#this isn't a villain arc he's just kind of an asshole

[wc-confessions]

I have NO idea if I've submitted this before (I have a tendency to send in something to this blog, then bounce for a few weeks without checking in) so I apologize if you've gotten this exact submission before but:

I wish there were more redeemable villains. I don't think Longtail or Dustpelt or Needletail count too much. They were kind of just assholes for a little bit. Maybe Blackstar kind of falls into this? He was mostly a side villain, propping up more major ones, but he still did some bad, story altering things, but died "a good guy". Leader privilege I guess.

But like, could you imagine someone like Scourge or maybe Splashtail being beaten in battle but not killed or driven out? Or somehow comes to the conclusion that what they're doing ISN'T right? And spent the rest of the story or next arc like. Trying to live their life with the guilt of what they did and unlearning the behaviors that lead them down that bad path? Unfortunately, major characters of previous arcs tend to get aggressively sidelined when a new arc comes out, so it likely wouldn't be as satisfying or fascinating to watch as I'd hope.

But idk! Imagine if a villain wasn't killed or didn't die immediately after making up for their crimes. And like, a major villain! It'd be cool, especially, to see them as a POV character in the next arc! Can you imagine? Idk if what I'm saying is getting across here, but I hope y'all can see my vision.

ㅤ

#confession

[wuxianxkexing]

This face. I'm going to talk about it. Spoilers below!

So my pathetic little meow meow looks kind of unhinged here. I've said that much already. But what exactly is he thinking in this moment?

From a storytelling perspective Heaven Official's Blessing doesn't really have a main villain by this point. Pei Ming is the closest thing to one since he caused and ignored the Bridegroom and he tried to sweep his deputy's crimes in Banyue under the rug. However while those things might make him a "bad" guy that isn't quite main villain of the story material since he hadn't really gone after our main character Xie Lian all that hard. Yeah, he tried to shift the focus onto Xie Lian hanging out with Crimson Rain, but it wasn't really personal. He wasn't trying to drag Xie Lian down since he also spoke in his defense and said that Xie Lian was probably just tricked. He just wanted to shift the focus off of his deputy but failed to. Still a dick move to Xie Lian, but at least it wasn't personal? 😅 Or at least it wasn't personal until the very end when he realized that he wasn't going to be able to save his deputy after all.

But from a storytelling perspective having Mu Qing make this expression puts him on the radar as potentially being the story's main villain. At this point all we know about Mu Qing is pretty negative? He used to be Xie Lian's servant but left/betrayed him to ascend to godhood. He clearly still remembered Xie Lian though Xie Lian didn't recognize him and he seemed miffed by that fact. In the books it is revealed that he hangs out in the communication array all day every day, supposedly because he is catty and loves gossip and he has no friends. He is shown to have beef with General Nan Yang, who forgave Xie Lian's absolutely massive debt out of the kindness of his heart and who in this very episode publicly sides himself with our main character when he is concerned about him getting hurt. The audience realizes that Feng Xin is actually a pretty good dude, and naturally we are suspicious of anyone who openly hates him as much as Mu Qing does. Then Mu Qing makes that face. At this point the audience can only assume that Mu Qing made that face because he is a huge asshole and hates Xie Lian. The main villain has to be either him or Pei Ming. Right? They both have personal beef with him, and figuring out which of them is going to be the main villain gives the audience something to think about. I think this is why MXTX decided to have him make this face. The story needs a main villain but she wasn't ready to reveal them just yet so she kind of pretended to throw us a bone to keep us interested.

Ignoring the overall story reasons and focusing on the in world reason that I think Mu Qing made this face: He is just vindictive. Not towards Xie Lian, but Yong'An. Xie Lian describes him as both petty and spiteful. Up until Mu Qing makes his friendship confession and tries to kill himself afterwards the audience doesn't really know any better of him. I've seen some people say that he made that face because he was glad that Xie Lian isn't as perfect as he thought, but I don't think that is the case at all. If you actually hated someone for being too perfect would you even /want/ to be their friend? Let alone be willing to throw yourself into a volcano for them? Nah. Most people try to avoid people that they hate, so Mu Qing wouldn't have even helped out during the Bridegroom arc, or if he did then he would've only done it to sabotage the mission (which he didn't).

But knowing how spiteful and petty Mu Qing is having him make this face upon hearing that the former crown prince of his kingdom massacred the royal family of their invaders? That makes perfect sense for his character. This scene reveals that deep in his heart he is glad that the Yong'an royal family "got what they deserved." They destroyed his home country and they set into motion the process of him losing his 2 best friends as well. Arguably they are the root cause of a lot of his suffering. As for the frown after he was done having his moment I think that the revelation of why/how Xie Lian did it kind of ruined his revenge fantasy. Xie Lian did kill the Yong'an king to protect the former people of Xianle, but he didn't go on the cool V for Vendetta campaign that Mu Qing had hoped for. Which maybe that is a problem too but at least you can see where he is coming from.

Ultimately I think Mu Qing had a very real and human reaction to the news, but it only makes sense with context. Otherwise he just seems like a crazy person. Like all I can think of when I see that face is that if Mu Qing was the one poisoned by the Land of the Tenders instead of Xie Lian he would've had the worst bloodlust ever known to mankind. He is still my little meow meow though.

#heaven officials blessing #tgcf #mu qing #pei ming

[right-there-ride-on]

A "Brief" Analysis of Religion and Johnny Joestar

Introduction

I would be remiss not to begin by addressing Stone Ocean. I believe SO was where Araki really began playing with the idea of faith. Enrico Pucci is a priest, and his outfit is emblazoned with a giant cross. While there is something to be said about Pucci's repurposing of religion to suit his own goals (there are several good discussions of Pucci's character with relation to his faith that others have made, though I don't have them on hand), for my purposes there are only two aspects of Pucci's connection to Christianity that are relevant here:

a) His actual religious faith is somewhat disingenuous (Pucci listens to Dio's Heaven Plan because it serves his own aims - like Hot Pants)

b) He belongs to organized religion (introduced in a church, works in a prison chapel, 'Father' Pucci)

And one aspect of his character that is relevant:

a) He fully believed the Heaven Plan was righteous and would be a boon to humanity

Given that Pucci is the villain of the part, I think it's safe to say that we are supposed to take away that all of these are negative qualities.

I bring this up specifically to juxtapose SO's depiction of Christianity to SBR's. Steel Ball Run is a natural evolution of Stone Ocean's religious theming that represents both a critique and affirmation of faith. This analysis will focus on the character I think best represents SBR's religious themes: Johnny.

Unlike Pucci, Johnny's faith isn't immediately obvious. He wears no crosses and, if it weren't for his own narration, we likely wouldn't know he was religious. After all, Jesus appears to multiple people throughout the part, not just Johnny. It is possible to reduce Jesus' manifestation to simply being the work of corpse parts, but working in tandem with Johnny's character, it becomes plain there's stronger themes about Christianity and religion at work in the narrative.

(It's also very telling when even ten years later (as seen in Jojolion Chapter 22: Morioh, Year 1901) one of the few panels we get of Johnny is him in prayer.)

Johnny's character is extremely rich, but for this analysis I'll choose one of the more prominent overarching themes for his arc: the search for forgiveness. The concept has another name too - redemption. I'll be using them interchangeably.

Section I - An introduction to Johnny Joestar

I'll start with a quick rundown of Johnny's backstory.

Here's a few panels to representative of George's parenting:

And here's a few of Nicholas. After several panels of darkness, from Johnny's POV we're given this:

Johnny admires him greatly, but already feels a great sense of inferiority toward him.

"Maybe I'm not your real brother?" Gee, I wonder who put that in his head.

Here's what we learn about the Joestar family:

(a) George Joestar is a Grade-A asshole. This will be a running theme.

And (b) Nicholas was everything to Johnny.

I want to point out this panel:

Even with George essentially physically threatening him to kill his pet, Johnny's kindness still wins out. His kindness toward animals is a consistent trait and also functions as indicator that, at some point in the past, he was far less aloof than he is in SBR. As readers, we find out this is because of Nicholas' death, which Johnny believes himself to be responsible for.

Johnny's perception of his own guilt in the accident is not helped by George's constant criticizing and reinforcement of Nicholas' amazingness:

It is made abundantly clear that Johnny isn't good enough for George.

And Johnny never will be good enough. He's already the youngest person to ever win the Kentucky Derby (one of the qualifying races for the Triple Crown, which it's previously stated his father won several times) but George doesn't care. You can explain this with grief, but it seems clear that Johnny was always the unfavorite. Nicholas' death just cemented things.

The death of his brother and his relationship with George severely damaged Johnny's beliefs about himself.

Chapter 42: A Silent Way (Part 2)

From a very young age, Nicholas' death caused Johnny to perceive himself as a murderer, willing or not. In other words, he has almost always considered himself a sinner. The 'sin' he committed of killing his brother is why he believes he is undeserving of happiness (Cain and Abel anyone?).

Because he is a 'sinner' - an unforgivable sinner - Johnny cannot fathom his life through any other mechanism but karma. He will always deserve the awful things that happened to him, because his sin is too great to forgive. God just hasn't noticed his mistake yet.

Section II - Broader themes in SBR

These are two main themes I will discuss here:

Individualism

2. Religion

My discussion on individualism in SBR will be limited to its connection to the religious theming. If you want a more in-depth look at this theme in general, check out this video.

As noted above, in Stone Ocean Father Pucci was a member of organized religion. Yet his faith was not truly in the church, but in the 'Heaven Plan', the completion of which would enable people to know their fate. They could not deviate from their set course, but the intention was that they would be able to find 'peace of mind' in that idea. This is how things are supposed to be.

