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bet-on-me-13 · 1 month

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Wes ruins everything

Wes had finally done it, he had finally realized why nobody ever belived him about Fenton and Phantom! It made so much sense now, he had been looking for an answer for years, thinking he was going crazy because everybody refused to see the Obvious!

He was Cursed!

He literally had an Ancestoral Curse on his Bloodline that made it so that all those born with the gift of Prophecy would be ignored! A Gift of Prophecy that he apparently had.

It was Cassandra's Curse, the one from Greek Myths. Apparently she was his Great×1000 Grandmother and passed down the Gift (and Curse) of Prophecy to him. And he knew how to break it!

All he needed to do was gather the right resources, chant the correct incantations, make sure not to accidentally summon a Demon in the process, and he could just foist the Curse onto some other poor schmuck. Sure it would suck for them, and he would loose his Gift of Prophecy, but Wes had been ignored for Years at this point, he needed validation!

So he did the Ritual, and he didn't mess it up, and he managed to get rid of the Curse.

Now all he had to do was convince everybody that he was right for the first time in his life! This was going to be great!

...

Cass didn't know what was going on.

A while ago, she had started getting these...gut feelings that she couldn't explain.

She would look over the details of a Case her Family was working on, and see a patern that the others were seemingly ignoring. Like when she realized that The Penguin was about to raid the Docks on the East Side, but the others were convinced it was going to be on the West.

But when she had tried to tell them, they had brushed her off. "We've already concluded that he will begin the Raid on the West side, no need to go to the East."

She had gone anyways, and low and behold she had been right. But nobody even acknowledged that she had been right at all, they had just wondered how they had missed the signs, not even questioning how she had known.

It wasn't limited to Cases either. Even small things, like telling her brother's where the TV remote was were brushed off, and hours later they would still be looking, never even having checked where she told them.

It seemed that no matter what, nobody cared about her point of view anymore. They kept brushing her off, telling her she was wrong, actively ignoring her ideas.

And it was getting worse. They were starting to ignore her more and more, forgetting she was in the room, not calling her down for Dinner, even forgetting to check in on her during Patrol.

She knew that there must be something going on, Magical or otherwise, but when she tried bringing it up with her Dad or JLD, they would also Brush her off.

Her Family was forgetting her. And they didn't even realize it.

...

Danny was not okay at the moment.

When he had gone to school a few weeks ago and noticed everybody staring at him, he didn't give it much thought. Maybe Dash or Paulina had spread another Rumor about him again, not too out of the ordinary.

When his name had been called over the Intercom, he hadn't thought much of that either. His grades were falling even more than usual, so he assumed his Guidance Counselor wanted to have another talk with him.

When he walked into the Principals Office to see both of his Parents and some GIW Agents, that's when he realized something big must have happened.

He didn't have much of a chance to react when the Shields went up, but he did react when the first Ecto-Blast scorched the wall behind him. His Parents began to scream at him as they fired their Blasters, something about replacing somebody? He didn't know, he was pretty preoccupied at the moment.

It took more effort than he cared to admit to escape the Room, but a stray shot to the hidden Shield Projector under the Principals Desk proved to be his saving grace. Unfortunately the moment he escaped the Office, he was met with a veritable Army of GIW Agents, all armed to the Teeth with Weapons he had never even seen before.

He managed to get away for a moment, hiding in the Bathroom as the Agents chasing him passed it by. That's when he met Wes.

He obviously hadn't been expecting him, but the moment he saw him Wes put on a smug look. "Oh hi Fenton, trying to get away from the other students?"

Danny had replied with confusion, "What the hell are you talking about?!"

"I finally managed to convince everybody about you, now everyone knows that you're Phantom! I'll bet you're hiding from all of the other Students hounding you for questions right?"

"...it was you?"

"Yeah, so? I finally get to be right!"

"...You absolute MORON-"

That was the last Danny got to say to Wes before an Ecto-Blast launched him through a Wall, seeing his face morph into a look of Shock just before the dust cloud covered it up.

Since that day, Danny had been on the Run. Nowhere was safe anymore now that the GIW knew both his Human and Ghost's faces, but he had to keep running. He crossed state Lines already, and was on his way to the next Ecto-Rich City he could sense, somewhere in New Jersey.

He cursed his Fenton Luck every day. Why had everybody believed Wes this time?! Nobody had ever belived him before, nobody even seemed to acknowledge his existence after a while! What had changed?

Danny just wanted to rest already.

...

Cass had taken to Patrolling alone recently. She had taken to doing a lot of things alone, actually.

After the first month, it seemed that nobody could remember that she was in the room with them, even if she was within their eyeline, she just faded into the background. By the 2 Month Mark they had stopped talking to her entirely, although occasionally she would get a Text or two from her dad. By the 3 month Mark she was completely invisible, and By the 5th she had been forced to get used to it.

She didn't know what was going on, was it a Meta Ability? Magic? Alien Tech? She had no idea.

She had begun to cook for herself after the first time Alfred forgot to set her Plate at the Table. The same with Washing her own Clothes, Cleaning her Room, and Paying her Phone Bills. At the very least the Automated Allowance Payments to her Account had kept up, or she wouldn't have been able to go to her favorite Cafe anymore.

