old Scott.. EVEN OLDER SCOTT.

I love his look: he still has his old jacket, his iconic x-men one, but laso looks like Ryu from Street Fighter 5, just with a giant beard and crazy eyes, being a mix of that ryu and devil ryu.. and nega scott. Old Scott wasn't a great person but still had the potetial to turn it around if he got his finger out of his ass. Even Older Scott is every horrible thing Scott Could've been.. and this is something the comics foreshadowed was possible.

And the thing is while Ramona was being dickish in her own right there, not getting that while Scott cheated on Knives with Ramona he had changed since then, she's not WRONG. Scott was VERY close to giving up on change entirely if Kim hadn't turned him away. Hell had Ramona not come along Scott might've become Old Scott sooner just by dating a teenager. The potential to, like the exes, sink into his resintment and worst self was always there... this is just a Scott that did. A Scott who when faced with the fact change is hard would rather hull up, get buff and plan to kill everyone he cares about just to avoid changing. This is the Scott he almost became.. and sadly at least one scott did become.

He's also horrifying for more than just the implications of seeing this guy who while a dickhead, CAN be better if he puts in the effort and does change and grow in both main versions as his worst self. It's sad to see that.. but we also quickly see just how dangerous an evil ex scott would be: After all Scott beats all the evil exes... I mean original timeline scott beat Lucas and Todd via Indigo League style technicalities, but still. While Scott was still beatable, it took multiple rounds, a feint, and ramona's help to put down the last four exes, he was still fairly strong.. so give him 24 years more of experince with ten of those spent JUST training and specifically preparing to counter the exes , ramona and his past self.. and you have an unstoppable monster that NOTHING can stop and everyone else is very lucky they get sent back. They all put in a good offense.. but the league is out of their league.

Even Older Scott is a brick wall.. and one that smacks straight into Scott and Ramona trying to run from their problems. Scott is forced to face the fact that even getting better might not last even if he dosen't become this guy and Ramona's forced to face the hide this guy is right. Our heroes are up against the wall, their relationship almost over...

Enter Even Older Ramona. Turns out Even Older Scott just.. ghosted her. But her presence finally gives present Ramona the wakeup call she needs as finding our her older self just.. ran away each time her and scott had issues.. gives her a needed ephinay the same way Older Scott being a dumpster fire on cocaine gave this Scott one and Scott in the comics got one from seeing a dark mirror in gideon: Ramona Flowers.. always run. Lucas outright said as much and with the series fleshing out the exes more, almost there just give me a minute, we find out she just.. bounced on each relationship. Matt isn't a suprise, his backstory is the same as it ever was, and in some cases she was ENTIRELY justified in her assholery: Todd was an obnoxious prick she left another, far better guy for, the Twins were recontexculazed as serial predators who preyed on new freshman with Ramona dating them both being a way to get even on both of them, so while she still did a bad it was on legitly bad people, and Gideon.. is still Gideon. He may get more development here and have his own backstory.. but the series makes it VERY clear he was every bit as shitty to ramona as previous versions, he just hadn't got to using the glow or mind control chips levels of creep yet.

But as i'll get into more in a bit... she legitly hurt everyone else: While Matt didn't get into supervilanny till high school, it's hard not to think that being used as a weapon to keep other boys away didn't lead him down the tryhard path he now walks, Lucas was left devistated and became a xerox of a xerox of the kind of guy Ramona left him for, and Roxy was left genuinely devistated thinking she was nothing. All Ramona has done is run and deny people closure and the series reckons with that.. and like the comics forces Ramona to stand and fight, recognizing that her relationship with Scott could end badly.. but it's worth having.

It's a neat metaphor: our heroes see exactly how badly things could end... and that's how relationships can be. You worry about how badly things are going to go or how you'll fuck up. But the only way it can go forward.. is if you try. Risk the hurt for the good. present/past/whatever Scott made a valid point when trying to talk to his Older Self before seeing that was a lost cause: There had to be good times too? While Old Scott and even Older Scott bury them in self pity, a relationship, even if it fails.. has something to add. Something to help you grow. And given Brian himself had been through a divorce after a ten year marriage it's hard not to see the subtext, to see that idea of "would you talk yourself out of a relationship if you knew it'd end". And the answer he and Ramona have.. is no. It's worth the risk, worth the pain, and worth the possiblity that someone else can do it better.

Granted this being scott pilgrim doing it better involves the ramona's fusing and Even Older Ramona, while done with Scott (He ate up his second chance a LONG TIME AGO) gives both Scott's another chance. As she puts it "This one's just an idiot kid... and this one's a real mess" (When told to kick his ass) "It's never too late to clean up a mess.. " Despite it all.. part of her loves him.. and gives him another chance. Not with her, Oh lord no, but to be better. That .. we can always be better, no matter if your 23 or 47, you can become better. As Super Ramona says "What you've done in the past dosen't define you, hell me keep remembering that". It's a beautiful message: you can screw up, there is no happily ever after.. but you can always be better even if you stumble. And as our heroes face a new future together once again.. it feels a bit brighter this time, like these two kids will make it you know?

Not That Evil

One big pull of doing the story this way for Brian and BenDavid was the exes. Brian admitted in interviews he wrote the books by the seat of his pants and as a naive 20 something who didn't know how skaters or musicians worked except via magazines. Moving to LA among other stuff gave him more perspective, and he wanted to add that to the story, flesh the Exes out as people and use the bits he didn't have time for in the original.

As such 5/7 go from sometimes one dimension, sometimes wholly evil bastards for Scott to punch.. and Lucas, to 5 very flawed , very intresting people we get to see way more of and who all get something resembling a happy ending. Also Kyle and Ken are there. Getting them out of the way once again the adaptation barely uses them, as their more a plot device/backup so we can hear Will Forte sing the theme to Bubblegum Crisis. You know when Brian hinted at that scene in interviews pre show I expected to here Kirean Culkin, Bree Larson, maybe even Micheal Cera. I didn't expect Will Freakin Forte and god bless Brian for that.

So yeah the Twins are.. fine here and I love the anti climax: they don't get closure with ramona.. but are cool with Scott since they'll be buddies eventually. I also like that out of ALL the exes for Scott to befriend after they respawned it's these two guys.

Thankfully everyone else gets way more and no where is that more apparent than with MATTHEW PATEL, the first evil ex.. and the one who naturally gets the most to work with, going from the biggest jobber who ever jobbed, to the guy who killed scott pilgrim

Satya Bhabha gets to have a fucking feast here and I hope this leads to more rolls, voice acting or otherwise. While he was already one of the highlights of the film, easily, taking what was implied to be a music number and making it into this glorious thing.

youtube

The series takes it to new heights.. mostly by giving Matt his best life. Granted.. this life naturally dosen't include Ramona who walks out pissed off and Matt is befuddled "Wait we DON'T get her automatically if we win?"

So he does what you'd expect from an egocentric theater kid who realizes he was just played and this whole evil exes setup is a sham... call a meeting in GIDEON"S OWN LAIR to dramatically reveal it all. And punch the head off a good soft robot boy because he's a prick and a half. A loveable prick and a half but still.

It's something I just.. never thought about with the league. I assumed it was simply a "If I can't have you" situation as that was GIdeon's whole goal.. and to put her in his girlfriend freezer which i'm sure Matt released. Gideon and Roxy seemed like the only ones who wanted her back. But given the weird logic of this unvierse even if some of them DIDN'T want her, I like the idea they'd still like to keep that option open by unaliving someone. It's fucked up as it is sensical for a group that all gathered to keep their ex from moving the fuck on.

It makes equal sense that this was all a ponzi scheme, Gideon , being an entiled dick, just.. assumed he got her if anyone won. That the exes wouldn't object or, more likely, they simply woudln't make it far enough. They were just patsies so he could swoop in and score her on the rebound, also not getting that would never work and sh'ed just hammer his nuts so far in they'd be impacted.