We can also look at the Heaven Plan through the lens of "God has a plan for you". No matter what struggles you endure, you are supposed to be able to find comfort in the idea that some unknowable thing has it all taken care of. Is it a trial of your character? A test of your faith? If you accept God has a plan, then no matter what happens you can be assured you made the right decision (and alleviate your guilty conscience). If you live your life according to the Bible, then you have nothing to fear. If your life sucked in particular, then don't worry, because Heaven's waiting. Faith is based on the idea of "hope". That's what a prayer is - hope that someone is listening.

These ideas of religion and God's plan (i.e. fate) are also present in SBR, in a more subtle capacity. Most obviously, we have the corpse parts. The corpse is understood to be an object of power and value by most everyone in the story.

Here are a few panels of how different characters perceive the corpse.

Chapter 27: Tusk (Part 3)

Gyro understand the corpse in the capacity of its ability to grant power and glory to the nations of the world. Still, he acknowledges "saints exist for the common people".

Chapter 57: Civil War (Part 2)

Chapter 75: D4C (Part 8)

Hot Pants initially seems to have a similar impression of the corpse as Gyro. However, as the story progresses, we learn that they and Johnny's motivations to collect the corpse are quite similar. The difference is that while HP wants the corpse for themselves (to earn forgiveness), they believe they can accomplish this forgiveness by giving the corpse to a higher cause (the Vatican). Hot Pants, too, acknowledges that the miracle of the corpse is supposed to belong to the people.

Meanwhile, Valentine uses the corpse as proof of the 'napkin law'. Whoever has the corpse will have the power to influence the rest of the world. This is representative of religion as an influencer and indication of power.

Chapter 78: D4C (Part 11)

Valentine quite literally claims the power of the corpse - the power to control the right to good fortune, to decide who deserves good things and who doesn't - as his own. He even decides this power doesn't belong to the corpse, but was his all along, his own potential just waiting to be drawn out. He compares this new ability to that of God himself. Valentine is putting himself in the position of God.

All of these characters consider the corpse in terms of what it means to a larger cause. The corpse, and thus religion, is a tool to grant power to those who possess it. It enables whatever entity possessing it to impose "God's plan" (I use that liberally) onto others, supposedly for their own good. Even HP, who has the motivation closest to Johnny's own (even mirroring his 'any means necessary' approach), still views the corpse in terms of its wider applicability. These viewpoints are starkly contrasted by Johnny's own; he just wants the corpse to be able to walk again. Johnny's motivation is very base, but out of the everyone in the cast, it is the humblest and I would argue the most sincere. It's a wish that would affect only himself. The corpse - and thus religion - is something deeply personal to him.

This relatively deterministic stance on religion - as a power related to fate and a tool to control the fates of others - would be in strong contrast with SBR's individualistic themes, were it not for Johnny.

Section III - Understanding Johnny's Search for Redemption

Now I will take a moment to address the unfortunate elephant in the room, namely Araki's treatment of Johnny's disability as a metaphor. I'm not happy with it, and I think magically healing his injury was kind of bullshit when the narrative had reached a point and almost spelled out that it wasn't necessary, but it is what it is so I'll be discussing his disability in this essay in that capacity.

On a related note, I’ll say something kind of controversial: Johnny’s hunt for the corpse was never really about his legs, though that was certainly part of it. As discussed in my Civil War analysis, the parallels between HP and Johnny reveal something else: narratively, gathering the corpse is shortcut to characters earning forgiveness. I’m not sure Johnny himself realized it before Philadelphia, but at some point the corpse became less about his disability and more about spiritual redemption. Healing his legs is representative of cleansing himself from his 'original sin' of "killing" Nicholas.

Chapter 72: Ticket to Ride (Part 2)

Johnny perceives his shooting as the ultimate payment for Nicholas' death. He ran from George after their falling out, pretending he was living the good life without actually forming genuine relationships with anyone. He ran from the guilt he felt toward Nicholas' death for even longer, only recently truly facing his trauma in the Civil War arc. His disability prevented him from being able to run away anymore and forced him into further isolation. It was the final proof he needed that he is someone not allowed to be happy - not allowed to be forgiven. As he is, he's not worth anything to anyone. That's why he's so desperate to walk again. Johnny has been in the 'negative' his entire life. The corpse granting him mobility would be the ultimate proof that he is a person worth healing / saving.

I'll also suggest that his statement of "not giving a fuck if the corpse is a saint or whatever" is less how he feels about religion and moreso about the apparent reverence everyone around him has for it, namely Hot Pants, Valentine and even Gyro. They all believe the corpse to be something valuable because of what it means to a larger cause or organization. For Johnny, it's a means to an end. At this point in the story, it's become clear that the one thing Johnny wants most of all is to be forgiven for his 'sin' - a chance to wipe the slate clean.

Section IV - Johnny and Faith

Firstly, Johnny was raised in a religious household. As seen above, his father is obviously religious to some extent, and when Gyro initially questions him about the corpse he's able to list off a few Saints.

Chapter 27: Tusk (Part 3)

At the same time, however, I believe there's enough evidence to suggest he's in a crisis of faith. As per evidence I'll show later, he may simply think God has abandoned him like everyone else.

I'll move on to Johnny's perception of himself and how that relates to the religious themes in the story.

Chapter 41: A Silent Way (Part 1)

Stands are reflective of their user's fighting spirit, or, more literally, their soul. Tusk's bullets being destroyed so quickly is reflective of the weight of Johnny's guilt against his goal of forgiveness. At this point, Tusk is still in Act 1. Johnny feels any progress he makes towards forgiveness simply... fizzles out. Forgiveness means he can be happy, but he can never be truly happy because he has always been a sinner.

The dinosaurs here function as a metaphor for Johnny's guilt (isn't that a sentence?). He was able to start down the road to forgiveness through the hunt for the corpse parts and gaining Tusk, but at this point he still doesn't feel like he's truly earned the right to have them. 'Fate' will catch up with him before he can be forgiven, because he doesn't deserve to be forgiven.

Contrary to popular readings, as much as Johnny appears rather cold most of the time, he's actually an extremely caring person. His kindness with Danny backfired on him in a big way, which I why I think he tries to shut down the softer part of himself so hard, but it still comes through. We can see it in his loyalty to Gyro, putting up with his jokes and even playing along, as well as putting his life on the line to protect him several times when the easier option would have been to run away. He feeds the stray wolf in Wrecking Ball because he felt bad for it. He's also one of the only people to be genuinely kind to Lucy, even defending her to Gyro and protesting her involvement in the corpse hunt. Think about that - Johnny, Mr. "Get the Corpse at any cost" Joestar, was obviously willing to put Lucy's safety before his determination to get the corpse. Much of his coldness can be attributed to walls he built due to those he cares about frequently abandoning him, voluntarily or otherwise.

Chapter 42: A Silent Way (Part 2)

And if everyone has abandoned Johnny - because he has never been worth anything, because he is a sinner - then God surely has too. Very early in his life, he closed himself off to other people (and we can infer, by extension, closed himself off to God).

Because of this - because of his lack of connections to others, because of his low self-worth, because he feels he isn't someone who deserves happiness - Johnny's conviction to collect the corpse parts frequently wavers.

Chapter 44: A Silent Way (Part 5)

His 'dark determination', first seen in True Man's World, demonstrates that he does have the motivation to collect the corpse parts at any cost. At the same time, A Silent Way highlights his tendency to give up on himself. That's the struggle he must overcome in that arc. Johnny must harden his resolve, because despite still feeling like he doesn't deserve anything, he does want the corpse parts so that he can be someone worth something - to Gyro, at the very least. And because of his strengthening bond with Gyro, Johnny finds the resolve to fight on not just for Gyro, but for himself as well, evolving Tusk into Act 2. Even so, at the end of this arc, Johnny is still wavering. His still isn't sure of his worth because he has yet to pay for his 'sin'. Deep down, he believes he is not and never will be worth forgiveness.

But he keeps trying.

Johnny is the first to explicitly recognize the corpse as Jesus Christ, and Johnny is the only one to whom Jesus speaks directly and addresses by name.

Chapter 58: Civil War (Part 3)

As discussed in my Civil War analysis, his connection to Jesus, and Christ's words to him, are critical in Johnny realizing that Nicholas' death was not his fault. At the end of the arc, Johnny is purified, because Nicholas' death was never his sin to bear. Furthermore, despite threatening it several times, Johnny has never murdered in cold blood. Each and every time was self-defense against Valentine's minions (ironically, Gyro probably has a higher kill count.) When Axl Ro kills Johnny, his old self quite literally dies, and he is reborn purified of past sins (hey, that's a familiar story).

What we learn here is that it was the one man who was collecting the corpse - again, representative of a shortcut to forgiveness - for his 'selfish' goal of spiritual redemption that Christ deemed worthy of showing himself too. By reading Civil War as Johnny reconnecting with his faith through finding forgiveness for his sins in both himself and Christ, we understand that he isn't wavering anymore - now, he does believe himself someone worthy of redemption. But even with his faith in God and Christ solidified, Johnny still believes he hasn't been completely forgiven, as his legs are still not healed. Hence why he fights so desperately to reclaim the corpse in the D4C arc.

Section V - The Two Sides of Religion

First, the corpse siding with Valentine causes Johnny to have another crisis of faith.

Chapter 79: D4C (Part 12)

Valentine and Johnny's stances on faith are opposed to one another throughout the final confrontation. Valentine is trying to impose his version of "righteousness" onto the world. Valentine believes that, through the corpse (religion), he has the right to decide who is worthy and who is not. Johnny, by contrast, is fighting to save Lucy and reclaim the corpse - to make himself someone 'worth something' again. Yet we see that even Johnny isn't completely sure of that his path is the 'righteous' one. Does someone like him (someone still unworthy, a sinner) even have the right to oppose Valentine's vision? Is he worthy of forgiveness?

