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superbatson · 1 year

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i saw fotg today and bc i'm still not of sound mind to write a proper review (for here or letterboxd), i'm gonna just do a dump of all my spoilery thoughts featuring stuff i loved about the movie:

the new theme is incredible and epic i love you mr. christophe beck i'm gonna make you one of my top spotify artists this year for sure. (for reference: the previous score composer made my top 5 artists back in 2019 bc of how often i streamed the first movie's score.)

FREDDY AND ANTHEA WERE SO CUTE! obviously i'm ride or die for freebat but like freddy has two hands so he can date anthea too. honestly i'm team anthea/freddy/billy/courtney polycule. make it canon!

DARLA AND THE KITTIES! SHE NAMED ONE OF THEM TAWNY!!! so basically cat tawny, as my freebat server invented, is now movie canon. boom. (no really i screamed, i hope somehow that kitten becomes actual tawny in the movies. we really need to see tawny someday)

freddy calling billy "captain everything jr" was so fucking funny to me. like ofc freddy would act all cocky as a hero and the boys would still argue over who's the sidekick. i love it so much

GAY PEDRO REAL! WE DID IT Y'ALL!!! that scene got such a good laugh in my theater, it made me so happy. and i love that jovan got to be the one to say it too rather than dj. 'cause i know internet gays go all gaga for dj but coming out can be such a sweet, pure thing sometimes so jovan really deserved to have that moment and i'm glad he did. (and now seeing the movie, i have more respect for the tie-in comics, since pedro's was all about him being into baseball. i get why now hehe)

also i know i'm jumping ahead here but AY WE GOT AN ELVIS REFERENCE! sure, it was just the end credit song, but hey, i'll take it. it's something. and it was the junkie xl edit of the song too, so naturally, i loved it even more.

speaking of, the movie had a decent amount of bvs parallels! well, more than one, at least. everyone's harped on the final battle with billy basically sacrificing himself just like clark did in bvs (i hope to see those parallel gifsets in the future!), but i also noticed some bvs nods during billy's fight with hespera. when she dragged him by the cape and lifted him over her head to slam him onto the ground... i swear that was just like the bathroom fight with bruce and clark. at least the cape drag. i'd have to go back and watch both movies to see exactly what shots are parallel to each other, but, yeah. sandberg's movies still feel like love letters to zack's and i adore that.

WAS ANYONE GONNA WARN ME THAT IT'S ASHER'S FACE WE SEE WHEN BILLY DIES???? i mean, i didn't want the spoiler anyway but oh my god, i was not emotionally prepared. oh god. i'm still thinking about it. and freddy's sobbing. god. speaking of bvs parallels--

that scene is gonna haunt me for the rest of my days. i'm gonna write and read so many fics about it. ahhhhhhhh

yeah the movie did have a good amount of freebat bless you sandberg & gayden (and now jack and asher are adults so i can justifiably enjoy the freebat-ness of jack & zach scenes here too. suck it, antis!)

but also the movie did have a severe lack of asher and that made me kinda sad. there's a shot from the tv spots he's in that i do Not recall seeing in the movie at all. (though i did run to the bathroom just before the final battle so maybe i missed it somehow? but i doubt it bc his outfit was from an earlier part of the film) but also i kinda wish it was asher who came out of the grave instead of zach. like in the context of the movie, i understand why it was zach, bc diana gave him his powers back, but they buried regular billy so i wish he was the one to emerge from the grave. but whatever, i'm just picky.

asher did kinda out-act zach in all his scenes, though. this boy needs to get more work PRONTO! (he only has one other project coming out this year, i think. some small true story movie. put him in more blockbusters! disney, get him for your tangled remake! just something, please!!!)

the diana cameo was actually amazing and anyone saying bad things about it needs to shut the fuck up. it was great and yeah billy had a crush on her but he's established to be crushing on her in the first film too, it's literally nothing new.

"taste the rainbow, motherfu--!" one of the best lines in the movie, hands down. skittles has the only valid in-movie marketing. i know the line kinda got spoiled in tv spots but it was still so funny in context.

also darla sorting out all the yellow skittles for hespera was so cute and i was kinda thinking autie vibes before she explained her reasoning for it. the whole shazamily is neurodivergent and i will die on that hill.

yeah that's all i can think of for now i really loved the movie, i also kinda wanted more from it but probably bc i felt like we didn't see enough of the family together. but that can be resolved in a third film, of course. (if we ever get one. i know the opening box office is disappointing but maybe the film can still turn a profit. the budget's basically the same as the first film so it only has to make like $300 mil again for wb to make their money back. and it could blow up on streaming afterwards. you never know. i just hope wb is patient and takes their time before deciding on the future of shazam, if this cast is truly out for the reboot.)

#shazam #shazam: fury of the gods #shazam fury of the gods #fury of the gods #idk what tag everyone is using

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pixie-skull · 6 months

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Ten Characters * Ten Fandoms * Ten Tags

Before I list the most impactful fandoms in my list, a huge shoutout and thank you too @confettipetticoats for tagging me. =D Please go watch her (Non)-Disney crossovers on Youtube as she both so talented and such an awesome pal of mine. :D So I am ranking from 10 to 0 as why not my list, so why not include zero. >:D I tried to choose fandoms I can say I am still a part of, yet not just like, but either been a fan for a long time or the given product means a lot to me.

10. Universal Studios Monsters: Now this a confusing entry as I am not someone who seen all the monster movies, but the impact and the handful of films I have seen from original to remakes, I am a huge fan of. I mean if it was not for my special interest in Mythology as is, this fandom adds to it. Does not hurt most of the bigger or well known monsters have roots in Victorian gothic literature. Favorite monster is hard, as all of them are fun their own way, but I guess my inner psychologist would choose Wolfman/Werewolf.

9. The Simpsons: Yes I agree it dragging on but still one of few shows that my full family and I bonded over, next to select shows that some family members all liked (Bones was very close to being on this list, but I never finished it). It along with other animated shows plus movies made me really want to consider voice acting for a future job. As well, I am not sure why Lisa not featured in the gif below. XD Favorite character though is Apu, plus in the video games, The Simpsons: Hit& Run and The Simpsons: Road Rage.

8. The Addams Family: I only watch the 90's movies and plan watch the original show and animated movies too, but from what I can tell of this fandom, very creepy, spooky, and kooky . XD Sorry too obvious to reference. Favorite characters are tied for the love birds (or bats would that be more in character) Morticia and Gomez. I try to avoid looking up to other people's relationships as everyone is so different, but I can deny these two are what I hope for in a relationship. If not that at least, I adore the just what the two stand for in a couple that is rarely depicted, friends and lovers, who do not settle and hate each other. Sorry but so many relationships especially parents seem to hate each other but stay nice for wanting a family. At a young age this trope I hated.

7. Avatar: The Last Airbender: Such a great show, from world building, character arches, animation, voice acting, and much more. I rarely find myself wishing if I could voice act in something, but this a show that and overall franchise I would be so happy to be a part of. Plus Aang such a well done character and often I do not relate to a character's personality as much I had with him. If from his trying to best to see in others but grows to be selective of who to open up to, being seen as both so young but an old Soul, awkward but willing to laugh at himself, and wants to hear a different point of view or at least learn more of life are few of other traits I can relate to in him. That being said I also can relate to Iroh for similar but in his own way, traits prior. He the supportive, fun, but heartfelt uncle I hope I can be. Yes I am tied between Aang and Iroh. XD

6. Owl House: Yes, a newer product on my list, but can anyone blame me? XD I am still so sad it was short as was, but hopefully come back. It had so much to offer, my newest comfort character is Eda and I am so picky of my comfort characters*, but dang this show you can tell had so much thought and carefully planned, and more. Eda the character I like most from the show too. Yes my biggest ship if Eda x Raine :P .

5. Hellboy: I need to read more these comics, as the movies ugh such a great twist of fantasy, a hero who really wants to do the right thing, but you do not blame him for feeling outcasted by those he protects, and more. Bonus introduced me to my current favorite director, Guillermo del Toro. As well one of my favorite hero quotes of all time. However favorite character goes, Red/H-e-l-lboy.

4. X-Men: I know the movies' timeline is all over the place, the X-Men Evolution Wolverine seems so hated (even though a guilty pleasure of mine), the first two are the best in the full series along a few standouts, but dang it this movie series was and still holds so much meaning to me. I mean the not so subtle message of being yourself and use what makes you different as a power felt even more powerful as when younger I was diagnosed with ASD in elementary school and only found by high school from being told, but prior I felt like a mutant, like I felt so pity (yes I had former friends who only became pals because pity), teased for things like special interests, and more, but these movies made me felt there was at least somewhat others like me. Lastly, for a kid, I respect the beliefs of the leader of the "good" and "bad" were so complex, as simple narratives on morality felt so demeaning as a kid. I mean as I get older (@little-bloodied-angel and I talked about this recently) I really consider Magneto one of the best 'villains' I have watched and read (I need read more comics in general). Bonus this franchise seems so awesome the earlier films had so many people who are in the LGBTQ Community: Anna Paquin (bi woman), Ian McKellen (gay man), Elliot Page (trans man), Alan Cumming (bi man). To be fair the Mutants being a metaphor for those wanting more civil rights or equal rights is well known. Favorite character goes, of late again Magento again just the appeal he more complex and even though violence if can be avoided please do that.

3. 90's Sailor Moon: I am aware such a case of nostalgia goggles on tightly, as I have heard the recent new version more closer to the manga. However the 90's one felt so more fleshed out and bonus the titular character herself one of FEW characters I have ever related to as a kid that was not just comedic relief or a side character. XD Yes I related the awkwardness of Thief from The Thief and the Cobbler, Flower from Bambi (if anything as a trans guy it feels so telling I wanted to liked a guy character who just happens to be comfortable being mistaken as a girl XD). Bonus one of my friends who sees me as found family, we bonded over adoring the 90's version. Favorite character the "protector of love and justice" herself.

2. Disney, mostly the villains fandom: I do adore the heroes/heroines, yet the campy nature of the former hand-drawn villains so great. As well, yes I am not sorry I have a shirt with this design below. >:D In regards which one is my favorite, Maleficent.

1. The Last Unicorn: The animated feature and the book (to be fair I have the graphic novel) both hold such introduction to Mythology for me and the writing (Peter S. Begeal I hope read more of his work) so similar to J.R.R.Tolkien in ways, that it also helped me love the fantasy genre too. Plus the sequel Two Hearts is not required reading but it does add more too. Favorite character is maybe a surprise Schmendrick. I just appreciate his confidence and overall character arch most of the main cast.

0. The Lord of the Rings: Besides the 2001-2003 live action movies, the extended cut too, the books, and the animated movies, this franchise I can not explain enough the impact it has had on me since as far I can remember. As well yes, The Hobbit book, films (including animated movie too) are worth their thanks too. Now in regards of The Rings of Power show on Amazon, I am unsure to watch, yet that is if The Hobbit is a C at best, I worry what that show is at best. Favorite character is so hard to say, but if I had to really choose Pippin (fun fact met the actor Billy Boyd at a comicon once) as he most audience surrogate I had related to growing up.

