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kevingotabigasschin · 6 months

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Now people would expect Hak to be the most social or extroverted since he's the loudest and the most confident out of all 4 enforcers (not counting Valmont).

But he isn't.

Dude is the most social anti - social person I've ever seen if that makes sense.

That's what I like about him.

He subverts expectations.

Like I know that Hak being a social butterfly isn't exactly aligning with his work or job but he's a part of a team now, dude has to communicate and at least tolerate the others.

I understand the dude is the type that's just there for a paycheck, but considering the fact that the only time he pays attention to the other enforcers is when he complains to them about petty s**t or finally decides to do his job and lead them for a change like Valmont told him to just for an ego boost.

And the fact that he's had multiple chances to leave the enforcers and just doesn't for some reason.

Like he tried making it on his own in Season 2 in that godawful episode where one of the writers decided to implement their fetish in the show by shrinking Jackie and Hak and it was just them fighting the whole episode with occasional jumps to Uncle and Jade's shenanigans. (yes even though this is technically a Hak Foo episode I don't like Shrink Rap, it really didn't utilize him well at all, l know Hak can have a good episode if written correctly the show just didn't care about him and threw him a bone in the form of one of the worst filler episodes I've seen in history)

He somehow came back in the middle of Season 3 (even though he was shrunk and trapped in a jar at the end of Shrink Rap) just to destroy the other enforcers that were turned into Dark Chi Warriors before being turned into one himself.

Like why did he come back? I know because of plot convenience and the fact that they were still trying to keep him involved in the show (even though he only appeared in 3 episodes in Season 3) but it doesn't make sense.

How tf did he even know the enforcers were there to begin with, was he stalking them or something?

I know people will say he was only there for the power of the Ox talisman but why did he feel the need to destroy the other enforcers, they didn't pose a threat to him and were pretty cordial considering how Hak acted, he knows this considering all three are afraid of him.

He literally just did that to showboat, simple as that.

I seriously think the dude is an intense attention whore, always looking to impress or brag but when it comes to actually participating as a team player dude wants nothing to do with it unless he takes all the credit.

Considering the fact that Hak was apparently Valmont, Wong and Tarakudo's favorite out of the bunch (get your own whore assholes) and the other enforcers were the only ones who would be willing to listen to Hak's bulls**t and complaining, I think that's the only reason he stayed after getting stuck with the other enforcers and dealing with the new demonic boss of the week (besides the cool new opportunities he was gifted)

Example: He was literally crying and complaining to Finn and Chow about not getting an Oni mask and was upset that everybody was focusing on Ratso and the baseball game, thinking it silly that he wasted such a gift.

But Ratso was being an asshole to Hak so I don't blame Hak for getting mad (Ratso you're on my s**tlist)

So after another long ass paragraph essay, in short, he is therefore an attention whore because I said so.

#jackie chan adventures #jca #jca hak foo #jca enforcers #hak foo

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tellthemeerkatsitsfine · 7 months

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Spoiler alert for all of season 5 of BBC Ghosts and the first three episodes of season 2 of Our Flag Means Death.

I really enjoyed season 5 of Ghosts. More than I expected to, I think, because I’d thought it might be running out of steam. I didn’t find season 4 quite as good as the first three, I figured there’s maybe not enough in the premise to sustain it for all that long. But season 5 left me wishing it would keep going, there’s plenty more they could do.

I am glad we’ll have a Christmas special, as they left a lot of loose ends. Arguably too many loose ends for a season finale. They could probably have solved that by cutting the quite unnecessary “Pat and Robin fight over a weather presenter” B plot from the finale, and spending the whole episode on the main story. But that was probably the only storyline in the season that I didn’t enjoy. Even the baby storyline, which I anticipated annoying me ever since I realized last week that they’d inevitably do a pregnancy in the final season, was done nicely, I thought.

Aside from the baby thing, I like that they did avoid a few of the seeming inevitabilities. There is such a well-recognized formula to this sort of feel-good sitcom, and everyone is so familiar with it, that there were few things they could have done without being incredibly predictable. Everyone’s been assuming it would end with all or at least most, or at least a few, of the ghosts disappearing. So I found it funny that instead of doing that, they dedicated the second-last episode to parodying the fans’ certainty that it would happen, and then subverting the expectations. It was just enough of an affectionate jab at the audience and their expectations to be funny, not so much as to compromise the warm and nice tone of the show.

The characters are all really well drawn for a show with such short seasons, I thought. And I did like the closure we got on Kitty and the Captain in the last season. I mean, I’m disappointed that my theory didn’t come to pass, that it’ll turn out his name is Captain Ben Willbond (I would also have accepted Captain Adam Kenyon). But Regular Ben Willbond did a hell of a job in that dramatic scene. And Lolly Adefope did a hell of a job in hers. They all did, really. It’s just a really, really nice show. I’m glad Tumblr obsession with it got strong enough a couple of years ago for me to watch it. And definitely looking forward to the Christmas special, and hoping we get a bit of a time skip/epilogue that’ll tie up all the loose threads.

And on the other show that dropped a new season this week – the first couple of episodes had me rather disappointed that Our Flag Means Death seems to have given up on being a comedy altogether to be a drama, even if it’s a reasonably entertaining drama. But the third episode felt more like the first season, which was good. I didn’t absolutely love the first season as much as some did, but I did quite like it. It was low on female characters though (I mean, it’s a show about old-timey pirates, I’m not saying I blame the writers/creators for making it male-dominated, I’m just saying I’d probably have enjoyed it more if there had been more scenes for Leslie Jones and Claudia O’Doherty because they were both great characters), so it’s nice that season 2 seems to be quickly solving that. I like a lot of the new people. I’m not quite sure how much more the main two guys have to do from here, so I like that they’re bringing in other stuff.

#bbc ghosts spoilers #ofmd spoilers

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transcomputer · 7 months

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HEY HI WALLY UM SORRY TO SCREAM INTO THE VOID OF YOUR INBOX BUT I WATCHED 8 EPS OF FIONNA AND CAKE AND I SAW THAT YOU DIDNT LIKE EP 9 AND 10 WHICH MAKES ME CONCERNED CUZ I REALLY LIKE THIS SO FAR EVEN IF IM A PRETTY CASUAL AT FAN. IDK WHAT I MEAN BY SENDING YOU THIS JUST THAT. MAYBE I WONT BE AS DISAPPOINTED IDK?? ok ill stop screaming now i hope youre having a good day/night :"3

HIII SU YAYY IM GLAD YOU LIKE FIONNA AND CAKE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! o(^▽^)o despite my beef with the last 2 eps i really really do like f&c as a whole ... it feels like such a natural and intriguing progression for adventure time's story while also being creative enough to have its own identity. when i was watching it i was blown away with how much it exceeded my expectations!!! i wanna see where they take the 2 stories and im excited to see where the team decides take this universe (˘◡˘) ♪ ......

full disclosure im a #fake at fan i havent watched since iwas like 13 or something so take what i say with a grain of salt . but ig the main appeal of the first 8 eps for me is that i felt like it was set up as a subversion of what we knew about fionna and cake and, by extension, adventure time as a series. it takes a look at at's typical storytelling formula but from a more detached lens so it provides a new take on adventure time's storytelling by subverting it's key elements while offering a new perspective and tone (i was very pleased w how different f&c are from their at counterparts!) . simon's depression only seems to spiral with time despite everything "ending well" in the original series. fionna, who was initially excited to escape her boring life, becomes slowly disillusioned when she realizes she's out of her element amidst all the magic. both fionna and simon were stuck in a point where they can't progress in life (though in varying degree) because no matter what they do, there isn't really anywhere they belong. so their arcs are set up to have them live for themselves and carve an identity outside of wanting to escape their situations!! i found that very interesting!!

but then. episode 9 and 10 ...... gotta say i was pretty underwhelmed w these ones ha!

(extended thoughts beyond the cut bc its wayy too long and kind of a downer.. ^^ dont click if u havent finished yet!!):

i mean. eps 9-10 do a good enough job in wrapping up the story .... its just that the tone and way in which conflict was resolved felt kinda disconnected from the first half imo. fionna's struggles and what she needed was set up as a fairly complex problem and seemingly extended beyond her surface level desire to escape. but by the end shes like no wait im ok with my town actually i just needed to accept it :) which while yes that was the resolution the show was setting up, the way it's handled feels too. easy ig? idk her journey in the last two episodes feels wayy more cut-and-dry than i was hoping. it really feels like they wanted to delve into her struggles a little longer but weren't given enough time to do so, so they just kinda had to skip to The Part where she learns her lesson, but for me that kinda undermined the complexity of the conflict being set up and resolved things in a pretty generic way. also nitpick but her decision to not change her world mainly coming from gumlee going like "nooo we just got together!" was like disappointingly simple to me (._.)

which brings me to simon. ouuugh simon. i loooove fionna and cake's take on simon as a character a lot but im sorry betty and simon's resolution left me with more mixed feelings than it did closure. their story is bittersweet and doomed from the start so i dont have a problem with them not being meant to be but "simon was selfish too" being the major takeaway is so strange to me? throughout the show simon is shown to be incredibly selfless and self-sacrificial so having THAT be what we take away from his character feels so out of left field. and yes bc we dont see much about simon's personal life in the main series i dont doubt that he was prone to being selfish. it could be an interesting direction to take him in! but.... his selfishness towards betty is only brought up in episode 9 (we didnt see betty till episode 8 mind you) through an exposition dump via casper and nova (whose segments+designs were admittedly rlly cute) and directly called into question in the last episode, which was ALSO their last meeting. and it leaves such a sour taste to me ....... if youre basing a climax off a specific conflict....why wait UNTIL the climax itself to directly bring up said conflict with little to no buildup. i couldnt feel any closure bc i didnt think this was the conflict theyd choose to build their relationship on at all (then again i have bad foresight)

also "we could've made better choices" still confuses me bc literally WHAT..... if simon never put on the crown he wouldve died and never wouldve found marcy. if he escaped the crown's curse he wouldve projected his madness onto pb. idk. maybe i was reading too much into those isolated incidents. but also somehow i doubt that betty turning insane and ice king's existence were consequences of his selfishness 😭 mind you he literally tried to stop betty from saving him in at!!