Chapter 88: Break My Heart, Break Your Heart (Part 1) - quick side note: notice how Johnny still has very low self-worth and continues to condemn himself as a 'sinner' (someone evil) frequently and without much cause. Even after Valentine literally killed his best friend, Johnny struggles to see himself as someone who even at the bare minimum deserves to judge others. George Joestar when I get you...

Valentine assumes a similar role to Pucci. In this final confrontation, he is representative of the use of religion as a tool of power.

Quick aside here:

The comparison of those involved in the race to a lamb - famously associated with Jesus Christ himself - is curious.

Chapter 85: Ball Breaker (Part 3)

Valentine indirectly refers to Johnny as his 'greatest challenge' and moreover attempts to force him to attack first (Chapter 85: Ball Breaker (Part 3)). Valentine is trying to force Johnny to become a sinner again before he condemns him to death for being unworthy of Valentine's 'righteous' world. Valentine is literally acting in God's place as judge, jury and executioner by determining who is 'worthy' and 'unworthy'.

Johnny, on the other hand, is representative of religion as a healing influence. He doesn't want to influence large groups of people or protect any nation. His connection to God and Christ through his faith is far more individualistic and personal. I think it's very telling that he's the winner here.

Section VI - Conclusion

At the end of SBR, we learn that despite everything - even through his crisis of faith - still, Johnny prays. He's always been praying.

Chapter 95: The World of Stars and Stripes

The story of Steel Ball Run is about finding your faith again. Johnny always prayed, even when he thought he’d never be forgiven, even when he believed God wasn’t listening. He is the kind of person that miracles are for (as alluded to by Gyro and Hot Pants in Section II). Johnny is the only religious character to escape the narrative unscathed, largely because religion was something so deeply personal to him. Rather than simply being 'selfish', his goal was personal, spiritual redemption. Faith carried him across the continent, helped him overcome his trauma, helped him connect with Gyro, and showed him how to find self-worth again after his lowest point. His faith was sincere and for himself, in contrast to most everyone else in the story who tried to impose their beliefs onto others.

Hot Pants, a member of organized religion, used it as a means to an end but never found the forgiveness they were looking for because their faith was performative. Pucci too failed because he used his faith (in the Heaven Plan) to try and assume control of the fate of others (similar to Valentine).

In contrast to Pucci and Valentine, Johnny absolutely wavered in his faith. Several times, in fact. He believed for most of his life that no one, least of all God, was listening. God had no plan for him, because his life was a mistake. Even so, he found comfort in praying for himself and Gyro, and by the end at last believed himself someone worth forgiving. And he was forgiven - cleansed, if you will. His being able to walk at the end of SBR is indicative that he no longer considers himself a sinner, but someone worthy of a new beginning as a person.

By the end of SBR, it’s apparent that the corpse itself isn’t what Johnny needed. It was because of his relationship with Gyro and the trials they faced together that he was able to gain a better understanding of himself, where he fucked up in the past, and learned how to be a better person. Lesson 5 is the key. "The detour was the shortest past." (Chapter 84: Ball Breaker (Part 2)) Johnny never fully possessed the corpse, preventing him from using it as a shortcut to redemption. It wasn't the corpse, but the corpse hunt itself that enabled Johnny to find forgiveness in himself and reconnect with his faith.

Narratively, Hot Pants, Valentine and Pucci were punished because they were not sincere in their proclaimed beliefs or otherwise abused religion in a position of power. Yet religion itself still isn't represented as a negative thing. Johnny's character carefully combines themes of individualism and religion to demonstrate the healing influence of personal faith.

Closing Notes

This essay was a much bigger undertaking than my previous analyses, primarily because I feel I am not the person to be writing it. I wasn't raised particularly religious (I barely know the cliff notes of Christianity), but at the very least I hope this is valuable jumping off point for others.

I apologize if I repeated myself too much. This was a very messy essay and I tried to clean it up a bit, but I'm sure I missed some things.

Based on some brief scanning of different Christian denominations and what occurs in SBR, I'd say Johnny was probably raised Lutheran. What do you guys think?

Also, shoutout to Johnny’s little devil horns.

Thank you for reading! Please feel free to share your thoughts as well.

#johnny joestar #steel ball run #sbr #sbr analysis #funny valentine #hot pants #jojo's bizarre adventure #jjba #jjba part 7 #jojo's bizarre adventure part 7 #wow this was a lot #i love u johnny joestar... #my posts #johnny joestar character analysis #hopefully my last sbr analysis... yippee! #ofc this is only one aspect of johnny's character but i feel it's one often overlooked #when it's almost critically important to understanding him #steel ball run analysis

[vole-mon-amour]

3x10, a mix of everything, part 1

didn't expect it to happen that fast but HELL YEAH. there's nothing for Nathan to do next to Rupert. Rupert keeps switching his lovers like socks while his wife is still at home with their daughter. come on!! villain arc for Bex and Rebecca when? when is Rupert gonna get killed die and leave Bex all the money??? and then Bex and Rebecca become best friends and raise a daughter together?

Trent being the heart of the team? do you remember how it all started and how wary everyone was of him? do you? it warms my heart, but it warms it twice bc of the clear bond we see between Colin and Trent. like, older queer with younger queer, helping each other out and bonding. their friendship does things to me tbh. it's so very important and intimate and—

in other words, representation matters.

yaaay! also, Trent <3333 again, this warms my heart.

sometimes I really have no idea what this season is doing. i miss them being a dramedy, not a full on sitcom. i'm enjoying this season, but sometimes it's borderline too much. it's out of nowhere and it's not necessary at all.

besties unlocked <3 Trent is such a sunshine, I love him. the way he and Ted share a raised eyebrows look. there is something so wonderful happening between Ted and Trent from the moment they met. it's like they're connected and are being drawn to each other.

girl talk, especially when it involves middle aged men <3 Rebecca as their leader is really something. i love it.

I think Rebecca is being mean to the actual devil. also, why do iphone users love their matte screen cover? why not the regular one?

Trent is so in love with Ted, my goodness. that cute smile. Ted is so freaking oblivious, I need the show to do something about it. i need Ted to learn Trent is in love with him.

this is such a nice shot. something something, the idea of press taking pics of Nate's gf leaving. which at first I thought was kind of nice, but then she leaves with a suitcase and it looks like a breakup of some sort, so not that nice. hm. still, the shot is pretty.

this is such a nice look & I like her hair a lot, but my GOD, how do people wear those minies? it's beyond good and evil for me. shorts i can kinda understand, but skirts? that's... yeah, no.

there you go Jack's "me and Keeley are dating" without asking Keeley first if she wants to announce it and then Jack totally ghosting Keeley. *frustrated high pitched growl* I hate that plotline. if it's their way to push Keeley back towards Roy bc she will no longer be that busy so Roy can't come up with that excuse again, that's a very shitty thing to do. so far I don't see the bigger picture of this. they've been messing up Keeley's storyline this season just like that.

"the board" oh, fuck you, Jack. (in Grace Le Domas' voice) fucking rich people.

Dani crushing Van Damme's chips is such a dick move, ESPECIALLY since you're trashing the airplane!! you're not the one who's gonna have to clean it up, you asshole.

can somebody connect this parallel for me pls? it's just within my reach but it slips away.

sooo, Beard isn't getting out of a toxic relationship? gotta say, this plotline concerns me. idk where they're going with it and WHY in the first place. Beard deserves better & Jane needs some serious therapy.

#fired immediately

I'm here for Rebecca standing up for herself against Rupert. I hate that asshole so much.

I don't remember, have we seen Roy's sister before? it's so rare.

go fuck yourself. yes, i'm quick to jump to conclusions and violence.

Leslie is NOT having a good tea time this season. let him enjoy his tea 2k23! however, the fact that he knows every friend Rebecca has. some friendship between him and Rebecca developed along the way since s1.

#natiswatching #ted lasso #colin hughes #trent crimm #rebecca welton #jamie tartt #ted x trent #nate x jade #keeley x jack #coach beard #roy x keeley #roy kent

[jalebi-weds-bluetooth]

hey! I agree with every word of yours. I’m learning so much from ipk and I absolutely love loving the show! And regarding Arnav, I went from being like “this dude’s a total jerk” to being absolutely smitten by him. His character arc is just mind blowing. I think I genuinely started finding him attractive AFTER he started to fall for Khushi, when he was no longer denying it or was confused about it. Before that, he was just a really good looking guy with an asshole-ish personality, but it kind of justified who he was, so no complaints here. I liked that he had layers. I must say Barun killed this role. And it amazes me how we cannot see even one single speck of Arnav Singh Raizaada in Barun Sobti off-screen (the little fun interviews during the shoot) This kind of points out his unbelievable acting caliber, and how brilliantly he portrayed this role of a “heavy-duty complicated” man, despite being absolutely NOTHING like him in real life. Sanaya’s real life personality does reflect a hint of Khushi though, and I love her for it. She radiates such positive and fun energy!

Hey Anon :)

I'm glad you resonated with my thoughts! Arnav has been a favorite of man in the sense of he was written outside the template of the nice guy, had a compelling past and was set up as a villain/anti-hero.

He dehumanizes people beyond a certain economical strata and the show always shows how screwed up he is.

We are meant to dislike him, and I think that's the aspect I like the most. The show sells Arnav as rich, powerful and despite good motivations - he isn't just a good person.

Until he is.

Barun is really good in playing understated characters. He has shined in characters like Arnav (it's role where he legit learned and refined his acting skills - and benefitted from having solid co actors too - especially Sanaya), Arjun, Yusuf, the dude in Kohrra and so on.

In short when he's convinced of a character - he's really good in wearing the skin of the character.

