#this is really interesting

[lostcauses-noregrets]

By Rafael Motamayor, New York Times, Nov. 5, 2023

On Saturday, the final episode of the anime adaptation of Hajime Isayama’s “Attack on Titan” premiered on Crunchyroll and Hulu, ending an epic tale that started back in 2013.

Like the manga, which ran from 2009 to 2021, the anime was an instant hit, becoming one of the defining shows of the modern anime era, with spinoffs, live-action and video game adaptations, and even a comic book crossover with Marvel’s “Spider-Man” and “Avengers” titles.

Since the fourth and final season started airing in 2020, “Attack on Titan” has been one of the most popular shows on the internet — episodes have routinely trended on social media, streaming servers have occasionally crashed, the opening theme song became a rare anime song to hit the U.S. Billboard charts. Parrot Analytics said it was the most “in-demand” show in the world in 2021, a metric based on analysis of streaming, social media, search and other online behaviors. The manga has continued to be popular as well, selling over 120 million copies worldwide, and several of the published volumes have charted on the New York Times graphic novels and manga best-seller list.

What started as a thrilling yet relatively simple tale of a young boy seeking revenge against the giant humanoid monsters that ate his mother quickly evolved into a thought-provoking war epic. The tonal shift in “Attack on Titan” also came with one of the biggest heel-turns in modern anime, with the protagonist, Eren Jaeger, devolving into a radicalized monster threatening worldwide genocide.

Since the manga ended in 2021, there has been plenty of speculation and debate over Eren’s antagonistic turn and what the story’s ending means. Ahead of the release of the final episode, the manga creator Hajime Isayama, speaking through an interpreter, David Higbee, talks about the restrictive nature of writing and the story’s dark ending. These are edited excerpts from the interview.

The manga ended a couple of years ago, and the anime is just finishing now. How do you feel about the story coming to an end?

For this anime to be made and for that to go beyond the borders of Japan and to reach a worldwide audience is something that’s been a very happy occurrence for me. In a sense, “Attack on Titan” has connected me to the world, and that’s something that I’m very glad happened.

How much of the ending from the manga did you have in mind when you first began writing “Attack on Titan”? And how much did it change along the way?

That was pretty much there from the beginning, the story that starts with the victim who then goes through this story and becomes the aggressor. That is something I had in mind right from the get-go. Along the way, certain aspects of the story didn’t go as expected, and I adapted and fleshed out certain aspects. But I would say the ending of the story didn’t change much

There’s a much-talked-about scene where Armin, who is struggling with Eren’s turn into a mass murderer, seems to thank him for his actions. Can you talk about the meaning behind that conversation?

My thinking there wasn’t really that Armin was trying to push Eren away for the sake of justice or whatnot. It was more that he wanted to, in a sense, take joint responsibility. He wanted to become an accomplice. In order to become an accomplice, Armin had to make sure that he used very strong wording so that he could take those sins upon himself. And so that was the intent behind it.

You have a scene where Eren apologizes to a kid for the carnage he’s going to commit and says he was disappointed in the world he saw beyond the walls. What does that say about his motivation?

I think that refers to the fact that Eren was dreaming of going to this world outside of the walls where there was nobody and there was nothing. There was an excitement about this world that was just empty, a clean slate. I don’t really know whether that’s a good or a bad thing, and I don’t really know why that was the ideal that I set up for Eren as a part of this story. But what I can say is that, when he does get across the wall at that point, he says he sees that the world is really not that different from what’s within the walls in the world that he already knows. I believe that’s probably the disappointment that I’m referring to in that specific scene.

Eren says in the final episode of the anime that he had no choice but to follow the future that he saw, that he was powerless against the powers of the Founding Titan. Armin even asks if he’s really free. Was he telling the truth or do you see this as him telling an excuse?

So the truth is the situation with Eren actually overlaps in a certain sense with my own story with this manga. When I first started this series, I was worried that it would probably be canceled. It was a work that no one knew about. But I had already started the story with the ending in mind. And the story ended up being read and watched by an incredible number of people, and it led to me being given a huge power that I didn’t quite feel comfortable with.

It would have been nice if I could have changed the ending. Writing manga is supposed to be freeing. But if I was completely free, then I should have been able to change the ending. I could have changed it and said I wanted to go in a different direction. But the fact is that I was tied down to what I had originally envisioned when I was young. And so, manga became a very restrictive art form for me, similar to how the massive powers that Eren acquired ended up restricting him.

You have been involved in the anime production for a little while, supervising the adaptation’s storyboards, and have been known for asking for changes to the story in the adaptation. Did you personally ask for anything for the final episode?