It was bittersweet for her. She used to go to that Cafe every week with Alfred, but he didn't even come on his own anymore. Had he only come for her? Did she really mean that much to them? It hurt, she finally had a family that cared for her and suddenly she didn't exist to them.

She sat alone at a Table, ignored by everyone in the Cafe as usual, when a new face walked in. He looked about her age, a little roughed up, walking with a sort of cautious gaint, as if he was scared of something. His Body Language seemed to agree with her assessment, as his body practically screamed "Worry" in its movements.

Cass stopped watching at that point. Just another Gotham Teen, probably worried over something like getting not having enough money or getting mugged on the way home. It was a Common sight in Gotham.

She attention was pricked again for a moment when she heard a voice speak up. "Uh, can I sit here?"

She ignored it, he wasn't talking to her.

"Um, excuse me? Miss? Could I sit here?" He repeated.

She ignored him again, he wasn't talking to her. Nobody talked to her.

"Hello? Do you have Earbuds in?" He said, and he waved his hand in front of her face.

Her face. He waved his hand. In front of Her Face.

He was talking to her.

She looked up at him sharply, seeming to startle him for a moment before he asked, "So, is that a no?"

"You can see me?" She asked.

He looked a bit bewildered, but replied "Uh, yeah? Why would I not? Are you...a Ghost?". That last part sounded a bit suspicious.

"No. Not a Ghost. But nobody sees me. Ever. Nobody remembers me." She replied. She had never spoken this much to anybody outside of her Family, but in the past few weeks she had been starved for interaction.

He seemed slightly interested, and sat down at her table. He looked her in the eyes, and said "Do you...talk about it?"

She smiled. He could see her.

#Dpxdc #Dp x dc #Dcxdp #Dc x dp #Danny Phantom #Dc #Dcu #Batman #Cassandra Cain #Cassandra's Curse #Wes Weston has Cassandra's Curse #He manages to get rid of it and foists it onto a random person #That being Cassandra Cain (because irony)#The Cassandra Curse works a bit differently here #The User will slowly become less relevant and more ignored in the lives of the people around them #Until nobody can even be bothered to remember they exist and the Prophecy they speak becomes utterly useless #Ever wonder why Wes isn't an actual character in the Show? It's because everybody including the Audience forgot about his ramblings #Danny is unaffected because of Ghost Shenanigans #Wes Weston reveal Danny Phantom #He was so obsessed with finally being right that he didn't think of the consequences #He's still a moron though and doesn't have a way to undo it #Danny is on the Run #This is Cass/Danny if you didn't catch on #Danny has been Unseen because hasn't been able to talk to people for months due to being on the run #Cass has been Unseen for months because that's when she was cursed #Both haven't talked to another person is so long and it is relieving #They live together Unseen for Months since they don't know how to fix either of their situations #Dead Silent #That's their Ship name right?#Had to reference the Shipping Chart

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bloggingboutburgers · 9 months

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...Maybe queerbaiting can only ever mean homobaiting or transspecbaiting

Idk don't kill me those are just cans of worms

#no one can know i don't like sex #queerbaiting #asexual #aromantic #aroace #not 100% a hot take but i doubt aro ace bait actually exists tbh #because i don't think writers and audiences care about aro or ace people enough to even think of writing them as bait #it's in THAT sad a state #my art #nonburger

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sergle · 7 months

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(re: sssniperwolf and jacksfilms) It's laughable that she escalated it that hard. Don't get me wrong, I'm pretty sure stalking him like that is illegal and it's terrifying regardless, but Jack said in a stream (can't remember which one) that he wasn't about bringing up past controversies of hers or cancelling. And now she shows up outside his house (wtf!!!). Like he was willing to only call her out for stealing and freebooting but she's gone and stalked him and Jack doesn't seem like the type of guy to take that shit. Actual WTF moment from her part. wild