Sanaya legit made Khushi likeable. And definitely she vibed with Khushi's energy post playing Gunjan, who was very different from Sanaya's core personality.

Some actors have an undertone and they shine when placed close to it, and some actors are really good in switching between themselves and their characters.

Best,

JWB

#ask #anon #off screen

[asktheghosthost]

Some scattered thoughts on the 2023 HM movie

Maybe I'll do something more in depth later after the wide release and when I'm not so exhausted

But for now, here's some notes. There are a couple of minor spoilers, so I'll still put this under a read more. Be warned.

I really enjoyed the Easter eggs. I'm looking forward to getting the blu ray and pausing it every five seconds to see what I spy in the background.

Our mortal crew is very likable. Ben is definitely the stand out character for me. His arc is lovely and sympathetic and he almost made me cry.

I liked how the film approaches grief and loss and love. It felt sincere. And it was handled in a way that I think most kids would get, too. If anything, it may help open up conversations for some of the younger audience.

Lots of character cameos, and multiple new ghosts created just for the film. Really appreciated the new spirits. They fit right in. The extras and supporting cast playing these quirky ghosts were great. ... Pay them. Pay them what they're worth. You couldn't have this massive menagerie of the macabre without them

I've seen a lot of reviews say the jokes can fall flat. Most of them hit for me. "It'll cost you... three dollars," still made me giggle.

Hatty... I'm so glad Disney finally made a proper outright villain again. Not a twist villain. Just a straight up murderous, power hungry, manipulative, absolute asshole. It's been way too long. Pay your writers, and pay them well so we can get more of this.

The way the Mansion would change and rearrange itself was great. I love that the house is a character all on its own. It has a backstory. It's its own entity in a way. Love that. Properly pay your animators and special effects team, because their work is the only way that kind of thing is accomplished so well.

William Gracey is a total sweetheart and I love him. His backstory is actually super similar to Edward's, so that might bug some people. But he's different enough in his demeanor, I think, that maybe it won't be really obvious if you're not thinking that hard about it. But, yeah, there are a couple of things that feel repeated from the 2003 movie. I don't know how much of that to chalk up to tropes, or if it was some intentional reworking. This isn't a remake, it's still its own thing, but it's easy to see some inspiration from the previous film.

Loved Connie. No thoughts in that head except "WHACKITY-WHACK!" She's chaotically vicious for the sake of it, and that's fun. My perfect Constance is Debbie from Adam's Family Values. Or a slightly sympathetic schemer, for a more grounded route. But I'll take maniacal seriel killer Connie, too. One moment with her actually got the biggest laugh from me.

Thinking about it, it also borrowed plot elements from the 2003 video game, too. But did those elements better. For the most part.

That's all that's coming to mind right now. Might talk more about it later. I had a good time. I do recommend it. Are there things I'd do differently? Well, yeah. I still want something where the ghosts are the focus. But I guess I'll just provide that myself. And the IDW and SLG comics also give us that.

I look forward to discussing it more with the fandom once the film has been out a while longer. I think there'll be a lot of different opinions on it.

#spoilers #myrr post

[duckielover151]

The One Piece Diaries

Episode Count: 450

Holy shit, guys... I'm back. I took another several months-long hiatus from One Piece... Mostly unintentionally... (I've been bouncing between a lot of other fandoms these past few months but have been brought back by the live action.) Where to start...

We've been in Impel Down for most of the last 40 or so episodes since my last update post. And not to go off on a tangent, but you know... I've noticed One Piece lumped in as one of the shows that's swamped with filler. And that really hasn't been my experience so far.

What I have noticed is that, around this point, the pacing gets pretty atrocious. There's a lot that happens in the journey to try and break Ace out of Impel Down... But is there 40 episodes worth of stuff? I have to argue no. It gets to the point where the first third of the episode is all recap, and barely anything is actually getting accomplished each episode. So that is a little off-putting.

But! There is a lot of good to be found in this arc too!

Okay, admittedly... Buggy was never my favorite... (outside of some brilliantly written fanfiction by stereden on AO3) And I would have been content to never see Mr. 3 again... But it is really cool to meet back up with so many of the old villains who only met their downfall and ended up here because of Luffy and to have them be on our side now. Really puts into perspective the morality of it all. Luffy's always fighting for the right things... but in the eyes of the government and greater world, he's a villain as well.

I've finally met Jimbei... (Jinbe? Jinbei? I've seen all 3, but Crunchyroll's subtitles use the 'm' spelling, so that's what I'm going with.) I haven't seen a lot of him yet, but I like him so far. He's tough, clearly, but also almost goofily polite, in a way that really complements Luffy's general blunt insensitiveness. I think it's still a while before he joins up as the last member of the crew, but I'm looking forward to getting to know him better.

This arc makes it really clear how Bon Clay came to be as beloved in the fandom as he is. And there's a lot that could be said about Ivankov... A lot that would very quickly derail this update and which I'm not totally, personally qualified to weigh in on...

Listen, One Piece's portrayal of queerness isn't perfect. But it's a hell of a lot better than the way so many other shows handle it, especially given the time this aired. (The Impel Down arc was originally adapted throughout late 2009-early 2010. Frankly, the 90s often included more and better handled LGBT+ characters than the 2000s era anime did, up until pretty recently.) Just the fact alone that this group is so out and proud about it and undeniably allied with and wholeheartedly accepted by the main protagonist is a fucking statement all on its own. It's beautiful. I can't underplay that by nitpicking the places the representation fell short by today's standards in a storyline that's 15 years old now. (I know there's a lot of shit in the future that goes down with Sanji in particular... So I may have less generous things to say later, but that's where we stand right now.)

And as for the arc's villains... Magellan's okay. This last episode particularly, the venom demon attack was pretty badass. (That image of the mushrooming skulls as it formed it was so good.)

And Hannyabal... Okay, there were some early moments that made me laugh. The gag about how he's clearly lusting for the warden's job and not great about hiding it could be pretty funny. But by the time he's defeated... and the anime starts in on a dramatic backstory for this asshole, trying to make him sympathetic... All I could say was, 'You've gotta be fucking kidding me...' I know it's kind of One Piece's thing to try and redeem everyone, but I was so bogged down by the pacing at that point... I did not have the patience for it. Good riddance to that dude in particular.

Episode 450 ends with our ragtag group officially making it out... And man, it's cool to see some of these older characters again, but I already miss our crew so much... Especially knowing what's coming...

I'm sure I've already mentioned that I know the bigger Marineford spoilers... But I'm still not sure I'm ready to see it firsthand.

Wish me luck.

#one piece #impel down #Episode 450! #lgbt anime #queers never die indeed #anime update

[theerurishipper]

This is my obligatory movie review post.

And it was fine! I enjoyed watching it, the visuals were stunning, I liked most of the songs... my time wasn't wasted. But it wasn't... great.

Let's get the good stuff out of the way first.

I like Gabriel's arc in this movie. He's clearly not an abusive asshole like he is in the show, and it's pretty clear he's distant from Adrien because of his grief, not because he's an abusive controlling jackass. It really hammers in that he's deeply regretful about what he's doing once he finds out it's his son, unlike show Gabe who beat his own son up after finding out he was Chat Noir.

Marinette was really great in this movie. I like her character here and how she's finding out who she is and what she wants to do, and is learning to be more confident in herself. It works well without the large plot points in the show.

I like the songs. This seems to be a controversial opinion for some reason. But I like them. Gabe's villain song is the best song fight me.

Again, the visuals? Beautiful. Everything looked amazing and everyone was so pretty.

The villains were entertaining.

The scenes with Marinette being embarrassed by her dad were fun. It didn't really go anywhere as a plot point, and they should have done more with it, but I liked the idea.

I like how the movie gave Tikki some more character. Her excitement about adventure and her desire for danger? Love it. She's an adrenaline junkie and I'm here for it.

Master Fu works so much better as a cryptic, mysterious old man who just pops up out of nowhere to be funny and weird than as the shitty mentor he was in the show who we were supposed to take seriously. I actually enjoy his character here.

It was nice of them to show Luka going to the same school as everyone else lol.

I love movie Nino so much you guys.

LADYNOIR

But seriously, that Ladynoir song? Love it. I'm going to rewatch it over and over. Ladynoir won this movie.

But that being said, there are plenty of flaws too.

It was so rushed. Like, super rushed. Everyone just went from 0 to 180 real quick. It started out at a nice pace, but then it all just felt like they were crossing out bullet points on their notepads without taking the time to flesh things out.

The rules for the Miraculous are so inconsistent and vague. I don't actually mind this that much, but it's still kind of annoying.

Adrien doesn't have much going for him in this movie. It's still better than the show in that he actually got to confront Gabriel and take part in the final battle, but other than that, he didn't have much of an arc. It could have been better if they showed more interactions between him and Ladybug, but he went straight from being annoyed by her to being in love with her, and a montage isn't really enough for development. His arc had a good start and a good end but very little in between, so it didn't work all that well. It's not even clear why he was chosen for the Miraculous. We also didn't actually get that much between him and Gabe, so the ending moment between them kind of fell flat for me. But it was still pretty emotional.

This is also the case for Adrienette. The way Marinette met him wasn't as impactful as in the show, and there was little to no development between them. It would have felt more realistic for Marinette to like him if we had gotten to see them interact more. They could have showed him telling her about his mother in an actual scene rather than shoving it into a montage. As it is, it feels like she just likes him for his pretty face.

They should have let Christina Vee sing the songs. The person who sings for Marinette has a lovely voice and I do think her voice works well in the songs, but it's so jarring to go from Christina's voice to hers. They aren't similar in the slightest. It was better for Adrien.

The final battle was pretty anticlimactic ngl. Part of it is because of the rushed character arcs, and that made the payoff less impactful. But other than, it was still kind of low key. I enjoyed the battle in that Carnival better.

