#maybe a big movie with him in it as like a plucky side character comes out | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

usedtobeguest123 · 2 years

Text

Encantober - Transformation

Hello, can I talk your ear off about the music in Encanto, specifically Bruno's instrumental themes????? What if I promise to give you some unsolicited character writing tips on the side....😁

So was on the struggle bus with my current WIP that focuses on Bruno, and wanted to reconnect with the characters in order to better ground my depictions of them. Rather than watch the movie (again), I decided to listen to the instrumental versions of Lin-Manuel's songs as well as Germaine Franco's amazing score, and wrote a little way longer than planned analysis to condense my thoughts.

I'm nerding out a bit about it all (okay, I'm nerding out a lot…), so I wanted to post it for my fellow Encanto lovers to nerd out with me. Today's Encantober theme is transformation, so thought it was a fitting day to post it :)

A rough musical analysis by a very non-musical music lover below the cut 😊

1) Songs: WDTAB/All of You

To recognize Bruno's main instrumental theme, it helps to start with the instrumental version of All of You. It's easy to pick out here, as it plays in the part where he is singing (and in one other place…more on that later). Listen in at 1:08. This is when Camilo would be singing "So, we're gonna talk about Bruno?"---and leads right into when Bruno sings for himself. His theme is a sort of boom dih dih dih boom dih dih dih boom dih…dih…dih (yes, those are the technical terms), a strong base hit interspersed with plucky-piano.

What I love about this theme is how it mimics the movements of the character, and defines how he interacts with and perceives his environment.

Bruno often moves with big jerky movements sandwiched by small fidgets—hesitation, explosion, hesitation/doubt, explosion, very rat like. When a rat moves, it evaluates the environment, moves, pauses and sniffs some more, moves again. The tip-toe of the piano gives the feel of creeping or gingerly stepping, while the boom recreates the jerk into action, the push to make a big move, framed by caution.

This says a lot about Bruno's perception of the world. He's grown to be wary of his environment, like a rat sensing out danger. If he's gonna move, better make it quick (maybe before he talks himself out of it!), and then pause again to re-evaluate if it's safe to keep going. He avoids detection, tip-toes, sneaks from cover to cover—you can almost see him moving when you listen, shoulders hunched, hood drawn. Bruno is wary of being seen, as being seen has meant danger to him in one way or another. Many fans have interpreted what this danger looked like in many different ways (from social ostracization to actual physical danger), but at the very least we can identify a high level of learned social anxiety that forces him to proceed with caution and keep a low profile when interacting with others (more on that later). Bruno has learned to tread carefully because of how others have perceived him, through the lens of his gift.

Of course, once he's in the walls, fear of being seen takes on a whole new meaning. Discovery at that point would mean the consequences of discovery of the vision as well, and discovery of his shame—he never left/couldn't leave, and has been reduced to a rat in the walls of his own home.

When Camilo is singing, we hear a different feature associated with Bruno—the whine of a synth keyboard (I think?). It gives me major theremin vibes, and the song draws on that classic horror sound to drive home a "villain," seven-foot-frame image of Bruno, as portrayed by Camilo—-and, more importantly, as seen by the townspeople.

Let's backup to WDTAB. If you listen to that instrumental version, you can hear that the synth sound picks up right away (on the line "Bruno walks in with a mischievous grin," no less!). It comes in and out, and even picks up a more complex melodic pattern here. It's the townspeople's fear—but it's not a horrific dread sound; it's actually a bit playful. Now, part of this is because it's a Disney bop, but I like to think that this also points to the nature of rumors—we get enjoyment from spreading them, and the Encanto-folk are clearly eager to dish. Listen to how creepy this guy was! Ooooo doesn't it give you the shivers?! It's like a fun ghost story around the campfire. This juicy piece of gossip is a favorite to share.

BUT Bruno's actual theme—the one we hear when he actually speaks in All of You—doesn't appear until 1:33 of WDTAB. It's when the townspeople are sharing their grievances that we really hear his tip-toe, like he's tip-toeing through the minefield of their complaints. Now we can see the shapes he's learned to step around—you can almost see him weaving through their disgruntled narratives in the song. The music shows that here is where that learned social anxiety was formed.

Note that the theremin synth drops away when Isabela and Dolores sing their parts in WDTAB. When Isa sings hers, the plucked rhythm of the strings mirrors Bruno's plucked string style in his theme, though the melody changes. I think this speaks again to careful footing—they both share anxiety at being found out, being truly seen, and live life having to tiptoe their way through social interactions. Where as Bruno's plucked strings are jerky, Isa's are more graceful. When Dolores picks up, the plucked strings are replaced with a symphonic strings in a very romantic princess-esk style of longing.

To tie things up, let's pull forward again to All of You. In this song, notice the theremin-synth sound also drops away as soon as Bruno speaks, and we don't hear it again. We are left with the real Bruno—meek, anxious, and full of nervous energy, the antithesis of scary. The theremin really only appears in Camilo's part, highlighting again the one character in the song who was really only there for the novelty of the rumor and the story telling opportunity, and had no memory of the real guy. THAT'S Bruno???

In the end of Bruno's part in All of You, the melody overtakes his theme, symbolizing his unconditional acceptance by his mother and sisters and his reintegration into the family.

Also, let's not forget the nod to Let It Go! It's perhaps just an easter egg, but character-wise, I like to think it's also testament to his use of quirky meta-humor to deflect and avoid uncomfortable vulnerability. Does everyone in the room always get his jokes? Nope! But he can still disappear in the confusion!

Character Takeaways, for writing reference:

When uncomfortable, Bruno often moves and speaks in quick, nervous bursts, interspersed with small fidgety movements.

Nervous energy reigns supreme. Bruno hides behind quirky, lighthearted, sometimes meta humor as a way to deflect and avoid being seen/made vulnerable.

Bruno has learned to literally and figuratively tiptoe around the townspeople, and eventually, around his own family. Post-movie/All of You Bruno is unlearning/releasing this social anxiety around his family through the experience of (unexpected) unconditional acceptance

Isabela shares a similar underlying social anxiety to Bruno, though it manifests differently. They both have experienced having to tread carefully around other's expectations

Camilo is full of it. 😆 He feeds off of the environment to parody it, finding his drive in giving the people what they want to see—much like his gift. This can be a boon and a detriment to his character.

Knowing/hearing the real Bruno dispels the rumors that evolved in his absence

2) Instrumentals: The Rat's Lair, Tío Bruno, and It Was Me

I'm sure there is a lot more to say about these three pieces, but my main takeaway comes from the contrast between plucked strings/knocking percussion and wind instruments/bowed strings in Bruno's pieces, and how they reveal his layered character and his developmental arch.

In The Rat's Lair, we get Mirabel's (and our) first real impression of Bruno. Whereas the chase scene leading up to this piece is full of cacophonous, screechy strings (Chasing the Past), this piece has replaced those fearful sounds with plucked strings. We again get that image of tiptoeing, and it's playful. His room is full of mischievous rats, he's nervous and jumpy, and Mirabel is just trying to figure out what the heck is going on. We get a nice contrast between the expected Bruno (scary) and the real Bruno (quirky, but sweet and harmless). Also present are a bunch of percussive knocks, a nod to his superstitious/compulsive knocking.

Contrast this with Tío Bruno. This piece plays when Mirabel first peeks through the crack to the dining room, finally getting a look at the real tragedy of Bruno's situation. Tío Bruno has the main Encanto theme throughout (we also hear it when the Encanto is being created at the beginning of the movie). It's a nod to the miracle, but it's mournful here, with parts in a minor key. The miracle has had tragic consequences for Bruno. Tío Bruno is full of woodwind instruments and bowed strings (as opposed to plucked). Rather than nervous tiptoeing, we get raw emotion, frequently underlined by a sustained guitar tremolo (??) that speaks to the familial tension driving it all. Tío Bruno plays when Mirabel gets past all the nervous deflection and connects with Bruno in a meaningful and vulnerable way. Under it all, Bruno is deeply sad, carrying the dismay of a miraculous gift gone awry and the tragic consequences of his last vision.

Finally, we have It Was Me, which acts as a redemptive contrast to Tío Bruno. In this piece, the plucked strings return (he's nervous, confused by Abuela's unexpected embrace). It then transforms into a grand symphony as Mirabel, Abuela, and Bruno take off on the horse toward the ruined Casita, and then a chorus singing the Encanto theme when Julieta is reunited with Mirabel. It ends with the All of You theme. All of this follows the action of the scenes from Mirabel's perspective, BUT if we look at this from a Bruno perspective, apart from the scenes' action, we get a redemptive arc.

It Was Me carries Bruno's nervous plucked strings (tiptoe, anxiety) to disappear in the Encanto theme chorus (miracle, hope). He is reunited with the Miracle (his family, the true gift) and the sadness of the Tío Bruno theme is changed into the hopeful chorus that the Miracle once was (major key?) as heard in the beginning of the film. From there, the song moves into the to the All of You theme as Bruno is finally on his way to being seen and unconditionally accepted, a true healing moment.

Character Takeaways, for writing reference:

Bruno hides behind humor to deflect away from those vulnerable places within him. Maybe it's painful, maybe it's an attempt to keep the burden from those he loves (a cool analysis on that here!), maybe he's afraid of being rejected for being weak. Regardless, he has a deep sadness hidden underneath the nervous, quirky exterior, and Mirabel is the one to break through to it

When Bruno's defenses are down, the music slows down, and so does the movements of his character. It's like the weight of it all catches up to him, and he drops his attempts to be upbeat and lighthearted. He eventually picks the jumpy style of movement back up again in the film, when Mirabel begins to feel the weight of the situation (OR NOT! It's a mystery, it's a mystery…). In sum, when he is nervous (most of the time), he is deflecting, humorous, playful on the outside, with a deeper sadness carried within.

3) WAIT WAIT MY FAVORITE PART as a FINAL note I swear:

Bruno's theme reappears in a strange place at the end of the movie, in All of You. At 2:56, he's no longer speaking; in fact, he's not even in the scene! What's happening in the song? It's none other than the moment that Dolores opens up to Mariano (I can take it from here, GOODBYE). Bruno's theme underlies Dolores' entire speech to Mariano, but then the theme transforms at the end, rising up and bleeding into the All of You melody.

Why bring him in here? I think it's a moment of redemption. Bruno's 'bad' prophecy for Dolores is cast in a new light. The time pining after the "man of her dreams, betrothed to another," has built up in her this momentum, manifested as courage to speak out and demand what she wants (Wake up and NOTICE me!). At the moment that Mariano verbalizes that he sees her, Bruno's theme transforms into the All of You theme. Dolores is seen, all of her, and the moment arises from the backdrop of her Tío's prophecy. Perhaps this symbolizes a freedom from the confines of the prophecy, but maybe...if not for the years of not having the love she longed for, would she have had the courage to seize the moment when it came? Bruno's prophecy comes true in a way they'd never imagined, and with that comes hope—the promise of transformation.

End of essay 😁

People more musically inclined, please feel free to add to this! Also, please excuse any misuse of musical terms, my musical vocab is wanting. I am a non-musician in a very musical family, so when it comes to music, I often feel like I've missed something important… 😆

#my family is sick of hearing about it #so now you get to!#Encantober #transformation #music analysis #encanto music analysis #it really is an essay #oops #oh well #bruno madrigal #isabela madrigal #dolores madrigal #mirabel madrigal #camilo madrigal

54 notes · View notes

vyeoh · 3 years

Note

this is your chance: wax poetic about an Empires or DSMP character of your choice to a fan who is new to both. Explain why I should love them. I need guidance in this new and meme-populated land.

okok this is a lot of pressure haha. Spoilers for EmpiresSMP and DreamSMP below, obviously. I wrote a lot so prepare yourself, anon

I watch a lot of empires POVs but the ones I most anticipate every week are Scott and Sausage.

c!Scott (I'll call him Smajor for the sake of simplicity) starts off the series chilling, not really getting involved with the rest of the server, and staying aggressively neutral. After all, he's an elf. He has lived far longer than most of the other rulers already, and will most likely outlive them for many years. So, the best thing is to stick to his mountains and not get invested in the dealings of mortal affairs, maybe sometimes causing problems on purpose and dipping because what's life without a little spice right.

But then, this demon comes to the server, Xornoth. He's going around causing havoc and wants to send the world into an eternal winter, but he doesn't bother the kingdom of Rivendell much so Smajor stays tentatively cautious but ultimately unbothered. But then, the puzzle pieces start falling together. The first thing that the audience noticed was was Xornoth sounded like Smajor, but we mostly thought that this was just due to cc!Scott voicing both of them and there was nothing more to it. However, then, the people the demon starts possessing start chanting in elvish. The demon hates mortals, and the elves are conveniently one of the two confirmed not fully mortal races in Empires.

This culminates when Smajor stumbles across a cave that contains the backstory of the patron god of Rivendell, Aeor. Basically, there's two opposing forces, Aeor and Exor, and both have a champion. In a previous life, those champions were two brothers, where Aeor eventually prevailed and banished Exor. In this life though, the champions are - you guessed it - Smajor, and the demon Xornoth.

So now Smajor is like. Well fuck. It's my literal god-given destiny to be responsible for defeating this demon who is technically my brother, and if I fail the server gets plunged into an eternal winter. And I have no fucking clue what is happening because I've just been here on this mountain actively trying to stay out of the issues outside my kingdom. We watch him panic and teeter on the verge of spiraling for an entire episode, and when the followers of Xornoth go to the End to kill the dragon, releasing Xornoth's full powers, he fails to stop him. Smajor is a character who was used to being the smart one, the prepared one, the one who has the least deaths on the server. But he's also a character who runs away from his problems and ignores them. Before and during the dragon fight, we hear the desperation in his voice, as he's thrown into a situation he is wholly unprepared for, and it's bigger than him going to the Cod Empire to kill their king, or assisting in other people's plans to kill the codfather. He can't run from this. cc!Scott plays this scene so well as well, as I've said before, one of the best parts of Scott's acting is how he's never super dramatic, but he's so effective in the little things like inflection to make you feel, viscerally, the panic and dread.

So after the dragon fight, Smajor realizes, I can't do this on my own. I've tried and failed. So he gets allies. We watch him, someone who has so strongly been an isolationist, learn the benefits of allies and watch him learn to trust others and watch him learn how to get that trust in return.

My favorite thing about Smajor's characterization is that he's an incompetent protagonist, but not in the way of the "plucky young adventurer". He's capable skill-wise, and fairly jaded and very pessimistic. However, his issue is that up until recently, he did not care about the rest of the server at all, and by the time he learned to, it was way too late.

Also, in 3rd Life, cc!Scott and cc!Jimmy were canonically married and they reference it sometimes in Empires. Like, Scott goes over to the Cod Empire every so often both in and out of character to kill and/or flirt with Jimmy, the ruler of the Cod Empire, which may develop as a secondary plot into the future who knows. So ty Scott for giving the gays what they want o7

Now onto Sausage: his is a story of Icarus, his hubris and ambition being his downfall. He's one of the two followers of Xornoth, who promised him endless power in exchange for his servitude. He started the series being eccentric, but not outright unhinged, but slowly gets more and more extreme as the series progresses, as he gets brought more and more to Xornoth's side.

One of the best parts of Sausage's character, in my opinion, is how his gradual corruption affects the people around him. Initially, he got into a conflict with the Cod Empire and was allied with two other people in the Witherrose alliance. They were allies, but also close friends. The fandom liked to joke that the three had sibling energy, and I'm pretty sure the ccs played to that even more lol.

It was painful to watch the other two members, Gem and fWhip, watch Sausage get corrupted right in front of them, and see them desperately clinging on to this old idea of Sausage in their head because if they faced the truth, it would mean that their friend was gone. Eventually, they do finally cut him out of the alliance, leading him to fully commit to the side of the demon. Sausage felt very clearly betrayed by this, and declared the remaining two Witherrose alliance members to be enemies.

He gets more and more possessed, and we even see the other Empires, his enemies even, slowly realize that something is very wrong with the ruler of Mythland. He starts doing more and more evil things, like killing people more, making sacrifices to the demon, and eventually helping to kill the dragon to free Xornoth. So things are good for Sausage, for a bit. He won, and is more powerful than ever. Then he finds out: he's going to die. Xornoth's possession is slowly killing his soul, and eventually, his body going to be fully taken over and he himself is going to be trapped in the spirit realm. So how do you react to this? Over the next few episodes, we watch Sausage struggle between "the demon is literally killing me" and "the demon has given me so much, and I love it", all while Xornoth takes over more and more of him. We hear him exclaim that "don't worry!! I'm still about 15% there!" while trying to downplay every time Xornoth completely takes over his body. We watch him willingly oppose anyone who is trying to end the thing that is killing him.

My favorite thing about Sausage is that he is undoubtedly evil and proud of it, but he's also undoubtedly human. If you like to watch evil characters go absolutely feral, he's the guy for you. He makes the deal with Xornoth in the beginning, knowing and fully embracing the evilness of the demon, but at the same time he knows what he's doing is detrimental to both himself and everyone around him, but he's gotten in way too deep at this point, and to be fair the demon has held up its end fo the bargain, right?

Also, I would be damned if I don't talk about cc!Sausage's editing. Every one of his videos is like a movie. The way he does camera angles and uses music is so skillful- every lore scene feels like something out of a high fantasy action saga (think: LotR). Every big lore event I always wait in anticipation for Sausage's ep because his editing truly takes lore to another level.

I'm just generally very excited to see where this series goes. Empires is such a good mix of talented builders and good lore. Part of the reason why the series is so immersive for me, beyond any other lore smp, is that they have the settings to back it up. There is a certain charm to the DreamSMP's objectively terrible builds (with a few exceptions) but in Empires, the settings help sell the plot so much.

Another part of why I love EmpiresSMP is how much the ccs are involved with the fan community. I'm sure you've seen the memes about Scott being on tumblr, and Sausage regularly goes through the EmpiresSMP fanart tag on Twitter and likes art, even ones not related to Mythland. Most of the ccs, in fact, have brought up tumblr content on stream at some point or another. Like, several ccs have said that they read tumblr lore theories and hcs and stuff and sometimes take inspiration from them. Fun fact: Rivendell's church was inspired by my pinned drawing; confirmed by Scott Smajor himself. It's just such a good cycle of ccs and fans being excited about each other.

As for DreamSMP, I'm gonna be honest here, the only person I really am invested in in Technoblade. I started watching when he joined the server, and he's the only person whose lore I keep up to date with.

Techno's fun to watch because he's like the Deadpool of DreamSMP. Virtually unkillable, very skilled and scary, but consistently cracks jokes and breaks the 4th wall during plot. His POV is just fun. Like, he does wild plans and gives speeches and some of the stuff that happens to him should be called deus ex machine if it wasn't for the fact that Technoblade is the one who's doing it, and all the stuff is grounded in the fact that cc!Techno is just that good at the game.

However, the fact that he rarely takes anything seriously makes the few times Techno is 100% serious so much more impactful. His whole character has a basis in being perceived as inhuman and being treated as such, and therefore in return trying to hide his humanity. So, when he shows that humanity, whether that's fear, anger, or genuine love for his friends, it really makes you go "oh shit."

