#presented the first six or so seasons that I feel like at this point I've become almost too picky

[skinnypaleangryperson]

I don't know if it's just me, but are they gradually dumbing down Rick's character for the sake of keeping the show popular?

I got extreme Peter Griffin vibes from this episode, and I feel like in general he's a lot less sharp and cool gritty and witty and "unconventional" the way that he was the first couple of seasons. He wasn't an easy character to "swallow" in a lot of ways so to speak, and I feel like he's gradually getting dumber, more cloudy around the edges, less sharp and more conventional and shallow with a lot of the things that he says. He feels extremely typical sometimes this season-like more of the character that people would watch because the character doesn't challenge their headspace in any kind of way, and is someone that encourages their complacent drunk dead personality.

The character used to say things that was really unpopular, or at the very least would occasionally say things that would make people uncomfortable (just things like "if you know how you're going to die because of how boring your life is then you're not even alive" and just things that challenged at the boring drunk complacent status quo that most American sitcom characters are), was an extreme breath of fresh air in terms of how sharp he was and how he wasn't afraid to challenge everything even if it was just in a TV show character kind of way, and it's one of the things that stuck out about me about him the most, especially as someone who is mentally ill and feels detached from most of American culture.

I might just be in a bad mood, but I genuinely feel like Rick feels less sharp and "unconventional"and is starting to feel increasingly more dumb, dopey and easy to swallow as a character.

I still love him and I always will, and sometimes I find it endearing, but this episode in particular felt like he was just being a dumb genuine and boring drunk (really just in terms of the scene with Beth, but considering that the episodes are only about 22 minutes, there isn't a lot of elbow room to work with, especially considering most of this episode was summer screen time).

The only reason why I care so much is because of Rick is one of the very few characters I've ever been genuinely connected with, so I'm just worried that Rick as a character is going down to gradual slippery slope of just becoming an American extremely overly dumbed it down product. The show was so gritty and real and raw and a lot of ways for the first three to four seasons and kept that touch up to season 6, but this season just feels like they're gradually going into "American Dad" type feeling territory, and I'm vaguely worried a little bit about my connection to the show. Especially as someone that does not connect to things easily or ever at all really. And partially because everything is so dumbed down and doesn't seem to have any and genuine philosophy behind it except of being another brainless thing for people to consume to pass the time.

#I'm just complaining to myself #because I don't like talking to people on Reddit #lol #rick and morty #if anybody thinks that I'm being melodramatic then I am because there is such thing as being mentally ill because of real life #problems and being deeply in love with characters because for whatever reason that's what makes sense to my brain #I have no friends in this fandom so I can post as obnoxiously as I want anyway lol #Rick is one of the very few things that means enough to me to bring out this passionate side of me #when it comes to consumption #literally not even kidding but my attachment to Rick is so deep #that even just having a certain kind of dopey looked his expression after being confronted in a certain way from being caught drunk can put #me off #for the record I am aware of the fact that my attachment to Rick is unhealthy #and therefore how passionate I am about him is vaguely off-putting or a lot off putting depending on who you are #but I am a self-aware unhealthy person #and I'm also wear the fact that literally nobody has to put up with somebody else's posts if they don't like how intense or mentally ill #they are #fans like me would be better off at this point if the show was canceled #not because I want it to be but because I've become so specifically attached in my extreme labretentious way from other way that Rick was #presented the first six or so seasons that I feel like at this point I've become almost too picky #and obviously it's not about what I think #but I am saying this as someone that is more than content to be fixated on a canceled TV show because of how perfect it already was #like bj #literally the strongest relationship I've ever had with a character #and it's from a canceled TV show of literally 4 years lol

[mostlysignssomeportents]

"Efficiency" left the Big Three vulnerable to smart UAW tactics

Tomorrow (September 22), I'm (virtually) presenting at the DIG Festival in Modena, Italy. Tomorrow night, I'll be in person at LA's Book Soup for the launch of Justin C Key's "The World Wasn’t Ready for You." On September 27, I'll be at Chevalier's Books in Los Angeles with Brian Merchant for a joint launch for my new book The Internet Con and his new book, Blood in the Machine.

It's been 143 days since the WGA went on strike against the Hollywood studios. While early tactical leaks from the studios had studio execs chortling and twirling their mustaches about writers caving once they started losing their homes, the strikers aren't wavering – they're still out there, pounding the picket lines, every weekday:

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/08/09/how-hollywood-writers-make-ends-meet-100-days-into-the-writers-guild-strike.html

The studios obviously need writers. That gleeful, anonymous studio exec who got such an obvious erotic charge at the thought of workers being rendered homeless as punishment for challenging his corporate power completely misread the room, and his comments didn't demoralize the writers. Instead, they inspired the actors to go on strike, too.

But how have the writers stayed out since May Day? How have the actors stayed out for 69 days since their strike started on Bastille Day? We can thank the studios for that! As it turns out, the studios have devoted so much energy to rendering creative workers as precarious as possible, hiring as little as they can getting away with and using punishing overtime as a substitute for adequate staffing that they've eliminated all the workers who can't survive on side-hustles and savings for six or seven months at a time.

But even for those layoff-hardened workers, long strikes are brutal, and of course, all the affiliated trades, from costumers to grips, are feeling the pain. The strike fund only goes so far, and non-striking, affected workers don't even get that. That's why I've been donating regularly to the Entertainment Community Fund, which helps all affected workers out with cash transfers (I just gave them another $500):

https://secure2.convio.net/afa/site/Donation2?df_id=8117&8117.donation=form1&mfc_pref=T

As hot labor summer is revealed as a turning point – not just a season – long strikes will become the norm. Bosses still don't believe in worker power, and until they get their minds right, they're going to keep on trying to starve their workforces back inside. To get a sense of how long workers will have to hold out, just consider the Warrior Met strike, where Alabama coal-miners stayed out for 23 months:

https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/warrior-met-strike-union/

As Kim Kelly explained to Adam Conover in the latest Factually podcast, the Alabama coal strikers didn't get anywhere near the attention that the Hollywood strikers have enjoyed:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvyMHf7Yg0Q

(To learn more about the untold story of worker organizing, from prison unions to the key role that people of color and women played in labor history, check out Kelly's book, "Fight Like Hell," now in paperback:)

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Fight-Like-Hell/Kim-Kelly/9781982171063

Which brings me to the UAW strike. This is an historic strike, the first time that the UAW has struck all of the Big Three automakers at once. Past autoworkers' strikes have marked turning points for all American workers. The 1945/46 GM strike established employers' duty to cover worker pensions, health care, and cost of living allowances. The GM strike created the American middle-class:

https://prospect.org/labor/2023-09-18-uaw-strikes-built-american-middle-class/

The Big Three are fighting for all the marbles here. They are refusing to allow unions to organize EV factories. Given that no more internal combustion cars will be in production in just a few short years, that's tantamount to eliminating auto unions altogether. The automakers are flush with cash, including billions in public subsidies from multiple bailouts, along with billions more from greedflation price-gouging. A long siege is inevitable, as the decimillionaires running these companies earn their pay by starving out their workers:

https://www.businessinsider.com/general-motors-ceo-mary-barra-salary-auto-workers-strike-uaw-2023-9

The UAW knows this, of course, and their new leadership – helmed by the union's radical president Shawn Fain – has a plan. UAW workers are engaged in tactical striking, shutting down key parts of the supply chain on a rolling basis, making the 90-day strike fund stretch much farther:

https://prospect.org/blogs-and-newsletters/tap/2023-09-18-labors-militant-creativity/

In this project, they are greatly aided by Big Car's own relentless pursuit of profit. The automakers – like every monopolized, financialized sector – have stripped all the buffers and slack out of their operations. Inventory on hand is kept to a bare minimum. Inputs are sourced from the cheapest bidder, and they're brought to the factory by the lowest-cost option. Resiliency – spare parts, backup machinery – is forever at war with profits, and profits have won and won and won, leaving auto production in a brittle, and easily shattered state.

This is especially true for staffing. Automakers are violently allergic to hiring workers, because new workers get benefits and workplace protection. Instead, the car companies routinely offer "voluntary" overtime to their existing workforce. By refusing this overtime, workers can kneecap production, without striking.

Enter "Eight and Skate," a campaign among UAW workers to clock out after their eight hour shift. As Keith Brower Brown writes for Labor Notes, the UAW organizers are telling workers that "It’s crossing an unofficial picket line to work overtime. It’s helping out the company":

https://labornotes.org/2023/09/work-extra-during-strike-auto-workers-say-eight-and-skate

Eight and Skate has already started to work; the Buffalo Ford plant can no longer run its normal weekend shifts because workers are refusing to put in voluntary overtime. Of course, bosses will strike back: the next step will be forced overtime, which will lead to the unsafe conditions that unionized workers are contractually obliged to call paid work-stoppages over, shutting down operations without touching the strike fund.

