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rebellionbeach · 3 years

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The Usami brothers and whole family as a whole are really interesting characters. Due mostly by the fact of how different Haruhiko and Akihiko are yet similar in many ways as well. Let’s start with rabbit boy.

Not only is this man extremely sexy but he’s also one of the most popular novelists in Japan believe it or not (not in real life guys) Akihiko is the presumably biological son of Natsuko and Fuyuhiko and younger brother of Haruhiko Usami. Growing up, he had always yearned for the attention of his parents, wanting to impress them and make them happy. Haruhiko had actually been introduced to the Usami household at the age of 12 so Akihiko was 10 at the time and significant development seemed to grow from this change. As shown from volume 21, everyone had been cheering Akihiko on as the legitimate heir of the Usami family meaning to take over the family business however he had never gotten this support from his parents before. As a young child he had believed that if he just tried harder and became good at everything, then his parents would finally recognize him. However, this wasn’t the case unfortunately as shown in the same volume once a young Akihiko came home from school gaining full marks on a test, eager to show his father when he caught him telling Haruhiko that he truly intended to make him the heir of the family business. This impact was further felt once his mother, who had also witnessed this, declared that she should have never bore Fuyuhiko’s child which in the eyes of a young child must have been completely shattering. An important seed was planted however and I believe that it was at this moment that Akihiko had started to evolve into the person he is today. He poured all his emotion, pain, loss, suffering into his notebooks, his stories, proclaiming it to be his entire world. Overtime we see that Akihiko grows to be very adept at the talent, being one of the top-selling authors from debut which occurred while still in high school and becoming a full-fledged novelist. Doing this, he completely rejected his family and any connections he might have had to take over the business.

Looking as Akihiko today it is very clear the type of individual he is, independent and self-serving, he’s his own boss and does only the things he wants to do. From the first episode of season 2 we see this as there is a key event that takes place between the two Usami brothers in which a confrontation between two escalates into a full-out argument over Akihiko coming back to, as I assume, take over the lead of the Usami company and or serve there. I will note later on Haruhiko’s tone and content of his language but it’s Akihiko’s response which truly stuck out to me as he stated that he had no inclination of going back to that house and if that Haruhiko truly didn’t like being there then why doesn’t he just leave as well.

This point may seem entirely irrelevant but I actually believe it highlights an essential part of Akihiko’s character that not only serves as his strength but also a blind spot in that of his independence. Akihiko is the type of person who is able to do the things he’d like to do and encourages the people he cares about, basically Misaki, to do the same such as in episode 2 of season 3 where he is actually the one who encourages Misaki to enter into Marukawa after Misaki dismisses those thoughts as just a fantasy. This is a thing for his relationship with Misaki as he allows the man a different perspective and in a way allows him, or at least encourages him, to be more selfish. However this can also be seen as a flaw of his character as it can be interpreted that the only reason he has this lax and independent personality in the first place is because of his more well-off family and the fact that he’d had connections from the start. In all honestly though, this part of Usagi-san’s personality is one of the main reasons why I actually enjoy his character, along with his thoughtful nature, as I believe that it’s a pretty unique and well-suited trait.

Let’s get into Harry Potter or the eldest brother of the Usami residence, Haruhiko. Haruhiko isn’t Akihiko’s direct brother as stated before but rather a product of an affair that Fuyuhiko had with his mother. For the first 12 years of his life, Haruhiko had actually been raised by his single-mother whom he loved very much. During these times he had been seen to be much more happy despite living in poorer circumstances. This is a large aspect that is pretty big onto why he is the way he is today. After his mother tragically passing on, Fuyuhiko took him into to live in the Usami residence. Now this in itself is absolutely devastating, living with a father-figure that had never truly been there for you with a new mother-in-law that despises your every existence because you’re the proof of the infidelities of her marriage and a new younger brother who seemed lifeless from the rest of this. Top it all off with the devastation from losing the only person you truly loved and was there for you and damn I’m surprised that Haruhiko didn’t full out lose it.