Techno's often said not to have character development, but I'd argue that while he remains steadfast in his moral code, he develops leaps and bounds as a person. Like, at the beginning, he's brought onto the server to help Wilbur and Tommy overthrow a government; them knowing he's 1) an anarchist and 2) very very powerful. His character was more of a plot device at that point and was treated as such in the canon. Wilbur and Tommy straight-up lie to him about their plans to establish another government after they overthrow the current one, while he was led on to believe that they were abolishing all governments in the area. But he isn't a plot device. He's a person, as much as he only shows the terrifying, blood god side of himself.

After the establishment of New Lmanburg (the new government its a long story), his friend Phil joins. And for the first time, we see him be fully human with someone and we see someone treat him like a human. Like, we saw glimpses before, with Wilbur and Tommy in Pogtopia, but Phil is the first person we noticeably see he trusts 100%. Then Doomsday happens, and Techno essentially retires to the tundra. During this time, we see Techno learn to be more human, first with Ranboo, then Niki when he establishes the Syndicate. In fact, the two of them, along with Phil, canonically throw him a birthday party, which is a far cry from his treatment in Pogtopia.

Techno's development is one of a god learning to be human, and I just think he <3

#vio.ask #empiressmp #empires smp #dreamsmp #scott smajor #smajor #smajor1995 #mythicalsausage #mythical sausage #technoblade #to be clear i am not an apologist for any character #i fully realize that they are doing wrong and I like to watch it happen #minecraft roleplay got be in full character analysis mode #long post

69 notes · View notes

qqueenofhades · 3 years

Note

so…now that we all know what you DISLIKE about star wars (and 400% fairly so, you have my full support here)…

what drew you into the universe, what keeps you around?

favorite characters, ships (OTPs or actual spaceships lol), overall themes, do you have a favorite random weird creature or robot that you adore? whatever you wanna talk about!

go off honey (again, but supportively 💖💖💖)

tax paid: the very nerdy star wars punk vest i made and the even nerdier matching vest i made for starsky

Lmaooo, entirely valid. You were like "star wars?" and I was like the drunk person at the bar who can't stop shouting about how much their ex sucks. But now that I have gotten all that off my chest, let's talk about why I love it (since if I didn't love it, I wouldn't have such strong opinions). Basically my feelings on the OG SW trilogy are similar to my feelings on the OG LOTR trilogy, as that tumblr post floating around somewhere put it: sure, they have flaws, but also, they're perfect. I have a complicated relationship with the prequels, as do we all, since George Lucas cannot write dialogue or direct actors to save his life (stick to what you're good at, George, hire other people to do the rest), but even they have their moments. Like. Hit me with that "Across the Stars" love theme, John Williams. Gahh. Just like that.

Because... Star Wars wasn't actually this omnipresent corporate global entertainment monolith when it started out. It was a dorky low-budget indie sci-fi film in the 1970s which everyone thought was going to bomb. But it told a simple and compelling story in an interesting way, everyone agrees that ESB is one of the best films/sequels ever made, and then ROTJ gave it a happy ending while it was still okay to do that. My main thematic gripe with the Disney trilogy (I will try to keep those to a minimum, lol, but I have to bring it up to compare) is that it very clearly fell into the "actual happy endings are naive and unrealistic and a cynical postmodern audience won't accept anything less than things being Bad" trap that, yet again, we have GOT to thank for. It obviously existed to some degree before that, but GOT blew it up to huge levels, where the only valid situation or character is that which is Grimdark and Depressing. Which, in my view, misses the heart and soul of what SW is all about??

Like. ESB is genuinely dark. ANH was this fun plucky little sci-fi film where the scrappy good guys won the day against the Nazi stand-ins, as they were supposed to, and then ESB comes along (speaking of John Williams, let us all chant together, DUH DUH DUH DUHDUHDUH DUHDUHDUH, DUH DUH DUH DUHHHH DUHHH DUHHH DUHHHH) and things go... wrong. Leia and Han are on the run for most of the movie, then get captured and tortured by the Empire and and betrayed (however unwillingly) by Lando. The Rebellion is attacked on Hoth (I tell you, those fuckin AT-AT walkers were SCARY when you see it as a young kid for the first time), and forced into hiding. Luke loses his hand, doubts Obi-Wan and Yoda and realizes that his mentors are fallible, makes dumb mistakes, and of course gets hit with The Most Famous Line In Movie History. But it's also just adrenaline and excitement. THE ASTEROID FIELD! THE HAN-LEIA BANTER! THE FIRST LUKE-VADER DUEL! THE FACT THAT YOU HEAR TWO FRICKING NOTES OF THE IMPERIAL MARCH AND YOU'RE JUST LIKE OH YEAH OH YEAH OH YEAHHHH!

But also then... Return of the Jedi. It gets shat upon for the Ewoks and reusing the Death Star as the Big Bad and being supposedly cheesy and not as Thematically Dark as ESB. Which is all kinda silly, in my opinion, but also, can we talk about Luke Skywalker's character arc and how he chooses possibly the most radical compassion ever demonstrated by a hero in an action movie, let alone a space opera. He insists that Anakin Skywalker is still in there somewhere and puts his own neck on the line to prove it. Luke doesn't save the galaxy by being a Badass Jedi. He saves it by throwing away his lightsaber and saying "I will not fight you, Father." He saves it by trusting that even in the depths of darkness, Anakin can come back from the charred ruins of Darth Vader and finally do what he was supposed to do all along. He can end Palpatine for good and all (we don't talk about "Somehow Palpatine has returned" because it's nonsense, obviously). Anakin can avenge the Jedi and what was done to him and all the lies he believed and the pain he wreaked on the galaxy, even then. It's not too late. It's not too late. Like. I don't care if this is Lightweight or Childish or whatever. It makes me CRY every time I watch it. Especially the moment where Luke takes off Anakin’s helmet and sees how ruined he actually is under there, and yet the downfall and death of the trilogy’s chief villain is not triumphant at all but instead utterly heartbreaking. “You were right about me Luke... tell your sister... you were right.”

Excuse me, I need to just /CRIES INTENSELY/

Luke won't be tempted to the dark side for his own sake, but Leia's ("If you will not join me, then perhaps she will"). I likewise hold firmly that Anakin/Vader is one of the best movie villains/antiheroes of all time and likewise have many feelings and Strong Opinions about his arc, prequel writing clumsiness and eye-rollingly tepid love story aside. (See: he and Obi-Wan were deeply in love and in a way they still are, don't @ me. I have no problems with Padme and obviously stan Natalie Portman at all times, but Anakin and Obi-Wan’s relationship is the real love story, the heart of the prequels, and in some ways even the subsequent movies, the end.) And “so this is how democracy dies, with thunderous applause” is... raw af as a line. For being in a Star Wars prequel movie. What?? (Also, the Revenge of the Sith novelization had no business being as good as it was. If only that dude had also written the movie.)

Anyway, my point is: the OG trilogy had plenty of moments of staggering emotional weight and where things genuinely sucked for the good guys and the outcome wasn’t entirely clear. The difference is that it didn’t choose to dwell on them, and it allowed for a transformative fictional space where a happy ending, fiercely fought for and squarely earned, was the right outcome. We didn’t need to go back thirty years later and make everything suck for fear that a cynical modern audience couldn’t connect with it otherwise. (Like I said, we didn’t need the new movies at all, but Disney heard that Cha-Ching of the Almighty Dollar). Star Wars was sci-fi, sure, but it also had the fantasy elements that allowed a happy ending to be the right choice for what we saw the characters go through and the philosophy that carried us through the original trilogy.

Likewise it’s just... Peak as far as dynamics go. C-3PO the fussy metal butler who worries about Everything and R2-D2 who is the droid embodiment of YOLO? Flawless. Sassy scruffy space pirate and badass politician warrior princess bicker constantly, butt heads, drive each other crazy, and then fall in love? Iconic. (And has shaped my ship tastes for... all of eternity, oops.) The above-discussed transformation of Luke Skywalker, whiny ordinary teenage kid, to the truly great man who fulfills what Obi-Wan, Yoda, AND the rest of the entire Jedi order couldn’t manage to do, because of their own flaws and blind spots and black-and-white moral views that didn’t know what to do with a man who loved as passionately as Anakin Skywalker, for better or for worse? The guy who managed to save the galaxy with love? STAN.

So... what? The Disney trilogy decides to retcon all that, throw everything that they’ve fought for out the window, make Han, Leia, and Luke miserable and rejecting the roles they grew into in the original trilogy, and die without ever really reuniting or seeing each other again as a trio? The underlying message was that “these happy endings aren’t satisfactory/realistic/sophisticated enough” and idk, maybe it’s just the shitshow of the last few years, but I’d like to see some entertainment that had the cojones to tell me that despite all the darkness and despair, maybe there’s a chance for hope. (”Rebellions are built on hope,” thank you Only Valid New Star Wars Movie Rogue One.) And Rogue One worked so well, despite being utterly GUTTING as all the heroes died one by one, because we knew what was coming next (A New Hope) and that their sacrifice was going to be worth it. I don’t care if that’s “realistic” or not. As I’ve said before, that’s what stories are for, and if I only wanted things that were Real Life, I would only read the news. Besides, the idea that happy endings never happen in reality is equally bullshit. We as a culture need to accept that more, instead of finding reasons to tear everything down.

So just... yes. The original trilogy might have flaws, but also, it’s perfect. And do I want to rewatch it all now? Kinda.

(Anyway. I warned you this was gonna be long. Oh look, it’s long, and I’m sure there is even more I could say, but still. Ahem.)

sleepover weekend asks

#buffaluff #ask #star wars #long post

25 notes · View notes

invitedeath · 3 years

Photo

SEPHIROTH — relationship & plotter call.

hello lovely isolians! it’s been actually ages since i made my first one, or my second one, so i’m coming back with new vigour & hopefully some new ideas to tempt you all into friendship ( or...enemy...ship) with sephiroth!

so liking this post means that you are 100% down with interacting with me in some fashion! ways this might happen may be... → me sending you im’s / tumblr asks to plot or chat! i can be quite a talkative person as a forewarning, as i love discussing rp things as well as getting to know my rp partner! → if we are already friends on discord or twitter, i might message you that way to ask you about plots or ideas or to run things by you. → exchanging ask memes / meme day things that might be a bit more personal than a general sentence meme. → possible random starters or musings dedicated to your muse, sometimes i get sudden inspiration for these things! i will always check first that you’re okay with taking on a new thread, but yes this is for just... if i get inspired & want to put something up for you! → general tomfoolery and shenanigans in character ( and ooc if you like )

you can contact me via the im system here, by the /ask feature or you can ask for my discord/twitter if you prefer those. just let me know. discord is the most private however so we’d need to chat a bit more elsewhere first just for my comfort! i am in the isola discord sever however so we can totally talk in that server for a bit too!

FRIENDS.

↪ honestly friendships aren’t typically on the agenda for him. he is arrogant beyond belief and considers everyone to be weaker than him or to some degree unworthy of his time or energy. he really does not have any interest emotionally in anyone besides himself, instead he is far more likely to use and discard people when they are no longer needed. HOWEVER, in 2020 sephiroth underwent quite a big character development stage, essentially his long-term goal came to a head and it backfired pretty back when he got all his powers back, so while he’s super strong again now, he’s also semi-content (i guess) with living in isola for a while, if only so he can figure out how the multiverse works (meta, i know). he talks to people now (wow!) and engages in mostly philosophical conversations, about... life. death. etc.

↪ i am down to... vague villain-alliance type deals with fellow power players here. he wont consider your muse a friend, but rather a pawn or even a means to an end, that end being his goal of generally using this island for his means, apologies. preferably the intellectual, over-powered, edgy types will probably gravitate towards him more, but i’m willing to throw anything at the wall to see what sticks. he’s not a nice guy, by any means, but it would be interesting to see how he has to play the game here to his advantage until he regains powers. i especially would like to interact with other villains who are kind of just chilling, maybe they’re veterans in spirale also and they can share a glass of wine over watching all the citizens running around like ants. we could also do a murder if you are into that.

↪ there are some cases where he might engage in conversation with non-villain types and these would likely be far more dialogue-heavy threads including metaphorical topics or debates. the conversations of life, death, mortality, good vs evil, frailty of existence, legacy, power and corruption, calamities, birthright and betrayal are just some of the topics possible to arise in discussion. that being said, whilst these topics would be of interest to him, the character themselves must meet his standard of what he considers worthy of his time eg. those just willing to argue with him will bore him whereas someone curious to his nature might be treated to an actual conversation. over time this has opened up into most people being capable of talking to him. he has less patience for over-eager plucky types, but anyone with a respectable manner who likes talking a lot will probably find an interesting conversation partner in this... ONLY SLIGHTLY CHILLED sephiroth. he’s not totally chill, he’s just a lil chill.

↪ warriors, outcasts, villains, intellectuals, fellow puppet-master type villains especially, those he ‘befriended’ in past events, perhaps even neighbours to his castle would all be likely connections. friends of those he has worked alongside or met, or those wishing to seek great power and know of his existence might seek him out also, but yes... ““““friends”“““ is a very difficult term for him. he’s getting better.

→ his most recent developments see him as a far more casual version of his canon self, over a year of living as close to a “domestic life” as possible have meant that whilst he is aloof and cold, he is also far more likely to be out and about, buying wine at some creepy gas station at 4:30am for example. he chats when he’s in the mood and might even stick around to cause some chaos for the sake of boredom eating him alive. so whilst he is still very much a dangerous inhabitant here in spirale, sephiroth is currently Domesticated somewhat.

ENEMIES.

↪ heroes of all shapes and sizes might feel threatened by the ominous presence of a monster who seems inclined to side with chaos as opposed to peace. he’s not outright starting fires here but he is present in the more morbid moments of isolian discourse, an omen of death lingering on the sideline. he has his plans and he may just mock you with them, but in general since he does and WILL cut down npcs ( or players ) alike, he makes for the perfect villain. BE WARY he has all of his powers unlocked and knows the island well. fighting him would not guarantee your victory, especially if you are a freshly applied character.

in feb 2020 he almost brought chaos to spirale too so i’m sure anyone holding a grudge or wary of a potential threat like that would be very aggro towards him.

↪ he has traumas. plenty of them. some of them originate from labs and white coats, meaning he might just view you as an enemy if you’re a scientist or someone who dabbles in human experimentation. his reasons are his own, but let’s just say that if you consider him a good candidate for poking and prodding with scientific equipment, you may just lose an arm.

↪ i LOVE fight threads especially really gritty, bloody types. i would prefer to plot these out so we know what’s going on beforehand, but feel free to develop these with me honestly i love a good old classic villain hero showdown. he’s less likely to get into these without a good reason but if we do one, the winner is randomly determined via generator to make it fair if your character is also uncapped!

→ police/law enforcers/general crime stoppers might remember him for causing a bit of trouble in the past! insert how bad me be gif. try and ??? get him to apologise i guess. arresting sephiroth sounds like the plot of a funny movie.

LOVERS.

↪ this man has a bf now, can you believe it? 2021...isola gay rights.

MISC.

↪ pawns and such would be a fun dynamic later. his general presence is pretty terrifying, so it wouldn’t be a stretch if you have an appropriate muse for them to be fearful enough to carry out some little tasks for him. this might be more common later on, but i’m down to discussion for it currently!

↪ places you may find him can include: ↪ near his residence ( personal housing; castle in the mistwood ) ↪ fibonacci ward ( levels 3 and 4 especially due to the museums and things. but also the lowest levels, he tends to wander around there as if searching for something... feel free to try and figure out what it is ) ↪ golden ward ( the university if only to borrow books from the library, he can read there for days at a time without sleep or food. he reads all kinds of things, both fiction and non fiction. ) ↪ archimedes ward ( pretty much everywhere in this ward, it’s my favourite. he enjoys music and art sometimes. hit me with that biblical shit. ) ↪ the mistwood ( 100% down to be that cryptic creature that leads you from your path to your likely doom ) ↪ the city of yesteryear ( typically the underground areas, just investigating really. any strange occurrences would likely draw him there as would any presence of a strong power. ) ↪ atop skyscrapers, looming at the ‘edge’ of the world we can currently explore, typically more active at night, perhaps at the scene of a murder / attack ( plotted ), if he’s feeling extra ballsy he might be found in a bar but its very rare. very VERY rare, wandering broken buildings, invading scientific facilities or buildings. he’s not going to be found in busy, socially strained areas basically.

↪ i’m down for any ideas you might have too for plots so feel free to just message me if nothing here caters!

STATS PAGE | APPLICATION | PLOTTING PAGE

#isola relationship call #isola plotting call #cw // long post #AAAYYY

4 notes · View notes

duhragonball · 5 years

Text

Dragon Ball Z 187

Is this the best episode? It might be. Unfortunately, Larry’s camera doesn’t work, so most of Dragon World can’t witness it.

Nice shot of the squad to start us off.

So last time, Cell tried to fight Super Saiyan 2 Gohan and it didn’t go well. He only landed one punch, and only after he used his maximum power, and it didn’t do anything. Then Gohan hit him twice and left him reeling. By now, it’s clear which one of them is stronger and faster, but what can Cell do? Surrender? This whole stupid tournament was his idea. Apologize? We’re way past that. Run away? Where can he go?

Besides, Cell’s too pissed to consider his situation. All along, he’s put his faith in Dr. Gero’s design. He’s supposed to be the ultimate life form, despite looking nothing like Shadow the Hedgehog. All he had to do was follow Gero’s posthumous instructions and he’d become invincible, but now he’s done all of that and he’s still found himself backed into a corner. He can either deny it and keep fighting, or he can accept that his entire existence is based on an empty promise.

What’s amazing to me here is how Cell keeps throwing the same kick, even after Gohan blocks it, and then he screams “stop mocking me!” I mean, yeah, I guess what Gohan is doing counts as mockery, but he’s also just clearly superior to Cell.

As if in response to Cell, Gohan grabs Cell’s leg, charges up, and kicks him in the face. If you’re watching the original Funimation dub, this is where “Gohan Fights Frieza” plays again, and it’s awesome.

Cell gets up, but all he can do is wonder how it came to this. The first time I saw this episode, I started to think about what he did the last time he was in this sort of pinch, and he absorbed an android to leapfrog his opponents’ power level. Only there are no more androids to absorb. Cell is complete. There’s no miracle power-ups waiting for him. He’s completely on his own now.

So Cell tries.... Destructo Discs. Really? Pretty sure this is filler again, but it’s kind of silly for Cell to whip out his genetically inherited techniques now. Those gimcracks didn’t work on Goku, and they didn’t work on Gohan when the Cell Juniors tried them.

This time, Gohan just stops the discs in mid-flight and disperses them with his power. In a way, we’ve come full circle. When Cell first became Perfect, Krillin hit him with a Destructo Disc and it was completely ineffective. Now Cell’s the one using the same move, and with the same result.

Next, Cell fires a Special Beam Cannon, and asks what Gohan’s going to do this time.

Well, Gohan just deflects it, same way Piccolo did back when Imperfect Cell used it on him way back when. I mean, there’s a reason Piccolo doesn’t use this much after the Saiyans Saga.