What's more, car bosses can't just halt safety stoppages or change the rules on overtime; per the UAW's last contract, bosses are required to bargain on changes to overtime rules:

https://uaw.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Working-Without-Contract-FAQ-FINAL-2.pdf

Car bosses have become lazily dependent on overtime. At GM's "highly profitable" SUV factory in Arlington, TX, normal production runs a six-days, 24 hours per day. Workers typically work five eight-hour days and nine hours on Saturdays. That's been the status quo for 11 years, but when bosses circulated the usual overtime signup sheet last week, every worker wrote "a big fat NO" next to their names.

Writing for The American Prospect, David Dayen points out that this overtime addiction puts a new complexion on the much-hyped workerpocalypse that EVs will supposedly bring about. EVs are much simpler to build than conventional cars, the argument goes, so a US transition to EVs will throw many autoworkers out of work:

https://prospect.org/labor/2023-09-20-big-threes-labor-shortages-uaw/

But the reality is that most autoworkers are doing one and a half jobs already. Reducing the "workforce" by a third could leave all these workers with their existing jobs, and the 40-hour workweek that their forebears fought for at GM inn 1945/46. Add to that the additional workers needed to make batteries, build and maintain charging infrastructure, and so on, and there's no reason to think that EVs will weaken autoworker power.

And as Dayen points out, this overtime addiction isn't limited to cars. It's also endemic to the entertainment industry, where writers' "mini rooms" and other forms of chronic understaffing are used to keep workforces at a skeleton crew, even when the overtime costs more than hiring new workers.

Bosses call themselves job creators, but they have a relentless drive to destroy jobs. If there's one thing bosses hate, it's paying workers – hence all the hype about AI and automation. The stories about looming AI-driven mass unemployment are fairy tales, but they're tailor made for financiers who get alarming, life-threatening priapism at the though of firing us all and replacing us with shell-scripts:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/09/autocomplete-worshippers/#the-real-ai-was-the-corporations-that-we-fought-along-the-way

This is why Republican "workerism" rings so hollow. Trump's GOP talks a big game about protecting "workers" (by which they mean anglo men) from immigrants and "woke captialism," but they have nothing to say about protecting workers from bosses and bankers who see every dime a worker gets as misappropriated from their dividend.

Unsurprisingly, conservative message-discipline sucks. As Luke Savage writes in Jacobin, for every mealymouthed Josh Hawley mouthing talking points that "support workers" by blaming China and Joe Biden for the Big Three's greed, there's a Tim Scott, saying the quiet part aloud:

https://jacobin.com/2023/09/republicans-uaw-strike-hawley-trump-scott/

Quoth Senator Scott: "I think Ronald Reagan gave us a great example when federal employees decided they were going to strike. He said, you strike, you’re fired. Simple concept to me. To the extent that we can use that once again, absolutely":

https://twitter.com/American_Bridge/status/1704136706574741988

The GOP's workerism is a tissue-thin fake. They can never and will never support real worker power. That creates an opportunity for Biden and Democrats to seize:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/18/co-determination/#now-make-me-do-it

Reversing two generations of anti-worker politics is a marathon, not a sprint. The strikes are going to run for months, even years. Every worker will be called upon to support their striking siblings, every day. We can do it. Solidarity now. Solidarity forever.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/21/eight-and-skate/#strike-to-rule

#pluralistic #strikes #uaw #labor #automakers #big three #big car #eight and skate #work to rule #tactics

[systlin]

hi! i'm not sure if something you feel comfortable giving advice on, but even a point in the right direction towards someone who talks about this would be nice. i'd really like to start exploring the woods etc around me and engaging more with nature after living in the city for most of my life, but im Black and femme and have been very adamantly warned away from those spaces because of the risk of being hurt in them, esp in a mostly white town. any advice for exploring safely? ik not to be alone

Obviously I can't speak to Black experiences, because I'm so white I glow under blacklight. I CAN speak to lady experiences, though.

It depends a WHOLE LOT on the area, tbh. In my area, there...well. There simply aren't a lot of people, period. There are as many people in the city of Chicago...just Chicago, not counting the suburbs...as live in my entire damn state. There simply aren't a lot of people to present danger out here. I go out in the woods all the time alone, and really the only time I see ANYONE is in peak morel mushroom season. I've never felt unsafe. But again, that's because I live in Bumfuck Nowhere and there are like six people in my 'town'.

THAT BEING SAID, I have often gone hiking in local state parks where there ARE people, and have never felt unsafe. Indeed, most people are very friendly. Then again, I'm white, so I have NO idea if that experience would be different as a lone black woman. I've run into people of various colors, and had positive interactions with all of them, but again. I'm white. When I run into, say, a Black woman and her daughter hiking, I'm the one in that interaction who might pose a problem. I have no idea what that interaction is like from the other side, though I just say Hi and offer some of my extra water if they need it. I don't know what sort of anxiety might be present there, or what other interactions they've had that day.

It would not be a bad idea at all to find a hiking buddy. See if you can find a friend who wants to go tromp around the woods with you. Even I do this, though these days it's usually my dog.

Actually, if you have a dog? Particularly a large dog? That's a great buddy to take hiking. Not a bad idea to invest in a thing of pepper spray either. If you're in bear country, buy some bear spray.

TBH, if you can, go wandering on private land, where other people being around is less likely. Obviously get permission from the land owner first; I find a polite smile and maybe a plate of cookies and a 'yeah I just want to look at wildflowers and spot birds, they're hobbies of mine' usually works.

[sandybrett]

Here are my completely honest thoughts on a bunch of audio dramas I've checked out. (Don't worry, nothing scathing, they're all reasonably good. But please proceed with caution, or don't proceed, if you're involved in creating any of these shows.)

In the order I first listened:

The Storage Papers: Nine episodes in. A little slow paced, but I've heard it picks up in the later seasons. My only real concern is that it seems like a lot of the horror revolves around "this thing looks sort of like a human but it's Wrong somehow. also it kills people (or cats)." I hope at some point we meet a creature that looks and acts as unsettling as the Grinner but is nice, or at least complicated.

The Cellar Letters: Seven episodes in. I LOVE it. I love the natural-feeling messiness of it, the way Nate and Steve talk in circles and go back and forth on what to believe. It's made me laugh out loud multiple times. I can't wait to learn more about that weird little room full of letters with that one random word written on the wall (I forget what).

400 Words a Horror: Three episodes in. I had to re-listen to the first episode because I hadn't been paying enough attention, but I think that particular episode rewards re-listening anyway. Also it is the only show on this list that genuinely frightens me so I have to pace myself. Very good.

Tin Can Audio Presents: Middle:Below: Two episodes in. I won't say I'm hooked, but I am somewhat interested. It's a lot more relaxing than the other podcasts on this list, so I keep thinking I'll save it for listening closer to bedtime, then not getting around to it.

The Grotto: Six episodes in. Very much enjoying. I was SO proud of myself for correctly guessing the twist in the second episode. I love the characters and am extremely intrigued by the mysteries. My only criticism is that the musical interludes drag on too long. And I'm saying that as a WOE.BEGONE fan.

Soul Operator: Three episodes in. It's good but there isn't any particular element that's drawing me in just yet. There's a lot I don't know about the world yet, though, so there is still plenty of time for me to fall in love with this show. (Irrelevant note: I always get "Smooth Operator" by Sade stuck in my head when I think about this show.)

Shadows at the Door: Listened to half of the first episode. It was somewhat interesting, but I decided I had higher priorities for my listening time than disconnected hour-long episodes that are only *somewhat* interesting.

Archive 81: Five episodes in. Quite possibly going to become a major obsession. It's got everything: playing with point of view; the Power of Storytelling but in a menacing way; vivid character voices; probably a cult. I particularly love the way conversations play out on this show--I don't know exactly how to explain it but there's a certain... friction that happens in real conversations but rarely in fictional ones outside cringe comedy. I don't usually enjoy that sort of thing when it's played for laughs, but for realism or suspense? I eat that up. It does make me a little tense so this is another show I pace myself with and I'm glad the episodes are short.

Alice Isn't Dead: Two episodes in. I'm not going to make it a priority--it's got a similar sort of surrealism to Night Vale, but with higher stakes and less humor, and I had enough trouble getting immersed in Night Vale. I could probably enjoy it if I gave it enough time, but for now I'd rather focus on *gestures at some of the shows above*

The Silt Verses: Listened to the first ten minutes of the first episode and got bored, which I think says as much about me as it does about the show. It does get off to a bit of a slow start and leaves more space between lines of dialogue than most of these shows do, but I could probably get into it with adequate time and sleep. Not prioritizing it, for similar reasons to Alice.