Yes. Absolutely. I checked the script, but the main thing was the storyboards. There were different things I suggested. When it comes down to it, it’s really the role of the production to make those decisions. But I wanted to at least give my input so that they could take those into account when they were making the final decisions.

The manga ends with you showing the future of Paradis and sort of the cycle of war continuing. Is there no end to the conflict and the cycle you present in the story?

I guess there could have been an ending where it was a happy ending and the war ended and everything was fine and dandy. I guess that could have been possible. At the same time, the end of fighting and the end of contention itself kind of seems hokey. It kind of seems like it’s not even believable. It’s just not plausible in the world we’re living in right now. And so, sadly, I had to give up on that kind of happy ending.

[New York Times, 5 November 2023]

#hajime isayama #this is really interesting #the analogy between himself and eren is fascinating #interview #new york times #snk

[blue-inferno]

Ok! Another little analysis!

Here is a nice but also interesting detail. Just before Optimus decides to buy the group some time, and to combat the predacon alone, we see the team stand their ground as they look on in tough denial as their leader walks away to confront the beast. Its best to let the Prime fight the con as they head into the facility behind them.

But look here, for a very brief moment, Wheeljack and Bumblebee, both in unison, turn and glance into each others optics in what appears to be a stunned albeit worried expression whilst Ultra Magnus and Arcee fix their gaze ahead as Optimus departs. They know this battle could snuff him...

Its also very interesting too as Bumbleebee looks up highly to Optimus which could also mean Wheeljack now also follows in the Prime's footsteps too. He shares his worries with the little scout and to me its quite a sweet yet sad moment. Wheeljack is a tough bot but to see him falter at situations like this, to see his soft side, no matter how short, is quite a rare instance...

#transformers #transformers prime #bumblebee #tfp #transformers bumblebee #analysis #blue inferno speaks #this is really interesting #ultra magnus #optimus prime #arcee #wheeljack

[afieldinengland]

[source]

#‘​incredibly unfaithful unpleasant scheming little swine’ :) #this is really interesting #the thick of it #video #chris addison

[the960writers]

Character In Action: A close reading exercise

11th October 2023 by KJ Charles

So I did a class on character building for a writing conference recently, which was an interesting experience, especially since it forced me to think about what I do instead of just doing it. (Which, as regular readers will know, ends up being the root of all my advice anyway. Think harder, look deeper.) As one exercise, I took the opening of a book I wrote and did a deep dive into analysing how it builds character. (I don’t use my own work for examples because I think I’m all that as a writer, by the way. I do it because I’m lazy and can’t be bothered to type long passages out from scratch when I could just copy paste my MSS.) Anyway, it was a really useful exercise (for me at least), so I’m going to reproduce it here.

#characters #description #this is really interesting #what you can tell of the character #by the words you use #by what you give the readers #KJ Charles #this is so fascinating #the difference between the two ways of describing the scene #an amazing opportunity to learn

[hazelestelle]

Fic Stats Meme

@sidhelives tagged me, thank you <3

rules: give us the links to your fics with the most hits, second most kudos, third most comments, fourth most bookmarks, fifth most words, and fic with the fewest words.

Most hits: Impossibilities, How to get away with murder, Connor/Oliver, G Rated, 5920 hits

Second most kudos: Catching little words (wouldn't know where to start), Teen Wolf, Derek/Stiles, T Rated, 489 kudos

Third most comments: Auf der Suche nach Liebe, die so ist, so wie wir waren, Tatort, Adam/Leo, M Rated, 13 comments

Fourth most bookmarks: Sign my death with your teeth, Teen Wolf, Peter/Stiles, M Rated, 57 bookmarks

Fifth most words: Die Hoffnung sagt mehr als tausend Worte, Alles was zählt/Unter Uns Crossover, Axel/Ringo, G Rated, 3138 words

Fewest words: That's two drabbles (because that means 100 words exactly, this is absolutely a hill I'm willing to die on): Darling, Inception, Arthur/Eames, G Rated, and quick and dirty, Tales of Vesperia, Yuri/Judith, M Rated

tagging: @spacerhapsody @occhi-verdi-come-il-mare @ziskandra @wait-here @xinhua-jun @alyssalenko if you want :)

#this is really interesting #not what i expected at all #fanfiction #writing #isa talks

[goongiveusnothing]

Tayrry break up article

https://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/24929805/harry-styles-taylor-russell-crisis/amp/