Then Cell uses.... I guess that rapid-fire attack Frieza used on Piccolo in his Third Form? It doesn’t look quite the same, but I don’t know anyone else who does it like this. None of it works. In the dub, Cell observes that the blasts passed right through Gohan, but I’m pretty sure they sort of slipped around him instead. Either way, no dice.

Over where Mr. Satan is, he announces that he’s so impressed with Gohan’s performance that he plans to make him his apprentice. Piroshki and Caroni aren’t keen about this, since they’re Satan’s star pupils, but Satan tells them they’re expelled. Geez. Anyway, Jimmy Firecracker finally breaks kayfabe and tells Mr. Satan that Gohan clearly has far more impressive powers than any of them, but Satan insists that he could teach the boy to become even greater.

This part here’s super awesome. Cell was so busy being pissed that he forgot that Gohan’s still trying to kill him. When all his attacks fail, Gohan starts walking towards him, and his frustation gives way to fear.

The narration of Cell’s emotional state is truly terrific, but I’m also fond of the dub version of this scene, where Gohan speaks to him, and essentially describes Cell’s thoughts aloud.

“What are you so afraid of, Cell? Isn’t this what you wanted? I warned you! I told you what would happen if you pushed me too far! But you didn’t listen! You forced me to awaken my hidden power. And now that you’ve seen it, you’re afraid, because you know that I’m going to destroy you!”

And then Cell makes this priceless face. This is what I love so much about the character. Throughout his run as the main villain, Cell’s been a lot of things. He’s mostly known for being this brick wall that the other characters can’t overcome. But he’s also been a hideous horror-movie creature, and a smarmy wise-ass. He’s also been known to play mindgames with the heroes, like when he tempted Vegeta to let him become perfect, and when he invited Goku to eat a senzu bean during their fight. There’s layers to Cell. He can do more than just eat people and kick ass. And now, we come to the final phase of Cell’s character, when he’s completely outmatched, and he becomes a panicky coward.

Desperate, Cell jumps into the air and fires a Kamehameha wave down below. Essentially, this is the same thing Vegeta did back in the Saiyans Saga. If Gohan dodges the blast, it’ll destroy the planet, so he has to take this head on.

But Gohan just fires back an even bigger Kamehameha to put an end to that dilemma. Cell ends up getting overwhelmed and engulfed in the blast.

Everyone thinks that’s the end of Cell, because those big energy blasts usually do the trick in the movies, but Cell’s still alive! He’s lost part of his legs, most o his left arm, his wings, and those things on his head, but he’s still alive.

And that doesn’t bother Gohan at all.

As Goku watches this, he flashes back to the day he learned Gohan had this kind of potential. They were in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber, and Goku wanted to call it a day after a 20-hour training session, when....

... Gohan stood up and asked to keep going a while longer.

Then he made that same face he’s making at Cell right now...

... and then he turned SSJ2, but only for a moment. This flashback is filler, but it makes some sense. Goku must have seen some hint of Gohan’s true ability in the Chamber, or why else would have come out of the Chamber early?

The only thing missing here is the part where Cell actually dies. Piccolo reminds them that Cell will just regenerate if they leave him alone long enough, and Goku calls out to Gohan to put a bow on this thing already.

But Gohan refuses. He wants Cell to suffer a while longer first. And this is where things take a turn for the worse. As badly as Gohan is beating Cell here, it’s all for nothing if Gohan won’t actually kill the guy. I think the most popular interpretation of this is that Gohan is so angry at Cell that he’s just not thinking clearly. He wants to punish Cell for everything he’s done, to the point where he’s lost sight of his original objective. There’s also some youthful inexperience at play here.

That’s probably all true, but I think there’s another side to this. Despite his rage, I think Gohan still can’t quite bring himself to kill Cell. Maybe I’m way off, since he killed the Cell Juniors, and he killed some of Frieza’s men back on Namek, but those were sudden, impulsive kills. Cell may not be strong enough to beat Gohan, but he’s still powerful enough that Gohan will have to work a little to kill him, which means he’s got to make a conscious decision to end Cell’s life. That may be a road he just can’t bring himself to cross, even after everything that’s happened.

In the manga, Goku pleads for Gohan to take Cell out now, pointing out that there’s no telling what Cell might do if he gets desperate. The dub and the Japanese script of the anime don’t put it that way, which is kind of a shame, because I liked that wording. There’s really no telling what Cell might do if he’s completely cornered. By torturing him this way, Gohan is only giving Cell time to think of what he can stoop to.

First, Cell just starts swearing, which is pretty understandable.

Then he gets huuuuuuuge! That’s right, it’s time for Perfect Cell (Dummy Thicc).

I love this visual, because Cell keeps getting bigger and meaner and louder, and it looks like Gohan’s this plucky little kid being terrorized by a horrible monster, but Cell’s the one’s who’s scared right now. All he knows to do now is to try to frighten Gohan back, and it just ain’t working.

As Trunks points out, Cell’s making the same mistake that Trunks did back when Trunks and Cell fought. I’m not even sure Cell realizes it. He’s just so upset that he started powering up, until his body got super bulky and slow. So now he’s still no match for Gohan and he’s a bigger target. And this is probably why Gohan didn’t listen when Goku warned him to finish Cell off quickly. Yeah, we don’t know what Cell might do, but what can he do? If this is all he has left to try, what difference does it make?

Gohan just kicks the shit out of his face, and that calms him down a bit.

My favorite line from the dub version of this episode happens here, when Cell exclaims: “You’re not a boy! You’re a monster!”

Then Gohan follows up with a kick to the gut before Cell can even finish reacting to the last hit. For those of you keeping score, SSJ2 Gohan has only hit Cell six times so far. Two punches in the previous episode, then that kick to the face, the big Kamehameha, another kick to the face, and now this kick to the gut.

Then this happens. GPOY.

See? Cell was coughing up green fluid in the last episode, but this time it’s purple. What’s up with this guy?

That kick to the stomach fucked Cell uuuuup. He can’t stand, and he keeps drooling.

Oh, and he’s still trapped in an endless war against a Super Saiyan 2. Not a great place to take a sick day.

Then this. Holy shit, what is he doing now?

Piccolo calls it. By now, he figures Cell has become so weak that he can’t remain in his perfect form. Not quite sure how Piccolo picked up on this, unless he noticed Cell’s ki dropping below the level he was at in his Semiperfect form.

Okay, but why is he doing this, exactly? He looks like he’s about to throw up--

OH SHIT! HOLY SHIT! HOLY SHIT HE JUST BARFED UP 18!

Gohan’s just watching this and smiling like a sick li’l bastard. There’s no way he knew this would happen, but he looks pretty pleased about it.

Okay, so the implication is that Cell sucked 18 up into his torso and just left her in tact? Like she was balled up in his abdomen somewhere? And maybe 17 too? Only that doesn’t make any sense. It looks plausible here, but that’s because Cell expanded himself to three times his normal size. In his usual self, he wouldn’t be big enough to contain 17 or 18 whole.

Also, we’ve seen big chunks of Cell get blown away since he became perfect. Between Vegeta’s Final Flash, Goku’s Warp Kamehameha, and Gohan’s Kamehameha in this episode, most of the Cell we’re looking at is not the original. I think his knees, thighs, pelvis, and the left half of his chest are about the only parts of him where 17 or 18 could have been stowed away.

Past a point, you just have to say “It’s a cartoon” and move on, but my guess is Cell’s body dismantled 17 and 18 and assimilated their bodies into his own. But the process was reversible, so if Cell ever got hurt badly enough, his body would reject one or both androids and he’d regurgitate them. Shouldn’t 18 have come out of his tail, though? That’s how she went in. It’s just a cartoon. An awesome, awesome cartoon.

I’m just going to leave this here without comment.

So yeah, Cell’s totally screwed, but the thing is, he was totally screwed in the last episode. How much worse can it get for him? How much more is Gohan going to do to this guy before he finally pulls the plug?

#dragon ball #2019dbliveblog #cell #perfect cell #gohan #goku #mr satan #piroshki #caroni #pizza #larry #jimmy firecracker #krillin #vegeta #trunks #yamcha #tien #piccolo #android 18

22 notes · View notes

narkinafive · 5 years

Text

this one’s a doozy

(i feel like i should have done sth like this for the prequels/the clone wars but oh well. i'll get around to it eventually! maybe! gotta do something while waiting for ix right lol)

oh, rebels. rebels rebels rebels. i know it's probably unbelievable, but i was so gutted by the clone wars cancellation that i really Did Not Like rebels at. it took... idk about two years for me to give it a real chance (and i was still deep in a previous fandom hole, so i didn't really get into it until like. the start of s4) (if you can guess what fandom it was you get a cookie) i am so glad i tried it again.

of course, ezra bridger is, was, will always be my favorite boy. i really did not expect him to waltz away with my heart! anakin has always been my favorite (and he still is, tbh), bc that kind of character and that kind of arc is so on brand for me, like. i LOVE my dark tragic messiah demigods, i really really do!!! but then this doofy dumbass kid with big blue eyes and a big blue heart and his many cat friends just punched me in the gut!

it's been a year and i've had time to digest the whole package. let me preface by saying that rebels is absolutely 100% perfect and my favorite piece of expanded sw media by a LONG mile. NOW. that doesn't mean that there weren't things i didn't like (going under a cut!)

many times, it tried too hard to tie into the greater saga - bringing in palpatine, the wbw, all the saga cameo characters, like... some of them worked better than others. the r2d2 and c3po cameos were the worst, w obi wan coming in at a close second. the best saga character cameo was definitely mon mothma (and bail). i really liked leia's episode, but. idk. it still felt a little shoehorn-y

i wish ezra's descent into the dark side had been more ... present? he gets some great, great moments. but it's kind of sudden (i've touched on this before so i won't keep going)

someone else has brought this up (and i ................. do not remember who sdfkjlsdfjlk) but pushing aside the Great Rivalry of thrawn and hera for the force stuff is... idk. that's a whole other thing

now i love the force shit. like i LOVE it. but i think rebels might have been stronger if it focused less on force shit and more on the early war effort, in the same vein as rogue one. i know it'd be more difficult to fill out four seasons rather than one movie, but as it got into s4 and closer and closer to episode iv... idk, put the force shit at the beginning of the season? idk. i really love how they did it, but... idk! it's complicated

oh, and speaking of complicated - maul. i love what they did with him, i love this sad garbage pile and watching him recreate his trauma onto others as a way of dealing with it... but i think it was a weird choice. maul is so... idk, grimdark? for such a lovely sweet show

kallus going to lira san better be bc he's being tried for war crimes lmao

sabine staying on lothal is... a choice. not one i hate. but i still don't quite understand it

and my biggest gripe, ironically one of my favorite parts of the show: ahsoka lives.

dont' get me wrong; i was so happy that ahsoka lived, i nearly threw my computer across the room when ezra yoinked her into the spacetime continuum. i am a diehard ahsoka fan and i will fight somebody to defend her honor. THAT SAID. the narrative of ahsoka going down at the hands of her former master? as he desperately tries to erase every part of his former identity? the great commander tano, clone wars veteran, an early casualty of the rebel alliance? it's so good. it's SO good. having her story end there would have been just some phenomenal shit. just superbly poetic. i'm glad she's alive! and the emotional impact is still the same, even with her coming back, but my god.

now. the things i love.

the character arcs. all of them. ezra bridger, war orphan, street thief, cast out by his people, finding he is stronger than he ever thought could be possible, giving his life for his people because he forgives them, and because it's the right thing to do. kanan jarrus, jedi knight, reclaiming his heritage and his jedi legacy (and yes, watching him die still hurt just as much as the first time aroundd) (and also, thanks to @aspiringwarriorlibrarian and @greatlakesrebel for pointing out many many many things, but first and foremost tonight, that dume the wolf was of course voiced by fpj) (i’m slow ok shut up). hera syndulla, who unfortunately had to learn the hard way how to balance love and war so she didn't become her father, pushing away everyone she loved for the greater cause. zeb orrelios, finding his people, learning he's not the last of his kind, leading the refugees to their ancestral home. sabine wren, forgiving herself and freeing her planet from oppression. and not just the hero arcs - the villain arcs, too!!!! darth maul's single minded obsession that kept him alive for 30 years ending in a 3-hit fight on a backwater planet because he just couldn't sustain that hate for so long. all of thrawn's cleverness couldn't predict the force. i don't have an issue with a single one of these!

THE FORCE (TM)!!!! there is so much delicious crunchy force nonsense, i could DROWN in it

among my many, many issues w the old EU, one of them was demystifying the force, quantifying and trying to label it too much. some things were quantified bc they needed to be (the holocrons, the sith code, etc) but most of it was kept as vague and nebulous as possible, which is GOOD. when it comes to mystical magic, less explanation is mostly always more

i love that we don't have clear cut answers for the loth wolves and the lothal temple, i could ponder that shit for WEEKS and never get bored

it does feel like a mostly self contained story. "been there made history" can get overused very easily (see: hbo rome) but rebels used it just enough to fit it into the larger saga

having rex survive both the clone wars AND the galactic civil war??? fuck yeah

kanan and ezra. kanan and ezra. there is so much i could say about kanan and ezra. it's everything to me. war vet finds plucky young orphan and adopts him? sign me tf up!! their relationship as it grows from mentor/mentee to peers is really really well done

and speaking of growth, ezra and sabine going from obvious romantic interest to battle forged siblings is not something that i was expecting but is definitely one of the best parts of the show

kevin has some really incredible tracks in this show: top of the list is 100% kanan's end credits, followed closely by it's over now. wow

and speaking of, the entirety of the last ten minutes of twilight of the apprentice deserves its own bullet. that shit is right up there with vader v luke round 2

the planet designs, mostly malachor and lothal, but when hera and sabine launch the dome, and the lothal sky suddenly turns to blue as the pollution is leeched out and destroyed... that shit is breathtaking

and so much more. like so much

this show holds such a special place in my heart :") now if only dave could bring back my son... like. PLEASE

see you all in rogue one!

#the pre ix rewatch

8 notes · View notes

waterlilyvioletfog · 5 years

Text

Top 3 Supernatural Episodes Per Season

Warning: Spoilers below the cut. I am SUPER biased. Take everything I say with a HEALTHY grain of salt.

Season 1: omg they look like INFANTS

1. “Home” 1x09. This episode is amaaaaaaaaaaaaazing AND it’s super important to the mytharch AND we get Winchester family drama. One of those early instances of “Wow we need to give Jensen Ackles an emmy like yesterday”. Mary turns up and foreshadows like??? so much??

2. “Scarecrow” 1x11. Super creepy, major “The Lottery” vibes, fuck I just. I love it.

3. “Hell House” 1x17. Close call between this one and “Something Wicked” but in the end, Harry and Ed and all the hilarity that ensues just. *chef’s kiss*

Honorable Mentions: “Something Wicked”

Season 2: ugh so many good episodes season 2 is SO good

1. “The Usual Suspects” 2x07. SAM GETS TO BE SO SNARKY IN THIS EPISODE AND I LOOOOVE IT. Also Diana is a bamf.

2. “Croatoan” 1x09. UGH YASSSSSSS. Close call between this and “In My Time Of Dying”, though

3. “What is And What Should Never Be” 2x20. Look man, I don’t know what to tell you. I’m cheap as all get out. Dean angst? Gimme gimme. Also it has WYNONNA EARP IN IT.

Honorable Mentions: “In My Time of Dying”, “Nightshifter”

Season 3: half of these episodes suck, the other half are perfect heeeelllppp

1. “Bad Day At Black Rock” 3x03. This episode it just hilarious from start to finish. Also, Bela vs. Dean.

2. “Mystery Spot” 3x11. A double whammy of HILARIOUS and OH FUCK THIS IS DEPRESSING.

3. “Jus In Bello” 3x12. It was real hard to decide between this and Ghostfacers but ultimately, Nancy Fitzgerald (aka Ella Lopez) and Victor Henrikson are the actual best and deserve all the love ever.

Honorable Mentions: “Ghostfacers”, “The Kids Are Alright”

Season 4: Somehow there is only one episode that is not stunningly amazing??

1: “On the Head of A Pin” 4x16. Cas becomes a main character and it is AMAZING and oh my god give Jensen ALL the emmys oh and ALSO we finally learn exactly what Sam and Ruby’s “extracurricular activities” entail. Feels like a movie. We get the reveal that the angels are working to break the seals. Anna is also amazing. Why is this episode so beautiful. I’m fucking crying and so is Dean. I could gush for hours.

2. “It’s a Terrible Life” 4x17. This episode is just a fucking delight. (Am I giving it such a high score on the basis of The Kink’s “Well Respected Man” alone? Maybe. Honestly I SHOULD be putting Rapture here but oh well. I’m biased.)

3. “Monster Movie” 4x05. It was hard to decide between this “In the Beginning” “Lazarus Rising” “The Rapture” and “Lucifer Rising” (which all deserve all the praise ever) but ugh ugh ugh this episode is ALSO perfect AND I love it a bajillion. It’s in black and white and the guest actress is SO pretty and also I think I’ve already gone into detail about how the MoTW is a Lucifer Parallel. Also Dean says he’s been rehymenated so TRANS!DEAN RIGHTS!

Honorable Mentions: “In The Beginning” “Lazarus Rising” “Lucifer Rising” “The Rapture”

Season 5: You want to be sad? You also want to watch really good TV? SEASON FIVE IS WHERE IT’S AT!

1. “Two Minutes To Midnight” 5x21. I know, I know. I should be putting “Swan Song” here but look,, I am easily bought with the promise of Julian Richings as Death.

2. “Free To Be You And Me” 5x03. Funny Destiel buddy cop film, Sam gets to be filtered through the eyes of an audience-stand-in in universe, also contains Castiel’s ICONIC line “but today you’re MY little bitch”.

3. “Dark Side of The Moon” 5x16. Narrowly beats out “My Bloody Valentine”, “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid”, and “The Song Remains The Same”. I am trash for any pieces of Sam and Dean’s childhoods and also this episode gives me SO MUCH material for beating up John with a baseball bat.

Honorable Mentions: “Swan Song” “My Bloody Valentine” “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid” “The Song Remains The Same” “The End”

Season 6: We Don’t Talk About Season Six.

1. “The Man Who Would Be King” 6x20. Cas. Destiel. Ow.

2. “Mommy Dearest” 6x19. Eve! Sam Smith! idk, I just really like it.

3. “Appointment In Samarra” 6x11. As I said, I am easily bought with Julian Richings. Tessa the Reaper!!! Sam stop trying to murder your father.

Honorable Mentions: “You Can’t Handle The Truth” “My Heart Will Go On” “Weekend At Bobby’s”

Season 7: Terrible reputation given the fact that it has SO many great episodes. Sera Gamble? You’re mean.

1. “Slash Fiction” 7x06. Why is this episode so hilarious???? Robbie Thompson starting out with a BANG!

2. “Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie” 7x14. In the total goop of “thick. black. ooze.” of this season, 7x14 is a light in the darkness. Every inkling of joy, of spark, of color, of childishness, all of it, poured out into this one episode, wherein Sam totally loses his cool and I love it. Sam looks so pretty at the end. Dean is simultaneously an actual child and an actual Dad and I love it.