What threw me after this.. was Matt's Challenge to gideon. Not him challenging Gideon, I expected that easily: Matt gets all of Gideon's empire if he wins, Matt dies if he looses. I figured Gideon would kill Matt, again, and would do some sort of cordinated strike. But as before Scott Pilgrim Takes off Decides

Instead we get an absolutely gorgeous, awesome fight scenes. one of the best i've seen in animation and one of the best of the year, which given Invincible came back, is saying something. Gideon, while not having his pixel or glow powers, fights well with swords, a harness and pure skill while Matt is consistently forced to push his powers in new and creative ways. While we get the ones he got to show off against scott, fireballs and demon hipster chicks, we also get to see a lot of cool new shit as he manifests arms ala the Hindu god shiva, with all his powers seeming to tie into Hindu mythology instead of "magic stuff I guess" like the originals. It's a tense fight I assumed would end one way.. but instead... Matthew Patel FUCKING WINS and wins Gideon's emppire, only leaving him alive as a brag

Yeah I assumed from this when first watching that this was some sort of Buffy "Superstar" situation, that Matt had altereted reality to make it better for him. Instead.. nope. This just happened organically. Turns out Matt is badass as fuck, Scott simply had the power of friendship and punches. No power scaling here bitches.

As a result... the League falls apart. Matt is TECHNICALLY leader.. but in practice the exes all go off to do whatever, with Ramona instead encountering them organically. Matt spends the season as a highly paid CEO, mostly showing up once in a while to shut down a whole movie production because it makes him look bad, pathetically hit on ramona.. then get scared when he finds out Scott is alive. My faviorite bit of that is his very timid "Is he mad at me?" like he's a second grader and Ramona's understandably irritated "I dont' know dude" as a response.

Granted this dosen't stop his dreams as Knives and Stephen are able to pitch him a Scott Pilgrim Musical, one of the most gloriously batshit subplots in the history of this franchise. Which really can be said for.. most of this fucking show, but I digress. Despite seemingly hvaing no talent, the prospect of finally getting his broadway dreams back after his dad crushed them is enough for him to level up again, do a performance everyone loves and become a broadway icon. I assume the last part. Hamilton move over, your new compettiion's in town.

(Sidebar to that refrence, I think Hidgens and Matt would be besties. THeir both weirdly violent and obessed with musical theater).

Hell Matt.. dosen't even get upstaged by Gideon. When Gideon tries a looney tunes plan to bomb the theater, the Demon Hipster Chicks just.. disarm it and Matt.. gives Gideon his company back. Turns out being a CEO is hard yo. He's already lost billions. So Matt has his career, his musical, the only thing he didn't want to give up and Gideon could care less about anyway, and a new evil bestie. Life is good.

And naturally it sucks to be Gideon Graves as a result, or rather Gordon Goose. I liked giving Gideon a backstory, aging him down to be julie's old peer who used to wear no fear shirts every day and got shot down hard. Huh I never knew the guy I knew in high school who gave every girl he knew an invitation asking them out in high school became a super villian.

So Gideon spends most of the series in a depressed daze secretly plotting revenge and watching anime. Why is every guy I knew in high school compressed into one sad canadian?

Where he's crashing though was a nice twist: Julie. For those who read my reviews of the comics, you'll recall I didn't exactly like Julie very much. And for good reason: she's the worst. Here she still is.. but Brian found the secret to having a character whose human garbage around without making the audience pull their hair out. You have to make them entertaing. Julie is still a high school alpha bitch all grown up here, but instead of just constantly talking about how Scott sucks, she gets to be funny. She swears constantly, taking a great gag from the film and escalating it, slacks off at her job, and snarks to Ramona about her taste in men.

She also.. gets redeeming qualities. Something I never thought any verison of Julie could possibly have, but here we are. Instead of just seeming to know Ramona and only claming to be her friend because Julie Powers is a starfucker, she's GENUINELY a good friend to Ramona, giving her the info she needs and being contrite when Ramona catches her with Gideon. Julie here feels more like a person and less like a blob of all the worlds sins congealed into that bitch.

And yes she ends up with Gideon, a ship I never thought of in my darkest day but somehow works perfectly. Their both awful in a way that's made for each other and Julie taking in Gordon at his lowest is genuinely sweet.

We get to see Gideon not as G-Man.. but as a nerd whose lost everything.. and gets the greatest and most wholesome montage ever with Lucas Lee. Seriously Lucas and Gideon fucking around Julie's house like two teenage boys is one of the greatest thigns ever put to film, even greater knowing it was somehow only 90 fucking minutes. It's fucking adorable.

What helps though is that while Gideon is a touch more sympathetic and pathetic... he's still not let off the hook for how he treated Ramona. He's not putting the glow in her and stuff, but he was still the same controlling manipulative asshat. I mean he still made the league just to win her back. It's just without the league or the trappings of power... he's a less charming scott, something the books largely hinted at. Ramona DOES get him to be a better partner to Julie, calling him out for leaning on her hard and taking advantage of her, and as a result instead of leeching off her they become equal partners in villianny with vauge never to be elaborated on plans at the end. And it's honestly.. sweet. It's nice their evil together. Sure they'll probably be meancing our heroes with a super mario bros 3 airship eventually, i'm sure, but at least their better. And matt freed his frozen kidnapped wives so we're good.

So moving right along fun and fancy free we have Gordon's best bro, Lucas. Lucas Lee takes more after the film, something Brian admitted was unavoidable for some things: after the movie made some versions of the characters more iconic he really coudlnt' go back. It's why getting the movie cast was so important: While this was going to be it's own thing, having them added a layer and frankly he didn't think anyone else could do it as well. I do think someone could've, there's tones of great voice actors, but i'm still glad he got the all star cast back as their just.. giving it their fucking best. God bless Michael Cera for reviving that email chains.

And you can feel the enthusiasm in most performances, but especially Chris Evans, who responded back within 20 minutes of being asked and hams it up. This Lucas is a bro whose on the verge of being cancelled and who is delightfully try hard, saying let's party as every other line in his films, throwing parties, and generally being axe bodyspray made into a person. He also tony hawks a lot, and you can tell BenDavid loves skater culture.

Lucas is fun to watch, being arrogant and an asshole, but one whose hilarious epsecially squeezed into Scott's t-shirt playing him in young neil's movie. It's a great visual. And his downfall being dating a 30 year old who happens to LOOK like a high schooler is both a brilliant meta joke on ellen wong, and just.. fucking great.

The show also, like all the exes, fleshes him out: It takes what we knew ,that Ramona cheated on him in high school, and fleshes it out: Ramona was his everything, helping a skinny skater kid get by, fixing his boards and generally being sweet.. then aburbtly left him for a fuck boy, with Lucas deciding to become the KING of all fuck boys in revenge.

Lucas isn't super deep, but I love that he's not just the dudebro party massacre we see on the surface: he does actually read the script, has genuine insight into ramona pointing out how unlikely the regular ending of the story is .. simply because she always runs. He also willingly skates into a cloud of ninja paparazzi to cover for her.

And the skating scene.. is one of my favorites in the show. Granted I like me some tony hawk even if I suck eggs at it, so that helps, but the animation is gorgeous. Granted this whole damn cartoon is gorgeous: Science Saru put their heart and soul into every frame and everything looks stunning, having a very early 2000's look with it's frayed edges on the characters, and capturing Brian's style perfectly.

The Skating Segment shows this off, with fluid motion, some great set pieces and some impressive jokes like the alien. It's fucking great.

So Lucas ends up not even able to afford a first class ticket back home.. but finds happiness as a barita. and Stacey finds happiness starring at his ass. Everyone wins. I kinda low key ship those two.. I mean Stacey's a bit younger, yes, but it's not knives level of age gap, and Lucas could use someone with their head mostly on their shoulders. They do try teasing him and kim.. but she'd eat him alive. It'd be fun but she would. So speaking of Kim and the evil exes, let's roll on to my faviorite, Roxie. Roxie is a fucking delight this time, with Mae Whitman, unsuprisingly, bringing her best. It's fun to get to see her cut loose and just play a horny lesbian ninja gremlin like she deserves, with Roxy hamming it up. She spends the evil Ex meeting dunking on everyone else ("Act like you've been here todd!"), and already being the best. She comes off as a combo of her two versions: she has the manic gremlin energy of her film counterpart, being as bi-furious as ever, but has the snarky energy of her book counterpart, being willing to take shots at people and question them... it's just spread to all of the exes since Scott isn't around to be the sole obstacle in her way of ramona.