additional nitpicks the tone kinda switched back and forth and it felt jarring. going from the somber tone of simon and betty resolution/final meeting and the lighthearted/vaguely humorous tone of fionna and friends trying to stop the bad guy kinda messed with my investment a lil bit...also jay permanently living in fionna's universe was so strange to me likerwyt2r!^%@%#& DONT YOU HAVE SIBLINGS?

anyways i sound really critical but its only bc im rlly invested and believe it could be better if its given enough time to explore its concept better!! and even if the last 2 eps werent for me as a whole there are a lot of things i love about it . the visuals (casper and nova, simon and betty's resolution, the scene of simon returning to ooo, the dandelion scene, the epilogue, GOLB) were sooo beautifully done and did such a good job giving the scenes weight like seriously props to the creative team. i also looove beth and shermy we've only seen very little of them but already their dynamic is so endearing. there's so much passion and creativity jampacked into this project i reaaally can't wait to see what else they have in store

#PHEW im done....ive been working on this one in my drafts 4 quite a bit! sorry again 4 late reply (>﹏<)#but ANYWAYS. im rlly glad you liked it yayyyy ^__^ sorry it got long you gave me an opening and i just had to take it #ive been thinking abt this for awhile so ty for giving the opportunity to actually verbalize it :] (consumed by the f&c brain mold)#https://catabolicseed.com/txt #fionna and cake

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steamberrystudio · 2 years

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Listennn.. I too went into GS a little wary of Caleb. When contrasted against everyone else you can meet in the opening (stoic but gentle Ari, funny and flirty Jack, closed off but caring Caissa, clumsy and cryptic Magnus...) Caleb absolutely brushed me up the wrong way. Dude can be an asshole.

But then I did Ari's route first.

Let me tell you.. it took me only up until Ari and Caleb sparring and Caleb loosening up a little to realise I was in big trouble. Dude is hot as hell. And funny. And a bit of a rebel against the status quo, while still toeing the line, which I wasn't expecting. And I thoroughly enjoyed his route when I got round to it. You did an incredible job creating his personality - and I actually now love the fact he has such a wide ranging personality and isn't always gently gently with the MC.

Not that the others are like that but you get the idea - I appreciate being able to see an "ugly" side to them all instead of Mr perfect gentleman all the time. I think you did a great job of that with all the characters in different ways.

I'm still replaying all the routes. You created something special :)

Well ultimately, the prologue portion of the game was designed to set up character conflict and foundation for character growth in the routes. You're supposed to develop a first impression of the character specifically so the route can subvert the expectation and/or explain the behaviour.

So it's totally fine to like that character or be wary of another. There's nothing wrong with that. OWO

I feel like people assume I'm judging you for judging Caleb and that's not it *at all*. 😂 The whole point is to make people go 😡 at him so that when you get into his route, I can turn the tables and show you that he's actually a good guy who is struggling with some things but has a good heart.

I have people in my life who have the whole anxiety-as-anger thing going on, and I love them even though it's a super frustrating quality that they have to actively work on - and don't always succeed at not giving into it. It was a trait I really wanted to explore in a character because I deal with it a lot.

As you said, I don't want the characters to have to be perfect - Caleb can be an angry, anxious brat, Magnus has severe trust issues that he struggles with, Caissa is chained down by a lot of personal issues, etc, etc.

I'm not opposed to people having first impressions of the characters and withholding judgement until they see more.

Some of the struggles with Caleb in particular came about because of the combination of putting out a demo which allows people to see a very small slice of the game (about 20% of the total story if you count the 4 chapters of common route and 14 of each route) and a public development process which makes me very accessible for feedback.

It can be tempting to draw conclusions and give critique based on 20% of the content. But unfortunately it can sometimes not be helpful. Imagine trying to critique a drawing when you can only see 20% of it. How can you give a proper critique when you're missing 80% of the picture? That aspect of development can be a little difficult because you have feedback flying in from all directions on a thing you're still actively creating.

And that kind of led to some friction with Caleb a while back, which is why it's still kind of this big topic of discussion.

But it's not that it's not okay to have a first impression that is less than positive. That's absolutely okay! It's the point! It's what I wanted.

Like I said, the Caleb issues stemmed from a much earlier place in the development process when there were maybe some conclusions being drawn before everyone had the complete picture. Which, as I said, is very tempting and I get it. Sometimes there ARE characters that rub you the wrong way at the start and you don't want to give them a chance and that's also totally fine! I've had one character like that in all my game-playing endeavours, and I still haven't played his route. 🤣🤣

So to anyone who is/was wary of Caleb. It's fine. It's totally fine. The game is done now so you have the option of getting the full picture if you want it (or ignoring his route if you don't).

That was just something not available to people this time last year.

So all of that to say, I get it. And I appreciate that you gave Caleb a chance and have come to understand him better. And appreciate his flaws and attempts to overcome them (even if he doesn't always succeed). 💞💓💖

#gilded shadows #caleb #the brat

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ylojgtr · 1 month

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i just watched patrick willem's video from 2018 on the last jedi called "what do we want from a star wars movie?" and im going to share my thoughts because no one can stop me, im 6 years late and i don't care

i like his channel a lot and i think he did a good job explaining it, but i agree maybe 50% with his main point. he says that fans who were upset with tlj were looking for the Star Wars Feeling™️ from a star wars movie, the feeling of nostalgia essentially, and that the eu normalizing explications for everything made fans less open to new stuff. the main thing *i* want to say though is about one of his supporting points: that the prequels didnt feel like star wars in that they weren't relatable like the ot.

i love the prequels man. of course, i grew up with them in a way many didn't (as well as tcw which just serves to heighten the movies), so there's definitely bias, but one thing i love about the prequels *is* that vastly different feeling. looking back, the ot could be described as campy, but every person ive talked to who saw Star Wars in 1977 said the effects and presentation were beyond any immersion they'd ever experienced before. the same cannot be said for ep. 1, even people who got into star wars from that movie (at least that ive heard), despite also being on the cutting edge of movie technology, and obviously the dialogue is way cheesier than anything written by anyone other than george lucas, but all that just adds to the vibes, ya know? the galaxy was in a different time then too, and i can't explain how much fun it is to experience these completely separate times in such a visceral way, intentional or otherwise, when watching through the saga

i hate the sequels. of the 3, tlj is far and away my favourite. i would have LOVED to see what trilogy rian johnson and his team could have cooked up if they'd been given control over the whole thing. i love tfa visually, and introduces some great characters (ahem, KYLO...also finn i love him) but just *feels* like anh remastered. if that's what you wanted, great! but for me, i was just sooo stoked to see what a new era would feel like that it really disappointed me. the main thing i hear from people who like tlj is that it takes the story in a different direction. and while i really appreciate that, and do like the force dyad stuff and finn and roses subplot and the not-lightsaber fight at the end AND what all that stuff means for the saga, it still has that feeling of sameness, at least to me, because it's trying to be something so different. the way i see it, it's trying to be *opposite* of what everyone expects, which means it needs to have that same feel in order to subvert it. which, again, is fine by me! tfa was already done and it has to fit that aesthetic to fit into the trilogy, and im just one fan. of course everyone hates ros which i guess tried to do opposite of what they did opposite in tlj? i don't know what they were on making that movie

another thing i wanted to bring up was the whole interconnectedness of the franchise. patrick brought up the eu to show how fans were taught that every detail has an explanation. no second of the ot was without a dozen books detailing what every character was doing in the background and how they came to be there. his point was that, when new characters are doing new things in unexpected ways, people don't like it cause there isn't a wookiepedia article on it yet to explain it exactly, and that that ties into why people hated tlj. i don't doubt it, but i also want to point out that that eu is a source of a lot of enjoyment too. i don't think he was denying this, or saying it was bad at all, but i just wanted to share that the eu is basically the reason im as big a fan as i am. the idea that everything is connected is appealing to me, and the way that star wars does it, where expanded material takes place in all different times and settings with no correlation to publishing date, just really appealed to me in contrast to the marvel way or any other big franchise like that. in any other series, each new installment progresses time forward. in star wars, we have infinite time to explore any era we want...which brings me back to how much i love the completely different aesthetics from the ot and pt. the variety is so refreshing. the galaxy feels so different between eras where the sequels just make it rebels vs empire again. we already have a billion books on rebels vs empire so...what expanded stories can i look forward to thats different in the sequel era? im sure there are lots, but the difference just won't be as great. also, star wars *is* goofy. patrick says it himself, bringing up that there were a lot more jokes in the ot. id argue the prequels take themselves so seriously that the seriousness becomes the goofiness (and i love it). ive said many times on this blog that i LOVE the stupid part of star wars lore. like yes, the fact that it's explained who the stormtrooper is that han killed and stole armour from and that he's fucking tarkin is SUPER UNNECESSARY but it's FUNNY AS FUCK. no one needs to know palpatines name is sheev but that's the best name ever? the problem isn't the lore, it's when people take it too seriously and don't allow for that innovation to happen that leads to more fun lore and stories. which i think is exactly what patrick was saying, he just didn't emphasize how enjoyable the unnecessary-ness of it all is and how distinct feels in different star wars eras are imperative to all these diverse avenues for story and fun to arise. (now do i think people should be able to survive lightsaber wounds? only cause of how much i love qui-gon, i admit to being a bit angry about that...but at the end of the day i don't really care that much? im here to have fun and yeah ill complain about it sometimes but just cause complaining is also fun)

that's why i love tcw (it fleshes out this distinct time period and political setting) and rebels (again, fleshes out the distinct era of extremely fleeting hope between the empire's reign and the coming of the saviour) and the heir to the empire novels (they establish a new era with a different feel—much more similar to the ot than the prequels are to the ot but still) and kotor (same as with htte but more similar to prequels) and the new jedi order and legacy (although it's also basically rebels vs empire, it has enough of a divergent story and tone that i like it) and the high republic in the disney canon (although i haven't digested as much of it as id like cause fuck disney)

but my main point: the thing i want from new star wars is a mix of things patrick seems to love,l AND things he seems to hate. yes i want it to be star wars, so there's some sort of familiar feeling there that needs to present, but i also want a twist on it. the ot was a classic fairy tale. the prequels were political thrillers (sometimes not so thrilling, but still). other stories people really liked act completely differently again, like the mandalorian being a western and also a heartwarming family bonding adventure or andor being a spy thriller and also the best star wars show. each era or sub-franchise has their distinct aesthetics and feels that future artists can make feel even more distinct and special yet theyre all connected which is just fun don't you think? the sequels would have made me a lot happier if they gave us some new ground for new feels the same way the prequels did. anyway that's my official response no one cares about to a 6 year old video. yay!