*= My other comfort characters: Eda and King

Thief:

Psyduck

Cubone

Flower:

I am curious of what: @little-bloodied-angel @impossiblepeggy @airasora @geebs96 @0chaotic-queer0 @thenamelessdoll @jujubee-edits @theevilsquirrelqueen @animagix101and @wardisahi would say are themes in my choices. Plus, your ten fandoms and ten characters you peeps like. Also was unsure mythology counted as a fandom, as if it does that definitely my biggest favorite fandom.

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clarktooncrossing · 1 year

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Blue Beetle vs Moana

HEY THERE PEOPLE OF TODAY AND ROBOTS OF TOMORROW!

IT'S ME, CLARK, BACK WITH ANOTHER DOSE OF WEIRDNESS!

Man, March is gone. Good riddance! The first three months of this year have sucked! The weather sucked, my health has sucked, it's been a non-stop suck fest! Yet here April is, already off to a kick@$$ start! Little Caesars brought the Pretzel Pizza back, Disney clap backed hard against Florida, and DC released a trailer for a superhero movie I've been dying to see! Ladies, gentlemen, and weirdos, may I present to you the Blue Beetle!

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The Positives:

+ That perfect photo-realistic translation of the costume! Not since Raimi's Spider-Man or the original Iron Man have I seen a supersuit this sexy!

+ Apparently the actor chosen to play Jaime is a fan favorite. I haven't seen Cobra Kai, so I have no prior exposure to Xolo Maridueña, but he seems to be having a blast!

+ Emphasis is placed on Jaime's family life, making it very clear from the start they're as essential to the story here as they were in the comics.

+ Dang, that initial suit-up is something out of a horror story! Nice!

+ So many references to the prior Blue Beetles, Ted Kord and Dan Garrett, including The Bug! Heck yeah!

+ More representation for non-white superheroes is always a win!

+ DC is releasing all of his original adventures from the Pre-Flashpoint universe! FINALLY!

The Negatives:

+ Suffers from 'generic trailer' disorder, meaning I don't know a ton about the plot or Jaime's antagonists. Then again, I actually haven't read a ton of his books. Yet. Here's hoping Trailer #2 is more interesting.

+ George Lopez's stupid joke about Batman being a fascist. First of all, how dare you waste the comic genius of Lopez! Second, unless Frank Miller wrote this, Batman is not a fascist!

All that said, I am super excited for this movie! Let it be known that were it not for Across the Spider-Verse, Blue Beetle would be my most anticipated film of 2023! Good lord, I am so hyped for this! This trailer had me riding high this morning. Only for Disney and Dwayne Johnson to have me crashing down to Earth.

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Much to my shock, this is not a late April Fool's Day prank on behalf of the Mouse House and Ex-Black Adam. This is actually happening. Disney is remaking an animated movie that's not even a decade old. Now I'm not a huge fan of Moana, but even I think this feels desperate on Disney and The Rock's part. In terms of Disney, it feels like they finally realized they're running out of classic cartoons to 'reimagine', forcing them to result in current critical darlings. Sure, they could bring retell stories like The Black Cauldron or Atlantis, but they didn't make money the first time! Why take creative risks when you can make stupidly safe ones? Mark my words, Frozen is next. As for The Rock, this feels kinduv' insulting following the praises he sang towards animation at this year's Oscars. I guess his alliances changed following Shazam: The Prequel securing the final death nail on the DCEU's coffin. Maui needs moola. No matter which way ya' look at it, it looks pretty freak'n stupid. Thankfully I'm not alone on that though. Currently the like to dislike ratio leans heavily on the later and there are plenty of comments wondering why this is happening. What about you weirdos?

Are you excited for a live-action Moana or do you think it should stay in the realm of animation? Furthermore, are you eager for Blue Beetle's first big screen adventure? Leave your thoughts in the comments below! Until then-

MAY THE GLASSES BE WITH YOU!

#march sucks #Clarktoon Crossing #Moana #Blue Beetle #DC #Disney #Disney100 #dwayne johnson #Maui #superhero #pretzel pizza #Youtube

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lordsalissoon · 2 months

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After seeing your base,I'm not sure what to do I could try using the base with the wings to help remake my older oc, because the phoenix design is so complex. I also thought about maybe trying to make a new OC all together with the base, but like I can try to use it as a way to try making a new OC for an art block I'm stuck with. (I have an antagonist role, that I can't quite fill, because none of the OCS I own would fit that specific role, so I'm stumped as to what design I would do for the role. The role behind it, I don't mind sharing but it's a bit long. So I'm not sure if you really would want to read it to help), or to use the base just for the fun of it.

Also I hope you don't mind, but I reblogged my answer to "which page/pages was my fav from the comic" with a post you answered my ask with. I wasn't sure what the max limit of characters, there was here for asks, so I figured reblogging might be easier to edit and that kind of thing. I definitely meant, what I said about how amazing your comic is, and how you mastered the art of capturing the readers emotions. (From the reblog) ^^`

I saw your reblog! I didn't answer it yet because you left me in a lost of words!! Ages of Nokori is precious to me, and it is my first Project that reaches so many people! And seeing the impact it has on you made me so happy!!!

Your words really meant a lot to me! Thank you very much!!!

About the bases: You can do all of those! If you're having trouble drawing, you can start witu the one that seems more appelaing and easy, this way, you can help yourself into drawing again!

Have in mind that Nokori is an original species created for Ages of Nokori. You can draw any OCs you want, but you can only can use one in your Original Content as a reference to AON and with credit.

#ask #lucky24neko #lucky24neko ask #excuse the myspellings. I'm in the bus!#forgive any mispellings #im in the buss

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orphancookie69 · 10 months

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Nintendo Direct: June 2023

I have been catching the last couple of Nintendo Directs, and I was super psyched to see the most recent one. The one before gave us old handheld systems playable on the Nintendo Switch. So I was hoping for good news in games coming up...

Now, I watched it on 6/25 so days after. If you have a switch, you can still watch it. Or maybe Youtube? Here are some of my thoughts on the games I saw:

Pokemon Scarlet and Violet DLC: I have been out of the pokemon loop for while but the DLC’s look good.

Sonic: same thing with pokemon, but glad to see it still alive. It has been around a while.

Palia: looks like a neat real life simulator.

Persona 5 Tactica: Cute characters in chibi form! Happy to see a title that has only one other title on switch to have more titles.

Mythforce: this is such a nostalgia trap, but it looks real fun! I would totally play this!

Splatoon 3 Splatfest: This game seems like COD but kid version. I never really got into this. But this looks like DLC.

Detective Pikachu Returns: The movie was great, the game was good. I love this as a direction for Pokemon.

Super Mario RPG: This is a remake of an older game of the same name. It looks like a refreshing take on mario games, which are classic.

New Nintendo Switch Peach Game: This looks like another remake of an older game.

Luigi’s Mansion 2 Dark Moon: Another old remake, I do love the Luigi games and hope that this is to appease the players as they make a new one.

Batman Arkham Trilogy: This was supposed to be one of the better batman games and comics, and this looks dope-I am looking forward to playing this for the first time on switch.

Gloomhaven: Good looking game, card based.

Just Dance: nice active game, nice to see it continuing.

Silent Hope: Anime game. meh.

Fae Farm: this looks good, I kind of think there are too many simulators out, but it is supposed to be one of the better ones.

Hot Wheels Unleased 2: Looks ok for a racing game, but I also kind of feel like there is a lot of competition in this genre.

Manic Mechanics: This game looks like overcooked, and the builder game. I love games like this, this one is happening.

Mario + Rabbids Spark of Hope: Mario doesn’t do well in turn based games, in my opinion, but its an interesting game.

Dragon Quest Monsters: This looks like a pokemon wannabe, but it looks not bad.

Pikmin 1, 2, 4: I have never played this series but it looks cute and I would not mind this as a multiplayer family game.

Metal Gear Solid Master Collection: this is an old game, I might even try it if it goes on sale.

Vampire Survivors: This game looks really fun, simple but oh so deceptively hard. I do really want to try this game.

Headbangers Rhythm Royale: I am getting this game, its a beat game with birds. Yes.

Penny’s Big Breakaway: It looks like a hodgepodge of many games but unique in its own way.

Mario Kart Booster Course Pass Wave 5: I should be more excited but I am not.

Star Ocean The Second Story R: Meh, another anime game.

WarioWare Move It: This looks like 1 2 switch but mario, I mean wario. Might be nice for an active game.

The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom Amiibo: Amiibos are still a thing? This game looks good, but there are so many zeldas out at one time right now.

Super Mario Bros Wonder: Looks like a new direction for the mario side scroller.

For those that want to read more about this: https://www.nintendolife.com/features/nintendo-direct-june-2023-every-announcement-and-game-reveal

There were so many games revealed, that I had to reference the list to make this post. Obviously, ones that did not stick with me means I was not the intended customer but there are so many gaming customers these days! Games I am looking forward to are: Headbangers Rhythm Royale, Vampire Survivors, Manic Mechanics, Batman Arkham Trilogy. What games are you looking forward to?

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themousefromfantasyland · 2 years

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The Tragedy of Jafar

And no, this isn’t a reference to StarKid’s Twisted.

Jafar is one of the most iconic Disney Villains to date. Appearing for the first time in 1992 Disney’s Aladdin, he continues to appear in sequels, merchandise, remakes, and crossovers, cementing in the public’s eyes the role of the Evil Grand Vizier. But what people don’t know is that more than just an adaptation of the evil magician from the original tale, the vizier Jafar is a character that appears in a couple of tales from the original One Thousand and One Nights, almost always as a sympathetic character and more, that this character is inspired by a real person.

The most important story that Jafar plays a role is in The Three Apples, or The Tale of the Murdered Woman. The story starts when caliph Harun al-Rashid, a eunuch called Masrur, and the Grand Vizier Jafar are going into the city’s market to question the people about the performance of government officials. Just calling it right now, the caliph Harun al-Rashid is super important in Jafar’s ultimate fate and we’ll soon find why.

On their to the marketplace they find a poor fisherman who still hasn’t caught anything and feeling sorry for the old man, the caliph says for the man to cast his net on the Tigris' bank because whatever it ends there he will buy for a hundred gold pieces. The man does this and brings back to the caliph a locked wood chest. They bring the chest to the palace where Jafar and Masrur break it open and find inside a basket of palm leaves corded with red worsted. They cut it open and see within it a piece of carpet which they lift out, finding a woman's mantilla folded in four, and when they pull it out; they find at the bottom of the chest a young woman cut into nineteen pieces.

Enraged, Harun orders Jafar to find the responsible for the murder:

“[…] if thou bring us not him who slew her, that we do her justice on him, I will hang thee at the gate of my palace, thee and forty of thy kith and kin by thy side."

Jafar then asks for three days.

The story is too complex to try to completely summarize here, and within it, Scheherazade tangles at least two other tales. The point is, that Jafar fails, is almost executed twice, and only because of a series of coincidences the reasons for the murder are clarified.

So, not only Jafar is not a villain, but he even plays the role of a detective in a mystery murder, a very bad one by modern standards, but a detective nonetheless.