omg long post below bc apparently I have opinions: YES!! THAT'S WHAT'S SO INCREDIBLE ABOUT THIS... Jack has been genuinely diligent about keeping things on-topic in his streams, and hasn't brought up any of her other Stuff, or anything Personal. Despite the fact that she kickstarted the whole thing by making it INCREDIBLY personal and attacking his physical appearance... His goal has been to call out and bring attention to content theft, and he's stuck with it. Dude's also cared about this for years, and she's not the first content thief he's criticized. He just hates the way that freebooting has become so accepted-- to the point where youtube praised her for "coming up with such creative video ideas"? Hey! Ew! Dude wasn't trying to get her cancelled though, there was no smear campaign of her character. He's been rallying to get her to CREDIT the creators that she relies on for all of her content. It would set a precedent for all other "react" channels on the platform for one of the biggest channels on youtube to actually give credit where credit is due. Or, god forbid, get permission first? It's not hard. It's already done the job of making some other people who do "react content" self-analyze whether or not their content is transformative, and to maybe care about crediting the creators they rely on for their genre to work. There is a way to make this kind of video that isn't so slimy. And making fun of her lackluster-at-best reactions is so far from even being a big deal. Bc she literally does just sit there and say nothing. Plus, his goal has a clear End built into it: if she started shouting out the creators she takes content from, and put links directly to their pages in her video descriptions, the job would be done! That's what he's asking her to do. Real bare minimum stuff. It legit would have been easy to steer away from the content theft and to also talk about her history of lying to her audience! her ghosting a dying kid with cancer who was a big fan of hers! the fact that she's been arrested for armed robbery! her history of transphobia! He would also get more clicks that way, which is what she claims is his sole goal- to get more clicks. I'll bring it up though! She's been a terrible person the whole time, and has kept a steady course of manipulating her audience of young children and/or, let's be completely honest, simps- into thinking that she's a Wholesome creator. (And now, into thinking she's an innocent victim.) All of the actual effort put in by her has gone toward optics, not the content she puts out. A carefully constructed online persona, for one, but also literal appearances. Jack totally can't say this, bc she already went off the handle and said the only reason he doesn't like her is bc he Hates To See A Woman Be Successful. But I can! That was a cheap shot for her to use that argument when, for once, it's not applicable! Much the opposite, even! Dudes online wouldn't go to bat for her if she didn't look the way she does. And it weakens any case she'd have against him by making baseless claims like that. She banks hugely on being an attractive woman to get her clicks/following. A massive amount of effort is put into her appearance. The makeup, the lip fillers, putting her hair in little pigtails, the chokers and tube tops, the big non-prescription Nerd Glasses, the thumbnails where she has her mouth open in That Expression?

I don't even have to say anything. But making a weird facial expression and putting your hair in pigtails aren't moral failings. Showing up at someone's real life home (whose address you shouldn't even have access to), filming the front of their house at night, doxxing them to your audience of millions of people? Because you were mad at them online? That is fully scary! Yeah girl I'm pretty sure that Jack can press charges! There is absolutely no way to take the moral highground now that she's literally stalked him, and doxxed his home. She tried to goad him and Erin (Jack's wife) out of the house, also, which creeps me out even more-- because what was she planning to do? The fact that she's been arrested for violent crime before does pop into my mind! lmao! Jack was streaming a game at the time that she was outside his home, and these clips of him, his friends, and Erin reacting in real time to what is genuinely a scary situation have been taken down in case he needs to use them in legal action. Shit is legitimately serious!

#sergle answers #long post #LONGEST POST ON EARTH I'M SO SORRY #saying all this out loud only takes a few minutes but typing it... girl this is a BOOK #clearly I have thoughts on this Online Drama but also this isn't online!#these are people who exist in real life. and compromising a person's safety bc he criticized you for stealing tiktoks #is a real life thing. this isn't confined to online spaces! you can turn off your computer to get away from An Argument #but someone going to your house?? that's absolutely terrifying #and all of this is just because he's been telling her to credit the creators. it could have been resolved so simply.#I hope he takes legal action against her bc he genuinely has grounds to do so.#and I can't imagine how terrified and upset I would be if someone was outside my door. filming my house for their audience.#also the 'what if the roles were reversed' argument is rarely made in good faith... but she's already brought up the topic.#this would be getting even more coverage and the optics would be Even Creepier if a strange man with millions of followers showed up #at the home of a woman- just bc she criticized his videos- filming her home address for all to see and trying to get her to come outside.#It's just as creepy that sssniperwolf did this as it would be coming from ANYONE else #it's been downplayed bc her being a little skinny woman means that A Man shouldn't be threatened by her #which. even if she wasn't going to Do anything. any one of her rabidly loyal online followers MIGHT. she's not the only one who could go to #his house now! anyone could show up.#sergle.txt #Jacksfilms #Sssniperwolf

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flythesail · 10 months

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I'm so tired of the way tv is working right now. And it's not working. Seasons are getting shorter, and shows are canceled before they even get a chance to prove themselves. Shows with new concepts often get the worst of it, and it just makes me so sad to think of all the fantastic stories we're losing because of a system that prioritizes profit over the art itself. I want to live with these characters over years. Get to know them and grow with them and not watch as their stories are crammed into six episodes or even worse, go entirely unfinished.

#shows used to be 18+ episodes for 7+ seasons!!!! how did we end up here #with both writers and actors on strike too.. i can only hope they get what they deserve and it's a turning point for the better #audiences want these long run shows #either streaming needs to get on that or go away #disney+ moving to prevent password sharing now too.. like do you want people to watch or not?? i dont get it #this isnt even getting into the way they erase shows from existence either #flythepost

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chirpsythismorning · 4 months

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“Mike said his life started the day he found El in the woods, which was technically the following night. What he said had nothing to do with offending Will because he went missing the day before.”