#dont read all this ffs #just some rambling thoughts i had #star wars #patrick willems #not tagging all the star wars things i mentioned cause thats too many lmao

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paellegere · 5 months

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final thoughts: supernatural season 1

i was excited to finish season 1 yesterday! i even got to start on season 2, but that's not relevant to this post. i really enjoyed s1, and i think the showrunners did a great job at putting it together. it's been a long time since i watched older made-for-cable-tv shows and as much as i'm not a huge fan of episodic storytelling as a matter of personal taste, it was a breath of fresh air to be honest.

and if i'm being even more honest, my evaluation that i don't like episodic storytelling isn't even all that true here and might be more influenced by the shows i've watched than it being a hard and fast rule for me. it's still not my preferred method of storytelling, but i think spn takes what it has and makes something really good out of it. compared to shows like wwdits, i was relieved and delighted to discover that the pacing issues i was expecting weren't all that prevalent in spn. the recursive nature of episodic storytelling makes it very easy to press a "reset" button on the B plot of a series, which i find happens a lot in wwdits, but spn manages to keep the momentum rolling without ever really dialing back on the developments to keep things "more or less the same" for the benefit of future episodes.

that said, there are plenty of examples where the compartmentalization of the episodes makes that recursion very obvious, such as the full episodes dean and sam will go without ever even mentioning sam's developing psychic abilities. it's necessary, of course, to keep things relevant to the episode by nature of the plot structure, and as a result very generally relevant things are pushed to the wayside to benefit the episodes' A plots. so there are inherent drawbacks to episodic storytelling that i'm just not a fan of.

but compared to other examples, i think the inherent issues with the style of storytelling aren't that big of a problem here. they're dealt with well, and there are never too many episodes between major B plot developments. like i said, there's always a forward momentum, and nothing really feels like "filler" in the sense that the overall season plot is being ignored for the sake of a side quest. it did make me ease up on my feelings toward episodic storytelling to see that it can be done really quite well.

i've been comparing spn to charmed a lot since i started my rewatch, and i still think the comparison is relevant. at this point the shows are overlapping each other, with spn's first season corresponding to charmed's 6th season. by now, if i'm remembering my seasons correctly, cole has been well and truly killed and the whole "queen of hell" plotline has been averted within season 5. so that's the context supernatural is setting up its foundations. the wink and nod to buffy also implies that supernatural is building on a foundation set by that, too, but i have unfortunately not watched btvs so it's hard to make any real commentary on it.

either way i feel like i could make whole posts just comparing spn to charmed, and it's a lot of fun to see how dynamics set by charmed are replicated and subverted in spn with the main three characters (being sam, dean, and john). the biggest difference is of course that john is their father instead of an older sibling, but the tension and discord between john and sam does remind me a lot of a more hostile version of the relationship between prue and phoebe. the characters all occupy similar narrative roles, too, and with dean sandwiched in the middle as the family man, the whole trio is complete. the "power of three" doesn't apply to the winchesters, obviously, since it's made clear over and over just how dysfunctional and unhealthy the dynamic becomes when john is thrown into the mix.

idk i just like drawing the parallels here, and since s1 is the only time john really gets and screentime, this is the only place i can really make the connections.

anyway on the subject of dean and sam's relationship, i was honestly surprised to see how much wincest baiting there was from the very beginning. when i binged spn back in high school, i somehow missed... all of it? i don't remember it at all, which is hilarious because it's so obvious as i rewatch it now. makes me wonder what else i've missed, lol

i'm delighted by the codependency both sam and dean share with each other, and how quickly they become the center of each other's worlds. it borders on toxicity in how much they need each other, but it's also a reasonable maladaption to their situation: they do need each other because they're constantly in danger, and it's perfectly reasonable and justified for them to go to literally any lengths to keep each other alive, and to keep themselves together. it's a really interesting dynamic because you can watch dean talk about how many people he'd be willing to murder just to keep sam alive and nod along as if it's reasonable (because in a lot of ways, it is). i really like the depiction of their relationship, and it makes me even more excited to see how castiel entering their fucked-up little polycule will shake up the dynamic. just one season to go!

it's been a long, long while since i've watched these early seasons, so i'm really enjoying my rewatch. i hope the subsequent seasons are just as good as the first because i'm very excited to see more developments with sam's psychic abilities and of course the buildup to armageddon :)

#liveblogging: supernatural #supernatural #.txt #spn reviews

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bearpillowmonster · 1 year

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The Last of Us HBO

This show is sort of in a bad situation because it's an adaptation of a beloved property that's going to be criticized if you're too close to the source material and too far, not to mention it's a video game property which has a track record of being subpar to just plain bad. And then that game is one of the most well known games of all time so there's that.

To be honest, I haven't played the games but I'd be living under a rock if I didn't know a lot of what already happens. And how do you do that? How do you subvert expectations when everyone already knows the spoiler?

I have the advantage to look at this from a different lens than that of a fan but I still can't help but draw comparisons and I think that's partially because it's so baked in. A good scene to represent this with is the truck getaway. In the game, you have a third person perspective of Sarah so you're in the backseat while these guys drive recklessly. It's not the same exact scene but it serves the exact same job using the exact same technique. If you watched a scene with very similar dialogue and the same end point, but just different means to get there, what did you see? Is it worth seeing again? In a game, you can feel the vibration of the controller as the car backs up and the intensity of your surroundings and how they're invading your little bubble. The scene in the show does a good job of replicating that but does that mean you're missing something?

If you've played the Last of Us and didn't like it then I don't think this show will do anything for you. There are differences but I think they fundamentally have the same problems but I think that doubles for if you liked the game, I think you'll at least enjoy it for what it's worth for a whole other Last of Us revisit after the initial game, the remaster, the remake and now this. Neil Druckmann is still involved and you can definitely tell his fingerprints are on it, unfortunately they still have unnecessary cursing. (like, you don't need it to make it gritty, how many times do I have to tell you that?) People who were jerks are still jerks. There are better things about it, there are worse things.

The other guy involved, the freaking director, Craig Mazin and his stupid comments about video games. I just don't understand but first I'll give him a hand for actually walking the walk after talking the talk but I still think some of his comments are wrong and that they don't even make sense in this context when he literally uses video game techniques to make it happen but oh well.

I mean literally, despite never playing the game, I knew what must have been there. "Ellie, I'll give you a boost, drop that ladder down to me." Little stuff like that, but it didn't really feel forced or out of place. I see now where a Last of Us MMO could come in, sort of like making it an RPG where you can choose to fight or join the Fireflies, I think that'd be quite fun but from what I see, it's a battle royale.

Acting. Pedro. That's all. I mean, I got my space cowboy but now I've got the southern accent to boot, all he needs is a little hat and we're good to go!

Honestly, it's probably better taken episode by episode because aside from actively trying to make you dislike the characters in a specific way in order to care about them, there are a few really good episodes and even the bad episodes have good parts but they are dominantly bad episodes and just straight bad characters or characters that have no relevance but get spotlight anyway. That isn't to say that it's only the new stuff that's bad either, there's a lot of good new stuff too, it's just a mystery as to what you're getting in any given episode, you can normally tell "Oh, this will be one of the predominantly good ones."

The end. Though I knew how it would end, it felt a little bit short lived and I don't mean that in length, more like they were trying to get it done, like the moments didn't hit as hard as they should've because of one reason or another. It all feels pretty summed up. Dialogue was disappointing since it was the last episode and they have a short moment before it all goes down where it feels like they trauma dump rather than a nice payoff to seeing them slowly trust each other enough to reveal one's insecurities which is ironic considering….well, season 2 will answer for that but all in all, a decent video game product.

#tlou #the last of us #hbo #review

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writingwithcolor · 3 years

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I'm writing an AU of a movie that takes place in the 1880s USA, where a travelling white character and a Jewish character are waylaid by Native Americans, who they befriend. Probably because it was written by and about PoC (Jews) the scene actually avoids the stuff on your Native American Masterpost, but I'd still like to do better than a movie made in the 1980's, and I feel weird cutting them from the plot entirely. I have a Jewish woman reading it for that, but are there any things you (1/1)

2/2 1880s western movie ask--are there things you'd LIKE to see in a movie where a white man and a Jewish man run into Native Americans in the 1880s? I do plan to base them on a real tribe (Ute, probably) and have proper housing/clothes and so forth, but right now I'm just trying to avoid or subvert awful cowboy movie tropes. Any ideas?

White and Jewish Men, Native American interactions in 1880s

I am vaguely concerned with how you only cite one of our posts about Native Americans, that was not written by a Native person, and do not cite any of the posts relating to this time period, or any posts relating to representation in media.

Sidenote: if you want us to give accurate reflections of the media you’re discussing, please tell us the NAME. I cannot go look up this movie based off this description to give you an idea of what my issues are with this scene, and must instead trust that the representation is good based off your judgement. I cannot make my own judgement. This is a problem. Especially since your whole question boils down to “this scene is good but not great and I want it to be great. How can I do that?”

Your baseline for “good” could very well be my baseline for “terrible hack job”. I can’t give you the proper education required for you to be able to accurately evaluate the media you’re watching for racist stereotypes if you don’t tell me what you’re even working with.

When you’re writing fanfic where the media is directly relevant to the question, please tell us the name of the media. We will not judge your tastes. We need this information in order to properly help you.