3. “Out With The Old” 7x16. I love me some levis, man, don’t know what to tell you. It’s just so fun!!

Honorable Mentions: All of Robbie’s episodes, “Hello, Cruel World” “Repo Man” “Reading Is Fundamental” “How To Win Friends And Influence Monsters”

(The ONLY reason I’m not including TBAI is bc @mad-as-a-box-of-frogs is slowly converting me to hating Megstiel enough to not watch Destiel episodes)

Season 8: That one season where we admitted that Crowley’s a DICK.

1. “Hunteri Heroici” 8x08. CAAAAS!!! Also the only episode where anyone watching actually gives a shit about the Sam x Amelia flashbacks.

2. “LARP And The Real Girl” 8x11. Super fun! CHARLIE RETURNS. Dean is a FUCKING NERD. Sam gets flirted with :) Real close tie between this one and Pac-Man Fever

3. “The Great Escapist” 8x20. Edlund really gave it his all for this last episode. Cas kicks SO much ass. Sam needs to be protected at ALL costs. Kevin ALSO kicks SO much ass. The actor who plays Sweet Pea on Riverdale is here??? Wow.

Honorable Mentions: “Pac-Man Fever” “As Time Goes By” “Everyone Hates Hitler” “Trial And Error”

(See note on The Born-Again Identity for why Goodbye Stranger is not on this list. Again, blame @mad-as-a-box-of-frogs )

Season 9: Sam is mad at Dean for not letting him go

1. “First Born” 9x11. No, I will not elaborate. Tim Omundson speaks for himself. There is nothing wrong with this entire episode and if you try to tell me there is I can and will gut you like a fish.

2. “Heaven Can’t Wait” 9x06. DESTIELLLLLLLLLLLL.

3. “Do You Believe In Miracles?” 9x23. Wow it’s the first Season Finale to make it to my top 3!! Metatron gets what’s coming, DEAN BECOMES A FUCKING DEMON.

Honorable Mentions: “Bad Boys” “Mother’s Little Helper” “Alex Annie Alexis Ann” “Meta Fiction”

Season 10: Dean is mad at Sam for not letting him go

1. “The Executioner’s Song” 10x14. See my comments on “First Born”.

2. “Angel Heart” 10x20. BRING YOUR DAUGHTER TO WORK DAY. DESTIEL. JIMMY X AMELIA. COOL UNCLE SAMMY. DEAN IS A NERD. DEAN IS CLAIRE’S DAD NOW SORRY NO TAKE BACKS. (also, “blue eyes crying” is just ugh ugh ugh)

3. “The Werther Project” 10x18. SAMWITCH RISE!!!!!!!!!!!

Honorable Mentions: “Hibbing 911″ “The Prisoner” “The Things We Left Behind”

Season 11: Ahh, yes. You. Lucifer. Get fucked.

1. “Don’t Call Me Shurley” 11x20. *slow clap* Robbie Thompson, you have served your country well.

2. “Red Meat” 11x17. This is gonna sound strange, but this episode is sorta my comfort food?? I’ve watched it literally so many times. I love it. So much.

3. “The Chitters” 11x19. Nancy Won wrote three episodes for SPN, all in season 11, they are all stellar. Chitters is GAY. She also wrote “Don’t You Forget About Me” and “Thin Lizzie” I’m putting them here so as not to crowd up the Honorable Mentions.

Honorable Mentions: “The Vessel” “Devil In the Details” “We Happy Few” “Baby” “Form And Void” “Into the Mystic” honestly just watch every non-bucklemming episode they are pretty much all amazing.

Season 12: I WILL DEFEND MARY WITH MY LIFE DON’T @ ME

1. “The Future” 12x19. DESTIEL. I would die for Kelly. Fetus!Jack. GOODBYE DAGON!! THE MIXTAPE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2. “Who We Are” 12x22. JUST KILL ME WHY DON’T YOU, BOBO?! WE ALL KNOW YOU WANT TO.

3. “Stuck In the Middle (With You)” 12x12. Destiel love confession!!!!!! Drowley!! Mary will fight everyone willingly!! SAM GETS THE ORANGE JACKET

Honorable Mentions: Every. Single. Non-BL. Episode. Watch. Them. Now.

Season 13: JAAAAAAAACK!!!!!!!!!!!

1. “Advanced Thanatology” 13x05. *inhales deeply* AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. Also, Steppenwolf.

2. “Beat the Devil” 13x21. DICK JOKES GALORE. Also, we must protect Sam at all costs. Gabena is perfect. Samwitch is also perfect. Sabriel is also good. Lucifer can go fuck himself.

3. “Breakdown” 13x11. It physically pains me not to put “Funeralia” here but alas, I must not show Steve Yockey too much favoritism. Anyways. DONNA!!! DOUG!! CREEPY!!! SAM’S HEART IS WORTH SO MUCH MONEY!! GIVE SAMMY A HUG!!

Honorable Mentions: “The Scorpion And The Frog” “Funeralia” “The Thing” “The Bad Place” “The Big Empty” “Lost And Found”

Season 14:

1. “Moriah” 14x20. Proof that Supernatural will go down in history as ALMIGHTY. GOD IS THE ULTIMATE VILLAIN.

2. “Peace of Mind” 14x15. I still haven’t recovered. Jared must have had literally all the fun in the world.

3. “Mint Condition” 14x04. Yay!! Very fun!!! (I wanted to put Optimism here, but again, I can’t show Yockey so much favoritism. It’s not my fault! he’s too good!!)

Honorable Mentions: “Optimism” “Ouroboros” “Unhuman Nature” “Byzantium” “Damaged Goods”

#spn #too many episodes to tag #supernatural #rankings

5 notes · View notes

modernlcve · 5 years

Text

* — stats — shawn rhodes !

* — basics !

full name: shawn rhodes. nickname(s): none. age: twenty - one. date of birth: march twenty - third. place of birth: dayton, ohio. gender: male. pronouns: he / him. sexual orientation: bisexual. level of education: high school graduate.

* — physical !

tattoos: none. piercings: he’s let go of his ear piercings and his lip ring. he’s just grown that’s all. notable features: i think his curly hair is Cute. he also tries to keep some kind of Facial Hair at all times so he doesn’t look like a Tween. weakness(es): no spine. scar(s): two surgical scars on his chest. a long scar on the side of his thigh, starting at his hip.

* — domestic !

occupation: yeah he’s shawn from target now. residence: in carina, he stayed in a cheap motel in the delphinus heights area. in phoenix, i think we decided he, aubrie, and piper all share a place. social class: lower middle case. parents: whitney chapman, age 43, shawn’s mother and only discernible family for most of his life. she’s not the best mom, but she isn’t the worst either. bastard Rhodes is his dad, who was in and out of his life until he graduated high school and then got Dropped. siblings: i mean frankly. who knows how many siblings they actually have. the only siblings he’s aware of are the carina rhodes trio. extended family: his mom was decently close to her older sister, they’d crash with her every now and then when they were between places.

* — personality !

positive traits: dependable. enthusiastic. plucky. negative traits: impetuous. mercurial. reticent. myers-briggs ( x ): isfj; the defender. temperament: phlegmatic. moral alignment: neutral good. horoscope: aries, the ram. hogwarts house: slytherin.

* — favorites !

movie: the cabin in the woods. tv show: the office. book: it. drink: apple cider. food: he will kill and die for that good cincinnati style chili. animal: dogs. color: red. song: don’t look back in anger by oasis. artist: cage the elephant. celebrity crush: zoe saldana.

* — impressions !

first impression: he doesn’t make a strong first impression, if only out of self defense. he’s always been the type to look to blend in, and part of that is being just nice and inoffensive enough to fly under most people’s radar. self impression: shawn does genuinely think he deserves better ( and that maybe for once he’s finally getting it ). he thinks he’s a good person who’s been beat down, and yeah he borders on having a victim complex but. lover impression: yeah he gets nervous on dates he simply doesn’t have the confidence to not. but in an established relationship he really just Loves the idea of having someone to rely on and someone who can rely on him like he didn’t get that in his family and Revels in getting to have it now.

* — et cetera !

turn ons: short people. confidence. familiarity ( if that’s not a psycho thing to say ). turn offs: aggression. gossips. smokers. drink/drugs/smoke: yes/no/no. dominant hand: right. clean or messy: clean. early bird or night owl: night owl. hobbies or special talents: he’s gotten pretty good with computer stuff since piper has Enlisted him. he’s musically inclined but he doesn’t really want to do anything with it.

* — QUESTIONNAIRE !

01. where was your character born? what brought them to carina/phoenix? what do they like most about the town?

shawn was born in dayton, ohio, but he never really put down roots there. his mom moved him around a lot, so while it’s technically his hometown, he doesn’t really have a super strong connection to it. he came to carina to meet up with the rest of the Rhodes clan. he moved to phoenix for a Few reasons, the main one being piper’s manic roadtrip, the fact that as much as ohio sucked north carolina just Hates queer folx, and also just bc he lives for travel and shaking things up. he likes the people the most at this point, getting to blend aubrie in with his siblings really is a Dream Come True

02. who are your character’s friends and family? who do they surround themselves with? who are the people your character is closest to?

shawn’s family is his friends. he really only had his mom to speak of for a lot of his life, and their relationship is Fine but not the Best. he’s considered aubrie family for a minute now, just because he’s one of few people who’s been there for him when he’s needed it. he mostly surrounds himself now with his newfound siblings and the people they know as he tries to get acclimated to that.

03. what is your character’s biggest fear? who have they told this to? who would they never tell this to? why?

shawn fears instability. the big reason he doesn’t like resent or blame his mom for how rocky their situation was when he was growing up is because he knows she hated it as much as she did. he watched how she kinda wrecked her shit by caring too much and he worries he’s gonna go down the same path. he strives to have some kind of really boring domestic life one day, but he already knows he gets antsy staying in one place too long so like maybe its already too late. he’d probably talk to aubrie about this but he’s not ready to dump everything on say piper yet even if he knows all her business.

04. has your character ever been in love? had a broken heart?

not really 2 either. he didn’t stick around any high school long enough to Really Date, and once he graduated and moved out he met aubrie and while he didnt have an all consuming Thing for her at the start, once he realized he did he stopped dating and started Pining baby

06. it’s saturday at noon. what is your character doing? give details.

working probably. gotta stay on that grind. if he’s not at work working, he’s probably helping piper film or edit or whatever she has to delegate to him. and if for some Miraculous reason he doesn’t have to do either of those things, he’s chilling with aubrie or goofing off on his own. he’s interested in music and likes to hang out around record stores or just stream something Solid and stare at the ceiling its how he Centers himself.

07. what is one strong memory that has stuck with your character since childhood?

he has a lot of Negative ones but. i like to be happy. he vividly remembers going to see Batman Begins in theaters. his dad was in and out of his life, but it was one of the times he was in and staying with him and his mom. they made a whole little day out of going to the movies and lunch before and then all went home together and it was just a nice little day where their dads Dumbassery didn’t ruin everything.

09. what is something that upsets your character? where do they go when they’re upset?

shawn is Upset when he feels like he doesn’t control a situation or when he feels Lonely jsut general things ig that make everyone sad. when he’s upset, he likes to have his space and go to his room and just be in a space where he Is in control and feels like a Human

10. when your character thinks of their childhood kitchen, what smell do they associate with it? why?

his mom was big into making candies and stuff as gifts and goodies for people in her life. because they’re from ohio peanut-butter buckeyes were a Staple in any candy mix so that whole peanut butter and chocolate situation is Nostalgic to him.

#( shawn rhodes. )#( stats. )

2 notes · View notes

uomo-accattivante · 6 years

Photo

With Star Wars: The Force Awakens, director J.J. Abrams sought to prop up and revitalize the most popular film franchise in movie history, to preserve its qualities in amber for a new generation. The Force Awakens was very concerned about what you, the moviegoer and fan, thinks about Star Wars. It wants to please you. It wants to be comfort food. And it’s very, very good at that.

But with Star Wars: The Last Jedi, director Rian Johnson wants to burn Star Wars to the ground. Not because he harbors ill will toward it, but because he loves it. He loves it so much that he wants to cleanse the garden and allow something fresh and new to grow. The Last Jedi is not concerned about what you, the moviegoer and fan, thinks about Star Wars. It wants to challenge you and make you question what Star Wars is and what it can be.

(This post contains major spoilers for Star Wars: The Last Jedi.)

An Answer to the Ellipsis

Star Wars: The Force Awakens concludes with one helluva cliffhanger. The Force-sensitive Rey arrives on the planet Ahch-To, tracks down the elusive Jedi master Luke Skywalker, and offers him his long-lost lightsaber. Luke’s face flashes with a dozen different emotions. You can practically feel the words crawling up his throat. And then the film ends, to be continued in two years. It’s a grand moment. An epic moment. A perfect finale for a film built out of questions and mysteries, a film about legacies and the shadows they leave behind.

And when we return to that scene in Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Luke Skwalker accepts the lightsaber from Rey, examines it for a hot second, and casually tosses it over his shoulder. From its opening scenes, The Last Jedi makes it very clear where it stands – everything you thought this movie was going to be is incorrect. The symbols you hold dear, the symbols that J.J. Abrams held so dear in your stead, are being deliberately stripped of their power. If that shakes you, if that upsets you…well, that’s just Rian Johnson preparing you for what’s next. Abrams left him with an ellipsis, a “to be continued” that felt like a specific path. And Johnson takes a hard left turn in his land speeder, breaks through a fence, and goes off track into the wilderness.

Star Wars has gone off the rails. Either you’re going to be on board for the bumpy ride to a new place or you’re not. But the intentions are made early and they’re made perfectly clear.

Legends Bleed

Mark Hamill famously disagreed with Johnson on the direction of Luke Skywalker when he first read the screenplay for The Last Jedi, and it’s clear why. Luke, the farm boy who became a war hero who became a warrior knight who became his father’s savior, has fallen into disgrace. While The Force Awakens featured a Han Solo falling back into his old scoundrel ways (a position of comfort for those worried about a watered-down take on a character who was at his best when he wasn’t playing nice), The Last Jedi features a Luke Skywalker that is unlike anything we’ve seen before – a broken shell of a man who believes that everything he fought for and achieved was for naught. By telling young Rey that none of this matters, he’s also telling the audience the same thing. The stuff you love? The details that have reshaped pop culture and created a geek language that everyone speaks? Yeah, they’re wonky. Or rather, they’re broken. Your faith was flawed.

Luke’s hopelessness is especially affecting because the film is clearly on his side. This is not a movie where a plucky young Jedi-to-be shows up at the old master’s doorstep and teaches him how to hope again. This is a movie where a flawed old man with a lifetime of victories and regrets informs the decisions of a new generation of young heroes who need to find a new way to hope. Clearly, the old ways didn’t work because darkness rises again and there are still tyrannical man-babies trying to be the next Darth Vader. There’s a flaw in the system, buried too deep for most to see, and the only solution is to burn it all down.

The Last Jedi chooses to make this literal, as Luke Skywalker, wild and enraged, moves to burn down the ancient tree housing the ancient Jedi texts. But he doesn’t get to do it. Instead, the ghost of Yoda, the wizened master who trained him decades earlier, arrives, summons a lightning bolt, and does the job for him. This Yoda (once again depicted with a physical puppet after years of being a CGI creation) is very much the character we first met in The Empire Strikes Back – eccentric and wise and silly and profound in equal measure, the kind of old weirdo who has found grace and power in just letting go.

Johnson is clearly not a fan of the militarized, commanding Yoda of the prequels and the animated Clone Wars TV show. This Yoda cackles as he burns down what remains of the Jedi religion, the court jester whose mischief always carries greater meaning. This Yoda knows what Luke knows – the order to which he dedicated his long life is gone, and trying to recapture it is a fool’s errand. Why resurrect an archaic institution that cannot serve a new generation when you can let that new generation build something new for itself? Even Luke, a noble man who believed in the hidden goodness of Darth Vader, gave into his darkest feelings and considered murdering young Ben Solo in his sleep. The old ways failed Luke. They failed Ben. They will fail the Resistance. Luke knows this through anger and regret. Yoda knows this through wisdom and perspective.

It’s important that Johnson lets Yoda burn it all down and not Luke – the passing of the torch is not just the result of the failure of an old man who learned things the hard way, but it comes with the blessing of the wisest character in Star Wars canon. Luke knows that the Jedi must end, that they do not monopolize the Force, and that evil has flourished on their watch. But where Luke saw despair, Yoda sees a chance for renewal. Where J.J. Abrams saw a warm and comforting blanket that makes you feel really good, Rian Johnson sees that stagnation is the death of all things. Stagnation leads to Empires and First Orders. Hitting the reset button, breaking the machine, leads to revolutions. And after 40 years of circling similar ideas, Star Wars could use a revolution.

That revolution feels especially well-timed, as fans discuss whether or not “Luke would have done that.” Geeky debates will always exist (they’re the reason Star Wars thrives today), but maybe we should hone in on what The Last Jedi is telling us. Maybe it’s dangerous to worship our heroes to the point of idolatry, to convince ourselves that they can never do wrong, never make mistakes, and never let their hubris create monsters that threaten a new generation. Johnson sends Luke out on a high note, allowing him one more showdown with his former pupil in a fight that is pacifistic resistance at its most grand and extreme, but it’s the final gasp of the hero we once knew. Long live Luke Skywalker…but never forget that he erred. That he done fucked up.

Breaking Expectations

It’s easy to imagine Rian Johnson watching The Force Awakens and being thrilled. It’s a thrilling movie. It does that. It’s also easy to imagine Rian Johnson watching The Force Awakens and noting, “This Supreme Leader Snoke guy kinda sucks. I should do something about that.”

Despite being positioned as the Big Bad of the new trilogy, the overlord pulling the strings, Supreme Leader Snoke barely leaves an impression during his appearances in both Star Wars movies. His generic flavor of Almighty Galaxy-Destroying Jerk is something we’ve seen several times in Star Wars and countless times elsewhere. He’s dull. He’s especially dull when compared to the angsty, flawed, and powerfully human Ben Solo/Kylo Ren, played with such intensity and raw pain by Adam Driver.

But The Last Jedi knows our expectations. It knows that we think Snoke will remain a threat through the next movie and that Ben will find redemption. It focuses on Ben’s internal conflict as it showcases Snoke’s incredible power. As the son of Han Solo grows more sympathetic, his leader grows more godlike, revealing a command of the Force that allows him to flick enemies and allies alike around his throne room like gnats. The Last Jedi makes Kylo Ren more vulnerable as it makes Supreme Leader Snoke more unstoppable.

So yes, the death of Snoke is a disarming twist and a beautifully staged one – Snoke’s command of the Force bites him in the ass when he reads Ben’s feelings and intentions but cannot understand where they’re pointed. One little Force push from Ben Solo and Luke Skywalker’s lightsaber is activated, cutting the Supreme Leader in half and ending his reign of terror an entire movie earlier than anyone expected. It’s shocking. It’s hilarious. It’s bound to anger fans who have spent the past two years attempting to discern the identity of Snoke. Quite frankly, The Last Jedi doesn’t care about Snoke and it reacts accordingly – your Snoke theory never mattered because Snoke never mattered.