#byler #ignore the logistics of it #mike’s brain thinks of Nov 6th as the day Will went missing aka the day his life stopped #he met El after a whole day of worrying about will #its the day they had to see etched on will’s tombstone #Nov 7th is just an extension of him finding out and doing everything to get him back #nov 7th evening is a whole 24 hrs later #so yes not the same day #but it doesn’t make it any less incriminating #it’s not that Mike didn’t exist until he found el #it’s that it stopped that day #and then started again when he got hope will was alive #so many lines in mike’s monologue felt like lies mixed with a dose of truth #friends don’t lie co-founder and his loopholes 🙄#I think it’s interesting also that we never really get Mike and Will talking about his time in the UD #the one time they do it’s brief and mostly about uncovering what’s happening to Will in that moment in s2 #but like we never see them talk outright about what happened or how the party all coped #so the prospects of him finding out how Mike truly felt back then…#in a scene where mike explains the ‘i feel like my life started-‘ line to Will #(and even more importantly the audience who has to buy into this)#that could be quite something…

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chill-vibes-but-rainbow-panic · 3 months

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I love characters not being able to tell they're being deceived by a shapeshifter!

Love the audience not being able to tell they're being deceived by a shapeshifter!!!

#Don't get me wrong; zero shade towards my shapeshifters who are very 'obviously' shifters (Jake; Amethyst; etc.)#But smth about those where you realistically *couldn't tell* you're dealing with a copycat just hit different for me #Of course they tend to have obvious visual e.g. tells for the audience; but those often either don't exist within canon or I can ignore #And when even *we* can't tell? Even better!#Also Spy counts as an honourary shifter. Because what is shapeshifting but making a disguise out of your flesh and blood?#If you can't shapeshift naturally; store-bought is fine #In hindsight I think that's two words but I am not rediting the image so I'm spelling it like that in my own tags too #shape shifter #my little pony friendship is magic #changeling #thorax #darkwing duck #camille chameleon #team fortress 2 #tf2 spy #pokemon #ditto

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sshireens · 2 months

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i love seeing people take preexisting characters and just make them their own ocs. i love adopting fanon as gospel. i love stealing from the source and turning mercury into gold. rb and tag with your own

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classicslesbianopinions · 4 months

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the thing about being a disabled grad student is that if you want even half a chance you constantly have to not only reveal but interrogate and explain your softest most vulnerable parts. while people around you act like this is just completely normal and actually that is not the softest most vulnerable part of you and actually you are exactly the same as all of them. so you feel like you are in disguise as exactlythesame while also completely exposed. and you just have to live like that. absolutely insane

#mod felix #general disclaimer that this is my experience and this is how i feel and not necessarily how everyone feels obviously #but . i feel this way . currently #well and i think part of it is that like... people act like the institution isn't actively hostile to like. any marginalized person really #i mean this post is about disability but i'm sure it applies to other people too #and if you read this and say 'this is also how it feels to be x' i see and support you #anyway. posting this here because like... i feel like as a blog with a relatively large (for tumblr) audience like.#i feel the need to be honest and transparent about my experiences in academia #because i know there are people following us who like. want to be in academia or who already are #and like . i really like the program i'm in and i'm learning a lot but it's also a very hard thing to do even if you're totally abled #which like. i'll be honest i think the sort of person who says 'i want to learn ancient greek for the rest of my life'#is unlikely to be totally abled #like i'm not the only disabled person in my program either. and most people i interact with like.#have a base level of understanding about disability #but it's still like... surreal to operate in like. an institution that puts pressure on everyone to act like disability doesn't exist #i feel like there's just like. constant dissonance

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whetstonefires · 9 months

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The thing about the Shazam! (Captain Marvel but they don't have the rights to call him that) movie is that overall it's pretty good? Even if I question the pacing choices made in terms of screentime breakdown for '14yo boys making mortifying life choices and humorously failing judgment calls' vs. 'character development wrt to literally anything else about this fairly large cast.'

It's hokey; it should be. It's got some decent themes and fun character bits and set up good solid hero/villain parallels to subvert.

But.

But it massively clotheslined itself with a major storytelling fuckup connected to the opening hook mystery, whose resolution is meant to be the emotional inflection point of the whole film.

Because the thing is, this movie chose to be slightly interesting in how it approached its 'family' themes. In a variation on 'family of choice' (since your foster family are in fact assigned by the government and Billy not having a choice about living with them only about trusting them is a major story element) it went for the more nuanced and kind of interestingly grimy take that the people who are actually in your life giving a shit about you matter, if you let them, and that you need to stop giving the people who failed to love you power over your happiness.

Which is not a bad premise at all! As messages for a movie about a kid being sent to a group home go, that's the most upbeat you could possibly get and still be tied to reality.

The Vasquez couple are written and played well in these terms too because they really, genuinely care, and are making so much effort, but as system graduates themselves they never had competent parenting modeled for them and god does it show.

And the mental health problems of the kids who got enough characterization to have them were similarly...realistic in a best-case-scenario sort of way.

But! Still with the but! Even though they pulled off a lot of this fairly touchy premise rather well, there's a crack in the foundation that makes the whole movie kind of collapse on a thematic level.

Because the movie (following the prologue introducing the villain's backstory) opens with a juicy emotional hook where small Billy is separated from his mother at a Christmas fair and never sees her again.

Cut to some years later, establishing status quo scene, he's a Troubled Youth rebelling against the system in an endless quest to find his mother and go home. He is committing minor felonies to get access to police information about women surnamed Batson so he can go to their houses because eventually one of them has to be his mom.