Moving on.

I bring up my concern for you citing that one—exceptionally old—post because it is lacking in many of the tropes that don’t exist in the media critique field but exist in the real world. This is an issue I have run into countless times on WWC (hence further concern you did not cite any other posts) and have spoken about at length.

People look at the media critique world exclusively, assume it is a complete evaluation of how Native Americans are seen in society, and as a result end up ignoring some really toxic stereotypes and then come to the inbox with “these characters aren’t abc trope, so they’re fine, but I want to rubber stamp them anyway. Anything wrong here?”. The answer is pretty much always yes.

Issue one: “Waylaid” by Native Americans

This wording is extremely loaded for one reason: Native American people are seen as tricksters, liars, and predators. This is the #1 trope that shows up in the real world that does not show up in media critique. It’s also the trope I have talked about the most when it comes to media representation, so you not knowing the trope is a sign you haven’t read the entirety of the Native tag—which is in the FAQ as something we would really prefer you did before coming at us to answer questions. It avoids us having to re-explain ourselves.

Now, hostility is honestly to be expected for the time period the movie is set in. This is in the beginnings (or ramping up) of residential schools in America* and Canada, we have generations upon generations of stolen or killed children, reserves being allocated perhaps hundreds of miles from sacred sites, and various wars with Plains and Southwest peoples are in full force (Wounded Knee would have happened in 1890, in December, and the Dakoa’s mass execution would have been in 1862. Those are just the big-name wars. There absolutely were others).

*America covers up its residential schools abuse extremely thoroughly, so if you try to research them in the American context you will come up empty. Please research Canada’s schools and apply the same abuse to America, as Canada has had a Truth and Reconciliation Commission about residential schools and therefore is more (but not completely) transparent about the abuse that happened. Please note that America’s history with residential schools is longer than Canada’s history. There is an extremely large trigger warning for mass child death when you do this research.

But just because the hostility is expected does not mean that this hostility would be treated well in the movie. Especially when you consider the sheer amount of tension between any Native actors and white actors, for how Sacheen Littlefeather had just been nearly beaten up by white actors at the 1973 Academy Awards for mentioning Wounded Knee, and the American Indian Religious Freedom Act had only been passed two years prior in 1978.

These Native actors would not have had the ability to truly consent to how they were shown, and this power dynamic has to be in your mind when you watch this scene over. I don’t care that the writers were from a discriminated-against background. This does not always result in being respectful, and I’ve also spoken about this power imbalance at length (primarily in the cowboy tag).

Documentaries and history specials made in the 2010s (with some degree of academic muster) will still fall into wording that harkens Indigenous people to wolves and settlers as frightened prey animals getting picked off by the mean animalistic Natives. This is not neutral, or good. This is perpetuating the myth that the settlers were helpless, just doing their own thing completely unobtrusively, and then the evil territorial Native Americans didn’t want to share.

To paraphrase Batman: if I had a week I couldn’t explain all the reasons that’s wrong.

How were these characters waylaid by the Native population? Because that answer—which I cannot get because you did not name the media—will determine how good the framing is. But based on the time period this movie was made alone, I do not trust it was done respectfully.

Issue 2: “Befriending”

I mentioned this was in an intense period of residential schools and land wars all in that area. The Ute themselves had just been massacred by Mormons in the Grass Valley Massacre in 1865, with ten men and an unknown number of women and children killed thanks to a case of assumed association with a war chief (Antonga Black Hawk) currently at war with Utah. The Paiute had been massacred in 1866. Over 100 Timpanogo men had been killed, with an unknown number of women and children enslaved by Brigham Young in Salt Lake City in 1850, with many of the enslaved people dying in captivity (those numbers were not tracked, but I would assume at least two hundred were enslaved— that’s simply assuming one woman/wife and one child for every man, and the numbers could have very well been higher if any war-widows and their children were in the group, not to mention families with multiple children). This is after an unknown group of Indigenous people had been killed by Governor Brigham Young the year prior, to “permanently stop cattle theft” from settlers.

The number of Native Americans killed in Utah in the 1800s—just the number of dead counted (since women and children weren’t counted)—in massacres not tied to war (because there was at least one war) is over 130. The actual number of random murders is much higher; between the uncounted deaths and how the Governor had issued orders to “deal with” the problem of cattle theft permanently. I doubt you would have been tried or convicted if you murdered Indigenous peoples on “your” land. This is why it’s called state sanctioned genocide.

This is not counting the Black Hawk War in Utah (1865-1872), which the Ute were absolutely a part of (the wiki articles I read were contradictory if Antonga Black Hawk was Ute or Timpanogo, but the Ute were part of it). The first official massacre tied to the war—the Bear River Massacre, ordered by the US Military—places the death count of just that singular massacre at over five hundred Shoshone, including elders, women, and children. It would not be unreasonable to assume that the number of Indigenous people killed in Utah from 1850, onward, is over a thousand, perhaps two or three.

Pardon me for not reading beyond that point to list more massacres and simply ballparking a number; the source will be linked for you to get an accurate number of dead.

So how did they befriend the Native population? Let alone see them as fully human considering the racism of the time period? Natives were absolutely not seen as fully human so long as they were tied to their culture, and assimilation equalling some sliver of respect was already a stick being waved around as a threat. This lack of humanity continues to the present day.

I’m not saying friendship is impossible. I am saying the sheer levels of mistrust that would exist between random wandering groups of white/pale men and Indigenous communities wouldn’t exactly make that friendship easy. Having the scene end be a genuine friendship feels ignorant and hollow and flattening of ongoing genocide, because settlers lied about their intentions and then lined you up for slauther (that’s how the Timpanogo were killed and enslaved).

Utah had already done most of its mass killing by this point. The era of trusting them was over. There was an active open hunting season, and the acceptable targets were the Indigenous populations of Utah.

(sources for the numbers:

List of Indian Massacres in North America Black Hawk War (1865-1872))

Issue 3: “Proper housing/clothes and so forth”

Do you mean Western style settlements and jeans? If yes, congratulations you have written a reservation which means the land-ripped-away wounds are going to be fresh, painful, and sore.

You do not codify what you mean by “proper”, and proper is another one of those deeply loaded colonial words that can mean “like a white man” or “appropriate for their tribe.” For the time period, it would be the former. Without specifying which direction you’re going for, I have no idea what you’re imagining. And without the name of the media, I don’t know what the basis of this is.

The reservation history of this time period seems to maybe have some wiggle room; there were two reservations allocated for the Ute at this time, one made in 1861 and another made in 1882 (they were combined into the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation in 1886). This is all at the surface level of a google and wikipedia search, so I have no idea how many lived in the bush and how many lived on the reserve.

There were certainly land defenders trying to tell Utah the land did not belong to them, so holdouts that avoided getting rounded up were certainly possible. But these holdouts would be far, far more hostile to anyone non-Native.

The Ute seemed to be some degree of lucky in that the reserve is on some of their ancestral territory, but any loss of land that large is going to leave huge scars.

It should be noted that reserves would mean the traditional clothing and housing would likely be forbidden, because assimilation logic was in full force and absolutely vicious at this time.

It’s a large reserve, so the possibility exists they could have accidentally ended up within the borders of it. I’m not sure how hostile the state government was for rounding up all the Ute, so I don’t know if there would have been pockets of them hiding out. In present day, half of the Ute tribe lives on the reserve, but this wasn’t necessarily true historically—it could have been a much higher percentage in either direction.

It’s up to you if you want to make them be reservation-bound or not. Regardless, the above mentioned genocide would have been pretty fresh, the land theft in negotiations or already having happened, and generally, the Ute would be well on their way to every assimilation attempt made from either residential schools, missionaries, and/or the forced settlement and pre-fab homes.

To Answer Your Question

I don’t want another flattened, sanitized portrayal of genocide.

Look at the number of dead above, the amount of land lost above, the amount of executive orders above. And try to tell me that these people would be anything less than completely and totally devastated. Beyond traumatized. Beyond broken hearted. Absolutely grief stricken with almost no soul left.

Their religion would have been illegal. Their children would have been stolen. Their land was taken away. A saying about post-apocalyptic fiction is how settler-based it is, because Indigenous people have already lived through their own apocalypse.

It would have all just happened at the time period this story is set in. All of the grief you feel now at the environment changing so drastically that you aren’t sure how you’ll survive? Take that, magnify it by an exponential amount because it happened, and you have the mindset of these Native characters.

This is not a topic to tread lightly. This is not a topic to read one masterpost and treat it as a golden rule when there is too much history buried in unmarked, overfull graves of school grounds and cities and battlefields. I doubt the movie you’re using is good representation if it doesn’t even hint at the amount of trauma these Native characters would have been through in thirty years.

A single generation, and the life that they had spent millennia living was gone. Despite massive losses of life trying to fight to preserve their culture and land.

Learn some history. That’s all I can tell you. Learn it, process it, and look outside of checklists. Look outside of media.

And let us have our grief.

~ Mod Lesya

On Question Framing

Please allow me the opportunity to comment on “are there things you'd LIKE to see in a movie where a white man and a Jewish man run into Native Americans in the 1880s?” That strikes me as the same type of question as asking what color food I’d like for lunch. I don’t see how the cultural backgrounds of characters I have literally no other information about is supposed to make me want anything in particular about them. I don’t know anything about their personalities or if they have anything in common.

Compare the following questions:

“Are there things you’d like to see in a movie where two American women, one from a Nordic background and one Jewish, are interacting?” I struggle to see how our backgrounds are going to yield any further inspiration. It certainly doesn’t tell you that we’re both queer and cling to each other’s support in a scary world; it doesn’t tell you that we uplift each other through mental illness; it doesn’t go into our 30 years of endless bizarre inside jokes related to everything from mustelids to bad subtitles.

Because: “white”, “Jewish”, and “Native American” aren’t personality words. You can ask me what kind of interaction I’d like to see from a high-strung overachieving woman and a happy-go-lucky Manic Pixie Dream Girl, and I’ll tell you I’d want fluffy f/f romance. Someone else might want conflict ultimately resolving in friendship. A third person might want them slowly getting on each other’s nerves more and more until one becomes a supervillain and the other must thwart her. But the same question about a cultural demographic? That told me nothing about the people involved.