Another role that Jafar plays is of an adventurer in the somewhat comic Tale of Ataff. In this Dramedy, the caliph Harun wakes feeling melancholic one day and asks Jafar and Masrur to lead him to the chamber of his treasures in hopes that it can cheer him up. They lead him there, and amid all his glorious treasure, he finds a collection of books. There he finds a particularly special book. While reading, he can’t help but weep three times and laugh three times. Jafar notices this and is scared and asks why the caliph is crying and laughing like a maniac. Harun gets offended and sends Jafar away, telling him to only return when he understands why. Jafar's father advises him to go to Damascus. There he meets the title character, Ataff.

Now, Attaf is overly generous, like, REALLY GENEROUS. I can’t help but wonder if the bad things that happen to him are because of bad choices or because he is just unlucky.

Jafar falls head over heels over a woman he saw watering her plants, and when Attaf learns that this woman is his wife, he divorces her so Jafar can be with her. He also takes the blame for a false homicide just to protect his neighbors from suspicion. Thanks to the goodwill of the warden, he escapes from the prison and goes to Baghdad, but he is robbed on the way, finds a body in the shelter he was hiding and is arrested again. I also need to add that he also accepts the blame for this homicide too.

Back to Jafar, he finally learns that the woman was Attaf’s wife all along. He puts her in a separate palace and refrains from having intercourse with her. Rushing to Baghdad, he goes to tell the caliph about all of this, when the caliph shows him the book. He discovers that the book that Harūn was reading describes his adventures with Attaf. In the end, Jafar saves Attaf from execution, shows him the book, and makes him governor of Syria.

Jafar and Harun appear in a couple of other tales too, usually with Harun al-Rashid as the jerkish but still benevolent caliph and Jafar as his loyal sidekick, assisting him or going along with his adventures.

These two characters are very important because they both are inspired by real people. Harūn al-Rashīd was the fifth Caliph of the Abbasid Caliphate, the third caliphate to succeed the Islamic prophet, Muhammad. He is very important because his rule from 786 to 809 is linked to the beginning of the Islamic Golden Age, a period of economic and artistic blossoming in the Muslim world. Baghdad became a center of science, culture, philosophy, and invention. Jafar is also a SUPER important figure.

Jaʻfar ibn Yahya Barmaki was the vizier of Harun al-Rashid. He was one of the Barmakids or Barmecides, a highly educated, respected, and influential Persian family from the town Balkh, which is in modern-day Afghanistan. They were originally hereditary Buddhist leaders in the Nava Vihara monastery but came into power thanks to the Abbasid Caliphs in Baghdad.

As the vizier, Jafar sponsored the academy which was translating Greek works into Arabic and is believed to have helped bring the paper to Baghdad, by convincing the Caliph to open the first paper mill there.

But Jafar’s life had a tragic ending. At only 36 years old, he was executed in 803 by Harun al-Rashid, and parts of his body were displayed on the bridges of Baghdad. Other Barmakids were imprisoned and had their property confiscated. Nobody knows exactly why the caliph executed Jafar and the Barmakids. A popular story is that he had an affair with Harun's sister Abbasa, but is theorized that the caliph simply feared that the Barmakids were becoming too influential.

Okay, but why is Jafar today always represented as a villain? Two reasons: Historical bias and Hollywood.

Harun al-Rashid is such an influential figure that many scholars, writers and poets over the centuries tried to justify Jafar's execution and saw the Barmakids with suspicion.

Then The Thief of Bagdad happened.

The Thief of Bagdad is a 1940 movie staring Sabu, John Justin, Conrad Veidt, and June Duprez, and is inspired by the One Thousand and One Night stories. There Jafar, depicted by Conrad Veidt, is depicted as a treacherous and scheming Royal Vizier.

In the same way that Disney’s Beauty and the Beast is influenced by 1946 Jean Cocteau’s film, Disney’s Aladdin is inspired by this movie, with Abu being named after one of its characters.

Jafar also appears in 1953 The Golden Blade, which straight depicts Harun Al-Rashid as a swashbuckling hero and Jafar as a sinister evil vizier.

1989 video game Prince of Persia depicts Jafar as a treacherous vizier who wants to marry the Sultan's daughter.

I think the worst part about Jafar is that he’s just a guy. There is nothing in History or in the folk tales that depict him as the type of villain deserving to be dismembered with his body parts left to be displayed on the streets, but because of historical bias and Western misunderstandings of Middle-eastern culture and folklore, he will be always remembered as an evil sorcerer and the reason why Grand Viziers are not to be trusted. In a way, he is the middle-eastern version of Hades. There is no reason for works inspired by Arabic and Persian culture to have a super sinister vizier, but they do it anyway. From what would otherwise be an obscure historic person, to a generic bad guy.

#middle east #arabian nights #jafar #middle eastern folklore

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ramblings-of-a-mad-cat · 2 years

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Blair Plays: Legends Arceus (Phase Two)

Time for Sybil to begin her journey properly. Except this time, #AnyoneCanDie Edition!

Time to choose my partner! I’m a big fan of all three of these pokemon, to tell the truth. Gone back and forth on who I want to choose, from being tempted by Rowlet’s round nature and his little bowtie, to Oshawott’s adorable cry and his little scalchop, (I love that word) to the welcome return of Cyndaquil’s back flames, and all the personality they add. In the end, I made my choice…

C'mere you wholesome little otter pop!

I shall name him "Runaway." because that's what Laventon is always affectionately calling the three starter pokemon. And he's got a jolly nature, too! I never give a damn about resetting for natures, so it's always a nice surprise when I get a good one. Sybil and Runaway are about to take the world by storm!

I can already tell that these are the historical forerunners to the PC boxes in modern games, and I have to say I like this far better? I know the PC system is a tradition by this point, a staple. But even just thinking about this idea, it reminds me of the Poke Pelago, something I miss from Sun and Moon. I'm somebody who, in most pokemon games, doesn't "catch em all" but rather just captures the pokemon I plan to train on my team. But I don't mind boxing a lot more pokemon if they're going to have a big ranch to play on, rather than simply being stored in virtual reality.

Could say the same about you, pal. Nobody has an outfit that detailed if they're just a background character. Apparently he's just part of the merchant's guild in this game, which is pretty neat, but the fact that he gets a name and that he's the very first trainer battle suggests to me that he'll have greater relevance. I also don't like the pointing thing he does, I could live without that.

The battles. Oh my god, the battles. First of all, this music. This music slaps. It slaps me right across the face as if I was ever worthy. Second of all, these visuals. I love the way it opens and closes the fight with the text on screen. Third of all, I can move around! I even got hit by an attack! I can’t get enough of this. Which is a shame because something tells me that trainer battles are going to be fewer and farther between in this game.

I don't even know what to say to this. Because it wasn't just one little reference to death that they slipped in and were hoping it would go unnoticed. Every other scene, they double down on this. Rei was bedridden after he got hit by a thundershock! Thundershock. I dread to think what would have happened if it had been a Thunder attack. I can only hope Arceus reinforced me with some kind of resistance to Pokemon attacks.

Also known as the three basic first route pokemon from the Diamond and Pearl games. So is Legends Arceus just like, the real and proper Sinnoh remake? Are we simply pretending that BDSP never happened? Because I can live with that.

I'll say it again. This game is beautiful. Is it as high-definition as Breath of the Wild or Xenoblade 2? I suppose not, but a game doesn't have to look as close to reality as possible in order for it to be visually pleasing. One of my favorite decisions ever was for Rescue Team DX to have the storybook aesthetic and art style. That was gorgeous. I'm someone who didn't even mind the chibi art style of BDSP. (Which is not to say that I can take it seriously, it looks stupid as heck, but it doesn't offend me, if that makes any sense?) Anyway, let's get catchin'.

Something else I'd like to mention that I enjoy, is some of the dialogue options available to me in this game. Like, I know this is Pokemon, and it doesn't matter at all, that the resulting lines will be the same no matter what. But it adds personality. In the opening scene, I got to have Sybil just say "I don't know" like three times in a row and it made me crack up. Here, I can just imagine her turning back around with a nervous, comic-style expression. Someone needs to draw the "It has what?" Line, it feels like it would be very anime.

...This is the most metal Pokemon game I've ever played.

#Blair Plays #Pokemon Legends Arceus #Pokemon #Pokemon Screenshot #Jubilife Village #Captain Cyllene #Pokemon Volo #Professor Laventon

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jezmmart · 2 years

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Chamomile Comic Trivia #20

#101 Now

I guess I should count my blessings that while I do work retail, it’s at least a relaxed enough pace that I can get away with this ol’ chestnut. Of course, we now know from later comics that Sam was just off the side of the screen in that last panel the whole time (well... not actually the whole time, I guess that’s the joke). For those who don’t know, “PSHE” stands for Personal, Social & Health Education, which I believe is typically called “Social Ed” in North America. That one weird class where you learn about sex and jobs and don’t understand how any of it will ever be relevant, only to grow up and realise that you were right, it was a completely barebones introduction to every topic covered and totally irrelevant. I hope things are better these days, lol.

#102 App

Parodying Pinterest, naturally. Which I’ve never used properly other than to marvel at how much resposted art ends up there. Designing believable UI for phone screens is one of the most tedious parts of comics making for me. If I had a cleaner art style I could probably get away with using vectors for that sorta thing, but I find it looks too conspicious next to my thick ol’ freehand lines.

#103 Rent

Time for some world-building! We finally see where Cammie lives! I did a few little bits of concept art to solidify this for my own reference:

The backstory is that Mrs Beaufort here used to use the whole house, but when family moved out and she and her husband got older, they built the outdoor staircase and added a front door to the top half to rent it out. Beyond that though, the floor plan likely makes no sense to ever exist, lmao. Who knows where the interior staircase used to be.

The floor plan mostly is consistent with the snippets of fully drawn areas of Cammie’s flat seen before in both the comic and pin-ups. It was decided she lived upstairs thanks to the bedroom pin-up from before the comic having the tops of houses in view outside. The only one that isn’t consistent is the kitchen remake pin-up, where the garden outside looks pretty ground-level, but let’s just say that’s a trick of perspective! I also got rid of those curved counter-tops, her flat isn’t THAT fancy!

The final oddity to come from adhering to existing material is the lack of upstairs main window where Cammie’s sitting room is - again just done to be consistent with existing comics. I guess technically I could’ve just put the downstairs front door on the left instead of the right and done the two front big windows there! Apparently I commited to how the downstairs door/window was arranged and didn’t even consider to re-do it... Oh well lol. I don’t think there are many houses out there without having at least A window in a prominent position like this, even if it’s not one that matches the downstairs, so let’s say that was another eccentric re-design decision of the Beaufort family. I added the wall-climbing flowers to the front to at least make it a feature, because just leaving it empty was super strange looking.

I really like weird little “cosy” design decisions, but I didn’t have much room to include those in Cammie’s flat while still having it be sort of believable as something a young person might have been able to luck themselves into, the fact that the outdoor staircase is wooden and has that little enclosed space at the top is my little sprinkle of cosy design aesthetic though.