#audio drama #the storage papers #the cellar letters #400 words a horror #middle below #thegrottopod #soul operator #shadows at the door #archive 81 #alice isn't dead #the silt verses #woe.begone #<-tagging because a lot of these shows are woe.begone-adjacent #media i'm gulping

[gotylocks]

Willow Month 2023- Day 3: TV Show (Full Series/Specific Episode) or Movie

If you read my entry for Day one, you'll know I went into the show without seeing the movie. In fact, I actually made a point to wait to watch it until the finale, because it was a rare opportunity where I could watch one of these years later follow ups without nostalgia for the original (unlike, say, Star Wars), so I wanted to see if it worked on its own.

The fact I'm writing this should tell you, I truly believe it does. Now, I don't want this to come off like I don't like the movie, because that is not the case. I love the movie! I'm wearing a Sorsha and Mads shirt as I write this! But I would still love the show just as much without the movie.

Some hard numbers may make my point. I have watched the movie once, and while I often think about watching it again, I haven't yet. By contrast, I have watched the full series 13 times through at this point, and at least 8 of those times were marathon sessions where I went from episodes 1-8 in a single sitting.

Why is that? Well, I think the movie is missing some key ingredients that keep it from hitting that obsession level. Namely, Kit, Jade, (grown up) Elora... ok it's the entire crew. Their interplay, the way their relationships build over the course of the season, and the way that by the end of the finale every single one of them has been improved by the others being present in their lives.

The party of six, all with their beautiful, layered arcs and emotional storylines, they're the ones that make the show something special. I've said in the past that typically in shows with ensemble casts, there's usually at least one character that I find annoying, or one actor that I don't like for one reason or another. That's another thing that makes the show so incredible. I love every single person involved. From the main six, rippling out to the supporting cast and cameos like Hannah Waddingham and Christian Slater. Not only does everyone understand the assignment, they bring their own unique flavor and quirks so nobody feels like they're phoning it in. You can tell everyone is having fun and that translates to the audience.

And while fun is first up on the menu for the show, there's also so many moments of heart-rending drama. As someone who lost their dad at 26, I connect to Kit's feelings of grief and abandonment over the disappearance of her father. I connect with Jade feeling lost and purposeless. I connect with Elora desperately wanting to help despite struggling to believe in herself. I connect with Graydon carrying a lot of guilt over things he had no control over and wanting to prove himself as more than what his father believes he is. I connect with Boorman regretting his selfish choices and wanting to make up for his past mistakes. I even relate to Willow, thrust into a position where he has to be a believer despite feeling like a fraud.

Whether it's due to the run time or the time in which it was made, the movie just can't compete with the variety of character arcs, the layers that get peeled back the more the crew spend time together, the realization how each person has something to learn from the others and how they've grown to rely on each other.

By the time they reach the Immemorial City to fight the Crone, they have grown into one of the best found families I've ever seen. They have each other's backs, they trust each other implicitly, and they're willing to put everything on the line to save the world, sure, but more importantly, save each other and facilitate their rises to greatness.

The dialogue, while not to everyone's taste, I felt was a great choice. It immediately plants a flag on its own territory and says confidently "We are not Game of Thrones. We are not Lord of the Rings. We are our own thing." I love that shit! It is never a show that feels like it's chasing a trend, because it is so uniquely itself. That extends to the music, be it the fantastic score by James Newton Howard and Xander Rodzinski or the fascinating modern song choices deployed in each episode, which while I have opinions about songs I would prefer in different places, I cannot deny that they set the show apart from everything else that has come before. And "Crimson+Clover" by Pom Pom Squad will live in my brain forever thanks to its absolutely pitch perfect use in episode 5.

The fight scenes are fantastic, because they're never there for the sake of having action. Instead, major character beats are woven throughout, making each fight hugely meaningful to everyone involved. Whether it's Willow going from his weakened, nigh magicless state at the start of the show, to being the great sorcerer he was always meant to be thanks to working with Elora, or its Kit and Jade connecting and expressing emotions that words may not be enough for through their shared love language of sword fighting, or Graydon finding the magic within at the moment he needed to and killing one of the Gales pursuing them. Action has a purpose in this story and I love that after so many hollow and emotionless cgi fight scenes we've been inundated with over recent years.

This is why I can't simply choose one favorite episode from the series, because they are so intertwined that I cannot separate them. However, unlike many straight to streaming shows, Willow doesn't just feel like an 8 hour movie chopped into parts (despite my tendency to watch it like one long movie lol). Every episode has a unique identity that I can immediately point to when prompted. Every episode is important to moving both the narrative and character development forward, and there isn't a single one you could cut without everything feeling askew.

So. When I saw this prompt I was like "Maybe I'll make this one short", but we all know now that was going to be impossible. The intense emotional connection I have to this show from front to back just brings this out of me. To the only Fellowship I need in my life. I wouldn't be here without you.

To quote Erin from the making of doc, "These people are my family."

#willowmonth2023 #willow 2022 #willow meta #kit tanthalos #jade claymore #tanthamore #elora danan #graydon hastur #thraxus boorman #willow ufgood

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 12/01/2024

9​来​4s

Season 2

Featured on: THE SILVAGUNNER CHRISTMAS COMEBACK CRISIS ORIGINAL SOUNDTRAXX: vol. 1

Ripped by dante

Uh, so, hi, everyone. I'm going to apologize ahead of time if this post reads a bit more shakily, a bit less structured than what it maybe usually does. I always have a timeline of rips to cover over the week laid out ahead of time, and was really not expecting to cover 9​来​4s as part of it - I thought, naively, that today would just be a day like any other, one more on the pile. I wake up, get dressed, check the SiIvaGunner YouTube feed - and almost collapse onto the floor in shock.

The Christmas Comeback Crisis is back. Ten hours from the point of writing this sentence, the eleventh episode of the main SiIvaGunner storyline will premiere on YouTube.

I don't think I've ever done an effective job of conveying to people just how much the Christmas Comeback Crisis means to me. Sure, rips that I love are one thing, with those you can understand what I'm talking about with just a listen yourself. But the Christmas Comeback Crisis series is so difficult to truly appreciate without the knowledge, the memories and attachment to the channel from having been with it the whole time. To me, it marked the point where all of SiivaGunner's potential as a narrative, all of the loose threads of lore and jokes, all of those feelings of joy and sadness and comradery that flew like sparks throughout Season 1s 9-month run, were distilled into a streamlined narrative. It felt as if a bunch of stray thoughts were finally put to paper, a world envisioned by all of SiIva's viewers finally envisioned with an engrossing conflict and beautiful art. And it felt to me like the team themselves knew just how golden the idea they'd landed on was, as the scope of the storyline quickly expanded from just Christmas of 2016 to eventually enveloping the entirety of Season 2's run.

The final core episode of the Christmas Comeback Crisis released at the tail end of Season 2, on Christmas Day. That is to say, December 25th, 2017. It is currently January 12th 2024 - six years, two weeks, and four days have passed, as the main story of the channel has remained in limbo. When I watched that episode, live on the date of upload, I was still a teenager. I've followed the channel since, still immensely invested, still closely following and paying attention to the lore introduced since - the Side Stories and Haltmann's Archives of Season 3 and Season 4: Episode 1, the King for Another Day Tournament and its fallout across both episodes of Season 4, the many misadventures of Wood Man across Season 5, having seemingly left the Christmas Comeback Crisis canon altogether to explore different worlds where he could have fun with little consequence - only for it all to come crashing down on him in Season 6. After all of that time, all of that buildup, after Season 7 has already been one of the channel's all-around, best-ever years - the cherry on top has landed. Episode 11.

Beyond the lore, the world, the artwork, the storyline, the characters, and the community that's supported it all, what has held the Christmas Comeback Crisis together for me and many others has been the sheer passion present in all those aspects - including, of course, its outstanding soundtrack. I've talked about it before with voiceless, with 時の回廊 ＜ver. CCC＞, with vlEP, and now here - but dante is, genuinely, an *exceptionally* talented musician, possibly my favorite amidst the entire SiIvaGunner team, and he has been completely outdoing himself on the Christmas Comeback Crisis' soundtrack since the day it first began - his music, remixes, arrangement, and overall sound direction has breathed a kind of energy and life into the story that's immersed me in ways I could never have expected.

9​来​4s plays during Episode 8 of the Christmas Comeback Crisis, An Acrimonious Assault - which sort of marked a point of no return for the series. After the 6th episode, Advent of Hell, just barely managed to release during Christmas of 2016, and the 7th episode, Loves the Ladies, released four entire months later due to expressed production issues, it felt like the team had officially realized just how big the project was getting. Yet, despite the woes that the 7th episode had presented, the team pushed on - and the series continued until the end of the year. That energy, that hype and love for the channel, is echoed all throughout 9​来​4s, and it's a feeling I haven't truly felt since that Season that the series once ended during.