Also, the first time I meet a new person from a very different culture, it might take weeks before discussion of our specific cultural differences comes up. As a consequence, my first deep conversations with a Costa Rican American gentile friend were not about Costa Rica or my Jewishness but about things we had in common: classical music and coping with breakups--which are obviously conversations I could have had if we were both Jewish, both Costa Rican gentiles, or both something else. So in other words, I’m having trouble seeing how knowing so little about these characters is supposed to give me something to want to see on the page.

Thank you for understanding.

(And yes, I agree with Lesya, what’s with this trend of people trying to explain their fandom in a roundabout way instead of mentioning it by name? It makes it harder to give meaningful help….)

--Shira

#platypan #genocide #native american #North America #america #history #american history #media #representation #asks

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thedeadhandofseldon · 3 years

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The Anti-Mercer Effect

On the Accessibility of D&D, Why Unprepared Casters is so Fun, and Why Haley Whipjack is possibly the greatest DM of our generation.

(Apologies to my mutuals who aren’t in this fandom for the length of this, but as you all know I have never in my life shut up about anything so… we’ll call it even for the number of posts about Destiel I see every day.

To fellow UC fans - I haven’t listened to arc 4 yet, I started drafting this in early August, and I promise I will write a nice post about how great Gus the Bard is once I get the chance to listen to more of his DMing).

Structure - Or, “This is not the finale, there will be more podding cast”

So, first of all, let’s just talk about how Unprepared Casters works. Because it’s kind of unusual! Most of the other big-name D&D podcasts favor this long, grand arcs; UC has about 10 hours of podcast per each arc. And that’s a major strength in a lot of ways: it makes it really accessible to new listeners, because you can just start with the current arc and understand what’s going on!

And by starting new arcs every six or seven episodes, they can explore lots of ways to play D&D! Classic dungeon delve arc! Heist arc! Epic heroes save the world arc! Sportsball arc! They can touch on all sorts of things!

And while I’m talking about that: Dragons in Dungeons, the first arc, makes it incredibly accessible as a show - because it lets the unfamiliar listener get a sense of what D&D actually is. (It’s about telling stories and making your friends feel heroic and laugh and cry, for the record). If I had to pick a way to introduce someone to the game without actually playing it with them, that arc would definitely be it.

And I’d be remise not to note one very important thing: Haley Whipjack and Gus the Bard are just very funny, very charismatic people. Look. Episode 0s tend to be about 50%(?) those two just talking to each other about their own podcast. It shouldn’t work. And yet it DOES, its one of my favorite parts, because Haley and Gus are just cool.

And a side note that doesn’t fit anywhere else: I throw my soul at him! I throw a scone at him - that’s it, that’s the vibe. The whole podcast alternates between laughing with your friends and brooding alone in a dark tavern corner - but the laughs never forced and the dark corner is never too dark for too long.

Whipjack the Great - Or, the DM is Also a Player!

I think Haley Whipjack is one of the greatest Dungeon Masters alive. The plots and characters! The mechanical shenanigans! The descriptions!

Actually, let’s start there: with the descriptions. (Both Haley and Gus do this really fucking well). As we know, Episode 0 of each arc sees the DM reading a description - of a small town, or the Up North, or the recent history of a great party. And Haley always strikes this tricky balance - one I think a lot of us who DM struggle with - between giving too much description and worldbuilding, and not telling us anything at all. She describes people and events in just enough detail to imagine them, but never so much they seem static and unreal - just clear enough to envision, but with enough vagueness left to let your imagination begin to run wild.

While I’m thinking about arc 3’s party, let’s talk about a really bold move she made in that arc: letting the players have ongoing control of their history. Loser Lars! She didn’t try to spell out every detail of this high-level party’s history, or restrict their past to only what she decided to allow - she gave them the broad outlines, and let them embellish it. And that made for a much more alive story than any attempt to create it by herself would have - but I think it takes a lot of courage to let your players have that agency. Most Dungeon Masters (myself included) tend to struggle with being control freaks.

And the plots! Yeah, arc one is built of classic tropes - but she actually uses them, she doesn’t get caught up in subverting everything or laughing at the cliches. And it’s fun! In arc 3, there really isn’t a straight line for the players to follow, either - which makes the game much more interesting and much trickier to run. And her NPCs are fantastic and I will talk about them in the next section.

Above all, though, I think what is really impressive is how Haley balances mechanics, and rules as written, with the narrative and rule of cool - and puts both rules and story in the service of playing a fun game. And the secret to that? She’s the DM, but the DM is a player, and the DM is clearly having fun. Hope Lovejoy mechanically shouldn’t get that spellslot back, but she does, and it’s fun. The changeling merchant in Thymore doesn’t really make some Grand Artistic Narrative better, but wow is it fun. And she never tries to force it one way or the other - the story might be more dramatic if Annie didn’t manage to banish the demon from the vault, but it’s a lot cooler and a lot more fun for the players if Annie gets to be a badass instead - and the rules and the dice say that Annie managed it.

Settings feel like places, NPCs feel like people, and the narrative plot feels like a real villainous plot.

Anyway. I could go on about the various ways in which Whipjack is awesome for quite a while - she’s right, first place in D&D is when your friends laugh and super first place is when they cry - but I’m going to stop here and just. Make another post about it some other time. For now, for the record I hold her opinions about the game in higher esteem than I do several official sourcebooks; that is all.

Characters - Or, Bombyx Mori Is Not an Asshole, And That Matters

Okay, I said I would talk about characters! And I will!

Just a general place to start: the party! All of the first three parties are interesting to me, because they all care about each other. Not even necessarily in a Found Family Trope sort of way, though often that too. But they generally aren’t assholes to each other. The players create characters that actually work together, that are interesting; even when there’s internal divisions like SK-73 v. Sir Mr. Person, they aren’t just unpleasant and antagonistic all the time. Listening to the podcast, we’re “with” these people for a couple hours - and it isn’t unpleasant. That matters a lot. (To take a counter-example: I love Critical Role, but the episode when Vox Machina pranked Scanlan after he died and was resurrected wasn’t fun to listen to, it was just uncomfortable and angering and vaguely cruel).

All of the PCs are amazing, and the players in each arc did a great job. If you disagree with me about that, well, you have the right to be incorrect and I am sorry for your loss. Annie Wintersummer, for one example: tragic and sad and I want to give her a hug, but also Fuck Yeah Wintersummer, and also her familiar Charles the Owl is the cutest and funniest and I love him. And we understand what’s going on with Annie, she isn’t some infinite pool of hidden depths because this arc is 7 episodes and we don’t have time for that, but she also has enough complexity to be interesting. Same with Fey Moss: yeah, a lot of her is a silly pun about fame that carries into how she behaves, but a lot of how she behaves is also down to some good classic half-elven angst about parenthood and wanting to be known and seen and important. (Side note: if your half-elf character doesn’t have angst, well, that’s impressive and also I don’t think I believe you).

There are multiple lesbian cat-people in a 4-person party and they both have requited romantic interests who aren’t each other. This is the future liberals want and I am glad for it.

Sir Mister Person, the human fighter! Thavius, the edge lord! Even when a character is “simple,” they’re interesting, because of how they’re played as people and not action-figures. And that matters a lot.

In the same way: the NPCs. There really aren’t a lot of them! And some of them come from Patreon submissions, so uh good work gang, you’re part of the awesomeness and I’m proud of you! The point being, the NPCs work because enough of them are interesting to matter. It’s not just a servant who opens Count Michael’s door, it’s a character with a name (Oleandra!) and a personality and history. They’re interesting. Penny Lovejoy didn’t need to be interesting, the merchant outside the Laughing Mausoleum didn’t need to be interesting, but they ARE! And Haley and Gus EXCEL at making the NPCs matter, not just to the story but to us as viewers. I agree with Sir Mister Person, actually, I would die for the princesses of the kingdom. I actually care about Gem Lovejoy of all people - that wouldn’t happen in an ordinary campaign! That’s the thing that makes Unprepared Casters spectacular - and, frankly, it’s especially impressive because D&D does not tend to be good at making a lot of interesting compared to a lot of other sorts of stories.

And, just as an exemplar of all this: Bombyx Mori. Immortal, reincarnating(?), and described as the incarnation of the player’s ADHD. I expected to hate Bombyx, because as the mom friend both in and out of my friend-group’s campaigns, the chaos-causer is always exhausting to me. And yeah, Bombyx causes problems on purpose! But! She is not an asshole.

And that’s important. Bombyx goes and sits with the queen and comforts her. Bombyx gives Annie emotional support. Bombyx isn’t just a vehicle to jerk around the DM and other players; Bombyx really is a character we can care about. To compare with another case - in the first couple episodes of The Adventure Zone, the PCs are just dicks. Funny, but dicks. Bombyx holds out an arm “covered in larva” to shake with a count, and robs him of magical items, but she also cares about her friends and other people! She uses a powerful magical gem to save her fertilizer guy from death! Yeah, Bombyx is ridiculous, but she’s not just an asshole the party has to keep around for plot reasons; you can see why her party would keep her around. And one layer of meta up, she’s the perfect example of how to make a chaotic character like that while still being fun for everyone you’re playing with, which is often not the case. And I love her.

The Anti-Mercer Effect - Or, “I think we proved it can be fun, you can have a good time with your friends. And it doesn’t have to be scary, you can just work with what you know”

The Mercer Effect basically constitutes this: Matthew Mercer, Dungeon Master of Critical Role, is incredible (as are all of his players). They’re all professional story-tellers in a way, remember, and so Critical Role treats D&D like a narrative art-form, and it’s inspiring. Seeing that on Critical Role sets impossible standards - and people go into their own home games imagining that their campaigns will be like Critical Role, and the burden of that expectation tends to fall disproportionately on the DM. And the end result, I think, of the Mercer Effect is that we get discouraged or intimidated, because our game isn’t “as good as” theirs. (And I should note - Matt certainly doesn’t want that to be our reaction).