At the time of writing (comic 249), the little storage room behind the wall next to Cammie’s kitchen table is the only room of her flat we haven’t seen in the comic yet! The empty square next to the storage room I think I imagined being some kind of support column, but the house already doesn’t really make sense so I reserve the right to make that a secret shaft going down to a mysterious underground labyrinth if I really run out of plot ideas later on.

#104 Pillow

And just a simple little one here that I’m sure pet owners of all kinds can relate to. I can easily trust that they find interaction with their human to always be more engaging than whatever they appear to be enjoying, my concern is that I won’t live up to their expectations in that regard and they’ll be less content than they were before, even if they don’t remember what they were doing to actually figure out why that’s the case!

[More Chamomile Comic Trivia] (Above link may not work correctly on tumblr app)

#jezmm #not art #art insight #chamomile comic trivia

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popculturebuffet · 3 years

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Ducktales Review: The First Adventure! or Baby Donald Says Eat the Rich

Welcome back. I’d been looking forward to this one for some time in the hopes of getting one thing i’ve been waiting for.. sadly that thing didn’t come, we’ll get to that, but this was still a fun episode so let’s hop right in. Spoilers in a second but my tag is spoiler tagged soooo. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

We open in the 1960′s. Austin Powers just went into Cryo Freeze to prepare for Dr. Evil’s eventual return, The Marvel Universe was in full swing, a teenager in baltimore was battling racisim via a dance show, and Black Heron had just been caught by Agent 22, aka Beakly when she was young and just as gorgeous then as she is now. Heron once again engaged in her usual cartoonish supervillian, and now SHUSH has her. Meanwhile in a nearbye room a young accountant by the name of Bradford Buzzard is outlining his plan for Director Von Drake: The way he sees it every time a villian costs chaos Shush “Wastes” billions causing MORE chaos to stop it without controlling things. He proposes taking over the world, weeding out the chaos and ruling from the shadows. Naturally, Ludvig isn’t on board with any of this and points out they aren’t super villains. It’s here this episode fully defines something about Bradford’s character. Back in “Let’s Get Dangerous!” when Huey called him a villain, he said he’s not one... at least from his point of view. It’s here, in his youth we get a clear understanding why he dosen’t think so: So far most people we’ve seen in the world of Ducktales take the chaos and insanity of the world in stride: Either just numb to it like most of the citizens, Rolling with it like Daisy and Violet, or diving straight into it like.. pretty much the majority of the cast, either for the love of adventure and treasure like the McDuck/Duck family, or for their own ludcrious ends like Glomgold, Mark Beaks or Magica. To them the world’s fine the way it is and there’s to explore, take or whatever. To Bradford.. this is madness... he feels all these people are just a bunch of overgrown children, and in some cases actual children, are just making the world worse and worse until one day their going to break it. One day skill, intuition, wit, and knowledge just wont’ be enough. Someday Scrooge, SHUSH or whoever’s standing in the way of evil will fail and the world will fall. This simply can’t go on, and SOMEONE has to control this, someone has to take this world, shake the chaos out of it and MAKE it sane. Make it work the way it’s SUPPOSED to. And to Bradford that’s him. Someone has to, no one else will, so he will. To him SHUSH doing this is just the logical thing: They want peace right? Their fighting for good right? Then what’s better than making the world a utopia? Ending these conflicts and remaking it. The thing is.. that’s not what Heroes do. As we’ve seen in various stories where the superheroes, the Good Guys take over they do improve things.. but at the cost of free will. At the cost of free thought. At the cost of their morals. They become what they were fighting all those years and have to bloody their hands and keep them bloody just to make THEIR world right. And that’s not Utopia, that’s a dictatorship. The example I always come to, even though there were ones before and after this including Marvel’s incredible Squadron Supreme maxi-series, is Justice League the animated series’ two parter, like most of their episodes really but that’s not the point, a Better World, about an alternate reality where Superman kills Lex Luthor after Luthor kills the flash and hte League take over the world. The thing is.. the world isn’t BETTER. It’s just crime free. You can sweep the chaos and the crime under the rug.. but your not making a better world, your just making YOUR version of it. No one person is a god even if they have a power of one and no one person can or SHOULD be able to decide what’s best for everyone. It’s up to each of us to MAKE the world better, to fight for a better world. That’s what Ludvig knows full well and what Bradford just can’t see. You can’t control the world, you just have to accept the things you can’t change like it being chaotic and change the things you can like injustice.

Bradford however, who was hired as a favor to his grandmother, can’t though Von Drake lets him off with a warning.. and a laugh about an accountant being able to be a super villian. Bradford however realizes ther’es some truth to that.. he needs someone to teach him out to operate outside the law, and if SHUSH won’t take the world and remake it.. maybe it’s time someone else did. So in the prison cells of SHUSH, which are conveniently empty outsdide of Heron, Bradford outlines his plan to her. To create a massive orgnization to steal the world and give it the order it needs. To combine their skills: Heron’s for grandeur and crime, and Bradfords for strategy and focus, to take the world. The Orginzation for World Larceny, or OWL, fitting bradford’s hatred for theatrics. Heron objects, adding an F for fiendish, and Bradford relucntantly agrees to get her on board, lets her loose and fakes like he just saw her escape. FOWL is born. And the world would never be the same. Cue credits and cue the rest of the review under the cut.

After the opening we cut to 1994-5.. sometime around then as it’s hard to get an exact year, and that’s how the crew likes it. Point is it’s the 90′s, and Scrooge is.. busy running his company. We’ll get into the weeds of that in a bit, but this is a different Scrooge, one who while no less capable, has no thirst for adventure or drive. He’s not nearly as miserable as the Scrooge we saw back in Woo-Ooo but he’s still a much less complete man. Anyways alongside him for his planning is Duckworth, whose very much alive at this time, and who tells his boss his sister Hortense left something in his office for him. To no one suprise, that thing is the twins, at the tender age of i’m guessing 10. Since your probably curious, Della is still voiced by Paget Brewster, just using a slightly different voice like the Triplets and Webby’s voice actors do. It’s just a bit more jarring here since unlike those characters, we’ve seen adult della and thus are used to this voice coming out of a grown woman. It’s not bad and I got used to it eventually but it was jarring at first especially since once again Donald has a completely diffrent voice ACTRESS doing his voice. This time around it’s cristina valenzuela, of Miraculous Ladybug fame, who I know more for her song work and twitter than her actual work ,but am delighted to see her here and she does a terrific job. I genuneily did not realize it was her, and while not exactly like the late great russi taylor, it is just similar enough to work.

So we get to see what the Twins were like when they were the Triplets age: Della is about the same, but with more of Dewey’s impulsiveness, and Donald, much like he’d be a few years and some dead parents later, is a bitter, grungey musician whose constantly on his guitar and railing against the man.. which is Scrooge in this case which is fair. Hortense left a note.. which bothered me as I genuinely expected her to show up and was majorly disappointed she did not. We are in year 4 of this series, season 3 and STILL no appearance of Hortense or mention how she died, as she and Quackmore are still alive by the end of this. Given she’s easily my faviorite part of Life and Times, this bothered me, and the only reason i’m not more upset.. is the clever way they wrote around actually using her. The letter she leaves for Scrooge explaining things is the same one Della herself used in the comic strip, and using a bit of the postcard she left in the cartoons, when leaving Huey, Dewey and Louie with Donald, down to the Twins having left a firecracker in their fathers seat, thus leaving him in the hosptial. As disappointed as I am my favorite Ginger is completely absent once again, this is a brilliant reference, and I have to give them credit for it, so it’s a fair enough trade off. As for his “Angel Nephew and Niece”, Della wants to dive into adventure while Donald struggles to write a song, singing throughout the episode. It varies in tolerablity, though mostly due to the writing, Cristina is doing fine. Della however is disappointed to find her legendary uncle views his past exploits as merley a means to an end to get his fortune and now he has it he can just focus on building it in the boardroom. This is an intresting take.. and one I could easily have seen happening to the Don Rosa version seen in Life and Times. The Scrooge there himself saw building his wealth as the most important thing until his encounter with Teddy Rosevelt, who taught him experince was what mattered and the having isn’t as fun as the getting. It works for me: This is a scrooge who never got that lesson so once he got to be richest duck in the world, having achieved his life’s goal nothing was left. He’s not miserable like the Scrooge we saw at the start of the series, having lost his love for adventure after loosing his niece/daughter, and having lost his fight. This one has retired.. but because he likely just sees no point in going on. He’s the richest duck in the world, has a vast empire.. no amount of treasure is really going to add to that like it used to, and as he points out in a second Shush has tons of agents at this point to clean up what’s left of FOWL. He’s the man who has everything, so why keep going. It’s weird to see a scrooge without the hunger to keep going, but it makes sense when his belly is full. Without someone to get him to see there’s always another rainbow, he just stopped chasing them. Also a fun nod to the comics I almost forgot to mention is when hearing about the “Gift”, i.e. the twins, Scrooge dreads it’s another surprise party, a nod to life and times where Hortense threw Scrooge one that went.. badly and lead to their entire relationship collapsing. Though Donald did get back at Scrooge for screaming at his parents and Auntie Matilda

However his busy day is disrupted with a call from Beakly. They’ve found the last known cordinates of Captain Yellowbeak, but FOWL is on them and Scrooge is the only one Beakly trusts for this since they have a leak. Beakly is also director of SHUSH at this point, with Von Drake having retired or died or both at this point. Scrooge reluctantly accepts, while Della is excited at the prospect of a real adventure and Donald ends up sharing her enthusasim as it’d make a good song. Scrooge, naturally, has no intention of bringing them with him to their disapointment and leads Donald to sing another “Suck it the man song” which totally isn’t about Scrooge.... spoilers: It entirely is, he’s just a little dumbass grunge baby and I love him. We then get a cute sequence of Della popping up in Scrooge’s Luggage and Trunk to try and convince him to let them tag along, before we cut to the Limo, driven by Duckworth at this point, which solves that mystery. Scrooge is firm in having his butler take them back and have them work with him and Duckworth’s fine with that.. but wants overtime, which is fair. Scrooge, being Scrooge, grumbles about not being made of money, proven wrong by gold spilling out of him. Though I do like the update of Scrooge’s classic cheapness when it comes to pay: INstead of barely paying his employees like a monster, he’s simply reluctant to pay extra if he dosen’t have to, and would rather drag two 10 year olds with him on a dangerous adventure than pay overtime, which tracks. It’s also clear if he had to he WOULD actually pay it, either due to legal reasons or his moral standards, he just isn’t happy about it. So he agrees, though he wants Donald to leave the guitar behind which.. given the most Donald’s been able to come up with is “Suck it THE MAN” and “This guy’s a greedy asshole”.. he’s extremely correct and when Donald tries to pull a “YOU CAN’T CENSOR ME MANNNN”, Scrooge just chucks it out of the car. At the airfield while Della is excited like an rabid chipmunk, and genuinely thinks she can fly a plane because she’s played Outrunner 2.. which I have only vaguely heard of before now. And is apparently just a pc game where you run a lot so I genuinely do not get where Della gets piloting from that.. but she IS Dewey’s mother. So with that in mind the family take off and Scrooge explains what their after: The Papyrus of Binding. It’s a dangerously powerful magical artifact from Ancient Egypt that will make whatever’s written on it happen. The dangerous part is that it’s incredibly literal: As Bradford puts later in the episode, ask for unlimited power, it might zap you dead with a million volts, ask for infinite wealth, prepare to be crushed underneath it. It’s a nice twist on a Monkey’s Paw or Jackass Genie situation. Instead of either the source of the wish granting magic just being inherently evil, or some dickhead screwing with the hero.. it’s just an object that has no ability to interpret nuance, just like your phone with the goddamn autocorrect. It can’t judge intent or tone or meaning, it just gives exactly what it’s asked. It’s a thoroughly interesting concept.