Part of this reflects Johnson’s interest in Ben Solo and his lack of interest in Snoke (can you blame him?), but it’s also a perfect reflection of the grander ideas at work in The Last Jedi. Luke Skywalker loomed large, but in the end, he was just a bitter old man with a chip on his shoulder. Snoke loomed large, but in the end, he was just an vicious old bastard whose backstory is unimportant and who gets stabbed in the back by his angsty student. In a universe where everything is connected, where we’ve been trained to expect greater meanings and profound truths, this is a punch to the gut. Not everything is connected. The mightiest can fall. And at some point, they probably should.

Snoke probably mattered once upon a time, to someone. But he’s gone now. Luke Skywalker mattered to the galaxy, but his time is over. The future has been yanked from the hands of past masters and the universe will be reshaped by Kylo Ren and Rey, who are both fighting for the same thing from opposite directions: the chance to build a future beyond the command of a generation that failed. Johnson’s decision to bring us even closer to Ben Solo, even allowing him to fight alongside Rey in an incredible lightsaber fight, before doubling down on him being irredeemable may be the best choice in a movie filled with audacious choices. Just because Darth Vader was redeemed doesn’t mean his nephew is going down the same path. And yeah, the motivations of this new villain make a certain amount of sense, don’t they? That should trouble you as much as it troubles Rey.

(As a side note, the sudden demise of Snoke feels akin to General Hux’s transformation into bumbling comedic relief. Some may take issue with him being reduced to a punching bag, but it once again feels like Johnson taking an ill-defined character from The Force Awakens and running wild with him, giving him something to do. The same goes for Maz Kanata, who is funnier and wilder in her brief cameo here than she was in The Force Awakens.)

Save the Things You Love

If the death of Snoke was The Last Jedi bursting a bubble, the revelation about Rey’s parents is…an even bigger bursting of an even bigger bubble. The Last Jedi is a movie about disappointment – your heroes are broken, your allies failed you, and your mystery parents, whose identity has been driving your entire existence so far, aren’t Skywalkers or Solos or Kenobis. They’re just some schmoes who sold you off and left you to rot on a backwater planet. If your last name is Skywalker, you’re destined for greatness. It’s a given. But what does it mean if your name is Rey? Just Rey?

The Last Jedi is full of nobodies brushing shoulders with somebodies. Rey discovers that her parents were drunks, simple traders who didn’t care about her, even as she trains under the legendary Luke Skywalker. Poe Dameron must grapple with the fact that he’s taking orders from General Leia Organa, a woman who has suffered and bled and fought for the Galaxy for 30 years, and therefore knows what’s right more often than him. And poor Rose must come to terms with the fact that Finn, a “hero” of the Resistance, is prepared to desert the moment things get tough. The new men and women of Star Wars (with the notable exception of Kylo Ren) are profoundly ordinary. Or rather, they’re profoundly ordinary people forced to live up to the extraordinary people around them, even as those extraordinary people often let them down.

I imagine we’ll see Star Wars fans upset about Rey not being a secret Skywalker or a Kenobi or a clone of Emperor Palpatine or the reincarnated Anakin Skywalker (the internet is a bad place), but Rey’s origin as just a person is more powerful than even the most shocking twist. Luke Skywalker and Anakin Skywalker emerged from a nothing planet as nobodies and rose to the occasion, stumbling into destinies they could never have imagined. To tie every character of significance to them and their circle of allies and enemies would be to rob them of their power. The beauty of Star Wars, since its earliest days, has been the depiction of heroes coming from every corner and every walk of life. A farm boy. A princess. A smuggler. They have no business saving the galaxy, but damn it, they have to! Who else will?

And now we have an orphaned scavenger abandoned by her completely un-noteworthy parents, a conflicted deserter from a vicious military regime, and a skilled pilot with a lot to learn about leadership. The next generation of Star Warsheroes are born from disappointment, the disappointment of having to live in the shadow of heroes and the disappointment of having to fight the war that those heroes failed to actually win all those years ago. No one should have to do this. No young person should have to go to war. Why should these kids, with no connection to the previous generation beyond being unfortunate enough to exist in the same galaxy as Luke, Han, and Leia, suffer for the sins of the Skywalker family?

They shouldn’t, but this is the hand that was dealt to them. And they’re going to fight because that’s what heroes do, no matter where they come from. Secret parentage that supplies an easily digestible explanation for your superpowers is for chumps…and Jedi masters who spend their final days in self-imposed exile.

A Long Time Ago…

Think back to the original Star Wars, the 1977 film, back before it was subtitled “A New Hope” and before it inspired an entire multimedia franchise. Look at the man who made it: George Lucas, a young hotshot, a proper artist, whose previous brush with science fiction resulted in the grim THX 1138. That film wears its politics, and its anger and frustration, on its sleeve. And while Star Wars is an infinitely more accessible film, it’s still the work of the same man and he’s still speaking the same language. A “fun” movie about a team of freedom fighters battling an oppressive, fascist regime is inherently political. Lucas knew this more than anyone and he even kept it alive in the much-derided prequels, which ended up being an entire trilogy of films about the failure of democracy in the face of a tyrannical despot.

When Lucas conceived Star Wars, it was as fresh and radical as anything else made in the American New Wave of the ’70s. But by Return of the Jedi, the ragtag Rebel alliance felt safer and the Force more of a superpower than a mystical way of life. An already simple premise was made simpler, an undesirable turn after The Empire Strikes Back doubled down on Lucas’ original concepts. It’s telling that The Force Awakens feels like a cinematic adaptation of our nostalgic feelings about Star Wars instead of a Star Wars movie as conceived by George Lucas.

Perhaps that’s why The Last Jedi is such a jarring experience, one that feels specifically built to make audiences work through their feelings about this universe. Rian Johnson is unabashedly political and unafraid to slaughter the sacred cows. The First Order isn’t just a group of guys whose costumes provide cool cosplay opportunities – they are fascists, evil and cold and frightening. The Resistance isn’t a team of plucky heroes – they are a band of fighters who are specifically cast with diverse men and women to reflect the fears and frustrations of millennials who feel trapped and afraid in a world where resistance often feels futile (and who really wouldn’t mind tearing apart a casino city operated by the 1%). The Force isn’t just a cool excuse for heroes to lift rocks – it is something mystical and mysterious that cannot be easily explained and comprehended, something that even Luke Skywalker has a complex relationship with at this point.

Even the Lando surrogate, the unnamed codebreaker played by Benicio del Toro, offers no easy answers as he betrays our heroes and doesn’t even reach for apology or redemption. Even the goofy humor that arrives early and often is a departure from the norm, a case of Johnson making the movie his own rather than following a style guide. The Last Jedifeels like a movie young George Lucas, passionate and bold, would have made. It feels like a proper Star Wars movie by refusing to feel like a Star Wars movie.

The Force Awakens and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story want to please you. They want to hit familiar beats and remind you why you love Star Wars. They are so much fun. But The Last Jedi doesn’t want to remind you of anything. It doesn’t care about your relationship with Star Wars. The only relationship that matters here is Rian Johnson’s relationship with Star Wars, and for the first time in a long time, here is a Star Wars movie with a proper point of view, one delivered by a storyteller who is unafraid to shatter a universe he loves, to break down the heroes that mean so much to him. A wise and noble Luke is easy. A Luke with regrets? That’s hard. That’s tough to swallow. That’s what elevates The Last Jedi beyond a simple retread – it asks you to take these characters seriously in a way that other Star Wars films have not, to acknowledge them as something beyond a vessel for escapism. Star Wars can only matter in the long run if it’s given the room to grow. And right now, it feels like the sky is the limit. Right now, Star Wars feels…unsafe.

And that feels great.

###

I find this to be one of the better thought-provoking reviews out there of “Star Wars: The Last Jedi.” I, personally, am glad that Rian Johnson had the guts to make the movie he wanted to make and not be swayed by public opinion. Truly great movies are born out of a strong point of view, not by appeasing to crowdsourced ideas or demands from moviegoers. Not all viewers may like or agree with a filmmaker’s opinion, but then, there is no way that a film can be everything to everyone - and it shouldn’t be. I applaud Rian Johnson for the courage to make such an unapologetically bold film - it’s stunningly good.