So the Anti-Mercer Effect is two things: it’s D&D treated like a game, and it’s inspiring but not intimidating. And Unprepared Casters manages both of those really freaking well. Because they play it like a game! A UC arc looks just like a good campaign in anyone’s home game. They have the vibes of 20-somethings and college students playing D&D for fun because that’s who they are (as a 20-something college student who plays a lot of D&D, watching it felt like watching my friends play an especially good campaign). They’re trying to tell a good story, sure, and they always do. But first and foremost, they’re trying to have fun, and it shows, and I love the UC cast for it.

And that’s the other half of it: it’s inspiring! It’s approachable; you can see that Haley and Gus put plenty of work into preparing the game but it also doesn’t make you feel like you need hundreds of pages of worldbuilding to run a game. Sometimes a cleric makes Haley cry and she gives them back a spell-slot from their deity! That’s fantastic! It’s just inspiring - listening to this over the summer, when my last campaign had fallen apart under the strain of graduation, is why I decided to plan and run my new one!

That quote from Haley Whipjack that I used as the title for this section? That’s the whole core of this idea, and really, I think, the core of the podcast.

The Mercer Effect is when you go “that’s really cool, I could never do that.” But Unprepared Casters makes you look at D&D and go “wow, that looks really fun. I bet I can do that!” And I love the show for it.

And I bet a lot of you do too.

#unprepared casters #bombyx mori #haley whipjack #long post #this is really rough but I don't have time to keep working on it and it's already a month later than intended

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mydaylight · 2 years

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Just watched Death on the Nile. The more I mull over the whole movie on my head the more I am left with an overall disappointment over the choices they made - adaptation wise. (since I read the book a year ago and it’s still relatively fresh in my head, I can’t avoid the comparison)

(spoilers for both book and film ahead)

I was really hopeful about the casting of Emma Mackie as Jacqueline de Bellefort (who was my favourite from the book) and I still stand by my first impression that I like her as Jackie. I like how they emphasized how emotional (and hot-headed) she seemed in the beginning, since this is subverted at the end of the book when she’s revealed to have been the mastermind behind the plan to murder Linnet. She had a lot of red dresses too, which I thought was a nice touch as she was mentioned to wear red at one point in the book (and it’s suited to her passion). However, I don’t think Emma Mackie really gets to shine as Jacqueline, since the character receives far less attention that she ought to have had. Jacqueline is supposed to be the most important character in the novel (besides Poirot obviously). The book opens with Poirot witnessing a scene between Jackie and Simon, and making a remark on Jackie’s love and investment in their relationship, which is again referenced at the ending when Poirot talks privately to her after he figured out their scheme. This final scene between them is absent from the film, despite being very important to the profiling of Jacqueline’s character. She really should have been a bigger presence.

They clearly also rewrote Linnet’s character. They did a good job of showing how glamorous and charming Linnet was, but they missed her haughtiness and the entitlement that came with the enormous amount of money she had. In the book Linnet is very ruffled when Poirot criticizes her and points out that she deliberate attempted to separate Jackie and Simon, precisely because she’s used to always getting her way and she’s irritated that Poirot isn’t impressed by her.

The rest of characters I think have a similar issue to Jackie, in that we don’t spend nearly enough time with them in order to really get to know them and empathize with them (with the exception of Salome Otterbourne and Rosalie). Some of the scenes where everybody is introduced or where Poirot interrogates them are very fast paced and I kept mixing up Bouc’s mother with Linnet’s godmother well into the course of the film. I honestly wouldn’t have a problem with the fact they also added a new backstory for Poirot (needless as it is) if I didn’t feel it diverted from the rest of characters.

I also didn’t like that they changed Rosalie and Tim’s (replaced by Bouc in the film) happy ending. I get they wanted a reason to have Poirot have an personal emotional investment in the case, but Rosalie and Tim being in love and embracing a new life with the encouragement of his mother was supposed to add a hopeful feeling to the ending of the novel.

They did try to make the cinematography impressive, and some of the shots are very aesthetically pleasing but..I don’t know; they’re just something about the repetition of all those shots that drains my enthusiasm. It seemed forced somehow. At a specific point they also had a lot of jump scares close to each other (first a snake almost attacking Linnet, then Linnet being scared by Simon uncorking a bottle, followed by a shot of a crocodile attacking some birds). The whole effect of the movie, (even completely divorced of the book) was unimpressive. Or maybe it was the soundtrack, which was very monotonous. I think they wanted to make the whole film feel ominous; but they overdid it in my opinion. I just didn’t get the sort of thrill you expect from a Poirot adaptation, not even at Poirot’s denouncement scene (which at least was better on Murder on the Orient Express).

The new backstory the added for Poirot didn’t really bother me since I was mostly indifferent to it. Obviously book!Poirot would have never have shaved his moustaches but I wouldn’t have minded it if the rest of the movie was good and there was enough time for all the characters.

#death on the nile #sorry that I hadn't a lot of positive stuff to say #there are other stuff I didn't like that keep coming to my head but let's not make it too salty #I am still making gifs of jacqueline when I can find some place to download it #I might delete this later but I needed to get all these stuff out of my chest

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of-house-atreides · 3 years

Text

This article is breaking my brain

Have you read this article ?

TW: mentions of suicide and also I’m an angry petty bitch

Yes I know this article is from like three weeks ago but I just found it... and I have things to say.

I swear I can’t handle this anymore...

“But today, Loki steps out of his brother’s shadow”... to step in another one. It be the TVA or Sylvie, just... take your pick.

“resuming his role as the God of Mischief” um where? when?

The comedy part is debatable but fine, whatever... I must have missed the noir crime-thriller bit maybe it was between two scenes of Loki getting his ass kicked by literally everyone in this show.

Yeah you forgot that end-credit scene showing Loki alive and well in IW/Endgame.

And no, alternate/variant Loki doesn’t count, he’s not the same person/character.

Because of course when you think of Loki you instantly think his story should take place in a “bureaucratic nightmare” -

And why not hire competent experienced people for Multiverse of Madness and Loki? Is this Marvel’s way of telling us they don’t really care about these projects?

Kevin really said “no experienced writers on this project, let’s just hire whoever” - or maybe it’s a budget thing? Less experience means less zeros on the pay checks?

Wow, ok.

So not a fan of the movies nor a fan of the character, just a fan of the genre, that explains a lot...

“what was really important to me was stripping away all the fantastical elements” ... ?? I’m sorry?? What?? So removing all the fantastical elements from a show titled after who is supposed to be the main character who is a GOD and a prince from another realm/planet was what was important?? The Trickster God of Mischief, magic wielder, master of illusions NEEDED to be stripped from his FANTASTICAL ELEMENTS???

ffs

“find the heart of this story” - is the heart of this story Loki becoming best friends with his (mental and physical) torturer after what? 2 days? Was it falling in love with the ‘superior’ version of himself after only 13 hours together? I’m still looking for the heart of this story.

“what is the relatable message at the center?” - well apparently it’s ‘you can be a God and a warrior with magical powers but still get your ass kicked by literally everyone all the time and never use your strength and skills to fight back’. Or it’s the power of love, idk -

Oh wait, is it falling in love with the female version of himself? For a weird ‘love yourself’ metaphor? That must be it.

Or maybe it’s jet skis.

Ah yes, the ‘you can be good, actually’ message of this series that is so subtly presented to us...

They really missed the whole fucking point of Loki.

They missed it so bad they made him call himself a narcissist (which he isn’t btw).

For the record, Loki is a prince of Asgard who learnt one day he was adopted and in fact taken from one of Asgard’s worst enemies, the King of the Jotuns, aka Frost Giants “the monsters parents tell their children about at night”. He found out he was not only adopted but also abducted and not out of love. He feels not only betrayed but he thinks he understands now why Odin always favoured Thor and why he’d never have the same love from Odin that Thor has had his whole life. He thinks of himself as a monster and wants to be worthy of Odin’s love. So he tries to get it. And sure, he doesn’t do it in the best way, and yes, he is the villain of that story. But Loki isn’t a villain. He doesn’t like to make people suffer, he did it out of pain, out of hurt. The events in Avengers was after he was thoroughly tortured and coerced by Thanos to invade Earth. There is even a moment in the end when Thor asks him if he thinks this ‘madness would stop under his rule’ (or something along those lines) and he looks unsure and regretful. But due to the fear of Thanos and insecurity about himself (love is weakness or whatever) he keeps going. He redeems himself in Dark World, again in Ragnarok and yet again in IW and he was thrown in the trash for it.

Yes, Loki’s story is complex, but it really isn’t that complex... So maybe Loki is a “scared little boy” but his way of acting out makes sense and there’s a legitimate reason for it that was not explored in the show. And his backstory is probably what she called the “bells and the whistles”...

“we literally delete his universe” - and apparently you deleted his personality too

“it’s a story of reinvention ... can Loki find goodness in himself?” - again, you’re missing the point. Loki is insecure, but not about his ability to do what’s right, but about whether or not he is worthy of love! Finding goodness within himself comes AFTER!

“Loki’s journey, to me, is really about acceptance of himself” - several questions here, um, first, what about himself does he need to accept? That he’s a Jotun? The show never mentions it. That he’s done bad shit and should forgive himself for it? Give him a reason to. Self-love doesn’t come after being mentally and physically tortured by some guy who acts like he’s your best friend after 2 days of working together and being yelled out that “he can be anyone he wants, even something good”.

Show, don’t tell, isn’t that the point of your job?? The job you begged for??

Loki’s journey should have been about self-love and no, falling in love with the female version of yourself (who keeps saying they have nothing in common (because they don’t!)) doesn’t count!

“a more mature and darker path” ...

well this is interesting... was making Loki a clown and the butt of every joke part of making the show mature and dark? Were the terrible attempts at humour? Him being beaten up every two seconds? Having him say lines he’d never say in a million years just to be funny but since it’s out of character for him it fails completely? Was making him incompetent and a complete idiot part of that attempt of making the show mature and dark?