She's then the first ex Ramona has to deal with herself on her investigation, and it perfectly fits her character: In the film she tried to jump the line, but got a cup of accidental boob punch instead, and while she did wait for Todd to get headbutted out of existence in the books, she also started her attack with some ninja poster clones of Canadian hillary duff in the excellent Free Scott Pilgrim one shot (The very comic that got me into the series), and tried the same sneak attack that ended up in boob punch city. No matter the version Roxy is an impatient little cave goblin and of course the second she realized Ramona was free and the others had stopped giving a shit she'd be the one to show up at her door.

She's also the only one Ramona has to fight instead of just having an adult conversation. And while Takes Off changes a lot by design.. it dosen't deny giving us another excellent Roxie vs Ramona fight, something that I didn't realize was a tradition till this one. Still they saved the best for possibly last as the two's video store dustup is one of the best fights of the series, only topped by the final battle with Even Older Scott and even THEN it's a very close call.

Starting with a furious one on one in No Account Video, one of my faviorite settings from the books i'm glad to see get fully fleshed out and used here, even if it gets wrecked and then shut down as a result, with sprinkler's going off, discount tapes being bodied and Hollie deciding fuck this i'm clocking out, we then get a fun take on an old trope as a stack of tapes fall on them, leading to the two getting stuck in video land. We get westerns, film noir, samurai flicks, Hollie griping about them ruining her faviorite movie but watching anyway, it's a gorgeous fight and the video tape grain just adds to it.

We also get at least one fun bit using the medium as when Ramona gets sucker punched, Kim simply rewinds to help her new bestie out.. and Roxie takes it like a champ and... exits the tape JUST to stomp the remote. Fucking amazing.

The best part though, like a lot of SPTO, isn't the punching, though it's glorious but the payoff. With both exhausted, Roxie lashs out in a brutally painful way, blood down her cheek. It wasn't just that Ramona left, it's that she left.. without saying anything: we get an actual sense of their relationship this time and rather than be the "phase" Ramona cruelly brushed it off as the last two times, we see the two slowly fall in love, a really cute shot of ramona throwing a blanket over the two of them.. and then Ramona moving out, almost saying something but not wanting to, leaving Roxie devistated. It's easy to see WHY she has this bubbling anger at Ramona: every time they've fought, she's made her feel like nothing, something she vocalizes here. It takes what was an extremley dated bit that made Ramona come off like a giant asshole in the previous versions, it's fine if she realized she's not bisexual (which any scene with her and kim in both the comic and this very anime proves is just.. factually false), but it's a face punching way to put it, and puts it in the context of really hurting someone. Ramona realizes she done fucked up, genuinely apologizes and the two.. just collapse. Their friends now.

I also love Roxie hitting on Kim. I could honestly see those two working out.. I mean yes there were no sparks but Kim was kinda put on the spot there and Roxie was on the rebound. Give em some time. Plus I think Kim would work well with a feral gremlin she has to reign in. She's done it before. Roxie also asking about hollie right after before cheerfully leaving.. it's the best. Mae Whitman's the best and I could see her headlining a spinoff easily. Give me more of my feral cave gremlin daughter comma you cowards.

Finally we have Todd. Unlike the others, Todd.. isn't really fleshed out more and is given an entreily new personality from the comics swaggering egotistical rockstar jackass (Since Lucas very much had that niche filled), and the film's errrr...

Brandon Routh done good with the cleaning lady bit, but he wasn't given much to work with. Here... he makes Todd into a gloriously dumb and horny slab of moron. The guy can't go ONE SCENE without nearly fucking envy, which is one of the funniest bits in the show, capped off with the glorious wolf whistling, then fucks Wallace about ten diffrent times that we see over three days, then gets an adorable wallace sailor tatoo.

Todd.. really isn't changed. He was a fucklord in high school and he's a horny cheating mess now. He's an excus efor an already rediculous show to take it up to 11.

So let's unpack the show's sense of humor since I hadn't got to yet: Scott Pilgrim Takes Off takes an already ridiculous franchise with psychic vegans, bollywood hindu sorcerers and literal one ups, and decides to take it to the next level with film fights, lucas lee pro paparazi ninja skater 3, future renditions of Konya Wa No Hurricane by will forte, the montage from stepbrothers: Canadian edition, stunt double fights, and Matthew Patel: The Main Character. This is a series that takes it's emotinal consequences seriously and not much else. And I love it: I love weird shit, I Love balls to the wall humor, and the humor still feels very much scott pilgrim just taken up a notch.

And episode 5 is where it hits it's what the fuck is this peak as Ramona infiltrates the set of the Scott Pilgrim movie. The episode feels like one long shit post and i'm entirely in favor of it. We have Wallace fucking todd and casually dumping him, Envy and Wallace siccing their stunt doubles on each other, an Edgar Wright stand in voiced by Kevin Mcdonald for some reason and Young Neil, who in this series is entirely shit post and i'm here for it. IT's glorious chaos and only the ending is really at all emotional on some level. I mean I feel for Todd, even if he was a cheating bastard, but it's hard to take his grief or envy's seriously when Envy is a carcature of herself in this series and Todd's depression is eating a KFC bucket of poutine and sadly recounting every place he and Wallace made out. Todd isn't given extra depth.. but even as a villian he never really had depth to begin with. He had a disapproving dad and a massive ego. It's fine if he's a giant goofy blushy man who's soul wallace destroys. Brendon Routh does a phenomenal job with that.

Overall the expansion of the exes is part of what makes this adaptation so fantastic. With the exception of the twins they all get to live their best lives, and we get to see more of them. It's fun to see them implicitly join scot'ts friend group, and i've already written little chats about that, as it's fun as hell now their full characters in the world instead of respawning back probably not having learned much except not to punch scott in the face.

And the Rest

So with everything upside down, how do the rest of the people in Scott's Precious Little Life fare when the main character their built to support is gone? It's another hook of this series: if scott's gone, even just temporarily, what happens to everyone else.

Sex Bomb-Omb naturally gets impacted the most, and the versions here are superb.

The standout of course is Knives who deals with Scott's death by discovering a new love: playing music. While Knives had always been a huge fangirl in past versions, it was in the way more teens find music: by glomming on to the first band or two that makes them feel something and guarding that new faviorite thing like a cat with a ski chalet

See? Despite letting these characters live rent free in my head for the past decade, I never once thought of this idea, letting Neil join shatterband, sex bomb omb's followup as it crumbles to dust in the comics, instead.

In hindsight this idea is the most obvious thing: Knives loves music, it's an easy excuse for her parents that eases them into the fact her friends are all 20 year olds, so she can stay with the group easier, and as for why Stephen and Kim would let it happen... both have always liked her. Kim's annoyance is more worrying about Scott scarring her for life, and Stephen an dher get really close towards the end of the series, with him becoming a big brother towards her. The two becoming big siblings to her and letting her join makes sense.

It's especially nice to see with Kim. Kim interacted with Knives a BIT in the books, being the only one on Team Sex Bomb-Omb (The band plus knives and young neil), to take scott to task for the Knives thing to his face, at worst getting annoyed Knives is copying her. Granted like most of the Team, Kim still fucks up with her, most notably.. this

Which at the time I, and apparently the devleopers of the game, saw as a shippable moment but nowadays I see as NOPE PLEASE STOP, PLEASE STOP.. PLEASE NEVER AGAIN. AGE GAP'S STILL AS WEIRD AS WITH SCOTT. PLEASE DONT' TRAUMTIZE THIS CHILD MORE. Kim gets more of a pass than her band mates and neil because she was drunk at the time and clearly regrets it, but it's still something entirely fucked up I wish hadn't happened and feel bad for all involved. This is not how you should find out your bisexual.

The series wisely avoids this as they've realized "This is also statutory". and instead nicely has Kim take up the big sis roll to Knives, being the only one to really look after her after her boyfriend allgedly exploded and was found to have been cheating on her.