Now going back to the scene originally discussed with Akihiko’s backstory, let us switch perspective onto Haruhiko during this situation. Your new dad just stated that the person he had truly loved in his lifetime was your dead mother and that he intended to make you, a 12 year old child, the heir of their family company that you had just learned about. Not only this but everyone around you is your enemy as shown through all the people cheering on Akihiko to become the true heir and saying that Haruhiko stole his position. There is basically no one there to support you, similar to Akihiko, and unlike Akihiko he actually was not used to this new circumstance making the situation even worse.

I’d like to discuss the scene stated before during episode 1 of season 2. Here, Haruhiko is visibly angry as Akihiko’s lack of care for his role in the Usami residence. This is something we’ve never actually gotten to see ever since with Haruhiko barely showing any emotion at all. However, if you take in the full context of his upbringing and circumstance to that point, you can see a fuller picture of what the man has gone through to become the stoic chosen one we know today. Akihiko, after being hoisted by Isaka to finally start publishing his works, his entire being, finally achieved success independent from the Usami residence, marking himself finally as an individual allowing him to finally see that he only needs himself. I think this is what caused Akihiko to cut most connection from his family, despite the occasional visits, and totally puts himself away from the idea of succeeding and become the heir of his family’s company. This leaves Haruhiko with the burden of shouldering the entire Usami company’s future, something he never truly wanted to today with architecture being his main priority. What he see’s in Akihiko is this lazy, selfish person who only thinks of himself, abandoning all his familial duties to a brother whom he barely batted an eye to during childhood. This is what he hates in Akihiko, but also envies. A very interesting point that season 2 makes with the connection between the Usami brothers is the inherent jealously Haruhiko feels toward Akihiko, with him trying to steal things from him during their upbringing together according to Akihiko. Even Misaki finally has this revelation during episode 8 I believe when he was distracting him from Kaoruko. I think his jealously mainly stems from the fact that Akihiko got his independence while Haruhiko is still confined to the Usami gates. With all of Akihiko’s absent-minded behavior and to quote Haruhiko, “having the eyes of a dead fish”, Akihiko in the end still achieved that sense of independence that Haruhiko could only dream about having. Add onto the fact that everyone around you hates that you got this position, lobbying for your younger half-brother who barely gives in the effort to succeed you, then baby that’s a recipe for childhood resentment if I’ve ever seen one.

So what does this all mean, well nothing since this is an over-analysis on a yaoi manga but in a reality I think it comes to show the clear dynamic Haruhiko and Akihiko have on one another. In recent chapters it is shown that Haruhiko is more and more aspiring in his own pursuits in architecture, even accepting his position as lead of the Usami household and accepting the fact that he’ll never get Misaki, wanting to stay as his ally instead (which is a lot more than I can say for a CERTAIN manga author).

I love Haruhiko AND Akihiko, they both are really great characters and I’d think it would be nice if in the future they could perhaps reconcile their relationship and kind of start to get along. The Usami household fucked up a lot of kids but they are still going strong and who knows, maybe Haruhiko might get a lover in the future (AKA Todo)

Thank you and now I implore you to go listen to Nelson’s After the Rain album, 10/10 made me cry.

#junjou romantica #nakamura shungiku #haruhiko usami #akihiko usami #misaki takahashi #usagi san #bruh sorry for not posting #hopefully there aren't too many spelling errors

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motherofoliver · 3 years

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Bloom Me A Flower, Maybe Two

(AO3)

Summary: Silly fluff, Kaneki meeting his daughter for the first time and giving her a name.

Word Count: 1,582

Notes: This was the first work I ever shared online and I deleted it along with my account during a particularity difficult time. Although reading it now, I see a lot of things I would like to fix, I am still proud of being able to share it.

*****

“Touka is in labor. Come quick.”

The call was short, like all of Ayato’s calls, but it was enough to send a jolt of panic through Kaneki’s body. He was on the outskirts of the city with some members from the United Front and was preparing to start running in whatever direction led to the hospital until Hide placed a calming hand on his shoulder, implicitly understanding the terrified look on Kaneki’s face, and telling him they could take Marude’s car.

So that was how he found himself squished in the backseat between Takeomi (Yoriko was already with Touka) and Itou (just excited about seeing a baby) while Hide (for the father’s emotional support) took the front seat and Marude (who wouldn’t allow anyone else to drive his new car) drove, grumbling about having to leave the mission early.