5K notes · View notes

toasttz · 5 years

Text

Photon Breaker Zechs: Through the Window

The following is a side-novel to Photon Breaker Zechs, a fantastic little tale being told over at my bro's blog dietaku.tumblr.com - where a bunch of plucky misanthropes get thrown into an MMORPG. My story is to be considered side content and, in the event of anything coming off as contradictory, assume that PBZ proper is canon over Through the Window. Lastly, depending on response, this may get moved to its own independent space. Either way, please enjoy! Photon Breaker Zechs: Through the Window Chapter 1: Video games can teach you about yourself I was seriously in over my head. I had gotten cocky and now, it looked like that was going to cost me my life. I stood, back to a row of trees that may as well have been a damned wall, taking stock of the rapidly approaching wolves – each nearly the size of a horse – surrounding me. I lifted my nearly-broken hammer in both hands, having lost my shield some time before during the chase that left me winded and unable to focus. Even were I able to do enough damage to open a path to flee, and assuming my hammer wouldn't just break like a brittle twig, it would do me no good at this point as both my strength and my supplies were tapped. My body was tense, my heart pounding a million miles an hour. It was do-or-die time. Mustering the last ounce of Spirit, I summoned up a manly shout of defiance in the face of impending doom, “Lee-roy—!!!” A sudden, deafening barrage of explosions caused me to hesitate as bodies of the massive wolves were sent sailing aside like mere ragdolls under an intense burst of fire from a source not immediately obvious to me. After forcing my eyes open from reflexively flinching shut, I saw a tall, radiant woman rush into sight, revolvers akimbo, opening fire into the furry fiends. Our mutual foes were soon but a memory as she holstered her weapons and flashed a bucktoothed grin at me, “That was close, wasn't it?!” I let out a sigh and leaned back in my faux-leather office chair, allowing my hands to come off the mouse and keyboard as I felt my tension fade away. My avatar on-screen was left with a meager 43 HP left and nearly-destroyed equipment after a long, maze-like dungeon had seriously done a number on my ego and my supply of HP and Spirit potions. Catching my breath, I opened the in-game chat client and shot back, “Thanks. I owe you one, FluffyStar,” “No sweat, Windowz,” she replied through text, executing the 'excited waving' emote animation, instilling a chuckle from me, “Would you like some help?” “Sounds good. Let's get out of here, my gear is nearly scrap metal,” I explained as she motioned for me to follow. We formed a party so we could properly share experience points and gold coins and she kindly escorted me back to the main town, Strattburg. It all started some time before our lives changed forever at the hands of a mere game. Slidelands was the game to play back then, a massive multiplayer online role playing game, or MMORPG. The game was a genuine worldwide smash hit phenomenon, and received regular expansion packs nearly every year since its launch nearly 15 years ago. My friend, Seamus, a younger guy I met by chance, invited several of his friends, including me, into the fold. Citing a lack of anything better to do, due to a job that involved me getting home in the dead of night and a dash of insomnia, I began to play the game regularly. The first steps of playing a game of this sort is to create your character, as opposed to playing a pre-set hero character – hence 'role playing' game. Also as opposed to games where you don't play a role, I guess. Think those are called 'movies' or 'modern JRPGs' but I digress. The game had disgustingly comprehensive depths for both mechanical and aesthetic customization. My friend, Dieter, literally spent over two hours just on how his character – Deegal – would ultimately look (and about ten minutes on her abilities). After picking your gender and a screenname, I was prompted to pick my “Tron”, class, and race. Slidelands's major selling point, back in the day, was how your characters could pick any of the four Trons (Proton, Neutron, Electron, and Photon) and one from over 30 Class combinations for different stats and abilities. Then you picked a race from out of over 20 options which further changed your growths and native passive specialties. Guides that run longer than dictionaries exist online with intricate detailings of precise, specialized “optimal” builds. However, I opted to cut my own path and designed a character that would be both fun to play and help in team settings – which the game heavily revolved around courtesy of a series of mechanics that were both ill-explained and near-mandatory for making any real progress in the game's story. My character, Windowz, was a Proton-Bunker from the Loppo – or rabbit-man – tribe. I was pleased with his incredibly tall stature and stout, upside-down triangle of a body. I knew from the start I planned to do some heavy-duty damage and be able to take a lot in return, so I was playing the game within about fifteen minutes of concerted effort. The first few tutorials for the game were threadbare (as was the original iteration of the game) and hardly of any use to newcomers. Seamus, or Zechs as his character was dubbed, was the one who really taught me how to play the game in earnest. The two of us made our characters and dove into the introductory quests (of which they were many) and collected our first weapons and armors. Zechs designed a Photon-Breaker which was the middle-of-the-road standard damage/speed class with no major strengths nor weaknesses. The first line of quests are what one might expect – a greeting some some plot-moving NPC who gave us some idea of location – Strattburg as that is where all adventurers begin the game. “Welcome, brave heroes of a far-off land!” the village elder prompted us as we loaded in, “To Strattburg! Where big adventures start! We thank you for coming to us in our hour of need! We have reason to believe you're the chosen ones we've awaited all this time!” “Never mind the millions of 'chosen ones' running around the server already,” Seamus chuckled over the voice chat. “Yeah, running around spouting poorly-spelled memes and lagging the damned server down with not moving their characters out of the load zones,” I clicked my tongue dismissively. “Our first quest is to kill some random monsters just out of town,” Seamus explained, “Seems standard enough!” We formed a two-man party and went out into the grasslands, where random crow and mouse-like enemies passive nibbled at the scenery. The scenery was the idyllic hamlet one found in traditional fantasy, with pleasant breezes making the grass sway around and the monsters here largely ignored players until provoked. On the one hand, I felt a little sociopathic for just massacring these creatures with a colossal warhammer, but on the other, if some random, faceless, nameless NPC tells me it's for humanity's collective benefit and offers payment, who am I to argue with them? Time wore on into the early hours of the morning. “Ah, this has been fun, but I need to get to bed,” Seamus admitted, due in some part to him being in a different time zone than I. “I'm gonna stay and grind a few more levels,” I explained, “I think the town is tapped for quests for now, so where should I go to power-level?” “Well, there's a forest not far from here that most everyone does some fighting in. That should get you started,” he explained simply. “Sounds good. See ya later, dude,” “Yeah, see ya next time, Jake,” Seamus bid me farewell before signing off. As I already said: I worked weird shifts and didn't sleep well at night, so I typically would play well into the early morning and sleep until my shift in the afternoons. So I decided to take my friend up on his advice as I headed into the forest and found the meager squirrel-like Critters small fodder under my tremendous hammer blows. It wasn't particularly fun to pick on the weaklings and I soon set for deeper into the forest for greater challenge. Whereupon I was beaten to near-death by the crazed wolves that lived near the forest's center, necessitating my rescue from some random stranger playing a Loppo woman. Thankfully, I survived the encounter, however narrowly, and soon we were back in the safety of Strattburg, where monsters couldn't spawn in. “Okay, I just wanted to let you know something,” FluffyStar said to me. “What's that?” “Your build is awful. Like, seriously. Did you plan it at all or did you just throw random bits together and hope for the best?” she verbally unloaded, “You should've played a Taurigante or a Zorren,” “Whoa, hey, c'mon. I had a strategy!” I swiftly protested. It's not that I couldn't change classes – players can do that any time they want so long as they're okay with starting said new class at level 1 again – it's that I didn't want to. “Was the strategy dying and not making any real progress?” she jabbed again, “Have you even played this game before?” “Literally, not before today,” I confessed my ignorance, “I thought the dexterity and luck of the Loppo would help me with the heavy weapons Bunkers wield and not make my build so loppo-sided,” I quipped. “I...” she began again before pausing to consider it, “That's not a bad idea, I guess. It's not really meta material, though. Maybe it's an experiment worth conducting... not sure I've seen it done before,” “Okay, so yeah,” I desperately attempted to float my side of the conversation, “Let me run my experiment with a little less venom, yeah?” “I don't have any poison weapons, sorry,” FluffyStar offered. I was kind of at a loss on that one as I couldn't tell if she was serious or not, “Maybe you'd like some assistance in level grinding?” “Sure. Can't sneeze at someone as powerful as you helping!” I chuckled. As any gamer worth their salt would attest: the greatest rewards in an RPG are loot and experience points. Quests being the best through-line to this end, most players end up staying more or less on the railroad that is the early story missions. Fortunately, for nerds like me who find the storylines in MMORPGs interesting, it also included storyline quests that taught us about the world, which I enjoyed completing and reading about. Seamus actually blew well past where I was because I wanted to read their flavor text and learn more about the game world, and he just wanted to hit things with his sword. Before I knew it, FluffyStar and I had played well into the morning and sleep started to overcome me. “This has been fun,” I relented, feeling the weight of my eyelids as I typed into the game's text chat window, “But I need to crash,” “Will you be on tomorrow night?” FluffyStar pried. “Yeah, probably. After I get back from work, I will,” “Great,” she punctuated, “Let me add you to my friends list, so I can see when you arrive,” Ah, the dreaded social systems these games are known for. Elegant in their simplicity and yet sufficient enough to drive those like my good buddy Dieter berserk with fury. Slidelands has many to its name and pioneered many – shall we call them – intricate systems into the core mechanics of the game as a result. Put bluntly: you were not expected to play this game as a lone wolf against all odds. Because of the game's heavy social bent, enemies scale slightly faster than their in-game level suggests, forcing players to team up or be unable to keep up with the progression in difficulty and this infuriated some of my close friends, namely the aforementioned Dieter and another friend, Cog. Who is Cog? Well, he thankfully avoided the fate that we did but not for the best of reasons. He actually played the game a few years before us, whereupon he played the robot race – the Teknos – and discovered that their crowd-dispersal Chaingun Riptide ability could be used to attack fellow players, even if they were in safe zones. So he, having grown bored within his first few minutes of play, parked his character in a field just outside of Strattburg's safe zone and killed unsuspecting new players as they left for 30 minutes – before the server admin banned him for life with no chance at appeal or refund. Not a week later, a hotfix patch went live, removing the Teknos from the game entirely, accompanied by an apology from the game developers and a small cache of Platinum Gems – the premium currency the game uses. Far as I know, it was the only time content was actually removed from the game. But I digress. “Thanks,” I said, seeing Fluffy's name appear in the roster alongside of Zechs and Deegal's, “I appreciate the tutelage,” “I'm just saying: it's not too late to go back and make a better-optimized tank race character,” Fluffy cautioned. I chuckled, “And do the same thing everyone else is doing? Where would the fun in that be?” “You only play for fun?” “Sure do. Isn't that what everyone does?” I offered. “Never thought of it that way before,” she responded after a brief moment of dead air. I didn't really take it to heart, as I was already half-dead with fatigue. The next day went by like oh so many others, coping with my job and commute, before returning home again to my computer. My beautiful hardwood desk and custom-ordered PC tower each cost me a mint in their own respective days. Together, they made up the centerpiece of my tiny studio apartment, and where I spent almost all of my time not dedicated to my eight-hours-a-day grind. And I take this time aside to say that that's not strange or pathetic at all. Shut up. In days to come, FluffyStar taught me just how complex the game actually was in its wellspring of potential customization and timesinks of grinding levels and growth trees and individual talent skills and much more. Not to mention the minigames. In what seemed like no time at all, she even invited me into her guild – The Night Owls. Being part of a guild – particularly one as active as The Night Owls – is really quite the experience. You never look far for parties (teams of up to six players who share all dropped exp and loot) and you end up developing some really cool strategies with others – a tendency Dieter referred to as “slightly more preferable than a violent death by rusty guillotine”. And here I thought I didn't much care for the company of others, but the owls took me in as one of their own. Well, sort of at any rate. “Whoa,” said one nearly-naked avatar as he eyeballed my towering, heavily-armored hero, “This isn't meta-standard at all!” I was as intrigued by his design as he was by mine, but for different reasons. His character was a nearly nude Floof clan male (the first I'd seen in my playtime), clad in a questionable banana hammock, a flowing, pink silk scarf, and a plush doll of a blue whale sitting atop his mane of dark hair. While idling, the character, NeekuthePantsless, would fold his arms across his chest and grin smugly, his long, bushy tail switching from side to side proudly, as if aware how indecent he appeared to be and basking in it. “This game is primarily player versus environment,” I protested, “How is there even a metagame at all?” “How can you even ask something like that?!” Neeku was astonished and annoyed at my exceeding ignorance (or sheer reluctance) on the topic of turning a video game into algebra homework, “The tank meta is so yesterday. Get with it, Windows! Everyone knows the current meta to beat is ProDoZoa!” I was relieved that, being physically removed from this number-crunching scrub, they were unable to hear my deep sigh that carried with it my intense distaste for meta-gamers, e-sports, and speedrunners of all stripes. I returned with an emotionally neutral, “Oh?” “Proton-Dozer Zorren Dual-Wielder,” FluffyStar interjected, “It's the highest physical DPS class in the game so far!” “Right, because just having the 'best' stats makes a game fun, right?” I growled my reply with disdainful, but equally-unseen keystrokes, “Gimme a break,” “He doesn't even know the ProDoZoa meta, Fluffy, are we sure we want this guy in the guild?” Neeku observed, either unaware or unbothered by my seeing it in the public chat. “It's an interesting experiment. I'm curious to see how strong he can be with it,” FluffyStar shook her head coolly, her long rabbit ears waving side to side limply as she did so. Neeku shrugged at this, “Okay. So, what level are you at, Window-man?” “Currently, I'm level 32,” I explained. In a way I sort of felt as though I was boasting. Most games of this type maintained levels that capped out at 80-100, so being one-third of the way through as quickly as I was even with my casual play style made me a little smug. “Oh geez,” Neeku worried, “We got... quite a ways to go then,” Feeling my pride called into question I had to ask, “Wait, so, what level are you guys?” Looking above them, I saw their nametags and basic stats appear in turn. FluffyStar, Neutron Drifter, Level 11,847 NeekuthePantsless, Electron Despoiler, Level 498 “What the actual hell?” I grunted as I re-read the numbers to ensure I hadn't lost my mind. I hesitated as I considered what I was looking at. I had seen the oft-repeated memes concerning just how grind-heavy SlideLands was, but this seemed incomprehensible. You can level your character, your skills (of which there are an insane amount), your subclasses (which also tie into skills to some extent), late-game armor and weapons, pets, and more, but to have a five-digit level cap? And who's to say at this point that it isn't higher than that?! My pride sufficiently deflated at this, I resumed typing, “I see. You must really like this game,” “That I do,” FluffyStar affirmed. “You're not allowed to do raid boss battles until you're at least level 100,” Neeku informed me, “So, how about I take you out to the Glass Desert and get you up to snuff. If you're going to insist on that suboptimal build?” “I insist,” I grit my teeth. My actual teeth – the set he couldn't see, obviously. “Ugh. But... the meta!” Neeku whined at me. “Neeku, just do it,” FluffyStar insisted. “Fine, fine. Follow me and, whatever you do, do not aggro anything,” Neeku demanded of me. “Glass Desert? I thought I couldn't go into really high-level plates though?” I wondered aloud as we walked. “If you're in-party with someone of a high enough level, I can taxi you to some places you'd otherwise be unable to go on your own. Of course, there are some hard limits. You couldn't get to half the places Fluffy can go, even if she tried to take you there herself. But we'll get this little power-leveling session out of the way and maybe you won't hold us back too much,” Neeku explained. I struggled to discern if I was supposed to be offended by that or not. “Thank you,” I managed. So we went, a plate far to the west of Strattburg's, where I got tucked into a small corner of the map, hidden in the shadow of a rock outcropping amidst the sand dunes. My character stood by idly as, within seconds, I had suddenly jumped several levels all in one go as Neeku's character deftly wiped out monster after monster. All common-tier, of course, since we didn't want to go anywhere that would put me in real danger. In SlideLands, monsters appear in one of five basic tiers: Common, Named, Boss, Raid, and Mega Raid. Common enemies – as the name might suggest – were the ones you would encounter commonly, whereas Named enemies spawn randomly amidst their common brethren for sudden bursts of challenges. Boss monsters usually sat in preset locations on the map and awaited challengers and usually were taken on in full parties of five or six heroes. Raid monsters were super-bosses, residing only in the game's toughest challenges: the dungeons. Raid monsters are much stronger than any other type even if they share the same level – as the name implies several teams full of adventurers pour in their collective skills to defeat these sorts of dungeons and their respective Raid-Boss monsters for high-tier loot. Mega Raids, at this point, I had only seen video of online and they require hundreds of active, high-level players to coordinate fairly well to defeat. Meanwhile, the common practice Neeku had begun undertaking with me, power leveling, was often done to build up new characters to expedite the process so they can play with their friends. My exact feelings on this are a bit mixed, due to my actually appreciating the lore of the game, but at the same time – a leg up this mild couldn't possibly make that big a difference if the max level were something obscene like 99,999 or something even greater than that. In no time, I crested level 200 and Neeku had grown bored with making short work of the local wildlife – and I had grown equally so with this exercise. “Alright, now, take that extra gold and buy yourself better armor. With that, you should be... passable, at least,” Neeku relented his first unambiguous praise upon me and my rabbit-man. “I appreciate the boost,” I admitted. We began making movements towards the exit, but the world around us began to shake, “Wait, what's that?” “We need to run, rookie!” Neeku demanded. “What's happening?” I asked again. “You weren't pushing anything this whole time, right?” “Right, but why?” “It's an anti-idle boss! Damn, I forgot about those!” Neeku hurriedly explained. I'd later learn that, in order to stop excessive camping in certain spots, players who sat in inactive states for long spans of time without any actions taken would summon unusually powerful boss creatures to weed them out. This was apparently a conscious decision to help with server load balancing and to punish idlers and, presumably, people who were doing precisely what we were doing. My mind raced with possibilities: being in the desert biome meant that it was likely something tough, but stylized – perhaps a giant scorpion would be fitting? Or for more of a fantasy flare, it may be a dragon with cacti growing from its hides, I considered. Perhaps the dev staff were fans of British comedy and we'd soon be accosted by a giant, bloodthirsty desert hare. But to my surprise it was none of those things. “Is that a giant crab riding on the back of a giant turtle?” I managed to hastily type in, “Do you need help with this?” “Damn! The King Crustaseanoid and his Regal Terra-pinner!” Neeku declared, “I'll be honest with you. I'm not sure even I got this one, newb!” “Actually, that should be a Queen Crustaseanoid. Male crabs have a triangular shell on their underbelly, while this one is rounded,” I observed. “That's... really not helping!” he took the time out to turn his character to stare mine down coldly. “Sorry,” “Alright, dumbass, stand back and try not to piss anything else off in the meantime!” Neeku ordered, brandishing a strange set of orbs attached to a long staff that I figured must be his weapon of choice. Neeku's avatar whooped with delight as he began bashing the legs of the turtle monster as I backed a safe distance away and quickly took in what new abilities I had unlocked in my sudden leveling-marathon to see if anything I had could help. “Eat balls, turtle!” Neeku challenged, causing me to glance up from my submenu to eyeball this sad, strange man who was really holding his own quite well despite his initial hesitations. After watching this go a bit and seeing that he was easily winning the damage race, I began to relax – this was well in hand despite the strange taunts he issued the idle boss. However, my calm demeanor was shattered when, upon seeing the turtle's HP hit 0, which should have brought the fight to a close, the crab leaped down from its perch and began attacking Neeku – and doing a ton more damage than the turtle could have dreamed of doing. “This is precisely what I was afraid of!” Neeku declared, “I'm running low on Spirit. I'm using it faster than I'm regenerating it! Hope you're ready to see what dying looks like in this game, newb!” A sharp, jabbing feeling crept up within me. It was, technically, my fault we were in this mess. I had to do something. Then I noticed it – an ability in my submenu. Black Iron Castle – a defensive technique that renders the user both invincible and immobile for 8 seconds and draws all nearby enemies' hostility (commonly called aggro) to the user. My class, the Bunker, had just the tool for the job after all. “Hey, Neeku! On my mark, make a run for it!” I ordered, as I watched his health swiftly falling. “You got a plan?!” he shot back. “Something like that, yeah,” I typed as quickly as I could. The cooldown on the ability was a devastating 12 minutes. In terms of active-time combat, that was several eternities atop one another. We'd have one shot to do this just right and if Neeku hesitated at all, the body count would still be two. “No time like the present then!” I declared, “Run, Neeku!” I said, watching my character take on a dark hue and a metallic sheen. I lost the ability to move or use other abilities, but it worked like a dream: the crab lost all interest in the near-dead Neeku and turned to my hero, slashing with its massive pincers as a long string of zeroes appeared above his head, the damage failing to find a home. I admit I didn't have a plan past that. The Bunker only does two things particularly well, and that's anger enemies and take hits. With this handy new tool in my kit, I was at least able to repay Neeku his kindness and cut the casualties in half. As soon as it hit me, maybe even just the one time, I would die. I'd lose anything in my public pouch – a large bag where dungeon loot is placed prior to the player being able to hide it safely in a permanent storage or bank – and half the gold on my character, on top of a small cut to my gained experience points and lastly, be whisked away the nearest cathedral to respawn and begin again. Granted, that would be pretty much every item I had that wasn't currently equipped and quite a bit of time's worth of gold, but I resolved to think better of the situation. I helped someone, so the goal I set out to accomplish was complete. I folded my hands across my stomach and leaned back in my chair and awaited the inevitable. However, much to my surprise, the inevitable never came. I glanced up again after the time for the buff expired only to see a dead crab, upside-down and legs crumpled inward like a squashed spider. My adventurer was very much alive. I leaned towards my monitor to study what had changed, only to see FluffyStar coolly walk into the scene once again. “That was close. I wasn't sure my EarthRock Magnum would kill it completely in one hit, but it did!” she 'said' in the chat, “Are you two okay?” “We are now,” Neeku observed. Letting out a small sigh of relief, I typed back at last, “Yeah. Thanks again!” “Don't mention it. You're a Night Owl in your own right now!” Fluffy commented. The adventure for the evening more or less ended not long after that encounter. Neeku went around the guild building – a space players create and customize for their guildmates – telling everyone about how he toppled an idle boss with only a minor lift from Fluffy. Somehow in his retelling, my saving his nearly-naked butt was left out, but I didn't feel the need to correct him. Tanks and supports don't fill the roles they perform for glory, fame, or adoration – that's what bastard DPS players do. It wasn't long after that our once tight-knit crew began to come apart at the seams. It happened shortly after Fluffy up and disappeared after boasting about her conquest of some high-level quest. One by one, our players began to wander off. Unfortunately, so did I. I got a new job that paid better and had more consistent hours, but it forced me to work mornings, so I rarely got the chance to see anyone from back then. Before I knew it, I sort of fell off from playing the game entirely. There were other games to play, other social groups I interacted with, and other obligations for me to handle. I even had a date set for one particular weekend. I would tell you how it went, if only I had been in attendance myself. I didn't stand her up, though. I woke up one morning, lying at the far edge of a ramshackle town. I stood up slowly, encumbered by the presence of heavy-duty solid steel plate armor covering my every side. Which is strange as I shouldn't need to clarify that I have never in my life slept in such garb. I looked down at my hands, which were massive and covered in equally massive metal gauntlets. I placed one to the side of my head to check for injury but grabbed ahold of a colossal bucket-styled helmet shielding it. I took a step back, physically shocked as the realization fell on me. I looked around me at what was unmistakably Strattburg. The NPCs were there. The random adventurers from all the different clans were present and accounted for. Even the random chickens which used to be background objects clucked merrily along their way as they pecked at the ground in search of feed. “No, this isn't real,” I whispered to myself. I closed my eyes, attempting to will myself awake from this lucid dream I found myself in. Then opened them to see the fantasy land again. I was aware of my own breathing, and my avatar's gear, and the uncomfortable truth of the situation made itself known to me: I was trapped in an MMORPG.

#Photon Breaker Zechs #Through the Window #Action #Fantasy #MMORPG

2 notes · View notes

minyboy · 3 years

Text

I got a request to make some non-muscular male Martial Arts Kids. Well that's as un-buff as I can make a team of crime fighting marital artists. Their scrawny arms are about to fall off. and now bios, but first a word from our sponsors... me! Disclaimer! I wish to assure everyone that all the Martial Arts Kids I make are friends and are friendly towards each other. But they also are human. They are diverse set of characters with different backgrounds, beliefs, and upbringings, yielding unique points of views. That's why we have diversity. Like any group of friends, there will be conflicting points of views, it's not malleolus, it's human. To have the world be perfect and everyone always liking everything everyone else does is bad writing and badly reflects on the creators. So there is no ill intent in the characters, they are just people trying to figure their way in the world just like anyone else. Thank you. Bios from left to right.

Jaymore Holmes (Jay) Age 9:

Jay is a smart but sometimes timid person. He will fight when he must, but often does his best to avoid conflict, and thanks to his creativity and intelligence he’s pretty good at avoiding them. Since he is a 9 year old child, this kind of makes sense. Jay can get very shy at times and stammers when he is nervous, it can make it difficult to talk to him. Jay hides a huge rock collection from his peer, he is too embarrassed to show them for it is incomplete and maybe a bit silly to him. Jay is trying to find his way in the world, but it’s a big and scary place and he’s just a kid.

Likes: playing video games, running, listening to the radio, mayflies, his grandma attending museums, going to the movies, charity work, podcasting, travelling, reading, walking away from the market

Dislikes: the color blue, being outdoors, bugs, open flower fields, loud people, dinosaurs, tea, eating fish and telling bad jokes

Ryan West Age 12:

Ryan used to have a passion for art, but one day seemed to lose all his love for it. He is not wandering from place to place in life trying to find a new passion (besides the Martial Arts Kids, of course). He's a brave boy, kind, caring to his fellow humans, but he often has a bit of distrust toward them and snakes around people he can. When he can’t he can become very grumpy when talking to anyone for too long. For some reason he blinks excessively and is always on the lookout for… something. Sharon Briggs keeps on trying to set his single dad on random dates. It’s a kind thing, but she’s not very good at it because she just chooses at random. He appreciates it, even if it makes him concerned from time to time . Ryan has a poor judgement of character and often misunderstands or makes incorrect presumptions, which can lead to trouble. Ryan is a kind, brave person, but wishes to find his purpose in life without too much social discomfort.

Likes: butterflies, boxing, Sharon, barges, art, waking up early, bees, birds, talking cows, crystal balls, his mom, volcanoes, extinct animals and wandering around aimlessly all day long laughing.

Dislikes: horror books, his art, Valentines Day, Shakespeare, cosmetology, Nightwing’s red costume, squids, indie music, Sherlock Holmes later books and guitars.

Ziggy Williamson Age 14:

Lab technician by day, surfer dude by afternoon, he goes to bed at night. When Ziggy’s not surfing the afternoon away or kicking bad guys' butts, he helps Nunu in her laboratory as a technician. While he works more on the biological side of things he does have an interest in the machines he uses and that’s why he partners up with Nunu. She can be cold to him but they work well together and enjoy each other's company, usually. But one can not be friendly to another all the time, that would be pure madness or pure apathy. Ziggy is a more laid back dude but He has big hopes and dreams for this future, but very few believe he wants to do anything about them. Sadly sometimes he believes these people. Nunu is some of the few people who believes in him, or at least what he creates. Ziggy hosts a local surfing club with numbers like Aina, Maeve and Celesta. He wishes to use what he learns to help fight evil and clean up the local beaches, then he plans to sell his inventions for profit. Most don’t take him seriously, but he’ll work hard to one day prove them wrong, or right.

Likes: wild life, swamp scum, Nunu, traffic signs, people with manners, inactivity, surfing, the beach!, strategy games, lizards, and waking up early.

Dislikes: magic shows, noses, patterned socks, long fingernails, cold days, hard work, not beginning believed in, his will power, blepharism, and willow trees.

Myong Si-U Age 16:

Myong is a young aspiring film director, but he has not filmed anything… yet. He has many plans for stories he wants to tell and he wants big local names in them, like Kerry and River. Not Brandy, for she is too popular and legendary for him to have a chance, or so he thinks. Myong comes from a poor family, he lives with his uncle and aunt because his parents passed away at an early age. He is friendly to all he can, trying his best to make the best impression on everyone, for that is the best way, it’s not what you know, it’s who you know. He plans to know all the important people, if they like it or not. Myong has a severe phobia of sharks, no one knows why, he loves to go swimming often, but he can’t stop talking about them in horror when they are mentioned. Coming from a poor background Myong will do anything to get ahead and that can make him very untrustworthy and a bit standoffish. He wants to make his dreams come true, but can Myong not stare in the abyss to do so?

Likes: movies, Kerry, musicals, dandelions, shiny things, sandwiches, camera, getting free stuff the movie Treasure Island, Christmas, extravagant period clothes from the 1870’s, oceanography and Dominos Pizza.

Dislikes: sharks, being ignored, his teacher Ms. Quinn, stand-up comedy, hot water, candy-making, stories about plucky young magic-users, purple bread, candles and sharks.

Oliver Canmore (Ollie) Age 18:

Ollie is a immigrant from Belgium, he moved from a younger age. He is a very calm person, he speaks the same despite being angry, upset, happy, etc. often looked at by other members as a big brother. Ollie has a passion for cooking and soap making. They often spend their free time making soap. When he’s not being creative or kicking butt he is a groupie of Brandy, for she has many groupies. In fact Brandy sometimes loses track of who is her groupie and Ollie can feel that. Ollie will defend Brandy from any criticism and will look out for the other members, often looked upon as the big bother of the group, he can never escape that image and he’s ok with that even with River’s friendly teasing of it. Ollie has trouble focusing on one thing and often aimlessly goes from one passion to the next never truly mastering any one of them. Ollie is kind and has many passions, but can he focus on something that matters to him or forever stay adrift on the Lost Potential Sea?

Likes: Brandy, duh, sound of a ticking clock, deep sea diving, cooking, singing, caring for people, soap, shampoos, Skyrim, parasols, fast cars, breakdancing and snow globes.

Dislikes: hand fans, fantasy books from the 1940’s,sensation of heavy bass, fireworks, loud noises in general, manga, gnomes, musicals, and the sensation of the color yellow.