Hence we get one of the the best scenes in the series, the drum session. Which I know some did interpret romantically but first off...

And secondly.. really dosen't given the context: Kim sees the band needs a bassist.. but more importantly sees Knives is trying really hard to learn and is clearly spiraling after Scott's death. So she invites her to play since Neil is busy with his screenplay and Stephen, as usual is handeling this sudden loss with all the grace and dignity he's known for

IT's a beautiful scene as two people simply bond as they jam, and both heal a bit from what they've lost. And we find out Knives is a musical progidy who mastered the Bass in only four hours, and masters a keyboard later in less.

This gives Knives her first real plot in the series that isn't tethered to Scott in some way, something that was jarring to realize, but easy to see why: the books are centered around Scott's life, his friends, his love intrest, etc. Their there as needed for his story. Knives has one of the most detailed and intresting character arcs of the main cast.. but it's still thorughly tethered to Scott: his dumping her sends her on a journey of spiraling depression and growth, eventually going from someone who puts scott on such a pedestal that she attacks his new girlfriend instead of seeing the obvious, to accepting Scott wasn't perfect, he cheated and that while he opend her world up, they were really bad together and it was never an equal paring. Even the fun subplot with her dad as the mystery swordsman in book 4.. is because he thought she was still dating Scott and thus attacked him for dating his daugther. The movie makes this worse by trying to make the relationhsip seem legit missing the point entirely. While Knives has a friend in Tamara an da passle of high school drama she gleefully tells scott about, neither are important to the narrative. We only meet her parents because her mom was there when Knives met Scott and her dad tries to run him through.

Here while Scott certainly is part of her story, why she met sex bomb-omb and why she wears his jacket for most of the series, and his death certainly had an impact, she moves on quickly here not because she forgot Scott like it seems a chunk of the cast do or she's TRYING to avoid thinking about him like Kim and Wallace seem to be, she just found a healthy creative outlet, something to put her pain into in a healthy way instead of getting highlights and trying to murder Ramona or dating a guy who looks close enough to Scott. Knives moves on faster here, taking what's implied to be maybe a month at most to move on versus a year.. because she's not isolated in her pain. Scott's friends dont' dump her because it's awkward now and then awkwardly let her stay around post neil because they feel bad. Kim invites her in and after hearing she can wail, Stephen warmly welcomes her into the band, and the two become besties. So we have to talk about Stephen really quick as his plot dovetails into Knives, with the two being a duo for half the series. Stephen is based more on his movie self.

Yeahhh while I love the books on re-read, Book Stephen sucks. He just.. sucks. If your wondering some of the lowlights i'm glad you asked, here's an expertly crafted montage.

And that's just what I could fit into a montage: he also cheats on Julie for most of volume 4, focuses on his affair with joseph to the point he refuses gigs when it's clear playing live is something Kim LIKES doing and helps her relax, and never even informs Scott the band's broken up. The last one's .. iffy because Scott was in a waking depression coma after loosing Ramona, so he coudl've told him and forgot, but out of Scott's friend group he's the most consistently dickish, with Kim's grumpy nature mostly being a wall. It's partly the writing as , again given this is scott centric, we dont' peel back the layers on him the way we do with say Ramona, Knives or Kim. We don't see why he thought it was easier to cheat like we do with Scott and Knives, which wouldnt' make it okay but would make him less punchable. we don't know WHY he stays with Julie. Stephen is just an enigma and as such comes off immesnely annoying when most of his major endevors screw up everyone elses life in some way. And as one final coda to this rant, i'm not saying telling knives about Scott's two timing is bad... i'm saying he's the wrong person to tell her as not only did HE cheat on his partner, and as the last panel shows, KNOWS it's wrong Ramona clearly dosen't know half a year into the relationship, but won't tell her anyway for a friendship he REALLY dosen't seem to remotely care about.

So yeah a hammy constantly anxious relatable stephen was better, and Mark Webber was a delight by contrast. We didn't get to know movie Stephen.. but I didn't want to punch him either. So having Anime Stephen be more like the one who isn't punchable was smart: He's still panicky, crying more over the fact Scott leaves them baseless than over the fact his friend's dead (Which is mildly douchey but as we learned with Julie, if it's for a joke it's fine), and still obessed with making music his career while his band mates are like "Yeah fine whatever", so he's not really changed hard from the core of the character, but he is a delight and him and Knives becoming best friends in a far less hypocritical sense is adorable.

I also REALLY love their pet project: After Young Neil's movie falls through, more on him shortly, they make Scott Pilgrim, the original timeline, into a MUSICAL, complete with a bread makes you fat music number. I do like the ocasional nod here and there: O'Malley and Grabinski conciously didn't want to just.. repeat a gag because it was expected, but threw a few of the more iconic bits in as long as they could remix the joke. It's why the pee bar and the shoe tying making cameos, as their in new contexts, while there just wasn't room for the l-word or scott going out a window.

This whole subplot is gold from Stephens aying "as a creative to another creative" a hundred times, something I relate to since i say as a critic way more than I probably should, to it paying off.

And this is where Knives asceneds. By the end she not only gets closure with scott, admitting she's glad he's back but is glad he died, as the relationship wasn't healthy and she could grow into a hit songwriter, but she has a huge career with an award winning (Probably) musical, a new best friend and mentor, and writing songs for her fav envy.

And most nicely for me.. .I get a reality where Sex Bomb Omb dosen't fall to pieces in some way or form. Yeah without Stephen's drama or callousness depending on the version and with Knives creative vision the band not only stays together, but has a real shot at being something, giving everyone in it a bright future. Knives Chau really got to take off.

Kim is as usual the meaning in my life and the inspriation, with Allison Pill getting to do more with the character since she's not shunted to the background to say one or two lines. I mean she's still IN the background sadly: She gets a major roll in episode 3 and then just shows up when Sex Bomb Omb's together, not even getting that involved in the musical. I really wished after the film Kim got a big beefy roll. She could've been Ramona's sidekick or something like that, the two been clue buddies together. But I suppose the raw sexual tension would've left Scott out. Still she plays of Ramona well and it woudl've been nice ot have Kim around to response to the madness of episodess 4 and 5 with ramona. Still she gets a better shake than the movie: Episode 3 highlights how this version is actually over him, but encourages Ramona's attraction to him, simply warning her of what he's like, is a good friend to Rammy, and gets that moment with Roxie. I love how sh'es just like "I'm not... oh alright". And I think given another chance there would be sparks. Kim is sadly not given MUCH but it's still more kim pine, and i'm always in favor of that.

Finally we have my newly adopted son Young Neil. Unlike with Stephen, they didn't really take from the previous neil, whose super excited, and goofy and better than the graphic novel version whose alright. They go back to the Graphic Novel's glass eyed, barely emotive werido.. yet STILL make him something new rather than just adapt that version.

The result is a neil whose spacey, barely emotive.. but also REALLY dumb and really weird. Naturally I love him and relate immensely. Neil is somehow CRITICAL to the plot this time and entirely unaware of what is going on. He's season 1 todd chavez and it's wonderful.

This Neil gets most of the best bits, with Johnny Simmons having perfect timing. A good chunk of this series weird shit comes form Neil, who takes Scott's death as as sign he should persue his passion for screenwriting and get's his big break when in a half assed wel lmeaning plan, ramona adapts his book into a screenplay and sends it to him. Neil sees a mysteriously cloaked future ramona writing the script.. then assumes it's his sleep paralysis demon and he's a scripting genius.

We then get two glorious episodes of Neil at a movie set not remotely qulaified to be there as he assumes Americans and then the japanese call golf carts mario karts, gets a perscription but somehow winds up with sunglasses, and barely registers Matthew shutting his expesnive nightmare of a film down becuase he can't drive golf carts anymore. It even takes a lengthy and fucking glorious scene with sex bomb omb for him to realize "oh maybe my sleep paralysis demon didn't write this". Just the casual way he says it while everyone else is baffled, and how Kim and Knives have to slowly explain reality to him is great. Neil is comic relief incarnate and I love him, easily the best version. I'm also happy that like most of the cast, he gets a happy ending, as he apparently got a job at the studio after Gideon reopened it driving his cart around. Nick Frost is right, Young Neil really is off the chain.