His case worker after he's picked up again refers to his mother as 'someone who clearly didn't want you,' which Billy rejects as bullshit, and he's valid! Because that is not what you say when you have actual information. That's a surmise. That's a sentence that says Child Protective Services and the police couldn't find her either.

Especially because you don't immediately chuck a kid into foster care because he's found unattended. Maybe you do that later, after a lengthy period of oversight, depending on his mom's reaction to having him returned and her race and socioeconomic status and apparent mental health and so forth. But you don't just not contact her, and you definitely don't refuse to tell the kid about the result once you have.

The only normal situation where an accessible record exists of a kid's original parentage but it's denied to the kid is in sealed adoptions, which are a formal procedure that clearly didn't happen here. There is every indication in this opening sequence that his mom was never found.

Which means she's a missing person. Either because they located the correct Billy Batson and his adult never came back to their house (which would suggest foul play or some other drama) or because despite being old enough to be in school and knowing his own name, no one could find evidence that Billy existed prior to turning up at that street carnival.

Which would constitute a very mysterious situation! What is he, from a cult? Another dimension? Did someone (in the social worker's proposed scenario, Billy's mom) erase all record of her kid somehow? Was magic involved?

So: the way we're introduced to this scenario, there's a legitimate weird mystery here that none of the adults in Billy's life care enough about to do anything but tell him to write it off, the way they have. That his missing person clearly did it on purpose.

Billy's being ridiculous because if what he's trying would work then he wouldn't need to do it; his social worker could have arranged a meeting years ago. So it's a useless self-destructive behavior he needs to let go. But he's valid, in that he's being very obviously failed by the system and is doing the only thing he can think of to try to address his situation for himself.

And then! The Big Reveal is that his mom has been living under her maiden name in the same city as him this whole time.

Which the Gamer Kid Who Turns Out In This Scene To Be A Hacker (he's about 10) learned by. Breaking into a federal database.

So he goes to her house and it turns out. She'd been a teen mother and her babydaddy walked out after marrying her, and her parents cut her off, and she was depressed and felt like a bad mother so. When she saw the cops had her kid, she just walked away. And she wants to believe he's been happy and better off without her.

And the emotional arc of the film rests on how Billy comes to terms with this. With the fact that his past will never take him back and he has to learn to find joy in himself and his present situation and his future.

Having let go of that idea, he's able to emotionally commit to his gaggle of foster siblings and realize that unlike the villain, who was obsessed with punishing the people who never loved or accepted him, or the wizard who was focused on finding The Perfectly Worthy Champion, what you needed to be good and not lost was to be part of a mutually supportive group, like the wizard Shazam was before he and his siblings were betrayed. And then they can be a superhero team, woo!

And that part is actually depicted fairly well, all things considered!

But the problem is that the audience, to vibe with this properly, has to roll with the revelation that Billy was wrong to cling to the mystery of his vanished, beloved mother and the fantasy of going home again.

We have to be willing to participate in the idea that the Resistant Child Subjected To Foster Care was in the wrong.

And he wasn't! He wasn't wrong! His understanding of the situation was flawed but it should not have been flawed in this manner.

Because this scenario as it's depicted doesn't make any sense. The cops do not just keep your kid without following up if you fail to collect him from the baggage claim. CPS does not fail to provide a kid with the readily available evidence that he's been voluntarily surrendered to them, when he keeps running off trying to go home.

Why would they do that, after all? Billy's misbehavior was a huge hassle for them. They gained nothing by denying him access to his mother and the information about her that was, you recall, sitting totally available in a government database that could be hacked by a random 10 year old asian-american orphan. They just...made their own lives harder for no reason, while extending the suffering of a child in their care.

If the cops tried to return him back when and she said 'no i left him with you on purpose please keep him' maybe she gets prosecuted for child abandonment and maybe not, but either way, billy would know about it.

But if the screenwriters had made it clear early on that this information had been offered to him and he'd chosen not to believe it, they couldn't get a proper Reveal at the end because it would just be Billy being unable to continue pretending something the audience had known not to believe all along.

And they couldn't cram a good reason for the scenario they'd set up into the space they'd accorded it.

So they were just like, it's fine, if we cram enough cliches into this space people will react to the familiarity and go 'ah yes i know this one' and go along with it, and not notice that this isn't an actual coherent reply to the question that was set up an hour ago and therefore is emotionally unsatisfying somehow.

Anyway this is an important storytelling guideline: if you put in a mystery to control either the actual plot or, even worse, the emotional storyline, that mystery and its resolution have to make internal sense.

If you pull the Real Situation out of your ass, and it's not a matter of red herrings or That One Fact you didn't have that makes all the rest fit together differently, but in fact no one involved could have figured this out and especially if the people who did say this in the first place had no good basis for it, but still get narratively awarded the Correct trophy in a way that contributes to the thematic climax so the audience has to care. Then that will not get good results. It will make it hard to deliver on your intended themes.

Some people will not notice or care! This is true! But a lot of people will, and you'll get enough of a better punch even with the other folks, if the setup and denouement fit together properly and don't require reaching, to matter.