Itou was excitedly asking Kaneki a lot of questions like is it a boy or a girl? (he didn’t know, they wanted to keep it as a surprise, but he could’ve sworn Kimi slipped and said a she during their last appointment). Natural or cesarean? (natural if they could help it, despite his own objections to Touka having to put herself through so much pain after seeing that educational video). Would the child eat normal food? (Most likely if Kimi’s predictions were right, and they usually are). Did they have the nursery ready? (It’s been ready for a month with Urie personally doing the drawings on the wall). Will they have anyone to help the first few weeks the baby is born? (They had so many people volunteering to help that they couldn’t schedule all of them, and he and Touka wanted to spend the first night alone with the baby to bond anyway). What were they planning to name the baby? (They actually had no idea, but it wasn’t due to lack of trying).

Question after question, Kaneki appreciated Itou trying to take his mind off worrying about Touka but he really couldn’t focus with him at all. He had read too many books and too many disaster birth stories on mom forums to be able to just relax, and he hated that he wasn’t there to support Touka through what was probably the most painful experience of her life. He kept asking Marude if he could speed up and the man kept telling him, through gritted teeth, that it was the fastest he could go in a residential area.

After what seemed like an eternity, they finally reached the hospital and Kaneki all but jumped through the window and into the hospital, running up the stairs to the birth ward. He was met with Yoriko who was crying outside room 125 (the room they booked in advance, Touka thought it was a lucky number), and she came running towards him as soon as she lifted her head. “She is so beautiful, Kaneki, so beautiful. They both are.” she said through sobs while hugging him tightly.

Kaneki mentally beat himself up for missing the birth (and considered beating up Marude before the more sensible version of himself took over) but he returned Yoriko's hug and thanked her. “Go in, she’s waiting for you” Yoriko gently pushed him to the door "I'll join everyone in the cafeteria so you can find me there if you need anything".

Kaneki stood for what seemed like another eternity at the door. He was overwhelmed by so many emotions that he felt a little tingling at the tips of his fingers. On the other side of that door was Touka, and their child, the child she fought so hard to keep, the child they both tried building a better world for, the culmination of all their hopes and dreams. He was so happy and scared that he felt his heart could stop any moment now.

He braced himself and opened the door to be met with an immense amount of sunlight (unusual for this time of year). Once his eyes adjusted, he was witnessing the most beautiful sight in his life. His wife, Touka Kaneki (whom he expected to be exhausted after such an ordeal), was absolutely glowing, looking at the bundle in her arms with the biggest smile he had ever seen. The scene was so perfect that it looked like a painting and Kaneki took a few moments staring to preserve the memory in his mind.

“Touka, I am so sorry I missed the birth” he apologized quietly, but Touka looked up at him, still beaming, and gestured him to come closer.

“It doesn’t matter, you’re here now, come look at our daughter” she turned the bundle towards Kaneki so he can see.

“She has sesame pudding hair!”

Those were not the first words Kaneki wanted to say upon first meeting his daughter but he couldn’t help himself. Touka laughed and nodded “I was surprised too but it’s cute, I like it”.

Mesmerized, Kaneki couldn’t help but agree as he gently stroked the hair of his sleeping daughter with his finger. “Poor thing was exhausted after the birth and Kimi doing her exam so she is just taking a well earned rest”, Touka brushed her cheek with her finger and the little girl scrunched her nose, much to her parent’s delight.

Kaneki was still in awe, he had read and heard stories, but nothing could compare to the feeling of warmth spreading through his body now. He moved his finger to his daughter’s hand, and she quickly gripped it. He read about this instinct in babies but in that moment, it felt like she was welcoming him.

“We need to give her a name; I can’t keep calling her Usagi forever. Unless…” Touka looked up at Kaneki with a mischievous glint in her eyes.

“We are not naming her Usagi! We discussed this already!”

Touka pouted playfully and turned to look at her child’s face again. “What will we name her then?”