At least, that's what I once said. Because now, *we are so fucking back.*

#todays siivagunner #season 2 #siivagunner #siiva #dante #soundcirclet #christmas comeback crisis #siivagunner ccc #siivagunner lore #lore #hiroyuki sawano #guilty crown #Youtube #Bandcamp

[esther-dot]

It seems like jonsa wasn’t a thing till season 6 happened and they hugged each other? Idk I’m wondering what some saw in that hug that others didn’t that made people start shipping them romantically? That scene was emotional for me but that’s because I saw two siblings that have been through so much and are what’s left of their family reunite. Of course since then there has been a lot of metas written from both show and book to support it. But it was after the fact. What was it about that one scene lol

Well, season six premiered in 2016, but three years prior, in 2013 there was a beautiful meta speculating that Jon and Sansa would reunite first of all the Starks (link) and marry for political reasons, so, the hug may have been the introduction to the idea for some, but the interest in/theory of romantic Jonsa preexisted it.

In addition to spec, there are Jonsa fics on AO3 dating back to 2011 (I see some that are now dated before that but those may have been backdated, not sure), I know I've reblogged artwork and meta from before the reunion, here’s a post about the ship from 2011, so, the moment anyone thought “this reunion is being filmed some kinda way”, or, “this soup scene is a little flirty”, or “why are they breathing this way in their scenes and …is Jon…panting? WTF”, or “why did they mutually cloak each other?”, or “why are the promising trust and protection?”, or “why are they cosplaying as NedCat?” they could check and find meta and fics that predicted some or several of those elements before the show did it. Some of the fics and spec even predicted Sansa in Witnerfell and Jon at the Wall, so there was a lot of foresight on the part of the og shippers!

I suppose what I’m getting at is that even when people point to the hug, there’s a context for why it so easily  snowballed. We can pinpoint that as the moment, but my tendency is to think that all the surrounding things made a foundation for it. I mean, even genre tropes played a role here. I’ve had people tell me they expected it from the first book because of the princess/secret prince idea. And, in-verse, it has connections to other ideas like a Targ prince and Stark maiden, Targcest, and the Jaime/Jon foils + the Cersei/Sansa foils situation. I mean, hundreds of thousands of words have been written about this stuff since the reunion, sure, but a lot of the elements that make it so compelling were written by book fans first, they just never carried it to an endpoint where these things could all be gathered into a single development that allowed Martin to write a shade of grey into his discussion of incest via a storyline that also addresses Jon's longing for Winterfell/children and Sansa's desire for love. If one is willing to take a step back from the preconception of what Jonsa is, why it exists as a ship, it's very easy to see it as a clever culmination of many, many threads into a heart-wrenching, possibly hopeful, development. So, I’d argue that even if those ideas were only present in someone’s subconscious, it’s why someone might watch that hug (or the mutual cloaking/chemistry of the actors/lighting and blocking etc) and have a holy shit moment.

As for the hug itself, I don’t interpret it as romantic either in the sense that, I don’t think that is at all what the characters were feeling. However, when one thinks about how it was filmed, the breathlessness of the acting and how they let that scene stretch out and take it’s time...few other moments compare. Every aspect of it worked to tell the audience how important it was, and of course, as a Stark fan, finally having two Starks reunite after near misses, well, we had spent years building up to a meaningful Stark moment. Jon and Sansa’s relief and joy was ours. And not only did we have all that catharsis and a scene that was...treated with solemnity in a show that was losing it’s depth, storywise, it was one of the few writing choices after the halfway point that carried through the last three seasons. It set a trajectory for Jon and Sansa individually, that reunion and relationship changed everything for them. However one interprets it, their bond became the most important relationship in the last three seasons, and was of the utmost importance in the finale, despite everything becoming pretty nonsensical. In hindsight, it wasn’t accidentally meaningful, incidentally a highpoint of the series, it was essential, essential to them, essential to the story, essential to the endgame.

So, not only do you have in-universe ideas that make this meaningful, not only was there speculation that called it and presents it as the beginning of a romance, not only did they film it in a far more reverential way than they filmed any other relationship (even more so than the epic romance of the series), it also was a necessary stepping stone to the endgame. Even mishandled as it ultimately was, the weight of what it meant spans the entire series, and audiences felt that. It was a turning point for Jon, for Sansa, for the North, for the fight against the Others (even more so than Jon meeting Dany because s7-s8 were so horribly written), so not only is it compelling for lovers of themes, for lovers of the overarching narrative, for lovers of the characters who simply needed their favs to smile again, the failure of the last two seasons made it even more of a high point in our minds of what GoT was and should have been, who these characters are and what they want. And you see how this leads us right back to those desires Jon and Sansa have: Winterfell and family. Again, I did not watch s6 and think it had to be interpreted romantically, but after s7 when I got online and read spec, rewatched their scenes and compared them to how Kit acted Jon with Ygritte and with Dany, I changed my mind. Jon and Sansa, their desires and fears, were never as vivid and compelling as they were in their shared scenes, every conversation developed the complexity of their emotions for each other, and all of that was established in the way they presented that first hug—disbelief, longing, relief, joy.

Also, when someone can predict what happens, I think it’s worthwhile to consider the idea that maybe there’s something to learn from their interpretation of themes, and the fact that a Jonsa reunion was long predicted, matters so much for character development as well as plot progression...well, it means something! Anyway, I can’t argue that the hug itself was romantic, but I do think, especially in comparison to how they handled every other relationship, meeting or reunion in s7-8, that D&D were doing something there, and I personally can’t be convinced they meant for the Jon and Sansa dynamic to be read as strictly familial.

#dot chat #<- tag to filter #jonsa

[abigailnussbaum]

Good Omens 2, Some Thoughts

Look, it's just not a good season of television. I'm seeing a lot of bargaining on my tumblr feed, and some galaxy brain takes about how the badness is the point, see, because it's a clue that all is not as it seems. And yeah, all is probably not as it seems, and in 2-3 years, when (if) we get a third season it will probably turn out that at least some of the weirdness in this season was deliberate (I've seen some very plausible theories already). But that won't change the fact that this season was not good. I have some thoughts on why below.

I wasn't blown away by the first season of Good Omens. I thought it had a lot of the same problems as the book, which Gaiman, presumably out of loyalty to Pratchett, chose not to address. But Tennant and Sheen were so good, and like a lot of people I had the reaction of "who needs plot, just have Crowley and Aziraphale hang out for six hours". Good Omens 2 feels like a finger on the monkey's paw curling in response to that. What it most resembles is fanfic, in that it's light on plot and has a bit of a hangout quality, but without the things that make fanfic fun - the emotional intensity and willingness to be silly and weird. It's all curiously flat and, honestly, not a little boring.

The most obvious example of this, clearly, are the flashbacks (or, as they're referred to, "minisodes", though all told they probably make up about half the season). It feels as if the thinking was "everyone loved 'Hard Times' in season 1, so what if we did a lot more of that?" And yeah, everyone loved "Hard Times", but that's because it told a complete and concluded story. It was done. All the things we needed to know about Crowley and Aziraphale's relationship over the millennia had been established. The flashbacks in season 2 add almost nothing to that (it does seem very likely that they are pointing towards a Big Thing about the duo that will be revealed in a future season, but again, that doesn't solve the problem with this season). What's worse, they're not very affecting in themselves. There's no "you go too fast for me, Crowley" moment. And meanwhile, in the present, the duo feel curiously inert. We have no idea how their relationship has (or hasn't) changed since the events of the first season, or whether either of them are trying to change that. They spend most of the season in a holding pattern until the sudden, catastrophic upheaval of the status quo in the last fifteen minutes, which feels like it came out of nowhere.

(I want to be clear what I'm saying with that last point. I am not saying that the season's ending doesn't make sense for the characters - on the contrary, I think it absolutely does. I'm saying that there's no lead-up to it. We think we're watching one kind of (rather dull) story, and then suddenly, total swerve into a very different one with no emotional groundwork laid. You can backfill in an explanation (and I've seen a bunch of posts that have tried to do this) but in the show as written, it's just not satisfying or cathartic. Instead of feeling wrung out, you're mostly just confused.)

I think what really annoys me is that most of the plot elements in the season are actually quite promising. The framing story of Gabriel's disappearance, and how it ends up being about something very small (while still hinting at bigger things to come). Crowley and Aziraphale obsessing over two women in their general vicinity, and trying to push them together even though they're not in a place to be in a relationship, as a displacement activity from dealing with whatever is going on between them. The idea that, quietly and without much fuss, another demon and angel fell in love and just decided to be together while our heroes have spent millennia failing to get their shit together (I don't love that this is a straight couple, but you could certainly take it as a comment on internalized homophobia). The ending, as noted. And there are some genuinely good moments in the season. The Gabriel/Beelzebub flashback is sweet and almost instantly sells you on their relationship (along the way demonstrating that less is more when it comes to flashbacks). The ball and subsequent demon attack are thrilling, and make you wish the season had spent more time with the other merchants. It's just that overall, the execution is so indifferent, and so much energy is being directed towards those pointless flashbacks, that what could have been a strong, small-scale story ends up feeling like a slog.

