@lietwice sent:
[ smooth ] sender takes their time caressing over every part of receiver's body
Their first moment alone. After the camp and the rescue and the incredible mess of feelings that was watching Garak suffer through hell to save them all. After the gut-wrenching revelation that people hadn't even known he was gone--that a changeling had picked up his life...
But now it's just them. Julian hasn't even gone back to his quarters. He took what was possibly the longest shower of his life, dressed in newly-replicated boxer briefs that he could be certain the changeling had never worn, and laid himself down on Garak's bed, which somehow feels safer than his own now. And now he's being petted, which he can hardly blame Garak for with the mess of fur he's grown out in captivity. If nothing else, it's a novelty, and Julian does enjoy the feeling of Garak's hands carding through the hair on his chest.
"Garak?" he finally says, when hands rise to touch his face. He doesn't stop them, of course. "Did you think I was alive? When you realized, I mean. Did you believe I was alive or did you think I'd been killed for the changeling to take my place?"
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Ya know what’s wild? I never watched The Pacific all the way through until recently, even though I’ve watched BoB a thousand times. And the only reason I was hesitant was… I thought Leckie was played by Matthew Morrison, who I do not like. Only to realize they’re two completely different actors lmfao.
Like??????? I can’t be the only one to make this mistake dude. I think they look so much alike. I just never bothered to look up the casting 😭 like I’m sorry, James Badge Dale, I did you so dirty.
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While the lily orchard review didn’t do anything like calling the show bad (they actually praised it a lot but for some strange reasons imo) they did miss a lot of the main points of the show and lightheartedly insulted people who were making angsty fanart of it (they also didn’t credit the artist which was odd) I think they had only watched until season 2 at that point but season 2 was still pretty intense even if it wasn’t as bad as 3 and 4 so I don’t understand why they called it a “Saturday morning cartoon” because it clearly has an overarching plot. One of the quotes taken directly from the video is “There’s nothing in the plot that’s going to shock you or make you think about the human condition.” They said that people making the show seem dark were missing the point of the show. That’s pretty much it I think which isn’t too bad but it does not give the show credit for how they handle a lot of stuff imo
Okay so, watching s1 of the show? I totally understand the "saturday morning cartoon" perspective of LMK. That's what it is at the beginning—I have a half written meta in my drafts about LMK and "saturday morning cartoon" type tropes.
However, I also argue that s2 begings to deconstruct those tropes—take for example 2x05 "Minor Scale". That's an episode with what I would consider to be a tropey plot: "Oh no! The main character gets shrunk!". But, unlike a lot of previous episodes (like 1x06 being the "racing episode" or 1x02 being the "Main character is overworked and turns to a sketchy solution to fix their problem" episode), Minor Scale shifts us away from these monster of the week type plots. The whole reason MK shrinks to begin with is because he's belittling himself ("Maybe if someone was here to teach me! 'Oh you'll figure it out bud, just think little!' Ugh, like I could do this on my own."), which in itself is already a unique way to implement this sort of trope. But, not only that, rather than a little tease and a subtle feeling of the heroes continually losing like in the beginning of s2, the Lady Bone Demon reveals herself directly to MK. She manipulates MK, she gets inside his head, she makes him question his worth to Monkey King.
This pattern of "everything starts out normal and then dips into something darker" continues for the rest of s2. 2x07-2x10 all start out like you would expect—monster of the week "saturday morning cartoon" adventure set ups—that then take a turn for the worse during the episode.
Like, don't get me wrong, s2 isn't like s3, and I'd say it takes until s4 for LMK to truly deliver on everything it's set up, but s2 still has plenty. Minor Scale (STRAIGHT fate vs freewill directly into the veins with MK literally running away from the narrative), Macaque's shadow play ("Heroes inevitably bring darkness to those they hold dear" *sobs* THEY WEREN'T LYING ABOUT THAT), Sandy's sincere belief that helping his friends is where his true value lies (yet he breaks his vow to never fight again), MK's desperation in 2x09, LBD's inevitable victory.
Honestly, watching the way in which MK's mental illness manifests in the first 2 seasons makes even s1 of LMK unique. I remember watching Bad Weather (1x01) and being surprised that MK was so down on himself after the "I'm invincible!!!" facade fell.