They went through Kaneki’s list of names with meaningful kanji again, Touka rejecting each one again saying they were too old, too pretentious, or just didn’t feel right, then they moved to the names suggested to them by friends and family (Ayato being a huge supporter of any variation of Usagi), but none of them felt right either. They finally got to the list of ridiculous names Hide sent them after creating an online poll with Saiko. Surprisingly enough, Usagi was the most normal name on that list. Kaneki put the list away after reading the first few names, not wanting to name his daughter Toyotama-hime or after a manga character.

With Touka resting her head on his shoulder, Kaneki tried to brainstorm a good name but he was drawing blanks. His eyes drifted back to his sleeping daughter, noticing for the first time the blanket wrapped around her “the hospital has some really nice blankets, don’t they?”

“Oh this isn’t from the hospital, Yomo gave me this. He embroidered that flower on top himself, with Uta’s help of course”. As he felt the intricate design on the blanket, Kaneki couldn’t help but feel his heart swell a little at the thought of all those people in his life that loved him and his family, those people who willingly intertwined their lives with his and allowed him to be part of theirs. It’s been months but he still wasn’t sure if he would ever get used to the feeling.

“It made me really happy” Touka suddenly spoke up after a long period of silence, her voice a little somber “back when we first moved underground, I was really afraid we would spend the rest of our lives there, if we managed to live long enough. I never liked that place when I was little and I really dreaded the idea of us dying in a place with no sunlight.”

She had never spoken so candidly about that before, and Kaneki’s heart ached a little at the memory of all they went through during that period.

“But I prayed back then that we would get a sign, even if it’s one flower blooming through a crack” she looked up at him again, eyes filled with tears and a small smile on her face “I didn’t think my prayers would be heard but they were, I got my flower when I found out I was carrying our daughter, and I just knew things would turn around, I would make them turn around myself if I had to” they both chuckled through tears as Kaneki brought her head to his lip and kissed it over and over again.

Kaneki felt his mind clear for a moment and as if it was lurking there all along, he finally thought of the right name.

“How about Ichika?”

“Huh?”

“For a name, how about Ichika?”

One flower.

“Ichika” Touka whispered the name then repeated it, a little louder each time, her face brightening up as if she had finally found what she was looking for, “Ichika, do you like that name?” The little girl in her arms suddenly sneezed and woke herself up. She looked up at her parents with big curious eyes and a little smiled formed on her lips.

“I think she likes it.”

“Kaneki Ichika, has a nice ring to it” Kaneki felt a strange sense of pride at his name being carried by the symbol of hope to Touka and himself.

“And it’s really useful for keeping track of the kids in the future” Touka joked, gently elbowing Kaneki in the ribs.

“You want another baby already! Aren’t you tired?!”

“Not right now! Maybe in a few years. I want us to take our time getting to know little Ichika first”

Ichika made an incomprehensible baby sound that her parents interpreted as agreement.

Overjoyed with the prospect of raising a small child in a world that will be much kinder to her than it was to them when they were little. Kaneki and Touka couldn’t wait to build their life with the new addition to their family.

Their story had just begun.

#touken #fanfic #ken kaneki #kirishima touka #Touka Kirishima #kaneki ken #ichika kaneki #kaneki ichika #kanetou #tg #tgre #tokyo ghoul #My writing

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fizzingwizard · 3 years

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I could cry y’all. Episode 37 was SO GOOD. So good!! It truly felt like a Mimi episode, and it truly felt like Digimon Adventure, in multiple ways. It’s seriously fantastic!

I feel at once super duper relieved that this show is, really and truly, capable of this time of episode, and also super duper confused why, if it could do this, it hasn’t been doing it the whole time??

Anyway, we’ve now had four or five solid episodes in a row, so I’m letting myself feel hopeful again!

This episode is called “Mimi Wars,” but I feel it might be more aptly titled “Sailor Mimi”

In the name of employee rights, I will punish you!

More below!

Okay... so as I was watching this episode, I really got the feeling that they were parodying something again. Like last we had a Mimi episode - far far away in the distant past though it was - when they very obviously parodied Castle in the Sky. That’s twice now Mimi’s been compared with a girl with twin tails, Usagi’s pigtails and Sheeta’s braids xD

Although the poses Mimi uses aren’t exact replicas of Usagi’s, though, so maybe I’m wrong. I got the Usagi vibe from her personality even more, so maybe using the poses would have been considered copyright infringement and so they had to change them a little. Or, maybe Mimi is parodying someone else who also uses dramatic hand movements and talks a lot about justice in spite of being generally clueless...