0 notes

aion-rsa · 3 years

Text

Why Werewolves Within Isn’t Your Typical Werewolf Movie

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

The small town of Beaverfield is much like many others across the nation in 2021. There is political polarization, longtime residents suspicious of newcomers, a stark wealth gap, infidelity, gossip, and at least one guy who is either a scary loner or just wants to be left the hell alone. But in the new film Werewolves Within what really sets Beaverfield apart is their lycanthrope problem.

Based loosely on the multiplayer Ubisoft VR game of the same name, the film — which is now playing in theaters and hits Digital Rental & VOD on July 2 — is a horror-comedy whodunit where a handful of locals are locked down during a winter storm while a monster hides amongst them.

Directed by Josh Ruben (Scare Me) with a script by novelist Mishna Wolff (I’m Down), Werewolves Within shares cinematic DNA with Clue and Knives Out on the mystery side, as well as The Thing and An American Werewolf in London on the horror end, with a little Fargo thrown in for good measure.

The audience enters the world of Beaverfield through the POV of plucky pushover Finn (Sam Richardson from Veep), the new forest ranger in town before introducing Cecily (Milana Vayntrub, Die Hart), a welcoming postal worker hungry for a new person to meet. Through her, a cast of quirky townsfolk come into focus as the storm approaches, and everyone bickers over the proposed oil pipeline that will bring in big money but is environmentally devastating. And that’s before the corpse is discovered.

What makes the mystery of Werewolves Within especially fun is Beaverfield’s residents are played by a roster of character actors who bounce off one another in the way the cast of Clue did: Harvey Guillén (What We Do In The Shadows), George Basil (Crashing), Sarah Burns (Barry), Michael Chernus (Tommy), Catherine Curtin (Orange is the New Black), Wayne Duvall (The Hunt), Rebecca Henderson (Russian Doll), Cheyenne Jackson (30 Rock), Michaela Watkins (Brittany Runs A Marathon), Glenn Fleshler (True Detective).

Ruben and Wolff joined Den of Geek for a Paranormal Pop Culture Hour to discuss their collaboration on the video game adaptation. In the following interview, they likewise talk of a shared love of werewolf flicks, as well as why murder mysteries and creature features go hand-in-paw.

Note: Quotes edited lightly for clarity and length

What were the werewolves you loved growing up? Mishna, since your last name is Wolff, I think that entitles you to go first.

Mishna Wolff: There’s so many. Joe Dante’s The Howling, for sure. Definitely Wolfen, starring Albert Finney. That’s a great werewolf story. He’s actually wasted in that movie, as well. I would say Silver Bullet has a fun kids’ story in it.

Obviously, An American Werewolf in London, but I was always like, “More decaying humans! Can we get more decaying humans on the screen?” I feel like he uses them so sparingly. I could’ve done twice as many decaying humans.

Josh, what scratched your lycanthropic itch?

Josh Ruben: Clawed, even. I mean, the first one that really hit me was the guy in Monster Squad. He was a blue collar, everyday fellow who you really seem to feel his excruciating pain and torment, and that really hit me. There was something about the kids that kind of went after all the entities in that movie, but the werewolf in that one was particularly terrifying, and so much of it came through his performance. I think between him and the one in Silver Bullet, ridiculous as it ultimately ended up looking, that is a dreadful — as in a good dreadful — terrifying film. It really felt like what would really happen if you and your drunk uncle had to take on a lycan.

Later in life, my most recent favorite is Late Phases. I think that movie is so good. It’s so brilliant, and it’s also a Hudson Valley production. I was shocked by how much I loved that one. That’s a new fave.

Video game adaptations are so often not very good movies. So what was your approach? Was it to just sort of toss away the entire game? What elements do you think were important to preserve from the VR game?

Mishna Wolff: The feel. I mean, I feel like that was always the thing. All screenwriters who you talk to about adaptations, and they talk about, “What do you owe the source material?” I think you owe it the feel, and I feel like certainly, in the midpoint of the movie, when everyone’s huddled in the inn and they’re trying to ferret out who the werewolf is, it does feel like that video game, even though it’s a different era.

How did you set out to play with archetypes and the role women often play in these films?

Mishna Wolff: The movie started out with a lot of thinking about archetypes. I happen to love movies with pretty clearly-drawn archetypes. I like archetypes. I feel like it’s reassuring when you walk into a movie and you feel like “Oh, I know who that guy is.”

I like upsetting archetypes and having little things be different about the archetype than you expect, but feminism certainly plays a role in those archetypes and women in film haven’t always been given life and death stakes, so that was a huge thing that I was thinking of.

Josh, in Scare Me, there is a werewolf sequence. Was that in a strange way, a being a bit of an audition of sorts for Werewolves Within as your second feature?

Josh Ruben: I think it ended up being the case in Scare Me because it is the creature that freaks me out the most and that story, silly as it is, the first one out in Scare Me, is an idea I’ve had in the back of my head forever that just kind of collects cobwebs. It’s all crazy coincidence, and I’m happy to find my brand in recessed shadows, creatures in the dark and quirky, emasculated human beings. I think I’d be fine to tell those stories again and again.

Why do werewolves and murder mysteries pair well?

Josh Ruben: Going back to Silver Bullet, you have that priest character who, once it was revealed he was the big bad, it became that digging your fingernails into your knees, like “Oh my God, they have no idea they’re in the presence of this awful thing.” That’s terrifying, more so than a vampire or pretty much anything else. It’s the true movie monster, where they can walk amongst us during the day and be our brother, best friend, mother, father, whatever, but turn out to be the most violent thing, and terrifying thing imaginable.

And we can all have a monster within?

Josh Ruben: It makes sense, in the allegory of it all. In a film like this, everyone can be implicated. The allegory and theme of it all is, we all have violent, dreadful thoughts every once in a while when pushed to our limits. Even Sam’s character, as wonderful a protagonist as he is, he’s pushed to his limit, as well. Every character could have reason to be a werewolf, hence the wonderful mystery of it all, but it played lockstep for me. It’s a testament to Mishna’s incredible work. I just opened it and was just like, this feels like Arachnophobia and Fargo.

Sam Richardson’s Finn is the new ranger in town and he’s a nice guy. But there’s the notion that either nice guys finish last, or nice guys are too good to be true. So why are we so against nice guys?

Mishna Wolff: Well, yeah, a person can be too good to be true. There’s a couple of nice guys in this movie that are suspicious, and the reason Finn is such a nice guy is because the movie that we fashioned is his worst nightmare. He’s afraid of conflict, he’s a nice guy and he’s about to enter the epicenter of meanness. This movie’s designed to torture him and break him, and it almost does.

Josh Ruben: Nice guys have werewolves within them, mean guys have werewolves within them. Oh, it’s just fascinating to play with the archetype because I think Bundy was a nice guy, at least in his circle, and Gacy, so it’s fun to play with those kind of expectations. There’s a wonderful moment, without giving anything away, where even this wonderful protagonist reaches a breaking point where he has to match everyone else and it should raise the question “Well, shit, could it be the nicest character of all?”

Was there any version of this movie where there may not have been an actual werewolf?

Mishna Wolff: No. I thought about going there and just having it be more cerebral and meta, but I always start everything with the end in mind. Josh was super collaborative, and he had some tweaks on the ending. The werewolf is the werewolf, and that didn’t change, but he made some really nice changes to the ending and I thought it worked really quite well.

Josh, what did you discover about the challenges of tackling a werewolf movie where you’re ultimately going to have to show the monster?

Josh Ruben: When it came down to the werewolf, it’s like, “Well, we don’t need to see skin breaking, we know what this is going to be, we can evoke that visceral transformation and the terror of it all, but let’s just get to it.” At that point, when it came to the werewolf itself, it was nothing too extravagant. It was just like, “Oh shit, this is going to happen.”

Also, within the mythology of this character and this thing, and how fast it killed, it was fun to think about it having control over its changing as part of its, again, mythology and how it went about its business.

Mishna Wolff: That was such a conversation in the room, too, about, “Can it control? It can’t control? How come it can control? What kind of … ” It’s like “Doesn’t matter. Trust me.”

Josh Ruben: No one will be writing mean letters if they’re along for the ride, if they feel taken care of, whether the claws retract or extend, whether they change quickly or not, it’s just got to be a fun ride.

Mishna Wolff: I think the creature features that Josh and I grew up loving were always done a little bit on the cheap with the exception of maybe The Thing and Alien, which were really crazy expensive, but I think that’s part of the fun of the creature feature, to me at least

Josh, with Scare Me, you used the word “incel,” which you filmed before it was part of our lexicon. Now, this is neighbor against neighbor, people are either hiding the truth or rejecting it, and there is the idea that being grouped together can lead to your own death. You could not have predicted the relevancy of this, so how is it landing for you now?

Josh Ruben: It’s pretty phenomenal when people like Michaela Watkins improvise a line like “Antifa.” You think “Oh, that’s going to be the shelf-life joke that will end up on the cutting room floor.” And no, it remains to be one of the more relevant pieces of the film and of this character.

I mean, she’s a Karen. She was a Karen before the Karen thing. With incel, it’s funny, too, because Aya Cash was the first one. She improvised that line, “What are you, an incel?” I didn’t know what the word meant and Fred quite was.

It’s unfortunate how relevant it is, but I’m thrilled that it is because I’d like to think that the film is a ride so, hopefully, regardless of what people take away from it, regardless of the relevance of it all, I’d like to think that it’s coming out at a time where, after the trauma of it all, from the insurrect-y through the pandem-y, that people can at least forget the trauma of the past 16 and a half months and sort of go for the ride. We’re offering less bleak fare; we’re offering more fun fare coming out of this dark chapter, but it’s both wonderful and terrifying that it’s so relevant and will remain to be. There will always be people who are narrow-minded in small corners of the world and narrow-minded in the most liberal corners of the world, as well. The newcomers are no better than the townies, in some cases, in many cases in the film. Mishna Wolff: I think we were banking that people would be ready to laugh at everything that’s gone on, at this point, that people would be ready … Can we make fun of it now? Is it too soon? No?

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Werewolves Within is in theaters now, and will be available on Digital Rental & VOD July 2, 2021

The post Why Werewolves Within Isn’t Your Typical Werewolf Movie appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3haodRW

#aion-rsa #Den of Geek

1 note · View note

dpargyle · 6 years

Text

Thoughts on the Last Jedi

OMGs so many spoilers!!!!! Also it gets a lil NSFW and super dweeby at the end…. (proceed at your own risk)

So I just got back from The Last Jedi and -

I have so many EMOTIONS!!!

Lemme at least attempt to go through this chronologically…

“The First Order reigns.” I got goosebumps from that opening sentence of the opening crawl. It was like, yup – pretty much the feeling in the real world rn too hahahaha *sobs*

That whole opening space battle scene – ahhhh!!!! I loved so much about it – I especially loved how quickly Rian Johnson (the writer/director) was able to establish Paige Tico’s character – make the audience care about her and then boom she’s gone and I knew she was a goner as soon as they introduced her at Celebration but still it hit me right in the feels – like damn the sacrifices the Resistance is forced to make

At long last we got back to Rey and Luke on Ahch-To and I love how he doesn’t even say anything – he just flips the lightsaber over his shoulder like “thanks, I hate this!”

And then Rey follows him around like an adorable lost puppy for days and days and days and I was like awwww!

Speaking of which – I really liked how Daisy Ridley played Rey this time around – not so naïve (although I loved happy go-lucky, plucky Rey from the Force Awakens) – but she’s grown now – she’s seen some shit – and so as a result her character is a little more galaxy-wise and wary – which I think fits – though we see some of that lighter Rey sprinkled throughout the narrative – the “reach out” moment which I thought was pretty damn hilarious…

As for the new characters – oh my – how I love Rose. She’s this fan girl who’s suddenly grieving and then one of her heroes shows up and she’s all ready to fangirl but then he severely disappoints her but she doesn’t even hesitate – she stuns him – like yeah, she’s excitable and incredibly sad but she’s still gonna do her damn job and I loved it. And we see her grow and mature throughout the film and learn to trust Finn again – and the end where she saves him and then she says “we can’t fight what we hate – we have to save what we love” and then she snogs him and I was like HELLLS YES! What a bad. Ass. Character.. I love her. #protec I already liked the sorts of things Kelly Marie Tran was saying from the press tour – but she brought this character to life and now I have EMOTIONS.

So yeah, I’m totally on the FinnRose ship now since Disney are cowards and Stormpilot is never gonna be a thing ☹ (though I did appreciate when Finn and Poe finally meet up again Finn literally squirts on Finn lmao (I’m sorry I have a dirty mind!) so I think that’s the closest we’re ever gonna get hahaha)

I loved how Canto Bight really illustrated this incredible gap between rich and poor – so similar in our own world right now – and Rose’s rage at this injustice – “I just wanna punch straight through this beautiful, ugly terrible town.” (First off – what a line. Second off that sounds like something Leslie Knope might say hahahaha) Rose was given some of the best and most poignant lines.

Also – the focus on the little children slaves – fuck, that was crushing. And the Fathiers – how their coats were bleeding from the whips and the lashes – damn all so heartbreaking. I’ll get back to the little slave boy at the end – as I think there’s so much going on in that final scene.

Back to the Force montage on Ahch-To with Luke & Rey – damn I love how Johnson elaborated on the Force – showing us what Rey was seeing – such beauty. Such resonance. Kinda reminded me of those BBC nature documentaries (The Planet, etc…) – the beauty and savagery of nature – personified in the Force – ughh so frikken powerful.

As for Luke – his scene with Artoo was the best. Artoo shows him young Leia pleading for Obi-Wan and Luke’s all like “you’re not playing fair” and Artoo basically gives him this shit eating grin and oh gods so good – this is why Artoo continues to be my fave. Character. He is the best. Doesn’t even have to say anything. Like yes! Damn! Ughhh!

Then Luke’s scene with Yoda’s force ghost!!! As soon as you saw that little profile and the ears I was internally going like !@@!#$%&^%!@#$%%@$ and then he just blows up the tree like HaShem in Exodus and you’re like lmao – and he literally tells Luke “Rey has all the knowledge from the Jedi Texts with her already” – then if you fast forward all the way to the very end of the movie when everyone is on the Falcon – Finn is rummaging through a bunch of drawers and if you blinked you missed them – but the texts were in there! Rey up and stole them hahaha – amazing! And Yoda knew too! Ugghhhhhhh I love these characters!

Alright. Now on to the really big stuff.

Holy crap. Snoke is dead. HAHAHAHA! Ren turned out to be the BIG BAD of this trilogy. I guess I shoulda seen that coming, but tbh I was absolutely gut-wrenched. I thought he and Rey would join forces and become gray force users and have babies and it would be beautiful, but it was not to be. When they were fighting Snoke’s red guards I thought that would happen but then Ren is so full of hate and greed he can’t see anything else – he’s dead inside. He can’t see a path to redemption. He doesn’t even ask for forgiveness.

Yes, I know – for the last several months I have been a Reylo. I really wanted them to get together. And when they were force-touching hands I really thought they would – but then this asshole goes and

Decides to tell Rey she’s nothing???? Like what? No. No, no, no. You don’t tell someone they’re trash but they mean everything to you. Like I sorta get what he’s trying to say but he’s being super manipulative. Is that what gaslighting is?

Like fine you murdered Han Solo. You blew up Akbar. AKBAR! But you will not insult Rey. No. That is crossing a line. Maybe he wasn’t even consciously doing it – maybe he thought he was praising her – but really he was just trying to convince her she’s nothing without him. He allowed his rage to rule him.

I’m sorry people who still might see them together – but I no longer do. Rey doesn’t need Kylo’s bullshit. She gave him a chance at redemption and he denied her. She realized she can’t save him – and I think that’s an incredibly valuable lesson to teach young girls.

I’m sorry if that offends some people on the Tumblrs – and you’re totally entitled to your opinion – I’m not gonna be a dick about it (it’s not my way) – but respect that I’ve changed my mind.

As a side note – I think it’s kind of hilarious how whoever the hell Snoke was and who Rey’s parents were don’t even matter! All those theories! All the mental anguish we put into discovering how everything connects to older characters! But it doesn’t. Ha! We deserve it!

Luke made a mistake trying to take out Kylo, no doubt, but Kylo has to be responsible for his own actions. I think that’s what Johnson was trying to say – sure he might have been neglected, abused, and then manipulated by Snoke – but ultimately he had the power to choose – and like so many young men in this day and age – Ben has chosen hate. Rey has chosen hope.

And I choose Rey’s path.

The darkness might reign right now. But the light is strong. And it can burn in us all, if only we allow it to ignite within us.

Sure, the Jedi have a legacy of failure. But as Yoda said, “Failure is the best teacher.” Don’t I know it. Failure is painful. Failure sucks. But that doesn’t mean we burn it all down. We can rebuild. We can grow. We can make new the old.

The Jedi can live again.

And that gives me great hope, kids.

Great Hope.

And now, Luke and Leia.

I….

I can’t even…

This woulda been emotional enough with Carrie Fisher still with us – but now that she’s gone…

“Nobody’s really gone.” – Luke. That last conversation – just the two of them – Oh man, I’m not a crier but sometimes I wish I was. So powerful. So important. So cathartic. Funny. Sad. Bittersweet reconciliation. Imperfect people, imperfect goodbye – but a perfect scene.

I feel like we all needed that. Or I did anyway.

And then….Luke dies.

Luke dies?

Luke Skywalker. Is gone.

What? No! How?

Feels like I’ve known him my whole life – cuz I have. Like he’s a real person and the myth he became all at once. Who was one of the ones who taught us the power of forgiveness. To let go of hate.

And now he’s gone?

I know, I know, I sound ridiculous – he’s not a real person and it’s just a movie and you’re probably all rolling your eyes and saying “bundles you’re being such a dweeb rn” but damn it! stories matter. Characters matter. Words matter. Words have power.

Star Wars is a great myth of our time. The saga of the Skywalkers is our Arthuriana. From Anakin to Rey – this is our Trojan War. Luke is our Achilles.

And now he’s gone? When he disappeared watching those two setting suns (gods what great cinematography) it was like a gut punch. Like fuuuuuuuuuuuuck what now?

How do we go on?

I think Johnson gives us an answer – look to the past – look to the future – to the balance – to the cycle –

Which brings me to that final poignant scene -

The slave boy on Canto Bight. As with Anakin Skywalker all those years ago – he’s a force user (pulling that broom to his hand ala Mickey Mouse in Fantasia) and he’s staring up at the stars and dreaming….he embodies, with his phoenix-inspired Rebel insignia ring – the rebirth of hope – of the rebellion – of the resistance – of the beautiful broken dream that were the Jedi – he is Johnson. He is all of us. From Anakin all the way to this slave boy. And the story repeats. The cycle continues.

The myth lives on. Hope lives on. And if the myth lives on, well then so does Luke – “nobody’s really gone…”

I love Star Wars.

I love stories.

#star wars #sw #the last jedi #tlj #last jedi #rey #luke #luke skywalker #leia #carrie fisher #anakin #myths #mythology #rian johnson #luminous beings & bad feelings

6 notes · View notes

blueboxesandtrafficcones · 7 years

Text

A Whole New World

TenToo and Rose explore Disney World’s Magic Kingdom in Pete’s World, while debating which Disney couple’s costume would be most appropriate.