No iconic Miraculous Ladybug! No Lucky Charm.

Plagg. Plagg. PLAGG. PLAGG. They massacred my boy. His only personality is cheese and farting. Like, he's farting constantly. His bond with Adrien was non-existent. This is easily the worst part of the movie. I hate it. I hate it so much.

They ruined Plagg.

They ruined Plagg.

...Watermelon??

They ruined Plagg.

And yeah, that's about it!

All in all, it's a good experience. It's fun and enjoyable, the characters are nice. They are pretty different from their show versions. Especially Adrien, who's more about not getting close to anyone because he lost his mom in the movie, when his show version was about breaking free from his isolation and wanting to connect with others. But obviously, this is a different canon on its own and wants to show a different interpretation of the characters. It's alright.

It definitely has a lot of flaws, but also a lot of good points. Just like the show. I wouldn't say I like the movie more than the show. It's good for what it is, but I still prefer the characters and dynamics as they were in the series. Which is not to say that no one else should like the movie better, it's just not for me. I don't think they are really comparable anyway, because a movie is very different from a series.

For me, the thing is, I really love the show. And that's why Season 5 pissed me off so much. Because I love the show and it disappointed me. I wouldn't waste my energy on it so much if I didn't like it. And I did like the movie, but it didn't really have that spark for me that brought me into the show. Even if I despise many of the writing choices that the show has made over the years, I still like a lot about it. So my preference will always be for the show. But that doesn't mean the movie is bad, and I still did enjoy it.

Also, I like show Gabe (before the Season 5 finale) as an antagonist better than movie Gabe. He's a piece of trash and a waste of oxygen but he was a pretty well written antagonist when he was allowed to do stuff. Movie Gabe suffers from the same problem of his arc being underdeveloped and rushed, even if his personality is an improvement from show Gabe.

Anyway, movie was good. The last scene with Nathalie and Emilie looks like its hinting to a sequel, but that won't be coming out anytime soon, so we'll see.

#MLB #Miraculous Ladybug #Marinette Dupain Cheng #Ladybug #Adrien Agreste #Chat Noir #Gabriel Agreste #Tikki #Plagg #Miraculous Awakening #ML Movie #Adrienette #Ladynoir #Meta #My meta

[invisiblegarters]

Only Friends Character Rankings - Ep 7

WHY can't I stop laughing? Oh this ep gets even more fun the more I think about it.

(except for you, Sand. You are just annoying me)

Favorite Characters (From Most to Least Fave atm):

MEW. I don't care, he was doing the most this ep and I loved it. I love that he matched his outfits to his new villain arc. I love a guy with a great sense of the dramatic. Like just keep bringing this energy Mew.

I am not mad about a single thing he did this ep. You keep slaying, sweetie.

On a more serious note, I feel bad for him. Dude is suffering and he really doesn't have anyone who just wants to be there for him. Boston and Top are right out because they're the cause, Ray ain't it because frankly, all he cares about is finally getting Mew for himself just like he always wanted, Chueam is way too busy thinking about how this makes her a bad friend...

This isn't just Mew's revenge arc. He's gonna spiral and he's not around the right kind of people to see that and help him. Ray won't care because he's also spiraling and he's incapable of not dragging down whoever's closest to him by virtue of the way he's spiraling, we already know that Chueam is kinda useless.

It would be kind of funny if Top winds up being the only one who cares enough to yank him out of his downward trajectory.

Ray. All he do is win, win, win, no matter what. Got Mew's love on his mind and he can never get enough. And when he sees Mew's on the rebound, every hand he has goes up

I can't even be mad at him. Dude is getting what he wants - he had Sand crawling up his ass and being sweet right after his accident and taking care of him like he likes without even having to pretend to be sorry for being an asshole, and he gets to worm his way into Mew's affections the way he's always wanted. And the most he'll probably suffer for it is Sand being pissy at him for five minutes. Like. if Mew hadn't been so fucking hot all over this ep I would have to do the unthinkable and put him in as number one.

I am also getting a huge kick out of the fact that Boston was right. He did exactly what Boston said he'd do, hahaha gosh I know I said I don't like being right but that was a lie, I feel so validated in pretty much everything I ever said about Ray and his feelings for both Mew and Sand. He's awful. You go baby.

On a slightly more serious note, the dad was about what I expected, although frankly he wasn't as bad as he could have been. He kinda reminds me of all of Ray's friends, in that this has been going on forever and he just doesn't know what to do anymore. But there's still the thing with Ray's mom - did he not care about her? I just don't know. But if he did, seeing Ray do the same shit must be heartbreaking.

The fact that he was more upset about the car than his kid makes me think not, though, lol.

Also I want him to have offered Sand money to keep Ray out of trouble and for Sand to take him up on it. I know I won't get that but gosh, it would make me respect Sand a whole lot more and it would make his continued involvement with Ray make more sense to me.

Boston. Yes, you read that right. I actually felt really bad for him this ep. Yeah he knew no one would like what he did with Top, which is why he hid it, but I genuinely started getting upset that everyone keeps recording him and then threatening to (or actively) using it against him. Like yes, yes, he did take photos and video of Ray and Mew kissing, and that was wrong. But that's the thing. Both the show and everyone else treats it like it is wrong. Literally no one is acting like what happened to Boston is. And it is. It's fucked up.

Also, while I enjoyed Boston getting yeeted into the pool and I'm not mad at Mew for having some revenge, I feel like we got some real insight into Boston this ep. I think he genuinely just doesn't view sex and relationships the way his friends do. Like he really thought that Mew would just yell at him and get it out of his system and that would be that. It's just a disconnect on a fundamental level. I also find it interesting that he's still calling them friends even after the bust up.

Also, I just like him.

Top. He fucked up, he knows he fucked up. I haven't been mad at him for a while and I still think he actually likes Mew. I remember way way back when he slept with Boston I was waffling between his utter fury either being about feeling played or because he was genuinely hurt. Not that either makes it right, I'm just thinking now that hurt was what it was, maybe he thought it was a fun time before but shit got real fast and now he's sitting there half heartbroken because he actually went and started to like the guy that he maybe only thought was a challenge. Oops.

I don't know. Top can be nasty, he does a great job playing the prick when he wants to and I'm not really into his and Ray's pissing contests over Mew, but I also feel like he'd rather be the guy he is with Mew.

Chueam. She was better this ep and I laughed my ass off at her trying to hose down Top when he and Ray got into it. I also liked that she was the one who was like "great so do we want this fucking A or not?" about the hostel. But girl, if you're planning the party next ep you should know better.

Nick. Baby boy. Honey. You are such a mess but I kinda feel for you, finally. I really enjoyed his breakdown with Sand. It's pathetic but well at least he owns it, I guess. He should fuck Sand and Papang's character to get over his feelings. But please don't bug either of their cars babe.

Sand. So my trajectory on Sand this ep was WILD. I appreciate that he owned his responsibility in the whole blowup at the bar (probably a little too much but well, that's Sand for you) and with Nick. What he did to Nick in particular was shitty and he knows it and he should own up to it (yes Nick recorded the thing I'm not discounting that or acting like it isn't awful. Still).

But he's really frustrating me right now. I said I would defend all his wrongs and that is still true, you can't help who you fall for and for whatever reason Sand is all in on this loser and he won't stop. I get this.

But damn he's so pathetic. What he's doing isn't romantic. It's just sad, and the worst part about it is that he doesn't have a friend to tell him he's being pathetic. I would like to tell him he's being pathetic. Nancy, take it away:

I'm not even mad at him. I just - I've seen way too many people do this shit in real life to find it cute or sweet or think anything other than Sand is a moron who needs to learn to value himself and his time a lot more than he does. We can't choose who we love but we can choose how we let them treat us, and this letting Ray use him whenever he's bored or in need of a caretaker thing just isn't a good look.

I'm not mad, Sand, I'm just disappointed.

Relationships (Fave to Least Fave atm)

Sand & Nick. I want them to make out.

Mew & Nick. I wonder if they will talk again. I liked their one scene together. I was shocked Nick told Mew about the second sex tape but I guess by that point he was just done with it. Maybe that was Nick washing his hands of Boston. I mean, I doubt it. But it would be nice if one of the Pathetic Duo got his shit together.

Mew & Boston. Look whatever that scene at Boston's house was hot and I need them to fuck about it.

TopMew. What can I say, they're finally doing it for me. The preview has me seated, I don't care about Top and Ray's pissing match but I do like Top being there for Mew at his lowest. Genuinely, if we're gonna come out of this with endgame ships and not just everyone going their own ways I now think it might be these two who manage it. And that is insane to me.

BostonNIck. These two are weird to me, because I feel it, but it's like - Nick wants Boston to love only him which he also translates into sleeping with only him. Boston might actually wind up in love with Nick but monogamy just ain't his style. Truly though I think that the biggest problem that they have is that Nick bugged Boston's car. LOL I feel like if they'd had that "I just want you to love only me" discussion in any other context they'd actually come out differently. And honestly I agree with Boston what the FUCK, Nick. I do love me some mess so maybe it's that part of me talking but if you weren't planning on using the recording why even fucking bother? Just to hurt yourself? What's the point?

MewRay & SandRay. I genuinely don't know which I like worse, lol. I do think that Mew will make Ray cry though so I'm into that. Mew's rebounding hard and sorry but Book's not playing it like Mew even wants Ray (although that dancing scene was nice they are very pretty together), he's playing it like he's settling for someone he knows will never leave him. But I saw somewhere that Ray's probably gonna get even more possessive about him after this and yep. Probably.