And when people do notice at all, rather than their naturally flowing along with the climax you're steering toward and experiencing A Story, there will be a tendency to notice you standing there placing roadsigns toward the Intended Emotional Response, and call you a hack.

People call out plotholes way too vigorously sometimes, so I want to be clear: it's not the lack of supporting logic I mind. It's that the active presence of illogic, of what's presented as a chain but is broken along its length, means the central character arc intersects with the core theme in a noticeably forced way. Which is bad craftsmanship on a meaningful level.

There is a loss of cohesion where you cannot satisfactorily resolve how the scenario we were initially shown came to be superimposed over the revealed truth, because that relationship between elements is very important to making a 'revelation' storyline land, you know?

In this case it's particularly vexing to me because the last-minute asspull and its thematic weight reaches back around and at the last minute moves the whole movie thematically to the other side of the line wrt whether it's approaching Billy, our protagonist, as a subject with whom we're supposed to identify or an object whom we're supposed to observe.

It makes all the high-school-freshman-posing-as-adult gags retroactively less funny because we were now more explicitly laughing at him, and takes a lot of the depth out of the emotionally sincere moments.

Up to that point I had really appreciated how, despite wavering that way, Shazam! hadn't actually fallen to the MCU Spiderman temptation to dehumanize its protagonist. Which seems to arise out of this weird tendency I've noticed to assume the natural sentiment of adults toward adolescents is bemused contempt, and that therefore if they ask their audience of paying grownups to empathize too closely with a teen hero instead of setting him and his Immaturity up as a clown for our amusement, they'll get themselves banished to the Children's Fiction ghetto.

And, of course, if they'd been fully committed to one side or the other of 'Billy is a protagonist the viewer relates to closely' or 'Billy is a protagonist the viewer relates to distantly,' they wouldn't have gotten snarled up about how much information to hand over when.

Committing to either option (giving us only as much information as Billy had and constructing a story that was solid from a being-Billy angle or giving us more information than Billy and operating confidently in the realm of dramatic irony) could have worked quite well. But because of the mixed signals and unstable narrative distance, they wound up with a distinctly weakened finale.

#hoc est meum #in real life things happen that you have no good reason to expect all the time #but in real life we know they happened for some kind of reason as in #causality exists and even in situations where we can't dig into the chain #we have cause to understand that it's there #in fiction they happened because they'd be convenient #so the rules of what information can be available and how you frame new information being revealed exist #to keep the audience from feeling jerked around #you have to earn people's trust and if you lose it #that limits the kind of results you can get #when writing fiction one of your tools is the reader's mind #if you give them reason not to allow you free use of it your composition contracts #screenwriting #shazam #and like in this case there's a profound betrayal of the protagonist and thus of the audience who connected with him wrapped up in it

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nerdy-hyperfixations · 1 year

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What the fuck is wrong with the executives behind streaming services and why do they hate cartoons. Do they have some bull shit excuse for the garbage they pull? Did cartoons kill their grandma!? WHAT IS THEIR PROBLEM???

#inside job #I’m pissed #every creative show I like gets pulled #and fucking infinity train got squished down a grave for no fucking reason #infinity train #did it REALLY have to be obliterated from existence #and since it’s my current hyperfixation #rottmnt #really what is the reason behind canceling that?!#i know the ‘reasons’#it didn’t sell toys well enough and ‘didn’t have a big enough audience’#but those reasons are bull #I KNOW there is no way in hell they’re not making fuck all money with these #there are hundreds of people in the fandoms who rewatch shit all the time HOW IS THAT NOT ENOUGH?#at least TOH at least got the grace of being able to finish properly #the owl house #but even so why does it have to get canceled #why are all cartoons that have a little more depth to them and story being sacked like month old soggy apples?#it’s so frustrating!#i don’t understand!!

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fiapple · 11 days

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i'm getting towards the end of the skypeia arc, & i'd like to say just how much i adore the way the female strawhats have been treated.

just... every aspect of how the way their characters have been previously contextualized influences the story-line is treated with a masterful amount of consideration. we're given so many layers to both of them that enrich not only their characters specifically, but the arc, and the one piece world as a whole. without nami & robin having their specific skills, and their specific values, without those being built upon, the story would have come to a halt.

you could not have skypeia without nami & robin being who they are as individuals. not just because they never would've gotten there without nami, but also because the way these women think is itself foundational to the machinations of the arc as a whole.

to be totally upfront, if you think any other strawhats were more central to the skypeia arc than nami & robin were you are full-on fucking lying to yourself.