For @doctorroseprompts and @timepetalsprompts for Ten’s month and fall/Halloween.

Can you guess where I spent my Friday?

AO3

“Ready!” Rose bounded into the console room, dressed casually in a t-shirt, shorts, and trainers as the Doctor had suggested.

“Excellent.” He beamed at her, before beckoning her over to the door.

“So, are you going to tell me where we are?” She bounced on the balls of her feet, excited for the day ahead. After the exhilarating few weeks they’d had exploring other planets and times, he’d promised a fun-filled day on Earth.

“Nope!” As always, he popped the ‘p’, as giddy and ready as she was. “Close your eyes.” He ordered, and she did.

He carefully covered her eyes with one hand, walking her out the door of the ship and pulling it closed behind him.

He positioned them for the most dramatic effect, then let them stand there, taking in the noise and bustle without letting her see where they were, for several long moments, before he leaned down to half-sing in her ear, “I can show you the world, shining, shimmering splendid. Tell me princess, now when did you last let your heart decide.”

Her heart stopped before beating double-time, so captivated by his voice whispering in her ear she almost missed the lyrics. When that processed, she gasped, and the Doctor let his hand fall from her eyes to wrap around her waist as her eyes flew open to take in Cinderella’s castle standing tall at the end of Main Street.

“No!” She spun, eyes bright with excitement.

“Ask and ye shall receive, Rose Tyler.” He grinned down at her, more than pleased with her reaction. She’d only briefly mentioned a few days before that she’d always wanted to go to Disney World, and he’d made a mental note to take her next time she wanted a break from their whirlwind honeymoon/maiden voyage on their fledgling TARDIS.

“Oh, thank you!” She threw her arms around him, and he held her close.

“Ready to explore?” He asked after several long moments, and she slowly pulled away.

“Absolutely!” He couldn’t help but take in how beautiful Rose looked, bouncing in place like a kid, beaming smile and bright eyes.

“Allons-y!” He crowed, though he jerked her to a stop after only several steps.

“What?”

“No, hang on, wait, it’s in here somewhere…” He dug through his pockets with one hand, the other still clasped tightly with Rose’s.

“Aha!” With a triumphant shout, he pulled out two matching sets of mouse ears, one black and decorated like a tuxedo, the other white with a small tiara and a veil.

“Are those…”

“Matching bride and groom ears! I figured if we’re going to do this, do it all the way, yeah?” He jammed his own onto his head, before handing Rose hers.

Giggling, she carefully put it on, though the veil got twisted and ended up flipped up in front.

“Ah, ah, ah…” He carefully untwisted it, before brushing it back over her head.

When he revealed her grin, it was so reminiscent of the same on their wedding day he couldn’t help but lean down to kiss her.

Their mutual giggles made that somewhat difficult, however, and he gave up after only a moment.

“So?” She waited expectantly, sure that there was a story.

“So…” He drew the word out to tease her. Her eyes and nose crinkled adorably, but couldn’t fully squash the smile. “It is October 30th, 2017, and we, my love, are standing on Main Street USA in Disney World.”

The Doctor looked so handsome, standing there in his own t-shirt and shorts, the ridiculous ears on his head, beaming as proud as he had at every new location and experience to which he’d ever taken her. If anyone asked, she’d blame it on being newlyweds, but the joy within her to know that he was hers, for a shared forever was too overwhelming; Rose threw herself back into his arms, laying a rather spectacular, if inappropriate, kiss on him.

“Get a room!” An unseen man called with a laugh, and they broke apart.

“Right.” Dazed, and slightly breathless, it took the Doctor a few long blinks to come back to himself. He sent only one longing look back towards the TARDIS, parked innocuously besides the fire station, before putting on what Rose called his ‘tour guide’ voice. “So. In 19-”

“No.” She interrupted, holding up a hand, not even looking at him as she gazed around in wonder, eyes wide. “This is Disney World.”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t want to know.” She said firmly.

“Know what?”

She finally looked at him, taking in his confused, almost hurt look. “The history. I don’t want to know when he got the idea, or how it happened, or, at the moment, what part you played in it back in our original universe. I’m in Disney World, something I honestly never expected to see – please, can we just experience the magic?”

He’d long since accepted he couldn’t say no to her, so he didn’t hesitate to nod.

“Absolutely. What the lady wants, the lady gets. And what does the lady want?”

“Uh…” She looked around, seeing most of the people streaming down Main Street towards the Castle. “Can we go explore? ��What are the best things to do? Do you have a map?”

He pulled one from his pocket, handing it to her with a smile. “Now, what do you say we go check out that castle?”

Two hours later, they were waiting in line for Space Mountain. The Doctor, never able to resist sharing information, was giving her a detailed description of each section of the park, only to notice Rose was staring at him with that odd grin on her face.

“What?” He interrupted himself midsentence.

“Nothin’. S’just, standing here, with you – this is amazing. I still can’t believe we get this kind of life.” She murmured, and he grinned at her.

“Me neither.”

She grinned back, before pulling him into her side.

“Wha-”

“Selfie.” She explained unnecessarily, holding her phone out in front of her to take the picture.

“Why? Rose, we’re not in front of anything – you can’t see the castle, or any of the ride signs, there’s no characters – it’s just us!” He protested, faux-glaring down at her.

She shrugged. “Exactly. That’s all I need – us. Everything else’s just a bonus. Plus, there is no such as thing as too many pictures of you in those ears.”

Rather than argue with her, he leaned down to kiss her.

“I love you, Rose Tyler.” He told her seriously, and she smiled back at him.

“This really is the happiest place on Earth.”

“You are the happiest place on Earth.” He corrected.

She rolled her eyes, not bothering to hide how pleased she was at the cheesy comment.

“So, there’s a Halloween party here tonight?”

“Every night, since August. That’s at 7 – we’ll go change into costumes then. Start thinking about what you want to be.” He told her, and she tilted her head in thought.

“How about – the Doctor and Rose Tyler, the stuff of legends?” She said cheekily, and he laughed.

“If you want – or, we could get dressed characters. The new girl’s planning on spending the day learning all about this place, so by the time we go back she should have whatever kind of costume you like ready.”

“Like Chip and Dale?” She asked innocently.

“Of course. Or a couple from a movie – I’d certainly like to see you dressed up at Jasmine.” He told her, looking her up and down with mock-seriousness.

“Really? I thought Belle and the Beast would be more appropriate.” Rose teased him.

“What d’you mean? Aladdin’s totally us – A Whole New World? Have you heard that song? Us.” He argued playfully.

“Nope. Beauty and the Beast.”

“Hah! How?”

She stared at him in amusement. “‘Have you seen the movie?’” She mocked. “Handsome man gets cursed to an ‘ugly beast’, mopes about for years growling at anyone who comes near, meets a plucky young girl who sees past the beast to the wounded soul inside, accidentally gets him killed, and then in a golden magical light he transforms back into a handsome young man? And at the end, she asks, if not that he could change back, if he could at least take steps to look a bit more like his old self? That doesn’t sound familiar?”

He opened his mouth to argue, then paused.

“How’d you know I was handsome before I was all big ears?”

Curiously, she immediately blushed and averted her eyes. “Uh, long story. Met you on a jump. Very Victorian looking – cravat, curly hair, velvet suit.”

He stared at her in amazement, hardly noticing the line moving. “You’re incredible, you are.”

She grinned cheekily, cheeks still red. “So you admit I’m right?”

He made a noise, idly scratching his cheek. “Little Mermaid maybe?”

She scoffed. “You just want to see me in the clamshell bikini top.” She accused, and he was unrepentant.

“Possibly. Though, there was that whole one crying over the statue of the other thing…” He realized his slip up immediately, eyes widening.

“Doctor! Did you cry over the statue?” She gasped, touched at the thought.

“No!” He squeaked, tugging on his ear. “Maybe a little. To be fair, I thought I’d got you killed.”

She pursed her lips in amusement. “All right, I’m going to need more of that story later, but for now I’m going to say ‘no’.”

“Then what’s your idea?” He crossed his arms, enjoying their little game as they moved along.

“Alice in Wonderland?”

His brow furrowed. “But who would I be?” She merely stared at him, waiting for him to guess. “Oh, not the white rabbit!” He groaned, remembering the one who would constantly worry about being late.

“What about Robin Hood?” He suggested instead.

“Eh, not as fun an idea now that we’ve met them.” She decided, thinking back to only the week before when they’d stumbled upon Robin of all people. Robin had of course flirted, and while she hadn’t been interested, the Doctor’s jealous streak had been awakened and it had been amusing to watch, when it wasn’t almost getting them killed.

“Peter Pan? “ She offered, before smirking. “Nah, never mind. The falling from Big Ben thing would make it more appropriate with Jack.”

He rolled his eyes, ignoring the Captain. “Popeye?” He flexed, and Rose burst out laughing.

“No. Oh, I know! Lady and the Tramp?”

He pouted in response, but before he could say anything it was their turn to ride.

“Ready?” This time, it was Rose waiting at the TARDIS doors for the Doctor, dressed in her costume.

“Yeah.” He gamely stepped into the console room, dressed in his costume. Though, when Rose gave him that smile and slowly ran her eyes over him, he perked up a bit, puffing out his chest.

“Shall we?”

“We shall, my love.” He gallantly offered her his arm, they stepped back out into the park.

Armed with a map, the satchel completing his costume, and the frying pan completing hers, Rapunzel and Flynn Ryder set out to experience the magic of Halloween at Disney.

#bbatcfic #doctorroseprompts #timepetalscollective #ficandchips #doctor who #tentooxrose #TenToo #rose tyler #a whole new world #disney world

34 notes · View notes

runtosleepdreamer · 7 years

Text

Supernatural Survey 😊

Got tagged by @cas-watches-over-you - dude thanks so much for tagging me this was pretty darn fun and awesome!! 😘 1. What season did you start watching Supernatural?  I actually have no idea… I don’t even remember the proper story anymore cuz despite it not being several years it was still quite a few years ago when I was still in.. middle school perhaps? That my school mates were talking about it and I asked my elder sibling who showed me random episodes, going by the least violent ones so I wouldn’t get nightmares.. so yeah I have no idea what season I first saw or what season was out exactly when I began watching random episodes. I only stared watching properly since last year 2. Who was the first character you fell in love with?  Sam… he’s such a goddamn puppy that it’s hard not to like him!!! 3. Who was a character that you hated at first but grew to love?:  Omg so many. I remember making a post about how the writers kill iff characters that were initially annoying but right as they started growing on us - bam. Dead But ok maybe the first example was Bela… she actually was of course starting to grow o me by the time she died.. but the character that comes most immediately to mind because of how strongly I hated them… was Rowena. God she had been simply infuriating - I hated her so much for manipulating Crowley and threatening whatever good relationship he had with the Winchesters, that I wished she would die… but then come season 11 I fell absolutely I love with the woman 4. Which character would you most want to be in a long-term relationship with?  Eep I have no fucking idea… fuck idk.. mm I never during my daydreams imagine myself with my fictional characters but if I had to choose… ugh maybe. Ok Dean is loyal and Sam is a puppy but idk it feels weird coming in between them… Cass is pretty amazing but… ugh fuck it maybe oh ok why not.. Charlie? Yeah. Charlie for sure, she’s amazing, pretty damn amazing with technology, I sure as hell wouldn’t mind her teaching me how to hack or everything about Star Trek or whatnot, seeing as I’ve never watched them (le gasp, the outrage! I know I know) Or hell maybe even Sam cuz he’s pretty soft and everything (but also great in bed obviously) idk I can’t imagine myself with Dean cuz he would be more awesome with someone who can actually take care of themselves for real you know? Whereas Sam has always paired nicely with women in a domestic life - though they did end up dying… gah idk 🤷‍♀️ 5. If you could go on a date with just one character, which one would you choose?: Dean. Easily Dean there, cuz even if it’s one date, I’m sure he’ll make it worth it, sexy or not because he’s a damn attentive guy.. 6. What would you do on that date?  A first date or like after a few? Cuz if it’s after a few I wouldn’t mind a nature hike cuz goddamn do I love those… but for a first Idk I’d feel too self conscious. Maybe a good movie… maybe the beach… some cuddles and some good food and talking quietly to each other in the night under the moon and stars with a soft breeze 😊 7. Which character would you most want to be like?:  Hm. Any strong female roles out there? Yeah that seriously narrows it down but real talk.. I’m torn between Charlie and Rowena.. ugh maybe Charlie. She’s pretty amazing and nice and fun… though I honest to god can’t imagine myself ever LARPing… 8. Which character would you most want to see brought back from the dead?:  Right now, Castiel. But since (SPOILERS duh) we already know he’s coming back… Crowley!!!! 9. Which character would you most like to punch?:  Oh that’s a long list there buddy. Uh. Lucifer? Yeah. As of the season 12 finale.. definitely Lucifer. 10. Who is your absolute favorite character?:  Dean 😁😍😘 11. Which “Big Bad” do you think was the worst?:  uh torn between Amara and Metatron. God I kinda hated season 11 because of her, it was a bit of a drag to get through but god Metatron was so. Damn. Annoying. 12. Which character are you most like?:  Oh god I have no idea, they’re all way too amazing people for me to compare with them. Uhhh maybe… eep Idk Lisa? 😕 idk I’m not even sure if I’m brave much tbh but if not her then.. idk maybe Chuck before the end of season 5? 😐 idk 13. What death hit you the hardest?  Honestly because I kinda already knew about everyone who was going to die until season 12, because like I had to catch up with the show and that meant big watching 11 seasons before the 12th came out. So that means 11 seasons f knowing who already dies for the most part… but I guess.. ok Charlie, idr if I knew she died but it hurt me a lot because I hated the fact that she died, and even more so what it did to the boys. And then every time Dean died, mainly seasons 3 and 9’s finale, and goddamn how broken up Sam got about it at those times… fuck those killed me but I guess they were more of the heart wrenching scenes then death specifically that hurt me.  But of course. Cass. Cuz I had obviously. So. Not. Seen. It. Coming. I barely managed I avoid screaming and after… it took me a couple of hours to even remotely get to mouth shut 14. What season finale hit you the hardest?:  Season 9 and 12, reasons stated above^^^ especially 12 cuz hiatus!!!!! 15. What are your ten all-time favorite episodes?:  well fuck me cuz now I gotta most likely look up the names of the episodes Mm.  First one easily is season 9 episode 13 the purge (thanks google) because of how it ended. Ok Ima stop there cause season 9 was an emotional turmoil that I’d rank as love cuz of the angst. But the case itself was pretty neat.  Uh god I can only remember specific scenes. Ok uh “A very supernatural Christmas”(?) “Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie” “Hell House” “Ghost Facers” “Fanfiction” “Jus in Bello” “Bad day at Black Rock” is that ten yet.. “Alex Annie Alexis Ann” idek I just really love some scenes specially “Free to be you and me” and of course “Changing Channels” god this was so damn hard 16. What’s been your favorite season?:  9!!! Aaaangst! 17. Who is your favorite angel?  Cass easily 18. Who is your favorite demon? Crowley :) 19. Who’s your favorite evil character?  Favorite? Then Ima go with Crowley again 20. Do you have any Supernatural ships?:  Mm this blog I try to keep ship free but if you wanna check out my side blog for the answers, I’ll be happy to message you on this one ;) 21. Who’s your favorite supporting actor?:  Can’t remember any right now but they’re all amazing… oh how about Garth!!! God he’s such a sweetheart - and still alive! But oh Jody is amazing too…! 22. What’s your favorite quote from the show?: “I’m proud of us” it’s the main one at the top of my head but there are so many other brilliant ones. I have a tendency to lean towards the emotional ones made to each other (Dean, Sam, Cass) such as above from Dean to Sam, his ending speech in season 8’s finale “There ain’t no me if there ain’t no you!” 😭😪 and Cass’s - what he thought was his - dying speech to Sam and Dean mostly as well as Mary to an extent in 12x12 23. If you could cast one famous actor in an episode of SPN, who would you choose?  Katie McGrath? She was - and is - my woman crush 😉 lol she’d be an awesome witch or hell even huntress or screw it even another Bela 🤷‍♀️ 24. If you could write your own episode, what kind of creatures would you like to see included?:  Unicorns. Interacting with Dean. Idk.. uh honestly what have we not seen? Cuz I wouldn’t mind just another case that stumps the boys because it’s an almost unheard f monster, those are fun and new 🤷‍♀️ but maybe… omg some version of the Loch Ness monster. Idk it’d be interesting to see to have to deal with that.. or maybe what was it.. tree nymph and… what are the creatures who reside in the water called? 25. Who’s your favorite girl that Dean’s hooked up with?:  Omg um… ok that girl that he sorta shacked up with when he was a demon in season 10..? …Yeah probably her So I checked and her name is Anne Marie!… 26. Who’s your favorite girl that Sam’s hooked up with?:  Eileen - she was a huntress, so could take of herself, and Dean as just an absolutely amazingly (supportive) teasing elder bro about it 27. What are some of your favorite convention moments?:  Omg I don’t think I’ve seen enough to decide but… I think whenever J2M comfort each other. Those are just so soft and sweet and give us an insight to their friendship that just 🤤😍 28. If you were going to guest star (or be a recurring guest star) on SPN, how would you want your character to be described?:  Well fuck me I’d love to be a badass huntress cuz it’s something I’m obviously not IRL… or maybe someone who isn’t aware of the Supernatural world until the boys come along and then I prove really useful for heir research because of something and then somehow I get dragged into the world and I’m actually pretty good? Yeah, there’s a pattern there isn’t it 29. What do you hope to see in the next season?:  Apart from Castiel and Rowena and Crowley alive? Idk Jack not being the next big bad, hopefully a break from big bads for the boys and after they get Cass and Mary back and hopefully just leave Lucifer to rot in the alternate universe, just go on some cases and take some time to cool down you know? 30. - 40. If you had to choose… Bobby or John?:  Bobby!!!!! I mean hell yeah I would seriously love to see how the boys would react if John came back, but that would probably ensure that a lot of drama and fights would be quick to ensue as well, so yeah. Bobby Bela or Ruby?  Well ok I liked the first Ruby because as Katie Cassidy went, we didn’t know for sure Ruby was not to be trusted. But overall Ruby was pure evil.. and I actually felt bad when Bela died while I didn’t for Ruby - felt relieved when Ruby died actually -so yeah. Bela Jess or Madison?:  erm… Madison, maybe? Jo or Lisa?:  Jo… I actually shipped her with Dean more than I ever will with Lisa, truth be told Charlie or Kevin?  Ergh both but.. Charlie first? Balthazar or Ash?:  oooh they were both good.. but.. maybe Ash? Cas or Crowley?  Ooh Cass but ugh Crowley is definitely a close second! Ben or Claire?  Claire Jody or Donna?  Jody :) Sam or Dean?:  Mm Dean first, but of course Sam next immediately I'ma tag: @deanwinbean @thewincestfeels @atmaandauraofdean @doctor–idiot @deanandcastrash @all-i-need-is-destiel And y'all don’t have to do it if you don’t want to, it’s totally cool 🙂

#tag games #spn #supernatural

4 notes · View notes