I would like Sand to make Ray cry but he won't. I used to have hope that it would be Sand to finally get tired and walk away but now I'm thinking it'll have to be Ray, because Sand is to Ray what Ray is to Mew. At least with Ray > Mew I understand it. But I don't get what Ray brings to the table that has Sand so all in on him, aside from that's how the script says it's gonna go. I thought I did for a bit, but it feels more and more like Sand isn't a character when it comes to Ray, he's a cipher. He just loves Ray because we need someone to love Ray and give us that sweet sweet pining angst we all love so much. Doesn't matter if it makes sense, we'll just cast First Kanaphan in the role and no one will care because he's lovely and he does pining so well.

And i get what people are saying about how this show is deconstructing all these relationship tropes, but it still doesn't explain to me why Sand even wants this guy, sorry. He's done the bare minimum and Sand's over here googly eyeing and I'm just.

What I wish is that Sand decides fuck it and takes dad's money to try to sober Ray up, but my guess is that he already said no because Sand has already said that he doesn't put a price on either friendship or love. Too bad he's the only one who feels either when it comes to this particular relationship. But my guess is that Ray will find out that the offer was made and flip out as if Sand took it because all that matters to Ray is Ray.

Well. So long as Sand doesn't do something epically stupid like getting himself arrested for property damage or taking the blame for Ray's mistakes, in ten years he'll look back on this time in his life and just be like "wow, I was really fucking stupid huh." Frankly if that's all he has to deal with he's doing better than the rest of these losers.

Well. Maybe not Mew.

In Conclusion

I think we're heading for a true everyone alone ending and I love that for all of them. Jojo you legend.

#only friends #only friends the series #rankings

[mermaidsirennikita]

ARC Review: One Season with the Duke by Addy Du Lac

Out now (and available on Kindle Unlimited)! 4.25/5.

For when you're vibing with... fast physical burns and slow emotional burns, culture clashes, and friends to lovers done right.

With a secret hanging over her head, Hettie has been blackmailed into getting engaged to an asshole. Fortunately, her childhood friend (now Hot and Sizable Duke) Finn, offers a helping a hand... in marriage.

Friends to lovers is a tough sell for me--however, once I realized how much of the friendship in this book was rooted in childhood, I was readier to bite. And I'm glad I did! This is a fun, sweet, surprisingly hot Scottish romance that really focuses hard on the relationship development.

Quick Takes:

--Here's what I dislike about friends to lovers so often: either the hero longs for the heroine but doesn't have the balls to make a move, or the heroine longs for the hero and somehow he Doesn't Notice Her (doesn't get turned on by her) and the heroine is left looking pathetic. In this case, Finn is the one who's very aware of Hettie from the jump. However, she pretty quickly identifies that he's All Grown Up, and he actually makes his move very early in the novel. That, right away, solves a lot of problems for me.

What I expected from there was a marriage in name only, wherein they would, for some reason, wait on fucking for like five billion pages, and I would get increasingly annoyed. But nope! These two are getting down less than a third of the way into the novel, because it makes sense. They're married; the marriage being valid is super important for their general scheme and Hettie's safety; they're not in love (she definitely isn't) but they're physically attracted to each other. Why not?

So it's like, this mixture of duty and genuine interest that brings them together, and I found that compelling. It felt real and pretty authentic to the time period (albeit with the added benefit of them being just five years apart in age and hot). I really appreciated that there wasn't all this handwringing about it from Hettie--no "oh no, I must marry my hot duke friend to escape my evil cousin". She knows she's got a good thing going, and they both are aware that it may never be this dreamy romance (until it is) but they're gonna try and make it work. And a lot of making it work involves the thing they are 100% on the same page about from the get-go: boning the fuck down.

--A lot of the conflict in this book, and I mean this in a good way, felt very old school. There's an evildoer setting out to blackmail Hettie (I personally enjoy a blackmail plot, especially when the heroine is an heiress; there's something about a "MUAHAHAHA" that I just like), obviously. Then there's this stretch in which she's really adjusting to not only being a duchess, but being a Scottish duchess, and I liked the distinction made here. While Finn may be very Englishified in some ways (although he does do a bit of a brogue at the right moments, as all Scottish heroes Must and Should), he is Scottish. His people are Scottish. There is an expectation that his wife will acclimate this, and it's like--not fuckin' easy. I liked that it wasn't easy. In some ways, it felt kind of cinematic while also subverting some of the old school-isms where the heroine goes to Scotland and everyone is all och and aye and just welcomes her with open arms.

In particular, Hettie's mother-in-law does not welcome her with open arms. In many historical romances today, I don't feel like supporting characters who are a) not villains and b) not getting set up for the next book receive much fleshing out. At least, not in the way they used to. But here, we see a woman who is understandably protective of her late husband's legacy, a bit possessive of her son, and......... kind of a bitch to Hettie. However, not a bitch without dimension. She's not flat. There is meat to her character, and there's meat to her relationship development with Hettie. I'm extremely soft for historicals in particular that place an emphasis on female relationships, so that was nice to see.

--You're going to either be frustrated or relieved by the fact that we the readers know Hettie's secret from the start. For some, I suspect this will lead to some "but telll hiiiim", and at points I did feel that way. However, from her emotional perspective, I get why she didn't; and I also personally appreciated knowing her secret from the start. It's not an inconsiderable issue, and I personally find that when a hero or heroine dithers over something we don't even know the truth about... That's where the frustration really comes in.

--We do get a grovel in this one, and it's quite sweet. I can't say much about the grovel because spoilers, but I liked it a lot. There are insane grovels, and there are emotionally sense-making but still deeply felt grovels, and I think this one falls into the latter.

--This book got me to care about two people who are ultimately Good and Solid, in a relationship that is like... not toxic. Which is hard for me! That said, I really like Addy's writing style, and I wouldn't mind seeing her try her hand at a batshit pairing down the road.

--As a random aside, if you like a bit of "she is too young for me and I am a hideous pervert for noticing her ankles" (which I do), there's a dash of that behind why Finn didn't pursue Hettie earlier. She really isn't too young for him by the standards of the time (they're about 5-6 years apart) but he felt very bad for finding her hot when she was eighteen, and I enjoyed that discomfort immensely.

The Sex Stuff:

Like I said, they starting fucking early and they really don't let up. I literally let out a sigh of relief when it began sooner rather than later; I fucking hate the "oh we're married but let's wait until 80% into the book to fuck even though the marriage can literally be invalidated if people find out you're still untouched" dance. Wow, two people thinking with their brains and their libidos!

The sex is well-written and explicit, and like... earthy without being over the top, if that makes sense. I posted that excerpt of Finn commenting on Hettie's scent while he was...................... he's Scottish so down under isn't a joke that makes sense, but he was going down on her. It's the simple intimacies of sex that I found the book did really well. Also, I really liked how they talked about sex with each other--you can feel that there's a friendship there (and he's such a pleaser). And like, there's no shame around Hettie having and enjoying sex without being in love quite yet? That's one thing I appreciated throughout; she cares for him from the start but she knows she's not in love yet... and she's still comfortable with expressing affection for him in a sexual way, and he makes her comfortable with it. There isn't this expectation that being aware of being in love is important for good sex, which I often sense with the writing of heroines. Something that I can't give away happens and Finn is like "maybe no sex for a while" and Hettie's reaction is basically "exfuckingcuse???"

A romantic and emotionally authentic debut, which I think will appeal to many readers--especially those who like historicals that are well-researched and real, without trading in on some of the more problematic aspects of the subgenre. In fact, in general, if you find that historical romances "scare you" a little, I'd say this is a good one to ease your way into the genre with.

Thanks to Addy Du Lac (@thataddylady on here) for a copy of this book! All thoughts and opinions are my own.

#romance novel blogging #arc reviews #book recs #books #book reviews

[cobwebcorner]

how do you feel about wesker in the new separate ways? he's definitely more proactive than I thought he would be

God I have so many Thoughts and Feelings about Wesker in the new separate ways. (minor spoiler warning for the following, I did my best to stay vague)

If I had to summarize the newest iteration of Wesker's personality in a couple words, they would be "humorless" and "grumpy." Gone is the man who would cackle "Oh little fishy come see my hook", or yell "your future hinges upon this fight!" before kicking a man through a door. RE4R Wesker reminds me a lot of the old tie-in comics for RE 1, before Wesker got resurrected as a camp british villain, when they tried to write him as more of a hardass.

This is about what I was expecting when I went in. We don't get much of him in the main campaign, but there was enough to guess what kind of guy he would be, so the DLC didn't surprise me in that sense. He's impatient, hostile, irritable, and overall a pretty big asshole of a boss throughout Ada's campaign.

But then there's some things he does that just complicates the hell out of interpreting him.

On the one hand, I do really like his proactivity? Like, getting to see Wesker and Ada actually in the same room together is really cool. I can feel that these characters have a history and that their relationship is complex. He isn't just a distant employer this time. He shows up and steps in when he wants to (I'm going to emphasize the word 'wants', because he doesn't need to. He could do the whole mission himself, but he chooses to help Ada instead, at a great expense of time and energy, and even if he's grumpy about it the whole thing is fascinating to me).

On the other hand, the taint of RE 5 has thoroughly contaminated this Wesker, and he also says and orders a lot of really stupid shit that doesn't make sense for him to do for any reason except to drive Ada away from him, almost like the writer was focusing on Ada's arc to the exclusion of anything else.

I'm going to do a rough analysis of SW Wesker at some point, but I'm going to wait a bit for more people to play it first (and so I can finish streaming it for my friends).

#verb answers

[balanceoflightanddark]

I have a bit of a confession to make. An actual confession this time actually.

I...am a Zuko anti.

I know, it seems odd. I only talked about him directly the one time during my Last Agni Kai post and indirectly during my comic posts. So I'm not going directly out of my way to attack him or anything. And I do understand that he is a popular character that has touched countless of people, so I do need to give him credit for that.