So onto the one charcter who over FOUR DIFFRENT MEDIUMS has never really talked to anyone I just talked about but knives, we have Wallace. First off: yes i'm still disapointed he never really talked to Sex Bomb Omb. I got it vibe wise: everyone has friends who just.. don't know each other, but the intro got my hopes up they'd actually.. hang out at some point. But just like everything else, the intro isn't remotely indicative of what happened in the anime. The comics sure. And it's a true banger.

youtube

Seriously the colors are vibrant, the song is vibrant and fits scott perfectly, with Necry Talkie really nailing him down, and it's a perfect intro. Even if it ends up being nothing like the series , I still love it. One of my faviorite anime intros of all time. Love that cute falling shot of scott and ramona and the bit showcasing the exes. So good.

What was I on about? Oh yeah Wallace. Wallace here is a mixed bag. As with the film Kirean Culkin is perfect as Wallace: he gets the dry tone down, his drunken antics down and the whole sarcastic vibes perfectly. He was the best performance of the film, and while the compettition's too steep here for him to win again, he's still amazing.

That said Wallace.. is a bit more of a dick here. He comes off more.. tolerating scott instead of having a genuine friendship with him, and the only hint we get of him mourning his best friend is just how plastered he is.. and even then he threatens to change the locks. If Ramona reminded him to. I get the two weren't going to be as focused on, but it's still sad.

I also wish his friendship with Ramona stayed. While it makes sense they don't bond, Scott isn't around to link them, it was one of the funnest parts of the books.

Really this Wallace shows why he needs Scott and what he might be like when his bestie isn't around: Just because Wallace is more put together.. dosen't make him not an asshole. While I admi the's more dickish here with reflection.. I have to say it's not out of character. He's still giving us killer bits from wanting to see a notriously straight actor play him, to his smug acceptance of becoming an actor, to his deadpan acceptance that todd's in love with him, he's still the wallace we love... it's just we're seeing the side of him that dosent look better with a dumpster fire constantly ned tot him.

The biggest douchery is of course stealing Todd from Envy.. but besides it taking two to cheat, Wallace stealing someone's boyfriend.. isn't new behavoir. I laughed at how out of left field the PARING was.. but Wallace is Jimmy's bi or gay or pan, whatever he is, awkaneing in the book and film, and Stacey's reaction in both makes it clear he steals her boyfriends CONSTANTLY. So him stealing Todd and then explaining it was just a fling to him.. is entirely in the realm of Wallac'es douchebagery. He's not a terrible person.. but like everyone else in the cast he's a mess. HIs abuse of his stunt doubles was a bit over the line, but is so over the top it works. And this wallace also sings us complicated. So while I wish we got to see more of the Wallace we don't in the books... what we do get is still great.

Envy.. gets the shortest end of the stick here next to the twins, as she at least had a fairly comepelling arc in the book, being the focus of volume 3 and a major part of volume 6. Here while Brie Larson is once again great there really.. isn't much for Envy here. Even the film, which basically squoozer her in at the last second, still gave us an awesome version of the phone call she gives scott and the iconic black sheep sequence. Here while Envy gets another all timer scene in her funeral concert, the second most obnoxiously awesome crashing of a funeral behind flintheart glomgold

youtube

Envy DID at least get to dance on his casket. Or a stage above his casket. still counts.

Envy.. is left at the face value we meet her at the start of volume 3: queen biatch, queen of all the chaos, queen of all you love and adore. She's still a lot of fun from the above horny antics with todd to her yanking Ramona out of a talking head interview to fight her battles for her, but there's .. nothing really to her and it stand sout in a series that gives everyone else but the twins something new.

Okay ALMOST everyone as Stacey is once again out of focus like the comics. The movie gave her a bit more, but here she's scott's sister who calls people. That's it. It makes sense, Ramona has no real reason to talk to her, but it's a waste of your Anna Kendrick to not find more antics for her, especially since they found wallace and Neil great subplots. That said she does live her best life at the end starring at lucas' butt.

I also want to note the presence of Hollie, kim's roomate, best friend and co-worker. She does little, Shannon Woodward does a fine job, but I like that she's in here at all: Hollie was a character I liked in the comics.. who went on to steal kim's boyfriend for plot convience. So having a verison of her that dosen't do that shit and is just Kim's snarky foil and friend again works for me.

Finally we have a bunch of cameos, the bulk of them legendary. We get Simon Pegg and Nick Frost as security guards, Weird Al as the intro narator for the doc on the failed Scott Pilgrim film, comedy and voice acting legend MIcheal Mcdonald as Edgar Wrong, Bowen Yang as a tv gossip, kal Pen as matt's lawyers and Kirby HOwell Baptiste as Lucas Lee's agent. All fun one or two off bits, all fantastic.

Finishing off the character stuff we have a missed opportunity too: Joseph and Lisa get to cameo.. but are once again left out, to my annoyance. I get not being able to fit them in and Lisa has less of a point without Scott around.. but it'd still be nice to get a scene or something, especially since I was far from the only person asking for Lisa Miller to get a proper apperance.

So with that we close the book on Scott Pilgrim Takes Off.. and it was phenominal. While I would've loved a new adaptation, this.. is even better: a spirtual sequel that expands the characters, is not afraid to go full nonsense, let's a lot of the cast from the film fully shine, and has a bitching soundtrack once again. Not a ton of original songs sadly, but I Feel Fine and Orange Shirt are bangers, and we get Will Forte singing an anime theme song. If the last part dosen't appeal to you, I don't know how you got this far in the review. Takes Off is one of the best entries in this franchise and leaves me hopeful we'll return to this world again. Maybe not on screen but hey, even with the mountain of work it took to get this cast together again, tthis adaptatoin has proven anything is posisble.

Thanks for reading.

46 notes · View notes

chainofclovers · 1 year

Text

Ted Lasso 3x9 Thoughts

This one might be tied for favorite episode of the season for me. While I’ve been mostly willing to vibe with the jam-packed episodes, I approached 3x9 with a bit of concern; if it felt like the story was getting bigger instead of smaller here in the final third of the season, I was going to start to lose my patience. (To translate: I am an impatient person but I'm also a pretty long-fused person, and me starting to lose my patience would be akin to someone with a short fuse going fucking ham on someone.) Luckily, I felt like each thread here spoke to the other threads really neatly, like watching a cohesive conversation take place in multiple rooms. Magically.

For this one, I'm gonna attempt some bullets that cover 3x9 itself, then I need to attempt to process this weird experience of MISSING TED (while also basically appreciating what he's doing, but missing him, but appreciating him, lawjefpawoijfapweoijafwepklajwef) that has me very :eyesemoji: about the next three weeks of my life.

Nate’s desire for connection and camaraderie didn’t overshadow his ability to recognize that Rupert was trying to manipulate him into a toxic night out! There will be consequences for pulling away, and he knows it, but he did the right thing anyway. I’ve seen some discussions and arguments re: Jade’s influence on Nate and whether we should attribute Nate’s backbone and ability to make better choices to the love of a woman, and whether that’s disappointing and belittling to both characters, but I think a lot of those positions (on either side) are too hard-and-fast. Nate has always valued the things he values, and his relationship with Jade hasn’t changed his values or the fundamental truth of who he is. At the same time, being physically and emotionally close to a person you trust feels really, really good. Why shouldn’t those good feelings have a positive impact on the reserves of strength you must draw on to do things like stand up to an evil asshole you hadn’t entirely let yourself notice is an evil asshole? Nate in all his multitudes has always been Nate; Nate who is in love is able to see himself more clearly. If we were all only allowed in our real lives to experience character growth purely independently, we wouldn’t get very far.