#obligatory disclaimer that i’m aware luffy is the protagonist & a lot of interesting stuff is explored w him. this isn’t abt him though.#part of me wonders if this is an aspect of why people will write off this arc sometimes tbh... like that & the political themes.#but yeah anyway i get why people say that for all there are 100% misogynistic tendencies in oda's writing & character design #it is very very hard to say that he as an individual is an ideological misogynist. like the level of care he puts into his female cast mem #-ers generally speaking & how he approaches what existing as a multi-dimensional individual would look like in their specific contexts is #like... in a lot of ways still something that is unprecedented across all forms of media.#but also not the point but anyone who says nami in particular doesnt get real fights/is unskilled um... no you're wrong read her fight in #alabasta & then all of skypeia.#like in alabasta she takes on arguably a stronger opponent than sanji when considering the structuring of BW. not only that but she does s #with a weapon she has never used before while actively reading the instruction manual. and she WINS. she wins based on sheer intellect &#the ability to utilize skills the audience already knows she has. the pre-existing basic fighting skills she's introduced with are elabora #-ed upon by incorporating her skill w navigation. same with the way her cunning is used in skypeia to cover her lack of sheer brute. &#the best part about it is she's fucking tough in a way that makes sense! she isn't strong/weak just for the sake of positioning her as such #it is thoughtful & it strengthens her as a character rather than just like giving the power-scaler types smth to mindlessly chew on.#like do i wish nami got to fight more & take a more active role in that regard even if i don't think she needs to be a fighter in the same #sense as the monster trio? yes absolutely. i'm guessing this is going to be smth that bothers me potentially even more with robin.#but that does not mean her fights are not masterfully written when she gets them or that she isn't tough as a bag of nails.#respect my darling woman or die.#skypeia #nico robin #nami #grey's one piece tag

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hotwaterandmilk · 11 months

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I'm still not well so this isn't going to be articulate, but I wanted to say something anyway.

In the wake of Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies (amongst other titles) being purged from streaming I've seen countless posts saying "This is terrible, we need to stop this practice -- they might purge a good show next!" and yeah, for sure a lot of titles being impacted by streaming purges/lack of physical media/a decline in archiving right now aren't going to be remembered for changing the world.

However, I think it is vital that we fight to preserve these titles for their own sake not just because "What if next time it's something we actually like?!" There is value is preserving things widely regarded as "bad" not just because I have firm beliefs about the absurdity of taste, but because who gives a shit if something is deemed "good?" Actual human people put their time and energy into realising these artistic visions. Even if the results are arguably not "good" or "popular", should the efforts of these artists be lost to the sands of time? No, no they fucking shouldn't.

I share a lot of art on this blog from titles very few people consider culturally important or valuabe. However, I don't look at the things I collect & share like that. Even some of the most objectively absurd titles I own are still pieces of art that were developed, published, and consumed by humans in the real world. Whether they've turned out to be broadly memorable or not is irrelevant because they existed and that in itself makes them worthy of preservation so that others can choose to familiarise themselves with them long after the original creative team is gone.

So yes, we should all be trying to preserve the media that's important to us and not let corporations try to stamp out every trace of a financial (though not necessarily artistic) misstep. However, it shouldn't take the threat of something we, personally, like being taken away to stir us into giving a shit.

Even the demise of less admired works should concern us and make us start to burn copies of Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies because it might not mean anything to you or I right now, but to some kid in 20 years it could be a seminal experience that leads them to follow their dreams. Or it could become a cult classic that people reflect on at watch parties years in the future. Or it could continue to be a footnote in the history of television that nobody really cares about.

Ultimately I don't think it matters what level of value we arbitrarily assign to media now or in the future, we should be trying to preserve as much of it as possible so that generations from now people can enjoy the option of engaging with these titles should they so wish.

#personal #idk i just feel strongly that even trash should be allowed to exist #and all of us be able to access it if we so choose #some of the most meaningful film experiences of my life have involved B movies and other “low” culture properties #i'm not well enough to even start rambling about high and low culture and the rich #but as an audience we should be able to select what we want to consume #and we should be able to access it regardless of local laws or cultural norms #that's why the efforts of archivists and media preservationists from the lost media wiki to the louvre are so important #“but this spongebob ad had no impact on society who cares if it is accessible or not?”#you can't determine the value of something based solely on your own experience with it #so yeah spongebob ads and episodes of wheel of fortune should continue to exist #and so should the trashiest shoujo manga in the world #god and i haven't even touched on how disproportionately things like this affect work by artists of colour #queer artists and disabled artists #it's super fucking shit and i refuse to let streaming take away these media choices #ok back to my covid sick bed

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metanarrates · 17 days

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watched a majora's mask analysis earlier today with my fiancee. my verdict is that I actually really enjoyed the op's interpretations, but that I wished that they talked more about mm's literal level and what one can get from it, rather than talking about those events as if they are strictly metaphor. yes, of course the metaphorical layer of the game is rich to dig into, but it's also such an open-ended and surreal game that it's difficult to nail down every single distinct metaphor that can be derived from its events. which is why I consider it necessary to discuss the way the literal layer presents itself and what sort of motifs and ideas exist there as a baseline before you begin looking at it as metaphor