Something I really like about this episode is the fact it answers some little questions. While none were Hortense related, and I am still grumpy about that even with this coming out a good 17 hours after I watched it due to getting caught up with other stuff, it does have little touches that explain small parts of the lore: Who drove Scrooge? As just mentioned, Duckworth. Who flew scrooge? Paid pilots. Did he have a plane before the sunchaser? Yup. It fills in some small gaps in the world. Stuff we weren’t dying to know but’s stil lintresting. Said pilots in this case however are Heron and Bradford. This episode also fills in Heron’s character, as while we’ve already seen bits and pieces this season she LOVES being a classic, take over the world james bond type villian, like she stepped out of a duck version of kim possible.. and i’m just now realizing there probably IS a duck kim possible somewhere in this world as while far after disney afternoon, it fits too neatly to not be wedged in there with your tailspins and goof troops. I wouldn’t be suprised if there were brid versions of every human based disney afternoon and one saturday morning show. My.. my head’s swimming from this. I could be, and probably am wrong but the sheer idea of this... it’s amazing. Back to Heron, she just LOVES being evil and destructive, letting the world know she exists and operating on a grand scale. Now we’ve seen more of her while she’s Beakly’s nemisis.. she’s really an evil scrooge.. yes another one. Like Scrooge, at least how he normally is, she simply gets how the world of Ducktales operates and can take advantage of that to the best of her ablility. Just like adventuering, cartoonish supervilliany is about risk and reward.. sometimes you faceplamnt hard, that’s the risk, but the rewards and rush is worth it. She’s as addicted to grandoise villiany as Scrooge is to adventure by this point. And like Scrooge, and unlike her partner Bradford, she sees the world as it is: Chaotic and one big sandbox to play in. She contrasts Scrooge by the fact that while Scrooge is willing to bust down doors, he still has morals, as well as the wisdom to not go overboard Heron often lacks. It also makes her a good contrast ot the equally skilled Beakly: While Beakly is taciturn, controlled in all things especially her emotions, Heron is bombastic, gloating and borderline insane, and while deadly in a fight, dosen’t exercise any control in her plans, preferring it big and loud despite her partner usually being right about reiging it in. So Heron evacuates dramatically, taking a grumpy Bradford with them, and sending the plane into a tailspin.

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I can’t wait for Next Year’s Tailspin episode. I swear to god. I’m hoping for Shere Kahn but this episode has taught me to be okay with disapointment, if a grumpus. Della however shows her natural talent and despite having no real experince with planes, lands it gracefully. While that’s going on, Bradford berates Heron for her plan, pointing out that they COULD have simply landed the plane, then captured the McDuck family and executed them quitely, versus leaving a chance they’ll survive which they do. They AREN’T supervillains.. or at least he thinks he isn’t. Heron does show off her competence though, pointing out that this way they can simply stay low, and FOLLOW the Ducks to the treasure. Bradford is impressed for a second.. till Heron’s evil shows as she plans to use the Papyrus. Bradford loudly objects to this, listing the possible risks shown before. If not used CAREFULLY, it could kill them, and she balks and wants him to just embrace being the Villian already. It’s what I love about their dynamic set up here: While they are equals, Bradford is a better strategist, able to think and plan way in advance, and prefers subterfuge, and if present day is any indicatoin probably used Heron’s flash to distract from the real mission or goal often or to do something on the down low while she kept SHUSH busy. His last two plans, while again requiring some pizzaz, relied on misdrection: having the ducks take care of an immidate threat like their used to.. while he gets exactly what he wants while their busy and whatever they get out of it is either nothing (Impossibin) or something he couldn’t use just yet and thus if he didn’t get it, no loss, but if he did it just moves up the timetable. Not only that but he’s outlasted all three other big bads, lying in the shadows till it was too risky to leave scrooge and play and even THEN, only coming out into the open when forced out. IT’s why he’s Scrooge’s most dangerous opponent: He knows how Scrooge’s other enmities operates as well as Scrooge himself. And since he knows everything he can maneuver Scrooge exactly where he needs him to do exactly what he wants. It’s unknown how the family will beat him, but he’s easily the biggest challenge they’ve had.

But back to the show and the past, Scrooge bonds with his niece and nephew, retelling stories of his past as they get closer, with Donald ending up high at one point and thus seeing the ship stranded on a mountain. As he recounts a fight with El Capitan, the villian from the ducktales 87 pilot, he counts the story as as a loss: He didn’t get anything from it, no treasure no new contracts. But Della shows him the point he’s been missing; He got a story. Sure he lost.. but he got experince, a tale to tell and a legend grown.Just because you don’t get everything dosen’t mean it wasn’t worth the experince and you can’t hold it in your heart. And this episode shows why this scrooge needed his family: Without Teddy to mentor him, he simply never got that adventure wasn’t about gains or what you get.. it’s about the thrill of it, the enjoyment of discovery and the memories you make.. it’s about the Journey not the destination.

As Scrooge starts to warm up to that, he finds a gap, with Della volunteering Donald to jump but Scrooge just having the kids hop on his back and pogo caneing across. The family find the Papyrus, and find out why the ship is all the way up here: Captain Yellowbeak, who’s a character from one of barks stories and the one who had the scroll last, wished to escape.. but that just stranded them. He asked for water.. and it drowned his crew.. and finally with the document hteir reading he asked for release... and thus is now a skelington. The kid are happy to have reached the goal.. while Scrooge is back on his Zack Morris phone trying to reschedule things and schedule a SHUSH evac, to the kids annoyance. However Scrooge raining on their parade gets interupted by Heron and Bradford, as Heron can’t resist popping out dramatically and Bradford is UTTERLY furious since she blew his cover, and Scrooge recognizes him from his christmas party, a nice callback. Scroog being scrooge figures out he’s the mole and Bradford runs , furious at Heron. Their conflict is an intresting one: Both have a point but both will not back down. Bradford is right this showboating nonsense has only hindered Heron’s plans.. and Heron is right that Bradford needs to accept he’s the bad guy. Even if he has well meaning motives, he’s the villian, he works with them, he leads them.. he is one. He just can’t accept he’s wrong or dosen’t have the answers... huh.. I wonder who that reminds you of. And that’s 100% intentional as Frank has outright compared Huey and Bradford and like last season it’s neat to have the main vilian contrast our chosen Duck for the season.

Heron outfoxes the kids and gets the papyrus and being just an enitrely black hearted bitch, plans to kill them just to spite scrooge.. writing that “his sidekicks will perish on this mission.”.... but Scrooge’s character development, and her choice of words, means nothing happens. As Scrooge outlines, “Their not my sidekicks their my FAMILY, and this isn’t a mission, it’s an ADVENTURE”. Scrooge has finally accepted his life for what it really is.. and the thrill of the chase over what lies at the end. There’s always anothe rainbow.. and he’s finally become the man who will chase every last one.

OF course this is interupted, and Heron escapes with the papyrus, when a skeletal pirate attacks.. why is Yellow Beak alive, why’d the scroll do this?

But we get a neat fight as Scrooge fights the skeleton while he sends the kids after Heron. Scrooge gets a cool looking swordfight, while Bradford gets the papyrus, and Yellowbeak even terrifies me what with his bestial roll and fucking centepede crawling out of him.. jesus those things freak me out. Meanwhile the kids battle Heron, who throws della overboard... and thus for the first time, Donald taps into his beserker rage, snikty snoink, and easily incapaciates the more experinced and fully grown adul, though Della since we’eve been following her kids for the past three seasons, is fine, if suprised by her brother being the goddamn wolverine.

While heron is out for a second, Scrooge heads after Bradford, and vows to tell Beakly and chase him all across the world. However Bradford gets an utterly awesome moment.. he admits scrooge may be right and probably would.. but since he has the papayrus and is careful in everything he writes his request carefully and perfectly “As far as the ducks are concerned, I was never here.” Grante dit COULD have left scrooge out.. but since he didn’t sday duck family or specificy, and likely knew it’d do that, it instead just means the three bilogical ducks. Bradford dissappears, turning invisble and leaving the papyrus for scrooge, who foils heron by simply writing that this scroll will be lost until one day found by his heirs.

So Heron takes a fall and looses an arm, again.. or for the first time.. the family is triumphant and despite loosing his goal, Scrooge is convinced he and the kids will find it again. See above. Scrooge then pulls out his phone and tells Duckworth to rework his schedule.. but it’s so he can find someone to run his comapny so he can spend more time with the kids. As for why Hortense would allow this before her still mysterious passing.. i’m guessing A) she notices her brother is happier and more alive than he’s been for a while and B) they just blew up their dad’s ass with a firecracker, and she won’t be able to use it for a while, so she’s double mad, so if it means she gets a moment’s peace and is with someone she trusts.. why not?

So we end on Scrooge packing up, preparing for further adventures.. i’d love a spinoff of this one day. I mean Disney plus needs it, and since Frank is probably going over to Darkwing.. maybe matt could take a crack at this. Just saying. You have the cast ready, a giant world to explore, and 15 years worth adventures. Run that baby damn you! But yeah the inevitble happens and Bradford further proves his magificent bastardry.. by appling for the position of running the company as head of Scrooge’s board, and setting up said board. So now FOWL has unlimited resources, he has a direct eye on what he now realizes is his greatest threat, and the complete trust and faith of both Scrooge and Beakly. It also puts Beakly’s breakdown in context: We now see WHY she went as far as she did: While the revelation was bad for Scrooge, finding out one of his most trusted allies was a traitor the whole time and knew everything about him, for Beakly.. it had to be worse. Finding out one of your best employees, one of the FEW people you ever trusted, and someone you DIRECTLY RECOMMENDED TO SCROOGE, was not only the man who set up your greatest enemies, but had compromised your organization for most of your career. IT’s no wonder she broke down so hard.. while I already gave several reason adding “This level of betrayal and self doubt to the list” only makes it that much harder on her. But for now a partnership is started.. one that very well may end scrooge.

Final Thoughts: A pretty good episode overall. It’s well paced, to the point I probably forgot a LOT, has some good jokes, and fills in a lot of the gaps in the lore, while giving us a nice insight into bradford and heron. Even without hortense this was a pretty good episode.