Is that why there’s no magic? You cut off the magician so your show would be more “mature and dark”?

Having him cry every episode doesn’t make your show mature and dark.

Loki from Thor, Avengers, the Dark World and even IW is mature and dark. Your Loki from your series is just a pathetic clown.

“don’t give viewers the story they are expecting” - I personally wasn’t expecting any story, I just wanted Loki, you know, in this Loki series, supposedly all about Loki, and you guys couldn’t even do that.

So this is the author of the article speaking here, I’m guessing, and I think they’re giving a summary of the show so far, so let’s break this down:

“This is Loki as we’ve never seen him before” - I 100% agree -

“Stripped of his self-proclaimed majesty” - ok, first of all, Loki is a prince, that’s a fact, he didn’t make that up, and for the few years he was King of Asgard disguised as Odin, he seemingly did a great job, so...

“but with his ego still intact” - ah, yes, his ego, you know, because he’s such a narcissist... oh wait -

yes he has an ego, but he has a regal one, not misplaced entirely either - his ego in the show is basically him underestimating the TVA and Mobius (as well as the Time Keepers) - his ego is him getting offended by the variant: the ‘superior Loki’ - his ego in the show is used as a weapon to humiliate and belittle him.

“he faces consequences he never thought could happen to such a supreme being as himself” - he literally tried to k*ll himself in the first Thor - literally a result of his own actions - when he returned to Asgard in Dark World, he didn’t try to pretend he hadn’t fucked up. He didn’t try to hide what he had done (he tries to deny to Mobius in episode 2 that he was manipulating them at the fair) - he sacrifices himself in IW... but sure, Loki from the series is indeed surprised that he is powerless (even when he doesn’t need to/shouldn’t be)

“there is a lot of humour ... he is taken down a few pegs by the TVA” ... he is humiliated by the TVA - definitely not what we were expecting, I’ll give you that.

“sentenced to a lifetime of bureaucracy” - definitely did not expect that either

and here comes my favorite quote: “it’s a sad Loki without any mischief”

yes - yes - yes

that is a good summary of this goddamn show, a sad, pathetic, powerless Loki without any personality

“fallen God” - yeah that’s definitely not what I was expecting either from the Loki series so good job on subverting expectations I guess...

“who is going to win out in this match between them?”

there is no match - Loki is powerless - he’s been turned into a pathetic docile harmless wet dog - Mobius literally mentally (episode 1 and 4) and physically (episode 4) tortures him, both time in an attempt to have Loki do his bidding - Loki is the dog and Mobius is the master - even when Loki ‘tries’ to manipulate him it fails because he’s underestimating them (by overestimating himself) - he uses obvious techniques to manipulate the TVA (episode 2) and nobody buys it because it’s not subtle at all! Loki is smarter than that, he is a TRICKSTER GOD FFS!

“there is an interesting dynamic between them that maybe you haven’t seen with Loki in the Marvel movies” - yeah, maybe there’s a reason for that... like... he wouldn’t... submit so easily... he’d be wary, cautious, cunning... he’d be... himself...

Sans déconner ?

It’s like whoever wrote the series didn’t actually know shit about Loki... like that wasn’t fucking obvious...

And those lectures were apparently done after the script was written so... again, no surprise there... we can see that

Well...

“we wanted the show to be imbued with mischief” vs “sad Loki without any mischief” choose your fighter

“Loki has this very sensitive, damaged, broken heart with an enormous capacity to feel emotion on the biggest scale.”

Are surprised that only Tom so far has portrayed and talked about Loki accurately?

“loneliness, sadness, anger and grief and loss”

I love this man.

I do wonder what Mr. Branagh thinks of the show...

I’m of the people who see a vulnerability beneath those layers of charm and playfulness. I love Loki because he’s smart and cunning and regal, and elegant and sophisticated. I love him cause at the end of the day, he just wants to be loved, and he deserves to be loved.

And in the end, the only Loki I can’t stand is the one from the series.

#loki negativity #Loki #loki series #review #anti Loki

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aussie-tea · 2 years

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Who was your favourite Eternal

This is such a hard question! So I'm going to rank them, if that's ok?

1. Makkari

Even though she was the last Eternal that they found, she brightened up the screen and stole my heart. At first, I was worried about the extend of her power being too powerful, but it worked into the movie perfectly!

I loved it how even though, out of the group fighting for humanity at the end, she had spent less time with humans. Sersi obviously has always been close with humanity, and loved them deeply, Phastos had his family to worry about, and one of the first things we learned about Druig was how much he hated to see humans hurt.

Even though Makkari wasn't as close to humans as they were, she was still very emotional at the thought of their extinction, and ultimately chose to defend them against Ikarus.

I adored her relationship with Druig! Lauren and Barry did an amazing job of showing such strong chemistry in such a short time.

Overall, she has a good heart, cool powers, was wonderfully portrayed, and had strong connections with fellow characters.

2. Druig and Sersi

I seriously can't choose between these two, so they've tied.

Sersi. Gemma Chan. Just... Gemma Chan. She's incredible every time she hops on screen. And Sersi's character is something completely new on-screen for a heroine. She's soft, and gentle. She's not motivated by anything other than her love for humanity. And whilst she seems to doubt her abilities a lot, she never seems to doubt her morals, which I love.

Druig was such a great character! I went for being sort of unsure about which way he was going to go after his decision to control the humans at the start.

That's another thing I loved about Eternals. There are so many different ethical points of view. There are those like Sersi and Phastos, who will do whatever they can to protect humanity, but they won't take away their free will. Then there are people like Druig, who seem to be physically unable to watch humanity hurt each other.

This is strange for a person who seems to dislike interacting with people, but it also makes sense considering how hard it must be for him to watch all the awful things humans do to each other, knowing that he could stop it.

Also, that rock smack was the best thing in the world.

4. Phastos

Now that I think about it, I actually appreciated Phastos' relationship to humanity more so than Sersei's. Whilst Sersi seems to love humans as a species, Phastos' relationship is more personal. Despite "giving up on humans a long time ago", he's the only one who has married and actually raised a family with them.

His power is amazing, and you can truly see how this has influenced his perception of humanity. Similar to Druig, Phastos is tempted to use his powers to help humanity in a way that isn't allowed by Arishem.

Also, that Hiroshima scene really touched me, probably because I have a similar view of nuclear weapons that Phastos does.

5. Gilgamesh

Just... everyone deserves a friend like Gilgamesh. I'm actually a bit conflicted about putting both him and Thena in this list because, in a way, they seem to be part of a separate story altogether. And I love them both so much, I hate that they're so far down on this list.

He actually has one of my favourite lines (even though it's actually spoken by Thena) that I think really sums up what this whole film was about.

"When you love something, you protect it. It's the most natural thing in the world."

This quote is just the purest, simplest, yet deep, thing I've ever heard. And it's exactly what Sersi needed to hear. The main argument against stopping the Emergence was that they were going against the natural order. This view from Gilgamesh completely invalidates that view because their desire to protect the world was natural.

6. Thena

I loved how much this character subverted my expectations. She was uncharacteristically soft and doubtful of herself for a fierce warrior princess figure. And I like that it really goes to show that anyone can fall victim to low self-esteem and even mental health issues.

7. Kingo

I don't know what to say. I liked him, I thought he was very funny. He didn't blow me away. I wasn't a fan of the way he bailed in the end. But I guess it does make sense with his character. He seemed to be the one who shifted back into the team so well that, for him, it seemed like no time had passed.

I guess he was the one who really relied on his family (the Eternals) and couldn't bear to see them fight. His closeness with his family is also shown through his love of movies, inspired by Sprite's stories. And him 'adopting' Sprite after she became human.

8. Ajak

Don't shoot! Look, I liked her. Maybe she's so far down on this list because of the lack of screen time. I appreciated her change of heart.

9. Sprite

*sigh* Sprite, Sprite, Sprite. What sucks is if she hadn't betrayed them in the end, she probably would've been in my top three.

I adored her powers, her sob story, but it wasn't sob enough to justify her actions at the end in my eyes. Go to school, Sprite. Learn something, Sprite.

10. Ikarus

He can choke. I goddamn trusted him. His name was a fucking warning to us and we ignored it.

#teas asks #eternals

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tellthemeerkatsitsfine · 1 year

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Watching Daniel Sloss’ first stand-up DVD show for the first time, from 2012. He was quite young to get two Netflix specials in 2018; so in 2012 he was basically a child. Actually he was twenty-two, talking about how he’d been doing comedy since seventeen, and weirdly doing a couple of jokes about that that are very similar to one my brother did when he first started stand-up, at the age of sixteen.

My brother was once a sixteen-year-old comedian doing jokes about how it’s weird because most comedians talk about drinking, smoking, and gambling, but if he talks about that, he’s confessing to illegal activity. While Daniel Sloss, at age twenty-two, informed us that most male comedians brag about sleeping with women half their age, but when he started at seventeen, he couldn’t do that. So… apologies to my brother, but Daniel Sloss probably did the better job of achieving every teenage comedian’s goal, which is to have their whole act revolve around saying edgy things to subvert people’s expectations of youthful innocence. I wonder how many teenage comedians out there have done variations on that joke (for the record, my brother is now almost 30 and would be upset to know I remember his original material, but I have a recording of his first-ever performance and can use it if I ever wish to blackmail him about anything).

So far in the Daniel Sloss DVD, I have also learned that he auditioned for The Hobbit, which apparently just every person in England did. Actually I guess it’s just Jon Richardson and Josh Widdicombe who talk about how they auditioned for that movie and didn’t get the part, but they talk about it a lot, enough so it feels like something that was everywhere. I mean, the original Lord of the Rings movies were known to have cast every resident of New Zealand, so apparently all the agents in England assumed The Hobbit would work the same way and got their clients to audition.