#narrates #zelda #^ longwinded way of saying that i think that both the impeding inevitability of death #the way the characters react to it #and the question of whether or not termina is even 'real' or can be saved are all intensely interesting aspects of the game #regardless of metaphor. you are existing in a world where you empirically cannot change anything permanently until your very last cycle #and in a world that is potentially not real or is doomed in other ways. but your task is still to help these people and save it #which is interesting even before you get into the symbolic spiritual and metaphorical reads of the game #again thats not to say those reads are bad. i think those reads are what people find the MOST meaningful about mm #most of mm's strength lies in its atmosphere and its ability to convey all these overlapping ideas #its surrealism and the richness of its ideas is what allows for an audience to draw all sorts of meanings out of it #it's just also very meaningful in its LITERAL events and I enjoy that quite a lot!#also... I feel like you heavily have to acknowledge death of the author when dealing with mm #you cannot rely on what you think the author intended. because thats both unclear and does a disservice to the games open endedness #which means that your analysis tends to be far more meaningful when you discuss how IDEAS are embedded in the game #and how you personally constructed meaning out of that #rather than relying on your ability to convince me that your specific read was completely what the devs were thinking #idc about the devs tell me about YOU!#this video was way better than most at doing that but I just prefer mm analysis that is heavier on death of the author #edit: i don't mean you should discount cultural context. thats part of the ideas embedded in ths game #i just mean that I don't like arguments that rely on the idea that the devs INTENDED that cultural context to shape the games metaphors

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pagesofkenna · 2 years

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there's a post in the tag about someone wishing to see more Omar in D20 and I agree, but it also reminded me about how a year ago a few RPG streamers I like started Power Play, and I never ended up watching it, and I just recently learned that Omar was in that and I could have seen what an awesome player he was long ago if I just had watched it

and then I got to thinking about how many cool actual plays are out there that don't have the budget that Dimension 20 or Critical Role have, but tell really cool stories with really good players regardless! And a lot of these players deserve recognition, but there's so little space to showcase new players for audiences who only watch D20 or CR

so anyway I compiled a list of every single actual play Omar has been in (at least, those I could find VODs for)

Power Play: actual play of Icons, a silver-age inspired superheroes rpg, hosted by QueueTimes! It's played remotely, about 59 episodes long, and includes several one-shots where (I think?) they play some other game systems as well

The Borros Saga: Banesbreak: actual play of Dungeons and Dragons, hosted by PixelCircus! Played in person, about 12 episodes long, with some one-shot vignettes. Aabria is also a player here!

Monsters and Fables: actual play of Dungeons and Dragons, hosted by the official D&D channel! Played in person, 6 episodes long

Buffy the Vampire Slayer RPG: actual play of Dungeons and Dragons, hosted by Hyper RPG! Played in person, about 9 episodes long, and half the time Omar is DMing!

Balboa Cantrip Academy: actual play of Kids on Brooms, a rules-lite magical school rpg, hosted by Hyper RPG! Played remotely, and only 3 episodes long (Episode 2, Episode 3, on Twitch)

Pugmire: Homeword Bound: actual play of Pugmire, a simplified D20 with dogs, hosted by Saving Throw! Played in-person, only 3 episodes long

The Last VHS Store: a 3-episode series hosted by Saving Throw, where Omar GMs a lite D20 system he designed himself! All in-person

Carrier Penguins: a series of 4 one-shots hosted by Saving Throw, playing Lasers and Feelings, an easily hackable lite system. Ep1, Ep2, Ep3, Ep4, all in-person

Oneshots specifically:

Aces in Space charity stream with QueueTimes, playing Blue Shift - remote

The Golden Girls charity stream with PixelCircus, playing Lewd Grannies - remote

The Gauntlet s2e2 with Hyper RPG, playing Pathfinder (Omar later GMs the 8-episode s4) - in-person

Spy Island ep1 with Hyper RPG, playing ?? (an ad-hoc mafia/werewolf rpg) - remote

(And here's just a truncated list of his Saving Throw oneshots, bc there's a lot: Scooby-Doo rpg playing Wildlings, Lasers and Feelings with the Doubleclicks, House of 100 Nightmares GMing Dread, John Wick charity stream playing Lasers and Feelings)

Game the Game (board games instead of tabletops RPGs) with Geek and Sundry, playing Pitchstorm, Aftermath, and Scott Pilgrim - in-person

He was also a campaign guest player in Failed Save c2e3 (D&D, PixelCircus), Damsels, Dice, & Everything Nice s3e2 (D&D, PixelCircus), and Ironkeep Chronicles ep21 (D&D, Saving Throw)

#omar najam #dimension 20 #acofaf #phew this took........ a lot of work...#i wish there was a system already in place to see which players have been in which games #but unless the actors list their actual play work all on their portfolio website there really isnt a system #i compiled this partially to be like 'hey you want more omar?? you DONT need to rely on D20 for that!'#even tho I agree the production quality of D20 is so high that those actual plays can be more fun to watch than the smaller groups #and partially to be like 'hey look at these other game streaming groups that have good work they're putting out you should watch!'#and partially literally also to be like '...YO look at all these other games that exist???'#im still loling at acofaf using the D&D system at all. it does NOTHING for this setting except be familiar to their audience #Saving Throw uses Lasers and Feelings a LOT because its such a light bulk-less system you can do ANYTHING on top of #with virtually zero prep #acofaf needed an oracle system more than a combat system - which is what D&D is #and the oracle system in D&D is helpful but theres SO much bulk with the combat mechanics for a production that doesnt need it!#anyway if you like horror Omar GMs a game of Dread and I don't like horror but I still Need to see that

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