Upcoming Reviews: LIfe and Times; Master of the Mississippi Ride of the Three Cabbleros: The Three Cablleros (House of Mouse) Tomtrospective: Lava Lake Beach

#ducktales #ducktales spoilers #scrooge mcduck #bradford buzzard #della duck #donald duck #black heron #bentina beakley #the first adventure!#the first adventure #cristina vee

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uncloseted · 2 years

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Hello! would you like to recommend some interesting movies and shows that you like? I want to watch something nice but I don't know what

Yes! I have recommendations! Here are some of my favorites:

For live action TV shows:

If you like Skins, try the Norwegian show Skam (or one of its remakes) and the Australian show SLiDE. Both of them are a little hard to find but they're totally worth it. They're both character-focused dramas that center on the lives of high school students.

Euphoria a beautifully shot teen drama in the vein of Skins that deals with issues of mental health, gender, sex, and violence.

Pushing Daisies a mystery-of-the-week black comedy about a piemaker who raises the dead so that he can collect reward money for discovering how they died.

The Good Place is a philosophical comedy about a woman who is sent to heaven by mistake after she dies, and her quest to become a more moral person.

Ted Lasso is a comedy-drama about an American football coach who is sent to the UK to coach a professional football/soccer team. It's charming and optimistic, and is fun to watch regardless of whether or not you like football.

Gilmore Girls is a comedy-drama about the lives of a mother-daughter duo who are best friends. It's witty and whimsical.

Wandavision is a Marvel Comics mini-series about Wanda Maximoff/Scarlett Witch living in what appears to be a TV show. I won't say too much about this show, but it's one that ends up being deeply philosophical.

Schitt's Creek a sitcom about a wealthy family who loses their money and must move to the small town of Schitt's Creek, where they live in a motel.

Community is a sitcom about a group of friends who attend a community college together and the hijinks that ensue. It's a very quirky show. that's heavy on pop-culture references and meta-humor.

Only Murders in the Building is a newer mystery-comedy show about three strangers share an obsession with true crime and suddenly find themselves wrapped up in one.

Westworld is a philosophical dystopian science fiction neo-Western television series about a theme park where guests can indulge their wildest fantasies using lifelike androids. It deals with questions of artificial intelligence, consciousness, ethics, and free will.

Veronica Mars is a teen neo-noir mystery-of-the-week series about a high school student who moonlights as a private investigator.

Reality TV:

Great British Bake Off is a really low-key British competition show where contestants complete three baking challenges each week in the hopes of being dubbed the best amateur baker in the UK. The contestants are genuinely really nice and helpful to one another, so it's pretty chill.

Terrace House is a reality TV show where six strangers move into a house together. It's a dating show, kind of, but it's also about people making friends and following their personal and professional aspirations. It has a group of celebrity panelists who watch the show with you and then comment on what people are doing. How real it actually is is up for debate, especially in the later seasons, but it's a fun watch nonetheless.

Queer Eye is a reality TV show where five gay men give makeovers. It's focused on representation, gay culture, and self-improvement, and has a lot of really heartwarming episodes.

Anime:

Space Dandy, a Shinichirô Watanabe space opera that follows the misadventures of Dandy, an alien bounty hunter who is “a dandy guy in space”. It's mostly a comedy, but it has some episodes that I think are actually really profound.

Cowboy Bebop (the original, not the Netflix live action remake), a Shinichirô Watanabe space western that also follows a group of alien bounty hunters, but this one is in more of a neo-noir style drama that deals with themes of existential angst, loneliness, and a person's past.

The Tatami Galaxy a parallel universe show by Masaaki Yuasa that follows the adventures of a student at Kyoto University.

Night Is Short, Walk On Girl an anime movie by Masaaki Yuasa that exists in the same world as Tatami Galaxy. It's a romantic comedy and is super life-affirming. It's one of my favorite movies of all time.

Fullmetal Alchemist is a dark fantasy about teenage two brothers who are alchemists searching for the philosopher's stone.

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex: a cyberpunk spy/thriller that follows the adventures of a law enforcement unit that investigates cybercrime and terrorism cases. This has one of my favorite episodes of TV ever, Kusanagi's Labyrinth, which I really recommend everyone watches on its own even if you don't end up watching the rest of the show.

Keep Your Hands off Eizouken! A slice of life, teen comedy that follows a group of high school girls who have an eizouken (film club). This show is a love letter to the process of making animated movies and it's so, so beautiful.

Western Animation:

Adventure Time is a surreal, coming of age, fantasy-adventure comedy-drama that follows the adventures of brothers Finn the Human and Jake the Dog in a magical, post-apocalyptic world.

Movies:

Before Sunrise is a romantic drama that follows Jesse and Celine as they meet on a Eurail train and disembark in Vienna to spend the night together.

Amelie is a whimsical romantic comedy film that follows Amelie, a shy waitress who decides to change the lives of those around her for the better while struggling with her own isolation.

Her is a science-fiction romantic drama about a man who falls in love with his artificially intelligent virtual assistant.

Anything Taika Waititi, especially Hunt for the Wilderpeople and Boy. Both are slice of life, coming of age movies. They're sentimental, whimsical, and angsty. Boy is about a young boy's life and his relationship with his ex-con father. Hunt for the Wilderpeople is about a juvenile delinquent who was abandoned by his mother and goes to live on a remote farm.

Only Lovers Left Alive is a comedy-drama film about a centuries-long romance between two vampires.

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noxyfied · 3 years

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This, is Noxy/Noxyfied/Nox. This is the character I identify as online, and I want to tell you my story with this adorable Arctic Fox because it is one heck of a tale from not so long ago

Things did begin rough at the beginning of my persona’s history. I honestly can’t recall how I came up with it, only how I inserted my love for something and went with it.

From the early years of 2017 to 2019 I was all paper and pencil. Ah yes traditional art was my big thing for a couple of years during that era of 2013 to 2020. I had a time where I wrote stories about characters I made, and not much. No fan art, no nothing, I wanted to stick to my own original ideas at first before I took the step to do something that I did not own; it was a weird mindset I know, I couldn’t hold myself to want to be original and develop to be good enough to draw other things.

It took me some time to develop, hell even to this day I still am unsure of my own skills but I enjoyed trying new things. I don’t reject much criticism even if it comes harsh it still lingers in my head when received anyway. I needed someone to identify as online, a persona who I would have an identity through as I was moving forward on this hopeful career I want to make with my art.

Idea #1 draw my own self accurate to how I look

Scratch that...

Nononono, I am too bad at showing my face, even at that I don’t like myself.

So I had to come up with something else, 2019 was ending with my skills rising up to something neat. I had Fire alpaca and a wacom cheap tablet which I used time to time back then, and with how I moved foward I said “why not, lets draw a glaceon.

Not bad, not bad. I do enjoy anthropomorphic animals, and for a anthro Glaceon it wasn't so bad. Even back then I did not enjoy much of this picture but the idea sparked. I did roleplay around online a lot as a Glaceon. People always had referred to me as a Glaceon when talking, because furry friends tend to be like that and I don’t mind. It had definitely sparked the idea of identifying as one for my persona.

I had a hard time how I would draw this character, a more personalized Glaceon with my own flare of the art style I carry should be nice, should I make it tall? short? anthro? feral? the questions rose up. Even more as time passed, took some time unsure of it, Unluckily I had a Glaceon FURsona, not a persona. (Yes those were two separate things as I carried 7 fursonas as individual characters in their own stories).

But soon one day in class, my artsy self was bored and it just sparked.

This is it! yes! I love it! something about this just clicked for some reason, it was like nothing I had seen before I could not look away at it, this was it.

After class I went home and played some games. The idea was there but man am I tired. Things did go slow, but not for long as of January, the classes I took gave me the ability to better understand this Adobe Photoshop, an amazing tool for editing pictures but also... To draw?!? I have heard of using Photoshop to draw but was amazed to have the ability using such program. During my time 2019 I would doodle around on Photoshop in my school or at home (thanks to the campus giving me a cheaper prize to use it for assignments) Not bad, not bad, the program was for sure something nice to use. Look! I even drew my Fursonas there too, ain’t that nice

2019 was something for sure. It had just begun making 2020 quite the year as I took my wacom tablet, opened Photoshop, and on January there it was.

Oh how cute! I felt so proud of myself, firealpaca was nothing like how clean and pretty Photoshop was, I was amazed at this ability.

“I made this?” that would be what I ask myself everyday. Time to time I would, and still, look at my phone to my drawings and remember what I used to make some pieces, I will not forget how I used thick outlines with the line too from photoshop, added some depth on the eyes. But most importantly, I had a persona, and I introduced it

My friends loved it, I could not believe I am starting to do the shift, my days of traditional art were at a halt. Not at a complete stop since I do use traditional art for a few other things of course, this was just my main focus now.

This little creature was everything to me, cute, easy to make, helped me throughout a few months as I practiced with my digital art.

I also perfected it’s look, but something looked rather familiar about it. Could not put my finger to it, so I went on drawing it.

that was a few exceptions where I shifted the proportions for “it”

“It” “it” what was this thing supposed to be, I myself was unsure how to identify myself with this persona. Male? no, female? no. The issue was there, who am I really inside, who was my persona gonna be.

I still cannot tell you exactly what my persona was for the longest time. I at times felt lost and confused with my identity, it did not help that 2020 did its mumbo jumbo and a pandemic happened, it was a lot of time on my own at home just questioning really who I had been for the longest time. Classes were minimal so my free time was big around April and May.

I was always unsure of who I was exactly, through my early years late 2000′s I had in me that my body was uncomfortable for looking the way it did, 2010′s went silent but there was something in me I did not understand. why did I feel this way, why do I feel as I am not happy with who I am, and who I identify with.

This persona was the wake up call to who I really wanted to be. I saw it in me that I knew being a male was the main issue in me feeling unhappy. Throughout my life I did not enjoy masculinity as much as other kids, yeah I had some boy traits but it was rather minimal, I enjoyed other things more. I enjoyed a lot of things about being female it was something I had never seen before. as hard or confusing things tend to be from me to explain, its a rather hard thing for myself to explain. But that how it felt “confusing” I researched and looked for things and to my conclusion I had come to be, I come to identify as a MtF trans.

I felt relieved in me of it and I already enjoyed my days more after from it. The only issue is “who do I tell..?” I was timid to tell this to anyone, friends or even family. Especially family, those I come to admit they will never be told of what my decision was because of how hard headed they are. It is a tragic story to tell since most families are such closed minded people of rejecting others.

“My friends tho, my friends? I would feel bad if I told them” that was the mindset I had for a while before admitting to them time to time, one by one. This was a chapter in my life that had changed me early 2020′s but I felt a lot of joy in me to be who I wanted to be, I no longer took anyone else's guidance for controlling who I am, I just went with my own flow.

My persona was.... more comically confused, it could be either so I just left it how my mood wanted it to go for when drawing it. So, things went well, in 2019 with the money I got I found myself enjoying a lot of second handed games, with a game coming real soon that had me pumped for I had to get a console I wanted for so long

A PS4 for the the Final fantasy 7 Remake, I was so pumped waiting for the game, I got a used PS4 for it and even bought couple other games for it to get to know the console: Final fantasy 15, destiny, and later on this Persona 5 game a lot of people talked about. Hmm ok, well lets try it out and oh me oh my, a few days later:

The art style captivated me, can you tell I went all out to trying anything with my persona? I cannot believe I was my own guinea pig for these sorts.