But, ultimately, LMK starting with "saturday morning cartoon" tropes and then slowly transitioning into the darker and more plot focused episodes is completely on purpose. The start of the show, the "monster of the week adventures", is the home MK wishes, but cannot, return to. That simplicity and innocence turning to complexity and impiety is part of MK's "coming of age" story, and it's why I like the show.
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It’s such a dark irony, in retrospect, that in Ep. 9, Both of You, Dance Like You Want to Win!, Shinji and Asuka have to coordinate and synchronize to defeat Israfel
While in the rest of the series, their inability to connect and understand each other is one of the greatest factors leading to their downfall and tragedy
It’s almost as if they teased us with the right solution from the beginning and showed us what might’ve been
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reversed and upright ending for Sage & MC
So the final showdown with Mike happens and Sage turns but MC manages to change him back or something and they're about to take down Mike but Mike gets the upper hand and decides you know what i'm gonna actually kill MC and be successful this time and manages to kill them in front of sage and sage goes berserk and kills mike not before mike dies he's laughing and tells sage that MC basically died for nothing and that it still worked out for him bc sage went back to being corrupted
so then sage is filled with grief and corruption and tulsi and the group do what they can to try and pull him back, but sage is a master of alienating himself from the people who love him and he's so angry (imagine he never even got to say I love you until MC was dying in his lap IMAGINE THAT TO HEIGHTEN THE ANGST) and he decides he's gonna bring MC back (it's giving beginning of the whole damn story but i don't care) and sage goes to felix for help and felix and rime are like ummm don't think you should be doing that and sage is like i have to try so they tell him that maybe he can reach MC in the void if their soul is there. so Sage goes and is trying to find MC and finds them and tells MC his plan of trying to bring them back and MC is like no blah blah i love you blah blah the price would be too steep blah blah i don't want you to lose yourself and your humanity, you need to be with your family/friend (this would be an upright ending) and they have a final goodbye where they kiss and say i love you
in a reversed ending, the void works weirdly so maybe he has to leave before he dies for real and MC warns him against the plan but they don't get their final goodbye. in the real world he lies to rime and felix and says he couldn't find you bc he got lost and in that moment he decides he's gonna bring MC back consequences be damned I don't remember sage ever using magic in the story but say for argument sake he becomes basically the lord of shadows/rime in felix's route but instead he has to gather a shit ton of souls and trade them in order to bring back MC. so he goes around collecting souls (the logistics do not matter and I can't explain it) and finally he gathers enough souls and goes to where MC died and maybe the group had caught onto what he's going to do (time and felix had their suspicious that he had lied but felix was trying to give him space) and they're begging him not to
maybe they're about to fight him (felix telling sage not to and sage yelling at him like you got rime back why shouldn't I get MC back blah blah) bc they dont recognize this angry broken shell of sage (maybe he's even worse than when MC found him bc this time that mc "died" there was a body and the visual confirmation that they died and he blames himself partly) but sage manages to fight them and do the spell or whatever and he opens the void and trades ____ amount of souls for MC's soul and life force. he gets it and MC comes back from the void and MC is visibly different (they have white streaks in their hair or different colored eyes idk depends on what you would want your MC to look like) and everyone is stunned that MC is back
i've run out of ideas but MC is alive but asleep bc coming back from the dead is exhausting and the next day comes the angst, they're so happy to see sage and sage is happy too, but MC starts getting headaches and it all starts coming back in flashes--MC dying, MC talking to sage in the void, and then the coming back to life and (let's say sage has been hiding from them lowkey bc he noticed they didn't remember) eventually MC is just like uhhh what did you do ? and sage explains and angst ensues where MC is grappling with the fact that they're life was brought back at the expense of so many others and the fact that sage literally fell even more off the deep end and idk someone write this bc i cant write and MC grappling with the fact that they're basically an "abomination" and they try calling the astrolabe but realize they've lost their connection to it (so more angst)
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Now i'm thinking about what's the right balance to keep G1 SG au tonally consistent, and feeling at least a little like the G1 cartoon it's based on. Particularly with the PARD incident idea.
I mean G1 can get really dark under the surface, and a little bit ON THE SURFACE too, but still.
Idk, because on average I've observed that shattered glass in total tends to get darker than baseline (but hey that's based on the SG comics I read and fanfiction so many my sample size isn't big enough)
In my opinion, it's easy for something to come off as darker than intended so you might have to treat it like adding blue paint to other colors: a little truly does go a long way.
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