I’ve been thinking a lot about influence and obligation when it comes to Rebecca’s storyline, too. I was a little afraid, after 3x3 and the way she initially responds to Tish’s prophecies, that Rebecca would end up a lone actor, in a sense, tracking down clues and answers at the expense of fostering her actual existing relationships. While I’m still curious and nervous and excited about what all of it means, I really appreciate that Rebecca has shown up for people this season, especially here in the latter half. Rebecca is almost certainly being driven a little crazy by the unfinished parts of what Tish told her, but she isn’t isolating herself. In calling Roy out for his avoidant behaviors and lack of accountability for the press conference (and, of course, the way his work performance mirrors his decision to leave his relationship with Keeley), she demonstrates accountability as a boss and as a friend. I don’t need to see Rebecca conducting meetings or writing emails to know she’s working, but it felt really important to me to see her get upset with Roy, both professionally and personally, and break through his exterior. Ted, Trent, Phoebe, and even Keeley have chipped away at it this season, but the epiphany required Rebecca being Rebecca. And the energy between Rebecca and Roy is very !!!

I loved the way the Nate-Rupert-Jade, Rebecca-Roy, and Roy-Isaac(-Will!) interactions all reinforce the idea that no one has the full picture of what is happening in another person’s brain, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t act on truths as they are revealed, as difficult as it may be.

As a queer person who is thankfully many years removed from the most stressful coming-out experiences I’ve had (although of course there are still plenty of moments of having to explain or identify oneself to another person—it never really ends—I consider myself “out” in that everyone in my life who I care about knowing knows I’m queer, and, so long as general safety is established, I feel able to explain it to additional people in most contexts without much or any stress), I really loved and appreciated Colin’s storyline here. Very little about my identity or place in the world resembles Colins, but so much of this episode resonated. We’ve already seen Colin describe his relationship to his sexual identity to Trent, and within that same conversation he spoke about not wanting to be a spokesperson with the pressure of publicly representing gay men. I absolutely love that the framing of the locker room scene respected those desires; he tells his teammates and coaches he’s gay, but we the public aren’t part of the several seconds that the literal announcement occurs. We get to see the freedom and relief the truth brings him, but the lessons of this episode are for the people around him.

The downside of writing this a couple days after the episode airs means I’ve read a lot of discourse, but I don’t think this episode did a disservice to Isaac or Colin. The writers room in s3 included writers specifically experientially equipped to tell this story, and to me, it shows. It shows in the realism of Isaac’s well-meaning questions (which Colin wouldn’t have answered so graciously if Isaac wasn’t so genuinely curious and caring!), and the tiring ways that queer people are burdened with conversational “obligations” and explanations that are just different than what straight people deal with. Ignorance and awareness exist on an incredibly long spectrum, and for me this story was affirming, not traumatizing, beautiful, and yet it also included the exhausting imperfections that cloak even the most positive coming-out experiences.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about Ted’s speech. Basically ever since Colin said the thing about Grindr in s2, I’ve been certain Colin would come out as gay to the team and reckon with being closeted in the context of the men’s Premier League. And literally since he made that little comment, I’ve been nervous about how Ted would react. I already knew he was a politically progressive person who identified himself as an ally, so I wasn’t afraid he’d have some kind of bigoted rejection reaction. But I did worry that his reaction would be sooooo cringe and try-hard and awkward that I’d legitimately run into issues writing and posting fiction about his obvious latent bisexuality on our home away from home, Archive of Our Own. And while Ted’s seven-layer-dip Denver Broncos analogy WAS cringe and try-hard and off-base, I absolutely loved how unflinchingly imperfect it was and how, despite those imperfections, his instinct re: the point he actually wanted to make was spot on and extremely valuable. If a white, middle-aged, (past-tense-ish hahahahahahaha I’m so normal about the word “was”) straight man who’s worked in sports his whole life had figured out the perfect thing to say, I’d have rolled my eyes at the screen. It felt realistic to me that he desperately wanted to find an analogy or connection point, immediately regretted it, and still—because of who he is when the din of his thoughts gives way actual clarity—managed to articulate that it’s very, very important that Colin’s community actually cares about who Colin is and that he was able to share this information with them. It’s the difference, in many ways, between being doomed to continue to feel like you have two lives (because you’re surrounded every day by people who look past something important to you or pretend not to see the differences) vs. knowing that even if you never come out to the entire world, you aren’t splintering yourself because you’re able to be your whole self around the people who actually matter. Anyway, the speech was imperfect and unwieldy, and that was the point, and his actual message was essential for everyone in that room to hear, and that was the point, and I will be capable of continuing to write fic in which Ted is attracted to men without his reaction to Colin haunting me. (I actually already have an idea for a future fic in which he reflects more, but that’s literally a story for another time.)

At this point in the season, I feel so curious about, um. What is happening. With Ted Lasso. The guy. In both s1 and s2, I felt about a millimeter away from him at all times, even when he wasn’t onscreen. This season, he’s so intentionally obscured. Getting to go to that museum in Amsterdam with him—and, perhaps even more importantly, the Yankee Doodle Burger Barn, and perhaps even more importantly than that, the back of that bus—was a relief and a reconnection point that was much needed, but I am absolutely FASCINATED and MYSTIFIED at this point in time at just how effective and maddening it is that I’m having a lot of trouble understanding how he truly feels about himself and the people around him. Like, I would obviously love to watch him be in love with Rebecca. But I would also love to watch him be in love with a place, or with two places, or with coaching, or with his partially-lost Beard, or with the words and images that have come to him in visions, or even with the unhealthy things that pull at him, like booze and stewing and obsession. Basically every episode—at least for me—contains some glimmer of connection, to his self or to one of his friends, and it’s always fleeting, and I’m holding onto the almost certainty of the fact that the decisions he has to make are going to require some kind of visible reckoning. Most of my nerves about the final three episodes of this show as we know it are related to these questions.

As for this episode, I don’t think I’ve quite captured the FEELINGS I felt while watching it. (I also completely failed to go into Ted sharing his biscuits with Keeley and continuing his perfect streak of making it super weird whenever he shares biscuits with a non-Rebecca person. I LOVED IT.) This was the episode that made me the most audibly squeal-y this season. And the most curious about how Ted has managed to get so far into his own brain that I actually miss him on his own show! Very curious stuff. What are the next three Tuesdays going to do to my brain and heart?

#ted lasso #ted lasso s3 spoilers #ted lasso 3x9 #hot dork club #meta by me #ted lasso meta #ted x rebecca #rebecca x roy #ted x men x allyship x cringe x but not too cringe x lol #queer things

70 notes · View notes

firstkanaphans · 6 months

Note

okay, so based off of the lineup we saw from part 1 I think I see gmmtv's logic process (to clarify, not saying i'm happy about it, just that i think i see what they're doing 😂)

it seems like they saved a lot of their more experimental and/or riskier pitches for this part 1 - basically the ones that are more likely to slip under the radar if they'd been presented alongside the big fan fave pairings, directors and/or show concepts. but to make it a little more even they did pad it somewhat with a few easy fan faves like offgun and geminifourth to keep it a little more even.

my guess for why they saved firstkhao for part 2 is because they're saving part 2 for the big hard hitting pairs and show concepts. this way, the shows that would be more likely to go under the radar in part 1 get some time to shine on their own and garner interest before the big name shows/directors come in and occupy the fan discussion circles.

this way it also keeps fans coming back to watch pt 2 for the pairs that they're waiting to see. i also think it gives the producers some time to take a temp check and see what fans are/aren't interested in before committing to their 2nd half.

on one hand, it does suck that we have to wait a while longer before we see our boys again, but on the other, at least we'll have something to look forward to in dec/jan! also, even though they definitely deserve better than to be used as fan bait, i'm also kind of weirdly proud of our fk boys being saved for the pt 2 because that means they've officially made it in the big ranks if they are being used to boost ratings, haha 😂 :')

So, I’m going to put this under a read more because y’all’ve had to listen to me gripe enough for one day. Fair warning: Apparently, I’m still heated so open at your own risk.

This is a very nice thought, Anon, but honestly, I don't think these people have any idea what they're doing 😂 If their idea was to use Part 1 to make people more excited for Part 2, then they failed miserably considering they didn't even tell us when Part 2 was. Next week? Next month? Next year? No one knows. Much less us, the viewers.