#the sun #harry styles #taylor russell #okay! #this is really interesting #because we know he uses The Sun to share all his stories #so this is definitely from someone on his side #and they definitely want people to know #breaking up right before christmas is brutal LOL #who do we think ended things first? #i can see taylor being annoyed by him #the fact that he's so non committall #OR are pleasing sales so bleak he's trying to use a break up #to generate sales LOL #i doubt that last part #but we know how greedy this MFer is

[multicolour-ink]

Oh I can imagine that when mario and luigi find survivors they will freak out when they see that Luigi has been bitten and think he will turn into a zombie,and tried to kill him, only for mario to kill them instead to protect his brother

referring to this and this

While Luigi may act sort of the same, I imagine his appearance would change a bit. Maybe a more grayish skin tone and/or altered irises. So it's very easy for people to pick him out of a crowd. He can't just walk up to anyone like normal anymore (except for Mario).

So when they do find survivors, they are in no way able to accept that Luigi is harmless. One even pulls out a weapon. And that's when Mario snaps. Unable to stand by and let them kill his brother, he does what he can to protect him....

Oh! 👀 Now that opens up a lot of doors!

Let's assume for simplicities sake that the events play out similar to TLoU.

Mario and Luigi have managed to survive together, just the two of them - until one day on a scavenging hunt (or whatever job it is they are doing) they are ambushed by infected, and Luigi gets bit.

And at that moment Mario's world starts to crumble, because it's suddenly no why him this can't be happening I was supposed to protect him I can't lose him please

The next few days of waiting are torture; Mario even starts to consider the crazy idea of asking Luigi to bite him, just so they can turn together.

But Luigi doesn't turn, much to Mario's sheer delight; word of this soon spreads to a resistance group, who ask Luigi to come to them so they can figure out a cure from his condition. Mario is reluctant because - even though you did mention Mario is a nice guy who just wants to help others - this is still a zombie apocalypse. TLoU proves that desperation always sets in during the worst of times. So even though Mario tries to help as much as he can, he soon learns he has to turn many down, even if it goes against his very nature.

So the journey plays out pretty similar to TLoU - heck even the confrontation between Joel and Ellie in the house, as well as this line from Ellie could fit into the story

"Stop with the bulls***! What are you so afraid of?! You think I'm gonna end up like Sam? I can't get infected! I can take care of myself!"

This is pretty much almost word for word on what could happen between the Bros. Luigi knows that Mario has always been protective, but considering he's now immune, Mario, in his opinion, is just throwing himself in front of a sponge. There would definitely be conflict, and the Bros would have to work on that new trust in order to get to the resistance group.

Now at the very end...the moment Luigi needs to be sacrificed for a cure.

Much like Joel - Mario snaps. He can't, won't, have his brother come this far, only for once again there be another chance he can be taken away from him again. The world has already given up on itself, but the Bros have never given up on each other. They need each other as their own cures for this bleak world.

So Mario goes on a rampage, until he rescues Luigi, and manages to get them away before they are caught again.

Now...for the ending. I thought long and hard about how I believe this would play out, and from what I've decided - Mario still lies to Luigi, but Luigi immediately picks up on it. Neither brother confess to each other out loud (something they have had to do for the very first time in their lives) but they both know the truth. Luigi doesn't miss the look in Mario's eyes, the blood on his hands. But he's not angry, because he knows he would've done the same thing. They both know that they need each other, and they would never give each other up willingly.

On a side note: I legit thought that this was what they were hinting at during the end of TLoU with Ellie. The way she replied "Ok" to Joel's lie seemed to hint that she knew he wasn't being honest, but chose not to bring it up because she knew she would've done the same if it was him.

Only for that to get completely blown out of the water by having Part 2 say that Ellie wanted to sacrifice herself, even though there was no hint of this at all in the first game 😑

Perhaps later on down the line, Luigi tries to research how his condition could help people, without the need to sacrifice others. Mario tries to get him to give up on it ("It's all useless now") Luigi challenges his brother by asking if he would give up on him....

Cue a slightly awkward and guilty Mario....

#this is really interesting #because you essentially have two pairs of characters all about family - #but it's their different bonds and experiences that make the outcomes slightly different #also mario slaughtering a hospital of doctors like Joel #that is never an image you find yourself picturing! #super mario #mario #luigi #super mario au #mario au #mario and luigi #brothers #tlou #the last of us #tw zombies #tw horror #tw apocalypse #tw violence #tw blood #the super mario bros movie #super mario movie #mario movie #the super mario bros #mario bros

[miraclemaya]

"The very thought of feeding on her, shitting on her, fucking on her repulsed me unlike anything else." - They Were Here Before Us, Eric LaRocca

#i was recommened this book by the bookstore owner #and so far only a few pages in #this is really interesting

[sophieoverett]

FOSTA seems to have weakened the natural resistance of fandom and internet culture at large to the US’s broader puritanical, anti-sex culture. The purity movement formally began in the ’90s within evangelical culture as a way of normalizing an abstinence-only approach to sex, especially among teens. In the modern era, the language of this movement has converged with that of trans-exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs), who enact a regressive approach to sex and gender expression.