See the resemblance? XD

But what I REALLY think is going on is, they’re spoofing the genre in general, while also taking it seriously. That’s important. It’s not just a joke here. This is the girl power episode, in a way, and in my opinion, it’s a better girl power episode than the fare I got used to growing up, which went more or less like this:

Guy: *does something with good intentions but inept*

Girl: Ugh! Men don’t respect women!

Guy: I’m sorry, what did I do wrong?

Girl: I won’t tell you because feminism! C’mon girlfriends, let’s assert our confidence as women by going on a girls night out shopping spree and making a bunch of random guys stare in awe at us for no clear reason!

Girls: Yes! This is third wave feminism!

... that was more or less the formula. It was... awkward. I’d like to blame on “those episodes were written by men who think all feminists are angry feminists,” but I think if I went and checked who the scriptwriters were, there’d be some women in there for sure.

What we got in THIS episode is something I’d actually want my daughter to see. First off you’ve got Mimi, who loves pink and pretty things and comes across as a real girly girl, not to mention a bit of a ditz. And the show’s straight up, “but just because you have flaws doesn’t mean you can’t grow into a great person. Also, being girly is not incompatible with being a boss.”

Mimi doesn’t need to be a man, nor does she need to be a hard ass, nor does she need to be especially kind and sweet to soften her orders. All she has to do, according to this episode, is care about her craft, care about quality, and care about worker conditions.

I mean... a show where the girl boss wasn’t a Russian spy in a former life?? A show where the girl boss isn’t a Stepford wife who got where she is by marrying rich and funding her perfume company that way? She’s... she’s Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde. She gets to be flawed and girly and fun-loving and bossy and ditzy all at the same time. She loves diamonds - but diamonds are no longer a “girl’s best friend.” Rather, Mimi herself is the diamond in the rough!

This actually makes her a really good set with Sora. Sora continues to be both a tomboy and very sisterly. Mimi’s very girly but very bossy. Between the two of them, they can conquer the world. Of course, I don’t know that the show would take it any farther than they already have, but I’m just happy to see this development for Mimi at all. We had it to a degree in 99 Adventure, and Kizuna took it a bit further by making her an entrepreneur. Reboot Mimi is a remix of that for the 21st century.

*deeeeeeeeeep breath*

so... back to our regularly scheduled programming!

As awesome as Mimi is, she’s not the only one who’s great in this episode. The others get to let their real personalities shine, at least. We needed this episode sooooo bad like 20 episodes ago... le sigh.

Anyway, we start off having mad camp, for some reason (why aren’t they just staying on Komondomon?? whatev)

Food! They’re going to get food! They’re splitting up and making a plan in order to get food!!! I still miss the “food desperation” of 99 Adventure but hey, at least they’re acknowledging that they need to eat.

Sora advises Hikari and Takeru not to go too far on their quest and Tailmon swears like a knight of the round table to protect Hikari with her life.

Taichi: Oookay... note to self: don’t piss off little sister’s hotheaded partner...

Taichi adds that they’re also counting on Patamon, who is just thrilled to go off and play with Takeru.

Tailmon: *BIG SIGH*

Lol I really love that they’re bringing back the old Patamon/Tailmon dynamic where she’s all grown up serious and he’s got the priorities of a toddler most of the time... It’s Black Widow and Hawkeye bahahahaha

We even get to see them COLLECT FOOD what did I do to deserve this they are COLLECTING FOOD IT’S NOT HAPPENING OFF SCREEN I REPEAT IT’S NOT HAPPENING OFF SCREEN

Taichi even has to warn Agumon not to eat the food becaues they’re supposed to be gathering it to share ;___; omg... we actually get on screen proof that Agumon is a glutton??

Then Taichi tries to “help” by shaking the tree and the tree falls and they -

BAHAHAHAHAHA

humor!!! Poking fun at Taichi even!! Over food!! Because he has a klutz for a partner!!! And because he himself was overzealous!! ;_; I could die of Cute.