Right now, I just feel used. If they had announced all of the shows today and FirstKhaotung didn't get anything, I would have been disappointed, but I at least wouldn't feel like the possibility of them was being dangled in front of me like a carrot. I feel like P'Tha is in his evil lair, stroking his chin, saying, "Let's see how well they sell out their next couple fan meets then we'll make a final decision on whether to give them a new series." Dishonor on all their cows!

Splitting this into 2 parts was just a bad idea all around. Like are they really going to have another big to-do in a couple months (unlikely) or is Part 2 just going to be held on the GMMTV Live House set? Neo and Mark can host since they apparently don't have anything better to do either.

As to why they split the show into two parts, I’ve seen some people hypothesize that the Only Friends cast wasn’t included because they wouldn’t have had time to film the trailers, but they’ve been done filming OF for a while. If the cast didn’t have time to film trailers, it’s because GMMTV has them flying all over the world to fan meets every weekend. And that’s on GMMTV. Those fan meets should not get in the way of actual acting.

A better guess, in my opinion, is that whatever director they’re scheduled to work with is the one who didn’t have time to film a trailer. P’Jojo for instance is apparently editing Only Friends episodes on a week-to-week basis so it makes sense that he wouldn’t have time to film anything. I hope this means that FK might be working with a very solid director, but they’ve also just recently started following New Siwaj on Twitter so that specter will continue haunting us for the next couple months (or more) as well.

I just personally feel that GMMTV has really backed themselves into a corner here because now if FK don’t get something legitimately good, I’m going to be even more pissed than I already am. You kept me waiting for this?? And the cherry on top of this already horrendous situation is the fucking School Rangers announcement.

I cannot tell you how mad I am about the School Rangers thing. School Rangers is where they send actors to die. White’s been holding his own there for years because no one wants to cast him in anything else. So, to bolster ratings, they throw the entire cast of Only Friends in there. It pisses me off! They’re using our built-in fanbase for views on a show they don’t even have the decency to translate. Can you tell I'm angry?

Bottom line: these are actors. Let them fucking act. Because if you keep making them do ridiculous game show shit, they’re going to fucking leave—and I would not blame them at all. FK could probably make more money with a YouTube channel at this point.

I’m sorry I’m being so negative about this. To clarify: I do think FK are getting a series together (since they’re clearly not in anything else 🙃). And I don’t even need them to be in a series together to be happy. I just need them to be in fucking something.

I mean, if there’s one bright side to all of this, it’s that I can’t imagine they’ll do this shit again because they’ve managed to piss off so many fandoms. I remember watching the show last year and being so fucking excited but now, I can’t even get excited about the few shows I'm interested in because there's this huge “what if?” hanging over our heads. The long, drawn-out wait for news just seems cruel and I think they should all go fuck themselves, honestly.

#if we don't get a good sandray episode this week i might actually lose it #gmmtv 2024

19 notes · View notes

kalena-henden · 8 days

Text

Lee Je Hoon's Chief Detective 1958 starts today. Can't wait to watch! I enjoyed him in Taxi Driver and really want to watch through his filmography eventually.

Lovely Runner is knocking my socks off! Byeon Wook Seok and Kim Hye Yoon are killing both the comedy and the drama. Wook Seok is the cutest loser in love! The mystery and unexpected twists are fun and interesting. I hope this quality storytelling continues. I'm on the edge of my seat.

I only have 3 episodes left of Love Me Love My Voice which has been wonderful and heartwarming. I love the main romance but the friendships and secondary romances have been given ample time to shine as well. I'm always here a good found family. I really like how the dramatic readings and song perfomances have been carefully woven into the story to further the character development. Definitely recommend.

Now we come to our debrief on The Smile Has Left Your Eyes. Whoa, what a rollercoaster. The first half was interesting with many characters' selfish and dark intentions mixed with a little mystery were set up in contrast to our optimistic, self-sacrificing female lead. However, the second half drowned in major events happening and then being dismissed as if they never happened, multiple secret keepers refusing to tell the secret multiple times an episodes even when asked point blank when the answers could stop so many bad things from happening, and the existential dread I felt about what the big reveal was going to be only for it to completely dismissed. (FYI I found out what I thought was going to be the big reveal IS the actual reveal in the darker Japanese version it's based on.) After episode 14, I wasn't sure I could continue watching the show. But after a night of uneasy sleep, I decided to finish it the next morning on double speed to get through it. I did watch the last 10 minutes at regular speed. While there were some well done things about their relationship in the second half, it couldn't save the show for me even though I went in knowing this was not an HEA. Overall, I was just left feeling angry and exhausted. As a Seo In Guk fan, this was a show I had long wanted to see, just to find out what my opinion on it would be. I'm sad that the SIG fanmeet has been post-poned, hopefully I will be able to make the next date. But this means I feel okay to stop my SIG show binging so I will not be watching Hello Monster anytime soon. I'm actually impressed with how much of SIG's filmography I've already seen (7 shows as a ML, 4 shows as a cameo, and 1 movie). I'm pretty sure it's more than I've seen any other kdrama actor or actress.

After a bad experience at the new dentist yesterday, where the hygienist manhandled my teeth and they tried to upsell me on services, I was in need of a comfort rewatch. I've been thinking alot about Lee Jun Young lately and decided to break out the first thing I ever saw him in, Imitation. I was only going to watch a few favorite parts from an episode or two and ended up binging my favorite parts of most of the series. lol I really hope his upcoming Cinderella romcom with Pyo Ye Jin is going to be good.

I slowly picked Vigilante back up again this week and was excited to see Lee Joon Hyuk's character finally emerge to add a boost of energy and chaos to the story.

Now that I've got some time and the second half of the series has finally dropped, I will continue watching Chae Jong Hyeop's Eye Love You.

#chief detective 1958 #lovely runner #love me love my voice #the smile has left your eyes #imitation #eye love you #kdrama #kalena watches tv #kalena watches kdramas #tv #tv list #kalenapost

7 notes · View notes

justafriend-ql · 10 months

Text

Thai BL Favorites List Tag Game

thank you to the lovely @firstkanaphans for tagging me! the original prompt list was created by @thatgirl4815. let's get into it!

(note: i'll try my best to not make this entire list about never let me go, but you know who i am)

favorite bl: never let me go (nobody is surprised) it's unique, innovative, the first gmmtv bl series based on an original script rather than adapted from a novel. the lovechild of cringe 90s thai action dramas and BL tropes that p'jojo flirts with or fucks with depending on how he's feeling. palm and nueng live in my head 24/7 and the cinematography of the series drove me to learn how to make gifs (something i would not recommend you do if you value your freetime lol)

favorite pairing: palmnueng :) power imbalance, social expectations, and simmering sexual tension that all breaks loose at the seashore. duty turned to devotion and loneliness turned to love. two 18-year-olds whose life circumstances couldn't be more different yet find mirror images of their own insecurities and lack of self-worth in each other. clinging onto each other only to let go in the name of love. but always returning to each other, their other half, their soulmate. literally everything i could ever want in a pair. bonus: they kiss each other like they actually want to.

most underrated actor: sing! he's great in comedic roles (had me wheezing with laughter in unidentified mysterious girlfriend). but completely slayed as todd in not me. toddblack scenes make me genuinely sick. i would love to see more of him in dark dramas. also you really just have to respect his dedication. he survived infamous early series like slamdance (he was paired with drake) and put his whole pussy into the puppy play in warp effect.

favorite character: palm pannakorn jannaloy my most beloved boy. breaks my heart and heals it at the same time. he's just such a fundamentally good, kind person. and pretty much nothing in his life makes that easy. eternally self-sacrificing, without much love for himself but so so much love for others. even when they leave him behind. look! the very first gif i ever made was of him - see below and kindly disregard the quality.

favorite side character: pa jindapat out of all the series i've watched, pa is probably the character i relate to the most. that's why she's my pfp! i love her messy buns and glasses and over-sized t-shirts. she just feels very real in all her interactions with pat and her cluelessness about her very big crush on ink. the little tremble in her voice in the dark room scene when she tells ink "i liked it. i liked it so much i thought that i was special to you" makes me tear up. she's funny and she's bold and she holds her ground and i love her. very much.