“If you go into certain radfem forums, you’ll see language mirrored one-to-one,” Aburime told me, describing the way TERF rhetoric overlaps with and sometimes infiltrates fandom spaces. “It’s almost like a game — slipping some ideology secretly” into a fannish experience. “It’s misinformation under the guise of activism.” Like the US’s larger current moral panic over drag shows, LGBTQ people, and “groomers,” fandom’s culture has regressed toward sexual repression, attacks on sexual minorities, and censorship of art made by marginalized people. The shifts happening in fandom and across the internet help exacerbate this larger cultural shift.

Puritanism took over online fandom — and then came for the rest of the internet by Aja Romana, Vox, 2023.

#this is really interesting #fandom #articles

[mqsi]

north or south

That’s too many questions😡

Jk, but this is the last one I’ll answer, south.

#this is really interesting #love how you got invested

[bronzebluemind]

someone talked about white mats and ard is now showing a clip about mats who hold snow crystals and are white because of that

#this is really interesting #wanna research that seems like a good concept #less friction than normal mats but a bit more than snow #or artificial snow which is a disaster for energy money and climate #ski jumping #ard #wisla #season22/23

[letmeliedown]

“With the likelihood that hundreds of thousands of short-of-breath patients around the world during this pandemic will require low tidal volume mechanical ventilation, we are concerned about the potential for mass psychological trauma among the survivors, induced by untreated air hunger,” the authors stated in the article. Research has shown that among ICU survivors, the experience of air hunger is often associated with post-traumatic stress disorder.  

“Opiates are the most reliable agent for symptomatic relief of air hunger—they seem to act both through depression of ventilatory drive and ascending perceptual pathways, as they do with pain.”

#this is really interesting #reading abt air hunger because someone mentioned it in passing today

[tomorrowillbeyou]

Greenland’s Hand-Sized Wooden Maps Were Used for Storytelling, Not Navigation - Atlas Obscura

#this is really interesting #greenland

[wildernessuntothemselves]

Okay so here’s my theory ^ gyu keeps sending letters and eventually the “something crazy” he referred to is killing his father, and using that as a warning to tae that if he doesn’t get oc back he will also have the same fate. And everyone else is scared of him because he literally killed the king. But tae is not fazed and instead he just maximises the castle’s security (more guards and stuff) and this is where we see and oc sees just how easily tae can discard lives 1/2

Also during this time, tae teaches oc how to defend herself just in case gyu gets into the castle. Somehow gyu does get into the castle and oc keeps saying that she doesn’t want to be with him anymore (even though she is not so sure of that). But eventually she does leave. And obviously tae finds out and goes feral because just like gyu, he feels that oc is his. So tae sneaks into the palace and is about to kill gyu but gyu hurts oc to distract tae and kills tae.

Ohhhh that's interesting. But would oc consider tae not giving her up to be a disregard for people's lives? I feel like that would just be more along his righteous trait of always wanting to do the right thing and so he wants to protect OC from gyu since she says that she doesn’t want to get back to him.

Also do you guys think that tyun will exhibit the same possessiveness over oc that gyu does? Also is gyu capable of actually hurting oc physically?

#this is really interesting #mort talks #yamqn

[catmask]

the 'all marriage is gay as far as im concerned' except its me watching a man and woman character in a show i like and accidentally saying 'theyre so gay' because i literally forget thats not the word for romance because to me all romance is gay

#normally i find the way m/f pairings are written to be really frustrating #not because its like 'i hate straight people' or whatever i literally just want them to actually like each other and communicate #or have an interesting enough dynamic i can stay invested #also i am bisexual and m/f pairings can be nice. but liek they actually have to Be Nice and like eachother or be funny at the very least #txt #scratchpost

[cemeterymidtown]

Ignore that I’ve made this post b4

If you watched or currently watch family vloggers has this informed or shaped your ideal family structure?

And by family vloggers I mean who only document their life/their children’s lives with no other types of content. Feel free to add what vloggers you watched/watch in rbs/comments

#this is to see if it’s good for class tbh #sociology kinda #tumblr polls #please do the poll #this is really interesting #uhhhh #vloggers #I guess #yeah #I never watched them but I’m curious