The problem I have with Zuko though is...complicated.

I'll admit, I was kind of neutral to him during the show popular. Knew he was gonna be redeemed eventually, would fight Azula eventually and "win", and knew he was going to be the new Fire Lord to bring about an end to the War. I got that. I think all viewers got that. Though I never really built that much of a connection to the character since I related more to some of the others (Aang, Katara, and Azula come to mind), and I was annoyed that he got away with some of the stuff he pulled during Book 1 and some overall problems with his arc that were left unaddressed, but accepted he was in a good position to do better and mend bridges and all that by series end. That I have no problem with.

My issues came around when the comics were released.

To put it simply, Zuko's flaws were jacked up to eleven. His arrogance and hotheadedness that got him into trouble during Book 1 came back. Now, this alone isn't a problem. Not saying one can't backslide into old habits. The problem comes about when the narrative doesn't acknowledge it. He's supposed to be a good guy now. On the right side, yet he's still doing the same villainous things over and over again. And for some reason, the Gaang doesn't call him out on any of it. That alone is an issue.

Then...there's his relationship with Azula.

Remember how I said there was some problems they left unaddressed? Zuko's rivalry with Azula was one of them. I'm convinced that the more he pursues this rivalry, the more toxic and awful of a person he becomes. Especially since Azula was not Zuko's abuser. That would be Ozai, the one who scarred his face after all. And I wasn't entirely convinced that the Last Agni Kai was his redeeming moment where he showed compassion towards Azula at the last shot. Again...was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Then the comics quashed that.

He became an abusive jackass that physically assaults Azula with very little provocation, allows his friends to harass and provoke her into violence, and blames it all on her when she inevitably snaps. And the narrative supports him.

I...have autism. I have what many would consider to be a mental disability. I know what it's like to have a breakdown. To feel like a burden on my family whether underserved or not. And for a long time I was terrified of coming out because there is a stigma towards mental illness.

So when I see pages like this:

...the comics made me despise Zuko for a long ass time. And we're talking years.

Next thing you know I'm convinced that Zuko was doomed to be his father. To be the next Ozai. And I was so convinced, I started seeing only the worst in him. The monster. How every action he took was just proof that he'd never change and he'd be nothing more than a monster worse than his sister. And how fundamentally broken the narrative was for making excuses for him which genuinely affected my enjoyment of the show.

Cause shit like that? ...I saw myself a lot in Azula, and that made me hate Zuko on a very personal level. To the point I seriously considered writing fics where he'd get butchered just out of spite. It was that. Bad.

Comics!Zuko felt like everything I stood against. And soon everything around him became difficult to even look at. Cause how in the Nine Circles of Hell would anyone see this asshole as a beloved hero?

So why am I telling you guys this? Why tell you I once hated Zuko so bad I genuinely wanted to see him dead?

Easy...I don't want to hate him anymore.

Cause it's unfair both to the character and the fans who do like him. That do accept his flaws and want to see him overcome them. I respect those people and all the more power to them.

And as much as I love Azula, I don't want to harp on Zuko anymore. Even if his most diehard fans want me to tear my hair out, I don't want that spilling over to the character himself. Honestly, I think even he'd be disgusted by their attitude. Since tearing Azula down to make himself look good is...well it's the same as tearing him down to make Azula look good.

Again, I still have a grudge against Zuko, but I'm not asking for sympathy. I'm just giving my two cents and throwing it in the ring. Feel free to unfollow me if you want, that's fine. I figured you guys deserved to know going forward.

And I do hope this post is a step in the right direction at least.

#anti atla comics #atla comics critical #zuko meta #azula #azula meta #fandom confession

[beevean]

Let's do this: top 10 most hated NFCV characters counting both shows

As a bonus, if you're willing to: top 10 worst episodes

I think I did a top 5 worst characters for both shows but I can do it again :P

11) Drolta. She doesn't do anything egregious, in fact she's kind of tolerable, but she stole Isaac's drip. And for that, I will forever be salty :) (also yeah I couldn't decide for #10 so I added one, whatcha gonna do about it)

10) Sumi and Taka. Ah yes, these two Japanese people who look identical are most assuredly not related, they are just Japanese! Aside from that, they are the emblem of S3's utter failure: they add nothing of importance except for a gratuituous (and OOC) rape scene that is supposed to send the message "humans suck, trusting is for fools"... that in on itself doesn't change a thing, because Alucard is fine afterwards. But hey, you got your bi rep! Aren't you happy with this show's representation? :)

9) Emmanuel. This guy is just stupid. Just because you lampshade how absurd it is to ally yourself with vampires because you think the Revolution is "godless", it doesn't make it any less absurd. We're still at this level of shallow, childish CHURCH BAD.

8) Sypha. You're not cute when you insult Trevor. Stop it. I remembered her being nicer than she actually was :( during the rewatch she was painful, constantly complaining, defending Alucard from Trevor rather than the other way around (but still ditching him when he needed company because yay adventures!!!), and acting bossily with her bf because that's the only kind of character they can write here. Also she's OP af and that's not fun.

7) Maria. Does she even have a personality beyond stereotypical Twitter communist teen? Good god girl shut up you are nothing more than useless backdrop!

6) Carmilla. In theory, she could be an interesting unapologetic female villain who reacted to her trauma with rage rather than sorrow, a female Dracula but even pettier. In practice, she is the parody of a radfem written by a man with zero respect for women, so you can imagine that she isn't exactly nuanced. I hate that Dracula and his boytoys were made to be absolute dumbasses for her to win, only for her to conclude effectively nothing. villain.exe

5) Alucard. You absolute cunt. Am I supposed to like, or worse being attracted to, this piece of shit who spends his time insulting Trevor and treating him like dog shit under his shoe? He has zero of the effortless charm of the real Alucard, but I'm supposed to root for him because he's hot when he cries all boobily. Fuck off with your disingenous fanservice. (also his design is atrocious and the artstyle doesn't flatter him at all)

4) Erzsébet. Literally an OC made by a 5 yo. Look at her! She's so cool and special! She's older than Dracula, stronger than Dracula, more evil than Dracula, more dangerous than Dracula, and she turns into an invincible Sun Thundercat! Yeah good job, but you forgot to give her a personality.

3) Annette. She is not a character. She is nothing more than accurately engineered discourse bait. I refuse to acknowledge this shallow attempt at "badass representation" that I am supposed to like on the sole basis of her race and gender. I am so tired of Stronk Women that are actually giant assholes, all flash and no substance.

2) Isaac. I will concede that he has the most coherent character arc of all characters, but aside from that, he pisses me off something fierce for how overrated he is. Forgettable design, pretentious as fuck, spouting faux-philosophical quotes to hide how petty he is, basically a jihadist in S3, wakes up one day in S4 and suddenly he's Muslim Jesus, disgustingly OP because the narrative finds every way to suck his shiny dick... and his amazing arc that everyone praises him for, the thing that makes him "better than that stupid gay joker from CoD"? It's just a worse version of Hector's from the mangas, which left him Hector here with no arc to speak of. Get him out of my sight.

1) Lenore. Her concept is great. She is an intriguing foil to both Carmilla and Hector, and incarnates an unique type of villainy: she is amoral, kind for her own selfish purposes, with understandable goals but willing to do anything to achieve them. I want to like her. Too bad she is a disgusting, repulsive, inconsistent, bratty rapist that I am supposed to feel sorry for because oh, she's not so bad after all :) she did everything for Hector's own good :) she's not actually evil :) she deserved to smooch the man she raped into slavery, don't you feel bad that she sunned herself like a selfish coward :) Lenore begs to be rewritten by someone who doesn't jerk off to abusive dommy mommies, but in her canon state, she makes me ill.

Now for the episodes :P

10) The Great Work (S4E7): I never watched it because it's boring as shit, which speaks of the terrible pacing of this show and especially S4. I know it has the infamous "vampires dislike crosses because their vision is fucked up" scene lmao

9) The River (S2E6): It's the episode where the zombie bishop resurrected by a dark necromancer who is now working for a vampire with plans of enslaving mankind is apparently favored by God to the point of being able to bless water. Do I need to say more? Well, it's also the episode where the heroes suddenly remember they are supposed to do shit and hack into Dracula's castle, and the episode that fully cements Dracula as an ineffectual pathetic antagonist easily manipulable by the real villain, no I don't care that he's kinda cool in For Love. (at least the scene with Carmilla avoiding the river and the castle is fun to watch)

8) Bless Your Dead Little Hearts (S3E1): The beginning of Alucard's and Trepha's plotlines, two utter mindnumbing wastes of time, and Hector's plotline, which is the show beating me over the head with a nail bat while screeching "LOOK HOW PATHETIC HECTOR IS! LOOK AT THIS PITIFUL WET CAT! LOOK AT HIM COWERING NAKED IN A CELL EATING MOLDY BREAD! FEEL SORRY FOR HIM!". Just unpleasant for all sorts of reasons.

7) It's Been A Strange Ride (S4E10): Trevor miraculously survives Death! Alucard is happy to live with his new bossy gf as if nothing ever happened! Lenore suns herself just for a final kick in the balls to Hector, whose character will forever be remembered as "useless simp"! And most importantly, Dracula and Lisa get to live again as if the dude didn't just try to exterminate mankind, and they will have endless kinky sex until she dies while Alucard will forever mourn his parents but no one gives a shit about that because we love to piss on the games! :D

6) Old Homes (S2E2): It has the double combo "Alucard being the biggest moistest cunt to Trevor while we're supposed to laugh at this hilarious banter" and "Carmilla girlbossily girlbosses all over Dracula who can't even punish this vampire who insults his wife in front of everyone, establishing herself as the cooler villain"! Joy!