Going around some friends and they will tell you that I used this pfp quite a lot back then, as well as updating it with a new oc I had come up with

A tale in due time will be told about this gal.

well, it was set and forth that this was me, my persona, this glaceon was who I was. People loved it, my friends really liked it, and I had a blast having this first pure year of digital art only. Meeting new friends, and admiring their art. Having old friends come back, and even losing a few others on the way. During the time of june, to July I was rapid about drawing my persona in many ways, short, tall, anthro, feral

even metallic.

But there come some time I did not grew tired of. But a little worried that I had to rely on a franchise for my own identity, of course there is nothing wrong for those doing it. But reflecting on myself, back then when I wanted this art career to happen, I wanted to go all out letting out my imagination with my own creations. I had to make the decision, it was time to move on...

...To a new art program and new drawing tablet

No, it wasn’t that. I had to branch out from this Glaceon, but keep my identity, my legacy of this persona in check, but with a new coat of paint of course. did not take a long time before choosing that I had to use a real life animal as inspiration for this change. Something at least close to it, ah yes of course! the inspiration of the Glaceon was an arctic fox, well those are some good stepping stones to begin with so what happened one day is that I began sketching, not before saying good bye to this old self that helped me begin. It was weird, this is me but it was old me?

Tested the new Brushes from this amazing program called Clip studio paint, and I gotta say I love the program. Sincerely the best choice I made to leave Photoshop for this.

At last, this is it. the new Me!

Familiar looking isn’t it,baby steps we can say.

I cannot blame the people for calling my new persona a “Glaceon-alike”

I headed to the right direction stepping away from it, but it was hard to let go

new program, new tablet, new me. the later half of 2020 went onto a lot of changes with myself, the chibi small version did not make me happy to make anymore, I was losing the touch and with the few comments I got of looking like a “powerpuff girl look a like” did set me off to do a drastic change I am thankful to do. This new me had some weird phases, don’t we all tho?

where else to brainstorm than back to the traditional old ways. Now, you may see this and ask what was I thinking when making this. the order of when i started and finish goes as: Top right: ok what if it was feral, nah nah scratch. Top left: Can I still make it cute with a round face and features I had from before? ew no! that looks scary Bottom right: lets make it more natural and wow hey! yes yes yes! this looks hundred times better. Bottom left: It is time I go all out and make it humanoid, it was how I found myself enjoying drawing most things but still did some anthropomorphic things. I was just not the best of it.

Back to digital and.... Amazing, I really out did myself this time, lets go for it, lets keep going with this

I even got a cool sword too!

My practice continued from here, the second half was great and fun. New persona got me in a place where I was happy with and through October and December I was having a blast with the more possibilities with it. I went on to practice with even more suggestive things after a life drawing class I took, proportions mattered to me and with this new persona I went out to make more better looking proportions that were attractive and stylish.

This persona was great, and I managed to make so much of it. even Drawing the more suggestive stuff had left me with an answer for this persona. Just make it gender fluid, my selection for this character being male or female made me so tired I did not know why I just made it gender fluid since the beginning. My mood swings for this character, and I can’t resist drawing it either way. Was I finished? of course not, this persona still had some work around to do. The hair became a pain to make to keeping up with consistently.

2020 ended, with a year of exciting new things coming for this new year. I went through quite a lot in my life and my art career took a shaken with this new digital life style, my persona became the identity I saw myself through, something im happy with drawing to represent Me.

That isn’t to say that I gave up on drawing Me Me.

I drew who I hope to be, and will use this from time to time, nothing fancy but something.

It has been a year already since I began identifying myself with this persona from last year from now. ever since I sketched that doodle in class, it has been a happy trip through memory lane writing it and I am happy how things turned out. 2021 is what I hope to be as good as 2020 was (by that I mean drawing only of course) In 2021 one more change was made that had made me just as happy to continue on with.

I got more hair! as crazy as it is yes. More hair, and a different front style has been to this day what I been using.

I even made a discord emoji for all the warm hugs to have with my fursona!

and my first ever animation I have ever done before!!

I am always experimenting new things, and i’m proud to be an artists to go out there and leave my art out there to be noticed by anyone. The love and appreciation friends and others leave me are the best thing I could ask. I look foward to see what is up ahead, for me, my career, and Noxy.

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mrjoelgarcia9 · 3 years

Text

Let’s Talk #StarWars: The Sequel Trilogy

The Sequel Trilogy is not as good as the Original Trilogy.

However, it is still far superior to the Prequel Trilogy.

For my overall thoughts on The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, and The Rise of Skywalker, feel free to keep reading. There will be spoilers.

During the decade after Revenge of the Sith wrapped up the Prequel Trilogy, rumors swirled online over the possibility of additional films. Disney’s acquisition of the franchise was a surprise to fans, but it opened the possibility for new stories to be told with additional films and spinoffs.

The Sequel Trilogy, the final part of the Skywalker Saga, takes place 30 years after Return of the Jedi. The galaxy is caught up in yet another war. The remnants of the Empire have become The First Order, while the Rebels are now the New Republic. The mysterious Kylo Ren is looking for the Jedi Luke Skywalker.

As this occurs, a stormtrooper (Finn) defects and winds up running into Rey, a woman who has lived most of her life on Jakku. They wind up joining The Resistance, led by Leia of the former Rebels. Through three films, and several twists and turns, they take on yet another major galactic threat.

Disney’s ownership of the franchise has become a very toxic topic for fans to deal with, such as when Lucasfilm declared the Expanded Universe of books, comics, and most of the TV series to be non-canon. It was primarily done to condense the continuity into just the films, The Clone Wars, and subsequent TV series like Disney+’s The Mandalorian.

Frankly, a casual fan who only sees the films (and maybe the TV shows) would probably not care enough to look up obscure characters such as Mara Skywalker or Prince Xizor.

As someone who only sees the films, and mostly ignores everything else, the Sequel Trilogy is a mixed bag. It is not the worst film trilogy ever made, being far more enjoyable and less annoying than the Prequels. However, it is also not as good as the Original Trilogy.

The Force Awakens does a good job reestablishing the franchise for both newcomers and long-time fans. It quickly introduces the new characters and uses the Millennium Falcon to then reintroduce the original characters. The action pieces were visually amazing, it had a lot of memorable lines, and ended on the right note. The only problem was the plot being eerily reminiscent of A New Hope to an extent (more on that later).

The Last Jedi was really good. It is the darkest film in the franchise, having all of the characters at their lowest possible points. There were a lot of great moments, especially with the slow confrontation between the ships and Rey and Kylo’s force meetings. It also had a few problems, such as the elongated casino planet sequences, the previously unmentioned sacred Jedi texts, and the film refusing to end.

It should have ended after Kylo took control of the First Order but then drags itself out with another climax in order to have him fight Luke. This sequence would have probably worked better if it were part of the next film.

The Rise of Skywalker was a decent conclusion. Like any third part of a trilogy, it struggled to wrap up the story. In this case, both for this trilogy and the entire saga while also leaving the door open for future adventures. It also had a lot of backtracking, with characters introduced in The Last Jedi reduced to supporting roles, Finn becoming a glorified shouter, and the sudden return of Palpatine.

It streamlined the plot to focus only on Kylo, Rey, and surviving original characters. The film sadly reeks of desperation by the filmmakers in an attempt to appease everyone after the previous film’s divisive response. The end result leaves longtime fans extremely bitter, casual fans lost and confused, and everyone else wondering who were the Knights of Ren.

All three films have two things in common: They were too long, like any Star Wars film, and badly recycled plot beats from the Original Trilogy. Here are three of the more obvious ones.

Death by Lightsaber: Obi-Wan in A New Hope; Han in The Force Awakens

A Reluctant Mentor: Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back; Luke in The Last Jedi

Palpatine Dies: Return of the Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker

It is understandable why most fans are bothered with the Sequels reusing the exact same beats, making them look like faux remakes. The Force Awakens is far more obvious, with only a handful of deviations making it clear it is not a full-blown repetition.

The Last Jedi tried to be different; Empire Strikes Back ended with the Empire basically winning, whereas Last Jedi ended with both sides at a stalemate. The Rise of Skywalker is mostly its own film, with the only major elements it recycles from Return of the Jedi being that of a character related to the villain and aforementioned death.

Despite those problems, what makes these films better than the prequels is everything else. Jar Jar was nowhere to be seen (and presumably dead).

When it comes to special effects, the films prioritized animatronics and puppetry over CG, the latter of which have badly aged the prequels. CG is used but only when necessary.

The lightsaber fights are a good compromise between those seen in the Prequel and Original trilogies. The former were hyperactive, goofy, and acrobatic, while the latter were slow-motion fencing matches. In these films, they have the right amount of gravitas, knowing not to get excessively insane. The closest they ever got to over the top was the fight at the Death Star remnants.

The acting felt far more natural and not as wooden as in the prequels. The performances actually had emotion and at no point sounded forced or angsty. It was great seeing Harrison Ford, the late Carrie Fisher, and Mark Hamill, among many others, return for the trilogy. At no point do they upstage the new actors, such as John Boyega, Daisy Ridley, and Adam Driver, allowing everyone to have their own shining moment.

The Sequel Trilogy has several flaws, from the repetition of certain plot beats to certain characters being wasted. When put alongside the Prequels, they are still the better films due to the acting and special effects. It may not be as good as the originals, but they are masterpieces compared to The Phantom Menace.

Regardless of how you watch the Star Wars films, it would be best to watch these films last, as they reference most of the saga’s first six films. Alternatively, just watch Revenge of the Sith and then the other six films.

The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, and The Rise of Skywalker are available to own on 4K, Blu-ray, DVD, and Digital. All three films, as well as the entire Skywalker Saga, can be streamed exclusively on Disney+.

Until next time, thank you for reading!

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moltenhair · 4 years

Text

There’s been a lot of conversation on my dash lately about the Cass/Eugene parallels and... I may as well give my two cents

I didn’t mind that the show had a lot of movie callbacks... Until the final season was completely reliant upon them. The show up to this point could probably have been watched without someone ever seeing Tangled and still be enjoyable. But in season 3 they made it completely reliant on callbacks, references and visual recreations of movie moments and characters that it would be nearly IMPOSSIBLE for a casual viewer to understand what was happening.