The other thing that’s happened in this DVD show so far is he’s discussed his birthday, which I’m pleased about just because I know what it is from Wikipedia but had never heard him mention it on stage or on TV before. He was born about six weeks before me, as I was October 1990 and he was September (a fact that’s stuck in my mind because it makes me feel young that the comedian who’s known for having achieved a lot despite being so young is technically older than me, even though he doesn’t really qualify as all that young anymore), but specifically he was September 11, meaning he must have had a hell of an eleventh birthday, possibly adding to his understanding that comedy and tragedy go together. Watching his later shows, in which he discussed various aspects of himself and his life, it always seemed weird to me that he didn’t mention the 9/11 birthday, as that’s the sort of thing most comedians will want to discuss. But I figured it was so obvious that he must have done material about that before, probably often enough so he was done with it by 2018. Basically, it turns out I was right, as he has a little routine about it on this DVD.

Those are some thoughts I have partway into this show. It’s not the best comedy I’ve ever heard, but some of it’s been funny. If I watch the show made by someone who’s now a very good comedian, back when they were only twenty-two, I’m not watching to see the best jokes I’ve ever seen. I’m watching to say, “Oh, look at the small child with floppy hair.” And it’s definitely delivering on opportunities for that. It has also occasionally made me laugh.

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superborb · 3 years

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Imperial Coroner

tl;dr An extremely well executed mystery period drama, with an excellent main cast.

Instead of a premise ("mystery period drama" actually covers it pretty well), I'll start by introducing you to the main four characters.

From right to left: Xiao Jinyu: Prince Goldfish!! (His name is a homonym and early on, Chu Chu mishears his name that way. C-fandom also refers to him as little goldfish.) He is charged with investigating cases and is an excellent detective. Used to getting his own way, but upright and fair.

Chu Chu: Grew up in a family of coroners and has gone to Chang'an to try and become an official coroner. Her knowledge about corpses is vast, but she's occasionally naive. Practical and meticulous, she's set her sights on helping others with her skills as a coroner.

Leng Yue: A doctor and skilled martial artist, she is straightforward and direct. She grew up with both XJY and JY, but her grandfather is outside Chang'an as the military commander of an army.

Jing Yi: A little bit silly, JY often adds a touch of humor to a situation. He and XJY are best friends and often investigate cases together; they don't need to talk to communicate at all! He acts well, and has a silver tongue.

(It perfectly fits a sedoretu. I'm just saying, each romantic pairing of the sedoretu works.)

Where this show really shines is in the internal logic and intelligence of the characters. People don't do stupid things! If they do fall short, there is usually a good reason! Bad guys are (mostly) smart, it's just that our main characters are better. The show will also often seemingly miss an obvious clue-- only to circle back around to it, rewarding paying attention.

The plot is fast and mostly well paced, though the ending is somewhat rushed. I definitely needed the watch party to remind me when the Big Bad was introduced because I completely forgot hahaha, but it's not too difficult to follow. They do fall into an over-explaining trap to make sure you get what happened and end up repeating it a couple times.

That does lead into my biggest (slightly unfair) annoyance though: despite subverting some expectations, it fully falls into the murder mystery + imperial power genre niche. Bad Guys Bad, Emperor Good (even when the emperor doesn't really do anything either way), Everything Fixed Through Investigation, that sort of thing. No questioning of the system, the police state is fine because these upright gentlemen are at the head of it, doing some casual (bloodless) torture and interrogation... But at the same time, that is the genre, expecting more is a bit unreasonable.

My other complaint is that because of XJY's detective skills and JY's ability to follow XJY's thoughts, it ends in the girls needing the explanation more often than I'm happy with. As is genre-typical, explanations of the forensics and such are needed, of course, but it was an annoying trend when they otherwise did a good job of balancing the main characters.

Since I do talk about it a lot, there is a bit of second hand embarrassment in the first ep, but after that, not really. I only remember because it's in the start of my livetweet thread haha. I livetweeted the whole thing under the #imperialborb tag [https://twitter.com/superborb/status/1393711482664271872]! A first for me!

OK Let me end on some more praise! For a young, relatively unknown cast, the acting is quite good; XJY is a bit stiff, but that works for the character. They also had a small budget and did a lot with it: costumes are decent, no terrible CGI. Though there was a hilarious fight-from-the-POV-of-a-sword GoPro moment. Mildly terrible wigs, but what can you do.

Finally, there is an end credit scene at the very end of the show; don't miss it!

#imperial coroner #cdrama

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jq37 · 3 years

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Maybe I'm also being animal racist, but a current guess I have for oMaM is that the rabbit Sly saw at the docks was actually the newspaper photographer who seems to be spending a lot of energy documenting Sly's movements at this party, and the bad lighting/state of intoxicated introspection led Syl to make a wrong assumption. (Also did you ever watch Hoodwinked? Spoilers: the reporter bunny did it)

lol hey guys. So I've been fairly MIA the past couple of weeks due to my job trying to actively murder me but I wanted to pop in for a hot second to talk about where we are theory-wise at this point in the season.

First of all, to address the actual ask, I feel like Brennan must have known Longfoot would be suspicious due to ~animal racism~ and put him in as a red herring and now we have even more info to back that up.

I suspect that what's going on with the stuff in the manor is a version of the Pepper's ghost illusion which involves mirrors to do ghostly projections and look pretty darn good for an effect that was invented hundreds of years ago. If you've ever ridden Haunted Mansion at Disney, that's the effect they use to do the waltzing ghosts (fun fact, because the effect mirrors the objects it's used on and the Imagineers forgot to take that into account, all of the female ghosts are leading in the dance!) But that's just fluff, let's talk plot.

So last week's ep threw a LOT of suspicion on Sly with him literally being painted at the villain and Grant doing absolutely nothing to defend himself. And, I'll admit, it would be pretty delicious to not only have Sly foreshadow it earlier with his coy, "Why yes, it also could have been me," and also that Grant himself would have [REDACTED] Rekha a SECOND TIME (watch the Murder Mystery ep of Game Changers if you don't know what I mean--it's my fave ep). But I talked it over with my watch buddy @camwritery and I don't think Sly is actually a baddie. I think this is a double double cross (Lol a cross from Mr. Cross). Here's my thought process.

(1) Yes there's that stack of letters Daisy found in Sly's hand but those easily could have been forged. I'd like Buck to take a look at those since he has that rogue handwriting checking ability.

(2) Squire Badger specially said something was coming to F Sly up and Sly could tell he wasn't the mastermind. Fletcher would make the most sense as to who the mastermind actually is. Like, it wouldn't be so much a twist to the audience but it would be a big ass twist to the CHARACTERS who thought he was fully dead (for the most part) and I feel like that matters more than "subverting expectations" or whatever. It's possible we find out it's actually another party guest I guess (or more likely, that some number of them are involved as accomplices) but Brennan said last week we've met all the characters and it's too late to introduce a new person at this point. And Fletcher is such a through line in Sly and Daisy's stories, it would be weird to not go for the payoff.

(3) So Fletcher is alive. We know this. What would a dead but not dead criminal mastermind want? To ruin his arch nemesis, obv. So, how do you do that? Maybe you fake the death of some mouse to create an unsolvable murder to drive him crazy? And then maybe you work with the person who the fake murder pissed off (because of Sly's inability to "solve" it) to ruin Sly because that guy hates Sly now? And maybe you involve some element of faking deaths in your plan because a faked death is what was central to the original plot that made Sly's reputation and ruined your family? That's so convoluted but this is a guy who handcuffed himself to his enemy and jumped off a waterfall. He's clearly a drama queen and he has nothing but time.

(4) I think Sly has figured this out to some degree and he's decided that letting himself get captured is the best option for him at the moment. Like, he didn't protest at all. Which, yes, checks out to his laidback, posh casual persona but I think he knows that if anything happens to anyone while he's locked up then it casts suspicion on someone besides him or it means the "murders" have to stop because no one will kill anyone while he's not active as a possible suspect due to literally not being able to murder anyone. Speaking of--

(5) Yeah, I don't believe these are murders. All those dead bodies from the list? Badgers, corvids, horned animals. That's the badger fam and their spouses. And the one guy we "knew" was dead also doesn't seem to be dead (which Brennan seeded from the start with Conor's widow hearing his voice which seems possible if she lives so close and he was alive this whole time). I guess framing Sly for a full family murder or something was the plan? But that doesn't quite check out because presumably they'd un-die at some point and I feel like they wouldn't want to live under assumed identities in animal Bavaria or something. I know news doesn't travel fast w/o the internet but they're prominent people. News would spread I assume. Maybe the death faking was to make Sly believe he was crazy? Or to believe in ghosts? Messing with a genius's mind is I'm sure one of the worst things you can do. There's also Buck's Frankenstein theory which is a little out there but they were trying crazy stuff with electricity and dead bodies back in the day. Kind of a wild pull but cam sent me this about a Dr. Squires from the same-ish time period shocking someone back to life. It would be wild and now we have some alt explanations for the electricity but gotta explore all options. And this would Constance to call her dad a madman, lol.

(6) Grant/Sly has a lot more info than us with all those maddening redacted texts so it's very likely he has some long game happening we know nothing about. I wondered if he might have known about Fletcher for a while--when Daisy revealed he was alive he was surprised but I don't remember if he was surprised that he was alive or if it was ambiguous and it might just be that he didn't tell her. I assumed he didn't know at all (because I feel like that's what Brennan narrated in episode 1) but I need to go back and check.

(7) At the end of the day, D20 is a show that rewards love and friendship over betrayal and the like. This very much could be the first season with a real betrayal but I'm kinda skeptical. Sly could just be a big faker but he seems genuine to me. Also, what would his motive even be here? This doesn't seem like his style and I don't know why he'd do this.

(8) Lars failed their check on purpose and Ian saw full puppydog earnestness. Sly if you've been a bad guy this whole time and Lars didn't know, bitch I'll kill you

(9) Not really on topic but I want to note, Daisy's find of that second trick portrait makes me thing my theory was correct and there's a third somewhere. I wonder where.

(10) Even less on topic but the "Show Her Your Butt 2: Electric Boogaloo" sequence last week made me spit soda everywhere and I think that should be acknowledged.

#mice and murder #mice and murder spoilers #dimension 20 #dimension 20 spoilers #d20 #asks #madamxpresident

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