favorite scene: the farewell dance - never let me go, episode 9 there's no dialogue. just music. grief-stricken palm and nueng dancing slowly, somberly in a motel room palm will wake up alone in the next morning. nueng knows he's leaving; deep down, palm probably knows too. their steps slow and palm seeks comfort in a kiss that quickly turns desperate because they're both hurting and the only thing that will numb the pain is each other. the feeling of tears running down palm's face forces nueng to pull away. the look on nueng's face as he wipes palm's tears away is possibly my favorite thing phuwin has ever done. he looks so goddamn heartbroken and guilty, because nueng feels like palm's brokenness is his fault. also one of my favorite performances from pond - and he was in the hospital earlier that day!!

favorite line: "i love you. and i want you to love yourself too." ayan to akk; the eclipse, episode 12, part 1/4. speaks for itself i think.

most anticipated bl and why: dangerous romance although i'm definitely excited for only friends, i have a soft spot for underdogs and this series seems like one (especially if it airs at the same time as only friends). i love perth especially and both chimon and him are crazy talented actors. i hope despite the silly title of the series, the script gives them something good to work with. and i hope that "i hate you" kiss in the rain from the pilot is better in the actual series lmao. the bts photos are making me super excited! also: viewjune let's gooooooo

healthiest relationship in a bl: heartliming these two make me cry. really just the epitome of finding a safe space in another person and providing them with a safe space in yourself. everything about them is beautiful. the amount of effort and care they put into learning how to communicate with each other is incredible. i love that they fight alongside each other. and: "i love it when i'm with him" - sometimes it's really as simple as that.

most toxic relationship in a bl: going to second @firstkanaphans here and say tharntype this almost feels like a cop-out because it's so obvious, but it's true. nothing will ever excuse the things tharn did to type without his consent, and type's internalized and externalized homophobia wasn't dealt with satisfactorily in my opinion. there are good kernels in every story, but the bad overwhelmed the few good ones in this series for me.

guilty pleasure series: love by chance guilty because it's mame and i don't love how aggressive they make ae (the sweetest, gentlest boy) toward the end. to be honest i skipped everything except for the aepete scenes when i watched this so i can't comment on the rest. but i often find myself returning to episode 4, in particular, because ae's feelings realization journey is lovely and soft and seeing baby perth and saint is always a treat. i liked it enough to gif it, so...

bonus! most underrated series: my only 12% created this bonus category so i can beg you to watch this one if you haven't. trust me and suffer through the bad haircuts and slow burn. i knew it was different from other series when seeiw cries while watching a queer movie with his sister, recognizing his own feelings onscreen, then sneaks downstairs to watch the rest by himself in tears later that night. that experience is so fucking real. this series seared me with its portrayal of the nostalgia and grief of childhood friendships and eventual separation, and the role reversal post-reunion is so well done it makes me insane. i was sobbing in my room at 4am and that's the best review i can give a series.

i had a lot of fun doing this and i hope if you read to this point you got... well, something, out of it. tagging @cankersoregirl @first-kanaphan @feralmuskyscentedhoepran @akkpipitphattana @ayan-sukkhapisit @nongnaos and anyone else who may like to do this!

#ask game #thai bl favorites #never let me go sweep what did you expect

36 notes · View notes

aprillikesthings · 2 months

Text

The next episode itself is a two-parter, and I think that rather than split them up I will just watch through, which might mean I have to reblog this post multiple times.

Finishing out season four!

s4, eps 12&13 Destiny

Usual reminder: this is a REwatch and there’s spoilers ahoy, I make a lot of bad jokes (some of which are Adult In Nature), I reference other cartoons, I make random asides.

(also, this time specifically, I had some alcohol)

Tbh? it's a lot like watching things like this with me in person aaahahaha I always want to pause and infodump shit -_-

lol Emily is destroying Shadow Weaver's garden

Emily acts like Mal the cat does sometimes. WHAT IS IN YOUR MOUTH you are not supposed to have that! Get out of there!

UGGGH

it's easy to forget how BIG Scorpia is??

LOLOL oh my god I went downstairs for like an hour and a half talking to my partners about the most random shit and then playing with the cat and also: I've had most of a can of wine.

One of these:

YEAH (that's a huge image)

so if these get weird: blame the wine I guess

oh also @corpseauthority and I picked out fake fur and minky fabric for the ears and tail of my Catra cosplay :D :D :D I'M SO EXCITED

OKAY BACK TO SHE-RA

the only thing better than Scorpia's "huh?" is Shadow Weaver's flat "what"

Shadow Weaver: no we need the other princesses Glimmer: well they're gone but-- Scorpia, Shadow Weaver, and Emily: WAIT, WHAT???

AND THEN

okay but is the guard telling you this Double Trouble

ROLL INTRO

that thing was not meant to hold four humans and a horse with wings

why are you SNIFFING HIM

Entrapta: "I don't know you" Micah: "Yes, you do. You stole my food." Entrapta: "OH YEAH! It was delicious :D"

oh god Adora's like "....but are you okay? we came here to find you 🥺"

and she's like YEAH I'M GREAT

"each more deadly than the next??? it's PARADISE"

I love her so much oh my godddd

Bow: "We're here to rescue you" Entrapta: "didn't I just rescue YOU?"

Bow mentions Hordak and Entrapta pulls her little new bug-eye mask down :(

Adora: so hey we uhhhhhhhh really need your help due to a terrible secret of the First Ones that nobody but us knows

"WHy didn't you say so???"

well that's a callback to s1 ep1

THERE SHE IS!! MY BABY 😍 I LOVE HER SO MUCH

nooo

anyway Kyle, Rogelio, and Lonnie come in and Catra's like OH UHHH so...what's happening

Lonnie: "we just got back from conquering another Rebel town" Kyle: ":D You should've seen us!! It was all:"

and then he kicks Scorpia's old locker, with the drawings on it, and Catra gets mad

Ironically the degree to which Catra is UPSET is making me ship them harder lol

bb you need a break you are getting feral

Man Lonnie has her number lol. "What is wrong with you? We're winning! Even you should be happy."

god I love when she's this deranged

she slams poor Lonnie against a locker

john cena dot gif

but also OH DO THEY REMIND YOU OF WHO YOU USED TO BE? HMM? what you really wanted??? what actually gave you something like joy or contentment????? are you trying to just erase any part of you capable of feeling good?????????

Kyle is RIGHT

The cinematic parallels between Catra and Glimmer in this episode ("forget my friends I'M IN CHARGE HERE and YOU NEED TO FOLLOW ORDERS") are *chef's kiss*

Catra realizing this isn't what she actually wants: part ....a lot

STOP REMINDING ME I HAVE FEELINGS!!

The other three leave, she yanks the drawings off Scorpia's old locker, then THUMPs her head on it. And then Double Trouble shows up!

okay wait tho the way she pauses and then thumps her head on it is so funny I wish I could gif it, it's so cat-like and also Very Emo

I don't think this is supposed to be funny but it IS and I cannot stop rewinding and laughing. I blame the wine.

THONK

help i've rewatched it like five times now

okay

lol right??

Me, when I was info-dumping my own fic at myself: is it weird to imagine these two banging??? Me now: nope

Double Trouble: "Apologies for the delay, kitten. I got ...held up...in Bright Moon"

Anyway they give a little speech about how the Princesses keep fighting and She-Ra is away

NO SHIT, SHERLOCK

(now THERE's an old fandom reference ahahaha)

"We can't let them return to the Fright Zone!" TOO FUCKING LATE

YOU STOLE HER GARNET YOU WOULD THINK SO

Anyway they argue about the possibility of Glimmer taking Scorpia back to the Fright Zone

GOD I HATE IT WHEN SHE'S RIGHT UGGGHHHH

lolol I am. like. less than ten minutes into the FIRST OF TWO EPISODES and i've hit the image limit.

#april rewatches spop #destiny

8 notes · View notes

Last Seen Blogs

borbology

Welcome to Borbology

denjoart

Denjo Art

mryouwho

Mr.YouWho

electrothanasia

E L E C T R O T H A N A S I A

ezichiny

The Chaise and Lounge Blog