I've seen some comparisons between this season and Our Flag Means Death (I've even seen the suggestion that the separation at the end of OFMD S1 inspired the separation at the end of this one, but with 16 months between them I'm not sure that works). And, beyond the fact that there's a vast gulf in quality between the two shows, that's a comparison that would make more sense if OFMD had ended after episode 9. Instead, it gave us that shocking, sudden rift between the two leads, and then offered a hint of consolation and a direction for how they might find their way back to each other. Good Omens doesn't do that last part. Which, to be clear, is a perfectly valid creative choice, but it means that the audience walks away from the season in a very different emotional state, and that's something a writer has to take into account.

All of which is to say that it was, how shall I put this, uncool of Neil Gaiman to have written a story like this without being really, really, REALLY sure that he was going to get a third season. And look, it's obviously not his fault that the bottom has suddenly come out of the streaming business, or that we're in the midst of two strikes. But he's been reduced to running around saying things like "if you want a conclusion to this utterly gutting cliffhanger that I left you with, you have to watch and promote my show" (which among other things feels like it skirts very close to strike-breaking). And that just feels like a poor way to treat a fandom that has been so enthusiastic and supportive for so long.

(Finally, it's very possible that the decision to recast Anna Maxwell Martin was completely unrelated to the fact that her character is now Jon Hamm's love interest - it's been four years, there might have been availability issues. But it's hard not to notice that Shelley Conn's styling as Beelzebub veers more towards Sexy Goth than Martin's Grotesque Bug Person. If you must have a straight relationship in this show, why not make it kind of weird?)

#good omens

[strideofpride]

“I personally headcanon, and I think there's enough to go off in canon to support it, that Dan was closer to Alison than Rufus before she left.” Okay I love this take and it makes me sooo curious what the Humphrey family dynamic was actually like before Alison left and Dan stepped into a more parental role with Jenny!! The only Humphrey childhood anecdotes I can specifically remember are the one from 1x06 where Jenny tells Serena the story about 5 year old Dan being terrified of the Ice Capades, and the one from 1x15 that Rufus initially misremembers:

Rufus Humphrey:
[to Jenny] You used to cry when I didn't walk you to school.

Jenny Humphrey:
That wasn't me. That was Dan.

Dan Humphrey:
I was six. It was a very emotional time for me, post T-ball.

And the subtext of the 1x15 bit stands out to me, because in the show’s present it’s obviously Dan who’s afforded all of the autonomy and treated more like an equal by Rufus while Jenny’s just a kid in need of protection, yet in these few glimpses we’re given of the past Jenny’s the one who seems to have been the more independent and self-reliant kid, while Dan comes across as having been a lot more sensitive and delicate when he was a child.

I’m curious what the early/middle childhood sibling relationship was actually like between Dan and Jenny - were they parented more equally back then and did they therefore have a more equal relationship, or was Jenny always treated as the more problematic of the two? Were Rufus and Jenny ever afforded the easier going, buddy-buddyish type of bond that Dan and Rufus have when Alison was around to be The Mom™️, and is that why Rufus kind of sucks as a disciplinarian in the present even though he’s otherwise a decent dad? Or did Rufus and Dan only develop that type of relationship as a direct consequence of Alison’s departure? And at what point did Alison become so fed up with her marriage and her life that she decided moving away and giving up primary custody of her kids was the best thing for everyone, and how long did that tension simmer beneath the surface?

I've kind of always assumed that Alison was doing the bulk of the child rearing. I don't think Rufus was an absent father, but I do think it was the traditional gender role stuff of Rufus focuses on keeping the family afloat by running the gallery while Alison stays home with the kids. So when Alison leaves, Rufus has to become a lot more involved with the day-to-day of raising children than he ever was before.

With what I know of sibling dynamics, I kinda feel like Dan being the sensitive, needy one kinda pushed Jenny into being the more self-reliant one. Like all kids are sensitive and needy but the way they express it is formed by the dynamics of their home. But because Dan was the older one, he did mature first, and you know, being an eldest sibling myself, your parents do start to rely on you at a certain point to help with your younger sibling, which clearly is what happened with Dan.

I think Jenny probably only really became the "problematic" child when she started at Constance immediately prior to season 1. I think a lot of Rufus, Dan, and Alison's reactions to Jenny that season imply that they're not used to her acting like this/that they're seeing a new side to her. Which makes sense if this is Jenny's first year in the prep school system and the Humphrey sibs went to public school K-8.

Rufus does a lot of the typical dad double standard stuff when parenting his son vs his daughter, which makes me think that even though Dan and Rufus weren't as close before Alison left, they could still be buddy-buddy in a father-son way. While with Jenny, I could see her being a daddy's girl when she was younger, but her father didn't look at her like a "buddy" in the same way he did his son, if that makes sense? But like I said, I think Dan and Rufus truly became more like peers when Alison left and Dan stepped up into a parental role.

And then as for Alison...I mean, she gave up her artistic dreams to be a mom. Rufus at least had the gallery to go to during the day, while she was at home with the kids. I think she has a line somewhere about how her entire adult life has been about Rufus, so it sounds like it's the very typical thing that happens in a marriage where the woman kinda ends up giving up her identity to focus on being a wife and a mother and then she wakes up one day and doesn't know who she is anymore. I imagine it's the kind of thing that's "slowly, then all at once" where she slowly loses herself and becomes unhappier as the years go on and then she woke up one day in the spring of 2007 and said "that's it, I'm done" and decided then and there to leave for Hudson for the summer.

And part of me really gets it and another part of me really doesn't, because how could you just give up having custody of your kids like that? Like Rufus and Alison never seem to have a custody battle, my guess is that they have nothing in writing, Rufus has no qualms about her staying in the loft with the kids while he's on tour in between seasons 1 and 2, and it's initially his idea to send Jenny to Alison at the end of season 3. So it's fully her choice to stay in Hudson and rarely visit. Which I know is just cause of how TV production works, but in universe...yeah I don't really fully know how she was able to just...go months and months without seeing her kids like that. Especially because she seems very maternal when we do see her with them. Idk. In my Alison fic, I decided that it's because while she felt strongly she had to be in Hudson, she had moved around a lot herself when she was a kid and didn't want to uproot her own kids like that.

But yeah, the show never really takes the time to explore why she went all the way up to Hudson, instead of just getting her own place in the city, or write throwaway lines about her calling or visiting beyond season 1 so it's all just up to your own interpretation.

#the humphreys #gossip girl #rufus humphrey #alison humphrey #dan humphrey #jenny humphrey #gg meta #anonymous #strideofprideanswers

[fihyn]

don't get me wrong i really, really, really love some of the moments we got in sonic prime s2, there was some seriously good bits in there, but. I have to say. overall the writing was pretty weak.

"Avoid the Void" was such a strong starter I was really excited for the rest of it but seriously, so much of what came afterwards was just. flat. no real plot points connected for at least three more episodes, it was just unnecessarily drawn-out tension going "oooh who's gonna get the next shard, will it be Sonic and Friends or the Eggmans?? oooooh nobody knows who will win this round!" for like. six rounds. and we just re-hashed already-established conflicts from season 1.

also you're welcome to fight with me on this but I HATE the chaos council ughhhh they are not interesting or compelling remotely whatsover and idk why they're presented to us as though we should care about their machinations? the chaos council has more screen time than the good guy characters in s2 tbh! i am so frustrated about this.

initially I didn't like Chaos Sonic bc I was hoping for traditional Metal Sonic and was disappointed when we didn't get him but since my first watch I've learned to like him as his own character. I do LOVE the new powered-up Prism Sonic form but also that felt so contrived esp bc the summoned "Eggman Prime" didn't even last for a full episode. the whole thing comes across like manufactured drama. disappointing.

I am of course wrecked over the conflict that busted wide open between Sonic and Nine, they did that well, but it didn't get much screentime. I guess since it's technically the basis of the cliffhanger that does give it more weight but like. still.

idk I feel like overall I'm mostly grateful for the lil bits of good content that were sprinkled throughout but I can't help feeling disappointed about the watery plot. and utterly punchable villains with way too much screen time. ugh.

#sonic prime season 2 was not affected by the writer's strike for anyone not in the know #these episodes were produced and completed months before the writers began striking #this is a pro-WGA & SAG blog #sonic prime #sonic prime spoilers

[si-cucumber]

Mazz's Top 5 Shows (as of 8/23)

So I’ve been debating on letting my inner theater geek out on here for a while, but I also realize that....this is my blog so I can talk about whatever the hell I want to talk about.

If somehow you didn’t know already, I am and always have been a theater kid. I’ve been lucky enough to have seen tons of live theater in my day, whether it’s community, national tours, or in New York. And now that my current touring season is over, and I continue to gush over the amazing shows I’ve seen the past few months, I think it’s time for me to officially update my Top 5 Show list. 