But more than that this is what bugs me: Those moments being paralleled and referenced weren’t originally written to suit Cass’ character arc. Cass’ character (In season 3) centered around call backs to memorable movie moments rather than showcasing the actual character of Cassandra. Instead of letting her have her own special moments they added tons of references to other character’s dramatic moments. Eugene’s death, as an example, was a direct result of a long line of his choices that led him to the moment he gave his life for Rapunzel. His entire life had led to this moment where he chose to be a better person right at the end of his life. Cass just... fell over dead for no reason so they could recreate the ‘rapunzel cries over the corpse of a loved one’ moment. Instead of creating more memorable Cass moments that suited HER character arc, they kept calling back to the movie

A very egregious example (other than the death) is the line “You want me to be the bad guy? Fine... Now I’m the bad guy...” Eden delivered that line brilliantly. This was a big moment where Cass decided to go all-in into her villainy and that there was no hope for redeeming herself... There’s no turning back. She’s going to destroy everything she ever loved. .... Too bad her whammy of a line was a Gothel quote. She says Gothel’s famous line. They had a chance to do something really cool here, to leave a serious impact.. And they decided to wink to the camera with a movie reference. And these were moments Cass wasn’t even present for. So we can’t even believe she’s doing it on purpose to trigger Rapunzel. There is no reason she should be quoting Gothel word for word during (what should be) one of the most tense moments in the series.

These weren’t funny sight gags from the comic relief. These were moments the entire season depended on. This was- who Chris had decided- the character who needed to be the 100% central focus of the show now. This show was all about HER journey and how she was going to overcome this and how her relationship with Rapunzel was going to turn out. Instead of letting her have a serious moment of self discovery, genuine bonding, legitimate anger or her own significant lines... They made her moments callbacks and cliches. Instead of having unique relationship moments between the girls, they reused old relationship moments from Rapunzel and Eugene’s interactions. References did not belong here. But so much of what happened to Cass was based in references to more iconic moments that originally happened to other characters. Cass was robbed of ever having her own iconic moments in doing this.

It was as if they were saying that Cass’ character arc wasn’t strong enough to support itself on its own. There needed to be visual and verbal callbacks tied directly into her actions and arc in order to be effective. Cass in season three was like they put the original Tangled movie in a food processor, hit puree and then poured that grainy batter into a Cass’ shaped dish. It LOOKS like Cass, but it’s not Cass. It’s a mash of every character from the movie and maybe 10% of the character known as Cass from the first two seasons. A heaping helping of Rapunzel’s childhood, a whole bunch of Gothel mannerisms and constant talking about her, sprinkle in shot for shot recreations of Eugene’s greatest hits: Profit??

I got a lot of the same vibes from these blatant movie recreations as the live action Disney remakes.

It’s all about the IMAGE. It’s not about drawing out emotions or creating something new, it’s about the familiar image that the audience will see and relate to the feelings they had about the original. It doesn’t matter if the recreation doesn’t have motivation or a purpose for being there.. It’s THERE and that’s what matters. That it is SEEN. It reminds you of the original, and you liked the original, so that must mean you like the recreation. The original was acclaimed and praised, so that must mean recreating its imagery will automatically make this good without trying anything new. RIGHT?

But it misses out on the heart and soul of what made those original moments good. And the fact that the things being paralleled had actual relevance to the CHARACTERS the events happened to.

A word to the wise: If you’re going to make references to a previous (arguably more popular work), maybe don’t make them the central focus. It only draws attention to the fact that you haven’t got a leg to stand on without relying on how good the original story was to carry the new story along.

#long post #analysis

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iaintyourbro · 4 years

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I wonder if the reason why Cle~rith fans getting desperate with twisting facts is because most of their romantic moments are in midgar ,since midgar was in the pt1 and there’s non to them now only small parts ohh & GS date the moment they worship ,C beating A , A going to the FC then her death but i wonder if A death will actually happen the part 2 Because i’ve seen some people say the devs may change the plot and A death will happen differently (1/2)

so maybe A death will happen at the end of last disc in the remake , but remind me again when does the moment C say to T “it you opinion that matter.” I’ve CAs downplay this moment that the devs will remove it just like how most of their moments do you think the devs will remove CT moments in favor to them cause they’re hoping for that right now , i really thought it was too good to be true that many CT moments were added in pt1 since T was irrelevant until A death in OG (2/2)

Hey there! Thanks for the ask! This ended up much longer than I expected, so I’m going to add a Keep Reading for everyone’s sanity.

First I’ll talk about the scene where Cloud says this line Tifa. This happens when you go to the Northern Crater and Sephiroth creates an illusion of the Nibelheim vision. At the time, you don’t know it IS partially true, but it’s based on how TIFA remembers it. Sephiroth knew Cloud was there, but since he never revealed himself to Tifa, he used this to his advantage.

Cloud is holding strong saying he knows what Sephiroth is doing, and that the guy who runs out of the mansion won’t be him. Zack runs out - and Cloud is like I don’t care, this is Sephiroth’s illusion. I know I was here. Then Sephiroth also is like “okay... fine... I got a picture.” (He doesn’t say that exactly, but you get the jist)

Tifa then can’t respond, because she knows he wasn’t there. Cloud notices she starts to waver on this and says that her opinion is the only one that matters.

Here’s the exact lines that Cloud says:

However, Tifa can’t confirm anything now. Sephiroth did exactly what he wanted to do. This is what actually breaks Cloud. When he realizes that Tifa can’t remember him being in Nibelheim, seeing what Sephiroth is showing him and telling him, his mind breaks, and the illusion of Cloud Strife is broken with it. This allows Sephiroth to get the Black Materia and throw Cloud away like a used puppet, which is exactly how Sephiroth sees him.

This is an extremely powerful scene. You don’t get resolution on what most of this means until you go to The Lifestream later one and Tifa helps Cloud rebuild his mind.

This is the first time that it’s obvious that Tifa is very important to Cloud. This is probably why it’s discounted. Anything that’s showing anything where anybody is important to Cloud other than who they ship him with is not real.

If you replay the OG and pay attention, there are moments that show Tifa is important to Cloud. They are very subtle and NOTHING as obvious as what you see in Remake, but they are there. There are also comments from Barret and Aerith hinting at Cloud’s hidden feelings for Tifa.

Barret when you first get back to Seventh Heaven after the first bombing mission asks if he wants to see his little baby (I thought this was funny).

Barret on the way to Sector 5 makes a comment about them after Cloud is trying to make sure Tifa isn’t scared. “You two can do this later.”

If Tifa and Aerith aren’t in your main party when you get to Costa Del Sol, Aerith will make a comment to Cloud when Tifa says she wants to go swimming about him getting crazy ideas and melting that cold exterior, and then she runs off with Tifa.

But the OG was NOT romantic. I think it’s comical that so many people see all this romance. I replayed it recently. Any romance is very subtle. This game has like 5% romance, 95% crazy shit going on.

Okay, LTD stuff: The Midgar scenes people refer to that I can think of are Cloud laughing with Aerith on the roof (which was removed from the Remake and given to the Avalanche crew), being imprisoned so Tifa hears about the date Aerith promised Cloud, causing some LTD drama, also removed, Aerith running after Tifa instead of Cloud - also replaced with Cloud going after Tifa. The last one is used to say that Cloud didn’t care about Tifa. So, they made sure to cover that one.

Aerith HERSELF has helped to end the LTD. Her entire resolution was a nod to the OG plot - she gives foreshadowing on her death, on Cloud not being Cloud, and various other aspects. She tells him he can’t fall in love with her because even if he thinks he has, it isn’t real. They laid it on heavy there. Aerith HERSELF doesn’t seem interested. She’s absolutely more interested in what’s up with Zack. She built up the entire time you’re going through the Collapsed Expressway in Chapter 9 to ask Cloud if he had any SOLDIER buddies.

In any case, the Northern Crater scene will be one that slays people. It was emotional in seeing it in text and polygons, but with voice acting and HD, you’re gonna see crying, fear, and see Cloud slowly breakdown in HD.

Now on to Aerith’s Death

So, I strongly believe that the main plot points of FF7 OG will be the same or similar in FF7 Remake. The devs themselves have said they are not going to divert from the story. However, that doesn’t mean that things won’t be added or tweaked. They added 30+ hours of content to a 6 hour portion of the OG. They moved scenes around, reworded things, and in some cases, removed scenes. But EVERYTHING they did only added to the main plot points.

The Sector 7 plate still falls, no matter how hard you try to get there and stop it. Tifa still goes to Don Corneo and you have to save her, Cloud still falls in to the Sector 5 Church, President Shinra still dies, Aerith is still captured by Tseng.

The main aspects to drive the plot forward still happened. What happens in between those things is what is different, but ultimately, the main points are the same.

The things added or modified didn’t impact these aspects. If anything, they added to them. For example, having Barret get stabbed by Sephiroth served as a nod to the original idea to have most of Cloud’s friends actually die. This was changed to have just Aerith die. Sephiroth stabbing Barret also served to fuck with Cloud. Barret is revived because we all would have burned down SE HQ. (No, he’s revived because there’s quite a bit that would have had to change story wise, such as Corel and all that.)

Adding Sephiroth in early is enhancing the original story. There were instances in the OG where Cloud heard Sephiroth talking to him, but you didn’t know who it was. The “In my veins flows the blood of the Ancients.” is directly from the OG, at the same time. It’s when you’re going to Elmyra’s house. They just enhanced that scene. They’re building up the mental breakdown of Cloud slowly, so by time it happens, you will also feel like you’ve been mentally broken down by Sephiorth. It makes it much more powerful than hearing a high pitched sound and a random line of text appear on the screen.

I think that Aerith knows she’s going to die, just like she eventually seemed to know in the OG. I think Zack coming back is going to be part of that. I’m going to guess that he’s somehow going to help her. She will still need to be in the Lifestream at this point to make everything work.

Do I think that the entire event will be the same? No. I think it will still happen at the Forgotten City. I think Cloud may completely go nuts and your party will need to stop him from killing Aerith himself, like he almost does in the OG. I’ve seen theories saying HE will kill her, but I don’t know if they’ll go that far. I think Sephiroth will still kill her. I’m not sure it’ll be the same exact way, but I’d be very surprised if they changed the scene too much.

It’s a really powerful scene. I don’t think it’ll be JUST Cloud looking at her. I think that’s why they’ve built up the relationship with her and the others - especially with Tifa. But I definitely think she will be killed in a very similar way in order to keep the horror of the original scene... and I think initially she’s going to survive it. That’ll be the whole illusion, but she’ll die pretty quickly after that. They’re going to fuck with us and make us think she’s going to survive it.

I do think that Zack is going to come and “get her.” I think that Cloud will have interactions with Zack and Aerith to try and prevent the AC scenario of extreme guilt. Zack will definitely have a much bigger part than he did originally (which was almost non-existent in the OG).

In order for them to properly follow the FF7 story, Aerith has to die.

The other option is to have her die at the Northern Crater, which is originally where they were going to have it happen, but I’m not sure how that would fit at this point. Tifa is the key to breaking Cloud for Sephiroth. Sephiroth knows he can manipulate Cloud by using Tifa against him. Aerith wouldn’t do much additional in this scene. She doesn’t know Cloud. It also would require that Aerith dies to add to the grief the party is feeling. Cloud needs to be broken down, and Aerith is part of that breakdown.

So I think she will still die at the Forgotten City. I do think that you’ll have more interaction with her after she’s in the Lifestream, but through symbolism. I think that Tifa will talk to Aerith when she falls in to the Lifestream.

Everything that builds the skeleton of the FF7 story will be there. It’s just how powerful it will now be and how much will be added.

This turned out REALLY long, but I had fun writing it.

Hopefully I answered your questions!

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