5) The Good Dream (S3E6): "Walkies! :D"

4) Back In The World (S4E5): It's the one with the infamous "Oh, shush, you were having fun" :) and all the Lenore apologism that follows :)

3) You Don't Deserve My Blood (S4E6): I get it. Isaac is Jesus and I should drop to my knees to suck his entire dick. Good thing this is his last appearance. Other than that, this episode is the last nail in the coffin for what was left of Hector's character, who is revealed to have been working to resurrect Dracula (a complete spit in the face to everything he stood for in S2) and also chooses to stay with his rapist instead of seeking true freedom.

2/1) The Harvest (S3E9)/Abandon All Hope (S3E10): It's hard to separate the two, and I wouldn't know which one is worse. The Harvest is infamous for being half boring fight scenes, and half "hot" sex scenes that are actually rape by deception: the entire episode is simply uncomfortable to sit through, not helped by the shoddy editing. Abandon All Hope is the season finally dropping its final message: "the world sucks, and you will be betrayed". Everyone except babyboy Isaac is left traumatized and cynical because we are so fucking edgy, we are just like Berserk fr fr. And, of course, in retrospect, Alucard and Hector's endings piss me off even more as all of their pain was for fucking nothing :)

(Nocturne is completely forgettable and doesn't reach the peaks of NFCV so it deserves its own ranking)

#anti netflixvania

[whosmarinette]

Clarisse La Rue is a better "villain" than Draco Malfoy

Now calling either of them villains is... a stretch, but I may be in a mood for a workout today.

Let's compare their similarities: they are both what would be called a bully, if not for... unusual circumstances. They are both aggressive towards the main character. They both look up to their fathers (maybe an unhealthy amount) which causes them to be... assholes.

There are more, I'm just a bit too sleepy to think of them rn.

But let me tell you something. Clarisse would wipe the floor with Draco, both physically and as a more compelling character with a better story arc.

Draco's story is fairly simple: a boy raised by fascists becomes a fascist himself, his motivations are unclear, or at least, muddled by his skewed perception of the world around him. He was also written by Rowling (ew) and she explicitly said that he is just a bad person. Even if fandom prefers to feel otherwise.

Clarisse is a different case. She isn't prejudiced against a whole group of people (or at least, not to the extent of outright spewing slurs), she just really Doesn't Like Percy. Which is understandable, since she obviously fought hard for her place, and being basically belittled by Percy made her mad. I would be mad too.

She is rude, and grumpy, and violent, but she is not evil. She is, in fact, very kind, especially to people she cares about deeply. Unlike Draco, who sees his friends as his goons, or just an audience, unequal to him, she sees her friends and her eventual boyfriend as, you know, people.

She is not just a bully, that's the whole point. She has her own lide, her own relationships and motivations, people she cares and doesn't care about. The scene of her realising what happened Silena brings me to tears even now.

And on top of that, she is more of a threat to Percy than Draco is to Harry. She has more presence. And eventually, she is a stronger ally, fighting together with Percy and other characters, not even because she is suddenly good now, but because her motivations align with it perfectly. And she ends up friends with Percy after all, which is. Amazing to me and I love it.

Btw Rowling can fuck off.

#clarisse la rue #draco malfoy #villains #bullies #percy jackson #pjo #harry potter #anti jkr

[indelibleevidence]

Apparently I didn't do this the first time round (what was wrong with me?), so here are my 4x02 thoughts:

Really cool puzzles in this episode - both the magnetite map and the ATM have such great solutions. I wonder who came up with the creepy facial recognition gas-ATM.

I get why Patterson was so pissed at Boston to begin with this time around (the whole 'I coded a backdoor into Wizardville so I could snoop on people's phones' thing was a massive betrayal of trust, even if he then apologised and helped the team arrest his terrorist boyfriend), but why was Boston so mean to Kurt? 'You got one, Limpy!' I'd love to see you survive a gut shot, Boston (and let's be realistic, if they hadn't stopped the show at season 4.5, he probably would have gotten one, because gut shots are Blindspot's favourite injury - Mayfair, Jane, Roman, Patterson, Kurt, Keaton, Weitz...).

I've said it before and I'll say it again - as much as I love both Rich and Boston, the comedy gay couple/sassy gay friend trope makes me facepalm. I just don't get the sense in this episode that these men are attracted to each other, despite Rich's cooing. They have sibling chemistry, not ex-lovers who are still pining for each other, and they remind me of children squabbling over who gets the first cookie. 🙄 At least 4x08 goes a little way towards fixing that (until Rich ruins it by being a total asshole).

Remi's face when Sokolov describes the FBI as hamstrung by bureaucracy and ego is just awesome. She's like, 'Yep, this guy gets it.'

And again, the FBI's 'shoot first, ask questions later' policy comes back to bite them, because if Sokolov had lived, no 4x08... 🤷‍♀️ But also, I have no idea how they would have written it into the show, so...

The Remi and Roman scenes just made me so sad, because Remi is completely alone, talking to her brother who isn't there, trying to justify herself and her convictions (which we see at the start of 4x03, she isn't that sure of. 'Of course I can kill my husband...but not right now, that wouldn't be the right time.'

They really could have used the 'Zapata was on the plane, but not really' plot thread to make everyone cry, but they didn't bother. I wonder if they filmed a scene or two that were cut for length. I'll forever be sad that we never got any deleted scenes for seasons 4 or 5. 😭

Sometimes Blindspot is as subtle as a brick to the face with its cases and subplot parallels, but they did a great job with this episode. Sokolov being able to convince agents from multiple agencies to hand over documents, because there's no inter-agency cooperation, goes nicely with Keaton's complete lack of inter-agency cooperation re: Zapata (and why does it need to be kept so super secret that even a team working to take HCI Global down can't be read in, Keaton?). And Madeline's gleeful confession that she killed her husband pairs really well with Remi mixing up a little gift for Kurt at the end of the episode.

Audrey did so well with her 'I hate this undercover assignment' scene. Poor Tasha. Even though I don't see why Reade couldn't know, I do feel awful for her.

Madeline has such potential to be a great villain, but they just didn't bother to go anywhere meaningful with her. Helios was pretty masterful as a plan, but her underlying motives with her father are tissue-paper thin. :/ It makes all of the Helios arc feel kind of pointless, in retrospect. Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio does a great job, but after Shepherd and Roman, Madeline is just meh. Plus Remi just steals the show with her plotting and scheming.

Remi turning an argument around on Kurt again is so much fun to watch, and especially the way she course-corrects with the giant eyes and 'I just want to help people, just like you' stuff. Makes me think of the Jane-as-Goth!Remi episode, where she's just overly bitchy. 😁

Brb, squeeing over every moment of Remi now! Especially her knowing that he'll be first through the door to save her, even though she doesn't remember anything about being in the field with him from being Jane.

#blindspot #blindspot rewatch 2023 #blindspot 4x02

[spider-xan]

Fucking THANK YOU for your recent take on SHED - the fact that Martha and Billy are all happy chappy about being lizard clones who can never leave the sewers and live with the man who murdered the child gives me a bad case of the Big Yuck. I know that it is still canon, but I think of it as no more canon as that shitty mlp fanfic about Pinkie Pie killing Rainbow Dash - just unnecessary grimdark shite with no purpose than to show how """"""""""""adult"""""""""" Spidey stories can be. Not to mention the shitty implications of Curt only being properly being loved by his family because they share the same technical disability as him................

Yeah, like, I understand Nick Spencer was in a really awkward position in trying to do a back-to-basics approach at the start of his ASM run regarding Connors bc he inherited the absolutely fucking awful and offensive legacy left to him by Zeb Wells, Dan Slott, and Marvel editorial in terms of both Shed and the Clone Conspiracy, and for all of Spencer's many faults, I think he actually writes Curt surprisingly well and his characterization in the first arc and Hunted felt correct and compelling to me - except you have to ignore how it falls apart once you take Shed and the post-Clone Conspiracy status quo for the Connors family into account, leaving aside that Hunted was a response to Shed and attempt to resolve it (spoiler: it can never be resolved).

Not to mention that Peter and Mary Jane being totally cool with the situation makes them look awful too, like, how the fuck are they comfortable hanging out with them in the sewers for fun times under those creepy circumstances? Why was Peter cracking jokes about Curt eating people, as if that isn't wildly offensive on several levels? Don't get me wrong, I love the four of them being friends, but it no longer works without everyone looking like assholes.

Shed was horrible enough, and you know what, Clone Conspiracy may have been salvageable if Curt's arc was more along the lines of him getting one last chance to apologize and say good-bye to his family before letting them go - and you can definitely make a case that he has a problem with letting go (see: his entire inability to cope with his disability and loss that lead to the Lizard problem in the first place) - but no, Slott decided it would be sooo funny if Curt lost his mind and forcibly turned his family into lizard zombies to play house with creepy 1950s family sitcom overtones while his wife and son have zero agency and it's sooo funny he's delusional and crazy for that last page image??

Even with Spencer giving Martha and Billy their agency back, the entire situation feels so creepily coercive precisely bc they can't leave the situation, even if it's not meant to come off that way, which they never asked to be in either, and it's not like they even got any of the cool parts of reptile superpowers, they're literally just humanoid lizards stuck hiding underground and can't go anywhere, and Hunted kind of addressed this with Billy being rightfully pissed off, but Martha is just like, the endlessly accommodating perfect wife, and by the end of the arc, everything is back to being happy again, and just, fuck no, what the hell?

And at this point, I don't think any of it will ever get fixed bc Connors is mostly ignored now unless you need the Lizard as a generic villain for a one-off story where Spider-Man just beats his ass like a common street criminal, and honestly, I don't know if it even can be fixed - the Lizard really should have been retired as a Spidey villain years ago, but that's comic book serial storytelling for you.

#asks #barghestblues #xan's spidey meta #curt connors #the lizard