5.) Six (US Tour)

So fun fact, I just saw this for the first time yesterday. I've been a fan of Six since it opened in the West End and waited super patiently for it to tour. It was entirely electric, the crowd was beyond into it, and the vocal talent was so stunning that I instantly bought tickets to see it again. That has never happened to me before. I was incredibly blown away and look forward to seeing it again next weekend lmao

4.) Next To Normal (Broadway, 2010)

This was my very first Broadway show on my first trip to New York. This was baby's first online fandom. Back in the day, my friends and I ruled the n2n category on FFnet. It was my first experience with fanfiction and fandom and it was fantastic. This show was everything angsty, teenage Mazz needed at the time. Being able to see the original cast and it being my first real Broadway show, it will always hold a special place in my heart!

3.) Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2023 Revival)

I saw this back in June when I went to New York last! Actually, the whole reason for my trip was just to see this, especially since I missed out on Josh Groban in Great Comet. The most star-studded cast I've ever seen, tons of heavy-hitters. Sweeney Todd was a favorite of teenage Mazz and his theater friends. We'd spend our weekends in my friend's basement performing "A Little Priest" to the best of our ability. Even though I know this show inside and out, I was still on the edge of my seat by the end. Annaleigh Ashford was the stand-out for me. She was robbed of that Tony.

2.) Beetlejuice (National Tour)

I saw this back in January with one of my best friends. I've loved this show since it debuted ages ago, and was probably the best show I saw this touring season! The absolute funniest show I've ever seen. Like, we were laughing so loud and hard I'm pretty sure we were annoying the people around us lmao. But nonetheless, it was an excellent production and I left dying to see it again (no...pun intended).

1.) Some Like It Hot (Broadway 2023)

I will never ever ever stop talking about this show. Hands down, best show I have ever seen. The amount of joy i felt for hours after seeing this was incredible. I was so lucky to see this during pride month, so I have a pride version of the playbill, which is so so special to me. It was so refreshing to see a classic, jazz musical again and the choreography? Insane. Like jaw dropping insane. The final chase sequence blew my mind.

But what struck me the most was seeing a queer actor onstage playing a canonically trans character. A character who was done so well and felt so organic. I saw this at the point in my transition where I really started presenting and dressing masculinely. I was the little awkward trans guy from Ohio, alone in the big city, sat at the front of the mezzanine hearing the crowd cheer for Daphne. After months of feeling dread about the state of this country and the fear of being outwardly trans, this was just...the perfect thing at the perfect time. The amount of gender euphoria I felt was incredible, it was so moving to me. It will always hold a special place in my heart and that is why it's my number one.

So that is my current list! Will it change? Probably at some point lmao. My next season starts in October, and I look forward to seeing what awaits me next.

#long post #musical theatre #broadway #Six #next to normal #sweeney todd #beetlejuice #some like it hot #Mazz the Theater Kid

[seraphtrevs]

was the canon ending of lacho - nacho dying by his own hand in the middle of nowhere and lalo's only mention of him being a one liner - your worst outcome for lacho? or do you think it could've been worse?

This might be controversial, but I don't think that the ending we got was all that bad for Lacho. It didn't retcon or negate their season 5 story line. It didn't give Lalo a secret wife/girlfriend. It didn't have Nacho suddenly become a raging homophobe. I made a Lacho Power Point presentation a while back about how their fates are eerie echoes of each other, so even if we didn't get them together on screen again, we got a link between them. Maybe it would have been nice to hear Lalo say something about him, but who on the show would he ever share his true feelings with it? Having Lalo react to learning of his death would have been interesting, excpet Lalo never found out that he died.

I can't really think of an ending for them that I would have liked without completely changing the plot of BCS and ignoring BrBa canon. They were doomed from the start (which is part of the reason I love them, because I love star-crossed relationships).

Because there was no way Lalo would have forgiven Nacho in canon. I love to imagine different scenarios in the context of fic, but specifically in canon, it would not work. Maybe if it was just him being a spy, Lalo could look past it, but Nacho made an attempt to assassinate Hector and ended up crippling him in the process. That secret was bound to come out sooner or later (and honestly, just having Lalo never find out would be pretty unsatisfying). There's just no way for it to make any sense for Lalo to find that out and decide to forgive Nacho anyway within such a short span of episodes.

And if Lalo doesn't forgive Nacho, his only other option is to kill him, which means Nacho's only option is to try to defend himself. One (or both) of them killing the other is a really bad Lacho ending for me, even if it meant that the Lalo/Nacho plot was more prominent in the story and we got another few scenes of them. It would feel completely pointless, particularly since the beef that set them against each other in the first place was the one between Hector and Gus, using Lalo and Nacho as their pawns. It wouldn't feel cathartic at all, the way it felt for Will and Hannibal or Louis and Lestat, for example.

An ending where they put their differences aside to team up against their common enemy, Gus, would have been really fun to see...in an alternate reality where BCS is an action/adventure show instead of a tragedy and also isn't a prequel with certain elements of canon that cannot be altered. As a premise for a fic, it's fantastic. But BCS is a prequel, and we already know that Gus makes it. Lalo and Nacho teaming up, only to be killed by Gus, is a bad Lacho ending, especially since there was not room for a slowburn plot about their relationship. Them hating each other and then immediately dying before their relationship was given time to evolve would not have been satisfying.

Basically, any ending that would have been "good" for Lacho would have been bad for the show. Maybe if the show had ten seasons, Nacho and Lalo's relationship could have been a more central plot point. But it was six seasons instead, and as much as I would love more BCS and more Lacho, I know in my heart that ten seasons would have ruined it. Making it longer would have involved making it more episodic, like shows like Star Trek or Buffy, which isn't the right format for the story they were telling - the fall of Jimmy McGill, with all of the other plots being tools to tell that story.

So I think all of the best case scenarios for Lacho are the sole domain of fic, which is fine! I've always considered canon as just one way to experience characters, with reading/writing fic being just as enjoyable

#lacho #better call saul #asks

[penname-artist]

My first vent was way too rambly, so I'll spare you guys a lot of extra long stories:

You might have noticed, in my Ao3: I'm cutting back on my amount of writing, almost full-stop right now.

It's not because I want to. It's because I physically cannot write right now. My hands will not the words make the stories happen.

Why?

People.

It's always fuckin people, coming in, ruining all the good things in the world, y'know?

No but seriously...it's people, in the sense that I've lost a lot of friends recently, and gained many more people on my List of Blocked, Blurry Faces.

Three more in the last six months, actually. Some pretty big ones too. People I really cared about. People I really wanted to believe cared about me, too. But actions and events in the past have made it clear that is no longer the case. There is nothing more for me now, in those empty places.

And the grief of losing people over and over again, over such stupidly small things, over such basic needs...it's overwhelming. The amount of grief I already spent the last two-ish years processing, finally at a point where I can live normally again, just for more shit to hit the fan the moment I've cleaned the living room carpet.

It's really starting to take its toll. It's getting harder and harder to want to write, to want to be around and present and a part of the show. Even just a conversation. When I know that it will keep ending in closing curtains. I will keep having bridges to burn down, whether or not I want to.

I'm not entirely done from it all. Not yet, anyways. There's more I still want to do.

But...I know it's getting nearer to me. The end of this season, my near-decade clinging to this fandom like a ship in the storm, sailing from one disaster to the next.

The smoke from all these fallen bridges is making it hard to breathe from the top of the hill.

There's some good news though, like a little light at the end of a long tunnel. There are new opportunities beginning to emerge, areas that feel scary and new, but also tantalizing, exciting. My optimism is compromised and quiet, but it does compel me, this new thing.

But, until I can get out of the cautious stage, I am suffering in the ways of my passions and hobbies. Writing is very hard. Art is very strenuous, too. I have so many things I can't do right now because they're just not enough of a priority at this point in time.

So in all this, really I'm only asking you the reader for your patience, which thus far I've been so thankful to have. I'm in a state of metamorphosis right now, shedding one form and waiting for the other, and I don't know how long this new process will take me. But it is going, for it is inevitable.

One day, I won't post Planes things very much anymore. One day they'll be very few and far between. But right now, I'm riding the wave, trying to wait out the growing pains, and giving myself the time I need to just...be. And to stop being what I should be, and start being what I want to be.

Which is a cool yet approachable goth-hippie that FINALLY lands a goddamn date

This has been my 1 AM ramble. Thank you for coming to my Pen Talk.

#vent #personal post

[mdhwrites]

I’m surprised Belos wasn’t destroyed at the end of the first special, since he seemed to be presented as the first obstacle the group would need to deal with before going back to the BI. I guess they’re saving his death for the final special, and I don’t know what else they could do other than kill him- he’s visually non-human enough at this point that it would be acceptable on screen, they’ve explicitly shown he’s not redeemable, and him being imprisoned would be seen as just lame.

So this got me to talk about why S3 as a concept was doomed as a whole because it reveals that the second half was just kind of doomed. A return to the Isles was always going to be more adventure focused just like the second half of S3 for Amphibia was always going to be adventure focused. Amphibia had a truly monstrous world and a capricious, malevolent ruler with vast resources that could all challenge the protagonists. Half a season of that is easy to see how that's exciting.

Belos is ALL that TOH had. Honestly, I still hate that they struggle as much as they do with Kikimora because while it's a BIG Abomaton, it's still an abomaton effectively but with you just needing to knock out the driver. With the fact that Willow can just send one of those who knows how deep into the ground without effort, it's hard to feel intimidated by anything Kikimora does.

Now in theory, there's the coven heads, especially since after you remove Raine, Darius and Eberwolf, you have six of them. With Camila, the Hexide Squad is 6 members strong. That sets up for a very good possibility for each of them to fight a form of counterpart amongst the coven heads, either in personality or in magic.

…Except this literally can't happen because half the squad don't use only one magic, figuratively can't happen because Gus' fight can't have any tension without bullshit as he proved WITHOUT the coven head's artifact that he was already stronger IN A PANIC ATTACK and also narratively wouldn't make sense. Why would they be fighting? Sure, you can make literally all of the coven heads pure evil so they're fighting out of spite. That'd work for Terra and the illusion head but otherwise, they have no reason to go against the Hexide Squad or really anyone. In theory, they're just as screwed by the Collector's regime as anyone else is and the Collector has no interest in generals or armies. He wouldn't send them out to kill Luz and co.

The Isles themselves also aren't categorically dangerous enough to pose a threat. There is literally only ONE time where what Luz fights is a creature of the Isles and that's after she blew a hole in its fur in Adventure in the Elements. Otherwise, as Eda said, it would have left them alone most likely. This is the opposite of Amphibia where just sitting on a bench is liable to have a form of Roc or giant insect come and take you away.

As a note, the last Amphibia episode I watched was "After the Rain" and that episode is fascinating to me because of the push and pull of fantasy genre tropes, the world of Amphibia and the fact that some stakes and pains can never be trivialized for a good person. The fact that I've never heard it discussed blows my mind.

Anyways, getting back on track, this all presents a fundamental problem for the show. We're an adventure show that wants a big fantasy ending but we have no villains to fight. No monsters to beat. Not anything other than Belos. And having only one villain for three specials is a very rough place to be. After all, he has to be able to challenge the characters without killing them but if he's ever beat, the narrative tension is destroyed. This is part of why him being smashed by the Collector like he was actually made it hard to be interested in Belos because… Okay, once this kid is reformed, that's the win button. The Collector could literally just do "Rocks fall and everyone dies" after all because he feels like his powers are effectively unlimited.

And… I'm not getting into the finale because it's a whole other mess of structural and narrative problems and I'm trying to be respectful to those who care about spoilers, at least for a couple days.

What's hilarious to me though is that the second special didn't even try. They still brought back Kikimora despite Kikimora being even less of a threat and having less tension around her than Belos. It's part of why I'm baffled by the second special because while I haven't watched it, it sounds like it's mostly filler. Bare minimum, anything with Kikimora is where you just have to be sitting there going "WHY ARE WE FIGHTING THIS PERSON RIGHT NOW!? Don't we have more important shit to do?"

It's a mess and it's entirely TOH's own fault. What if instead of using Them's the Breaks Kid to make sure EVERYONE knew Raeda were a pair of soulmates, two clones of each other, we had spent literally any time with a right hand of Belos that wasn't Hunter. Or any of the Coven Heads to try and establish their villainous cred and why they may decide to fight the Hexide Squad once they get back? Or if Belos was already going "This bitch is a fuckup and a liar", have a coven head there for Eclipse Lake that Amity pisses off in the process of things instead of Kikimora who loses her credibility that very episode by how unhinged she is with minimal intervention by the heroes?

Just… Anything. But the show very rarely actually cares about its adventure elements, it's much more of a fantasy drama just like Amphibia is mostly a fantasy slice of life. Having life or death stakes in a fantasy setting, or the odd fight, frankly doesn't make it an adventure show… But I don't think TOH was ever willing to commit to that. To commit to climactic talk that resonated with the themes of the show instead of a high octane, big threat climax. If you have magic, you gotta do something with it, right?

Well… I mean, how much have you done with the magic? Anne's powers, introduced so late, are more connected to her character, the plot and has more interesting limitations/risks than Luz's magic literally ever did. Literally. It never played into her arc, her character, the plot… It was just there so she could be a witch and have magic so that the writers didn't have to think about what to have her do in a given fight scene that limitations would have forced upon them.

It's a part of the split identity problem. If you've not spent any time on your adventure elements and magic, when those elements need to come to the forefront, they're going to come up short. You're not going to have villains to call back to. You're not going to have interesting mechanics to your fight scenes. You're not going to have built up properly any last minute power ups.

And the fact that everyone was just ready for Belos to die is indicative of that. Some because he's a bastard, yes. Others like me? I was just done with him being around because I'd stopped feeling tension about him or thinking he was some master manipulator so him dying is more a frustrated "Finally" instead of a cry of triumph.

And while there is a place for that in shows, usually you still want villains people are enjoying on screen at the same time. And TOH just didn't have those.

#Belos #The Owl House Criticism

[sassykattery]

The Royal Standard, Pt. 1

Welcome to Season 2 of "Love, Eternal," Chapter 6: The Royal Standard.

I hope you all enjoyed the Prologue chapters, but it is time to return to the present and see what happens to our favorite trio.

CW: MC is afab, uses she/her pronouns. MC is a demon and in a polyamorous relationship with two demons. Intense arguing. Mostly storyline.

Themes: MCxDiavolo. MCxLucifer. Relationships.

Characters: Diavolo and Lucifer. Mention MC.

Minors and ageless blogs DNI

18+ only

Masterlist

Enjoy.

And remember, not everyone has honest intentions.

"I planned on proposing tomorrow night," Diavolo stated.

-

His words echoed in Lucifer's mind, and the pressure was still building in his skull from the headache that was forming.

"Diavolo," was all he could say, his voice was low with a warning tone.

"Yes?" Diavolo said back, equally warning.

Lucifer's fists balled up and he gave Diavolo an icy glare. "Isn't it too soon?"

"As I said, I've given this great consideration, and I know what I want," Diavolo explained.

"What if she says no?" Lucifer asked.

"That is her right. I won't force her into anything she doesn't want to do, I respect her wishes," Diavolo replied calmly.

It took all Lucifer had to not go berserk on the prince. "She doesn't even know what that would mean for her," he replied, his voice tense.

"I anticipate her having questions, and I will be sure to answer them all honestly."

Losing all composure, Lucifer shot to his feet and slammed his hands on the desk, leaning over it. "Why? Why are you doing this?" he snapped.

Now Diavolo was getting irritated, so he stood to his feet slowly and leaned in to get into Lucifer's face, slowly letting his demon form materialize. "I think you are forgetting your place, Morningstar."

He couldn't let it go, "Why? Answer me," he barked, Lucifer's own demon form flashing into existence.

"Because I love her, and she is all I will ever want. I want her to be by my side and rule with me. I can't imagine anyone else for the role, nor will I ever want anyone else," Diavolo retorted.

"You haven't thought this through. She can't give you want you want," Lucifer growled, leaning forward, inches from the Demon Lord's face.

Diavolo's anger rose, and he inched closer to Lucifer with eyes locked in on the Avatar and all muscles flexed and ready to pounce. "Excuse me? What gives you the right–"

"She won't give you an heir," Lucifer hissed.

"What?" the prince barked.

Lucifer looked as though he could pop a blood vessel. "Have you even bothered to ask if that's what she wants? Because I have, and you would surely be mistaken to go through something like this without even considering that rather important aspect of marrying royalty."

Diavolo stopped and considered Lucifer's words, leaning back slightly. It was true, that he hadn't even asked you about such things, but he had assumed it would come up as one of your questions about certain aspects of a marriage with him.

"I won't explain it to you, because you need to ask her yourself," Lucifer said in disgust.

"I... I don't care. If she doesn't want that, then I won't force the issue. I want her and only her. If I can't marry her, then I simply won't marry at all, and then there's no point in an heir anyway." Diavolo turned his head away.

Lucifer's jaw fell agape. "You can't be serious," he said.

The prince looked back at the Avatar, emotions bubbling in his golden gaze with his brows furrowed. "Put yourself in my shoes, Lucifer. I've finally found someone like MC, and I love her as much as a demon can love anybody. I won't let her go, not over something like that. And she doesn't love me for my title or the benefits that come with being with me, she loves me for me. I've lived an incredibly lonely life, and for the first time in it I don't feel alone when she's around. I cannot lose her," Diavolo explained.

Now it was Lucifer's turn to listen and consider his lord's words. It's true, by having six brothers, he never experienced loneliness in the way Diavolo had. And if Diavolo even felt a fraction of what Lucifer feels toward you, and Lucifer was certain the Demon Lord did, he could understand why you were more important than the royal succession.

However, it would be naïve to think this wouldn't create problems in the future.

Diavolo's voice softened, sat back in his chair in his regular form, and he continued, "I asked you to meet with me to also discuss the nature of our relationships should she say yes."

Lucifer looked up through his lashes, reeling from the intense anger he felt about it all. "Go on," he said through his teeth.

"Nothing should change very much, but I will require more of her time for political and social events. I plan to offer her to move into the castle permanently, but I'm also open to other arrangements if she so desires. I don't expect her to end things with you for the sake of the marriage, so you two are welcome to continue seeing each other," Diavolo stated.

Lucifer didn't often find himself gob smacked, but in this instance, he was at a loss for words. However, this only drove his suspicion higher. He sat back in his chair and asked, "Why would you allow that?"

"I promised that she would never want for anything and to always do my best to keep her happy. I intend to keep those promises," Diavolo replied.

A thought struck Lucifer. It had occurred to him once upon a time that he too wanted to possibly marry you, however, he never quite had the opportunity or the courage to see it through. He was already on a rocky start with you, he didn't want to upset you with the idea of commitment on that level. He also understood that if you did indeed say yes to the Demon Lord, then the dynamics of the relationships would change. Surely, having a spouse would be more important than a romantic partner, and Diavolo already explained he would need more of your time, so what would be left for himself?

"Let's hear it, Lucifer," Diavolo ordered, seeing how deep in thought Lucifer was.

"And what if I wanted to marry her?" Lucifer quipped.

"I obviously couldn't stop you, though–" Diavolo started to say.

"You absolutely could stop me, and you know it," Lucifer hissed back.

Diavolo was struggling to keep his temper under control, which was rare for him. He ordinarily wouldn't get so heated in any argument, but for some reason when it was about you, he was falling victim to his temper that he worked so hard to keep tightly wrapped.

"Not if it's what she wanted. If she wanted you over me, I would simply have to let you do it," Diavolo replied in resignation.

"Then, you do understand that by her choosing to marry one of us, that leaves the other out of her life, just through logistics and priorities alone," Lucifer explained, his voice becoming quiet again. He finally reverted back to his regular form.

They were both silent, thinking about that prospect. Neither of them were ready for such a change in dynamics within their relationships with you, at least in the way of possibly losing out on their position in your life.

"She's made it work with us this far, she could surprise us, you know," Diavolo thought aloud.

Lucifer thought the same, but his stream of ideas had a different course in mind, "What if there was another way?"

"I'm listening."

"There are multiple options here. One, would it be possible for her to marry both of us?" Lucifer mused.

"Though that's not something that's necessarily illegal here, it does make for messy paperwork. There's no reason as to why she couldn't, but I just don't know about the legal logistics of it," Diavolo replied, sounding uncertain.

"Then, two, if you are wanting her to have all the power of ruling next to you, and for the sake of argument she didn't want to marry either of us, would it be possible to give her the title without a marriage contract?"

Diavolo continued his thoughts out loud, "Technically, yes. I think I would probably find myself answering to very angry aristocrats, but in theory, I suppose that's an option too. Similar to how I would have to name a successor eventually, I could just give her the title, and that would be it."

"So... what if you did that instead?" Lucifer asked cautiously.

The Demon Lord stared at the black box on his desk. "You don't think you'd miss the idea of one day making her your bride?" he asked aloud, but it was uncertain if he was talking to Lucifer, or maybe asking himself.

Lucifer scoffed. "Truthfully, when I thought about how my life would go after the fall, I wouldn't have guessed that I'd be in a romantic relationship with a human who is also in a romantic relationship with my boss, and then that human decides to give up her soul to be with us for eternity, and that I'd want to marry said human-now-turned-demon. At this point, I'm open to whatever is thrown my way."

Diavolo raised his eyebrows, not having considered that himself.

"Then, I suppose, my proposal will be slightly different than I originally imagined, but a proposal nonetheless."

----

Thank you for reading~ <3

Tags:

@delphi-dreamin @leavesandflowers @the-ghost-of-panda @ariamichel @itsmeninerz @obeymediasimp @flammingbamse @frozengoldie

#obey me #obey me shall we date #sassystories #obey me fanfic #sassywrites #obey me lucifer #love-eternal #obey me diavolo #the girls are fighting #diavolo x femreader #lucifer x female reader

[animatedminds]

Catching up on "My Adventures With Superman"

I've been watching this one but doing it in the stints thing where I take a break for a couple weeks and then binge a few episodes at once. Just did one of those to catch up to the present and thought I'd share my reactions to the latest episode... seeing as it features my favorite of all of Superman's villains: the illustrious Mr. Mxyzptlk.

I know I'm Super late on this (ha), given that this is six episodes in, but I think I'll just give my thoughts on the two-parters coming up as they come/conclude and then my final thoughts on the show as a whole when its over. You can already get a bit of that towards the end of this, though. Episode 6: "Kiss, Kiss, Fall in Portal." So, this one reminded me of Spider-Verse. Not the movie. The original comic. And not in a good way. It has that same "we'll introduce the multiverse to give every bit of continuity ever made an established place so that we can homage everything... but actually devalue everything by forcing it to fit into a very rigid and contrived paradigm" feel.

For a while I've been starting to think the people who make this show don't actually see Superman's world and characters as especially interesting, which is why they've mostly been turning them into imitations of other things. The Legion of Lois'es, especially, really brought that feeling out: so the ultimate evolution of every prominent Lois Lane in every previous Superman property we've ever seen is... to cease to be Lois Lane and become Flash Gordon instead? It's such a jarring contrast for the primary Lois in this series to be someone whose main motivation is to become a reporter and help people by getting answers, only for the show to say "once you become the best you can be you won't even need to be a reporter anymore - then you'll be a cool sci-fi hero and do cool sci-fi hero stuff!" - and it then feels like Lois feeling insecure falls flat because none of these characters even do the things she or any other Lois we've ever seen cares about. I think it mostly hit me this way because this doesn't really get a resolution. The characters give the Multiverse Police the slip (which I do love, see below), but there isn't really a "I'm going to be the best I am because that's who I am, not what you think I'm worth" moment from Lois. She (and thus, the show) just kind of internalizes it.

I might be being harsh on it, I think. But it's comes off an idea that was intended as a homage on paper but ceased to work as one in execution - and instead maybe felt a bit like the opposite. On top of that "we love these characters and put them on a pedestal through nostalgia, so what if characters in-universe actually had the same reactions to those same characters and treated them the same way" is pretty much an idea I've never seen work out - it always just ends up turning characters into reflections of fan reactions, instead of allowing them to be... well... characters.

I'm explicitly not getting into the Clark implications, firstly because everyone overreacts the hell out any time an evil Clark or Clark-like character shows up in anything these days, second because the issues with the concept are evident even before Clark comes into it, and third because - due to the first - I think people are focusing too much on Clark specifically and not enough on how the concept as a whole wasn't great to characters involved (except Jimmy / Jalana because this show's versions of any Olsen continue to be a treasure).

And fourth because the "the characters discover some versions of their friend went bad" does actually line perfectly well up with the season's overall plot about Lois' dad being a paranoid nutter, but the Kryptonians maybe being evil and Clark being an unclear cog in the gears of this strange mystery. It's a plot decision I really liked in this show: I'm suspecting we might end up with something Iron Giant-esque, where all evidence points to the hero being a monster, but the hero refuses to fall into expectation as their friends refuse to fall victim to the fearmongering.

But... overall, all that is why I really liked how the main characters' ultimate response to the judgmental multiversal police squad was a "screw you guys, we're going home" without even a goodbye. Screw that noise. Presumably the Lois'es from other continuities who pointedly aren't among the Lois'es actually in the judgmental multiverse police squad did something similar. Live your life as yourself. Good message, though I think show could've been more overt about delivering it.

On the flipside, Mxy was fun. He was a tread to Lois & Clark's "more malevolent Mxy who wants to be a god" idea, which is... hate to repeat myself... fun. But being fun it what's most important where Mxy is concerned. It's a little less interesting to have a Mxy who needs power because he wants to be a god vs a Mxy who already has power and finds concepts like godhood boring, but I don't think traditional Mxy is in line with how this show envisions threats, and regardless he was delightfully tricky and - let's face it - is one of the two big things absolutely carrying the episode (the other being Clark and Lois' relationship, as usual).

All in all, the show continues to hit me two ways at once: I really love the way it's interpreting the characters and their relationships - again, Jimmy is fantastic and Lois and Clark's relationship is nuanced, adorable and continually keeps me invested - but the plot decisions that surround those great characterizations keep missing, often feeling like they're wasting good concepts.

I hope I'm wrong about the feeling I'm getting that the writers maybe have some overall apathy for Superman's world and characters, but bit by bit the show keeps making me wonder - I just wish the show would start feeling excited to reinterpret these characters rather than flippant.

Either way, though, fun episode. More Mxy is always a treasure.

#my adventures with superman #clark kent #lois lane #jimmy olsen #multiverse #mr mxyzptlk #kiss kiss fall in portal #episode reaction #animatedmindsforanimatedtimes #animation review