Sora absolutely shocks me this episode too. I expected she’d just watch Taichi and Agumon drift away with their folly while sighing and shrugging her shoulders or something.

NOPE

She jumps DIRECTLY UP and into the water without a moment’s hesitation, like they’re going to die without her - I don’t even know what her plan is here, she seems to want Piyomon to evolve and pull them out, but why does that mean Sora has to be in the water too?

I think her sisterly instincts just freaked out on seeing Taichi looking wet and confused and clinging to a tree trunk so she just did the first thing she could think of which was “Get to him!!”

Piyomon then fails to evolve, reason unclear, I suppose she’s hungry... they never do eat though so I’m not sure why she can evolve later xD (probably they eat off screen)

But I mean I just love that we got this bit with Sora. I call it freaking out but she doesn’t seem freaked out - she stays calm and seems decisive and takes action - all good things. It’s just hard to understand her thought process xD But it’s all good info about Sora. (again stuff we needed more of AGES ago)

Now I had thought this was all just a funny bit that was separate to the main story, but this is how Taichi and Sora end up washed up in the rocky area Mimi is. This does mean Koushirou, Takeru, and Hikari aren’t much in the rest of the episode, sadly. Not sure why but the reboot does seem to struggle with writing episodes for the whole group.

Like last week, I’m somewhat miffed that, in the end, the main group finds the stragglers instead of the other way around. It’s even worse this time because at least last episode Koushirou told them where he was and they had a reason to go there. This time they have no idea Mimi’s gonna be there and it’s all a big coincidence. On the other hand... I do think Mimi was born under a lucky star, so that explains it. :P

Taichi and Sora suddenly find them selves trapped Gulliver’s Travels style and they’re both immediately like, “Hmm... something about this situation seems very familiar...”

Taichi and Sora: Oh that’s RIGHT we totally forgot that the pink cowgirl we hand out with is also TOTALLY BATSHIT

D’awww. Our future overlord is just so adorable, I don’t even mind when she flogs us in the street

TBH, up till now they’ve woefully underestimated just how batshit she is. And it’s wonderful.

So Mimi has happened upon some poor, disenfranchised Digimon who are being forced to work for an evil boss who collects the beautiful gems that grow in this area. Like in 99 Adventure, Mimi will have none of this sort of crap. Her reasons, though, have evolved with the times:

omg... she voted for Bernie Sanders!

This is how Harry and Ron reacted when Hermione said she was starting a house-elf welfare organization called SPEW.

Though I joke - like I said before, even though Taichi and Sora are rather mind-boggled by Mimi’s mood swings and fits of passion, and there’s definitely humor there, Mimi herself is not a joke here. We are shown strongly that, however in the clouds her head might be, her heart is not only in the place, it’s also already internalized the fact that people don’t always get treated well in the real world and it’s up to those with power to ensure that are protected.

I mean. At this point, I’m going, “Sorry but ISN’T MIMI THE REAL LEADER IN THIS SHOW?!?!”

Of course she does have another, less lofty motivation... she really likes pretty stones.

Buhahahaha.

Mimi’s names are as creative as they are incredible, just like her. Taichi and Sora have trouble keying in with Mimi due to how changeable she is, but they never talk badly about her or reject her. They never try to wrest leadership from her either! Taichi might think Mimi’s names for the stones are over the top, but sort of sidesteps it and just goes along with her plan.

Reason #14567876867867 why I love Yagami Taichi: when someone else is the leader, he can be a follower. And he’ll be the BEST follower. Keep reading to see why.

The story of how Mimi befriended the enslaved rock Digimon here is pretty much how Goku became besties with Vegeta.

Men communicate their hearts through their fists! Or swords, depending on the anime. ANOTHER AWESOME SUBVERSIVE MOMENT FOR MIMI - she’s now even got cliche shonen hero tropes assigned to her!

Taichi and Sora, like I said, don’t try to change Mimi’s mind - they’re actually touched by her strong feelings about workers’ rights and her desire to help her new friends -

Taichi: Wait... what?

Sora: Well, she’s still a ten year old girl.

The rock Digimon show their allegiance to Princess CEO Mimi. They don’t even mind having their names and identities stripped away and being reduced to numbers on an Excel spreadsheet...

Taichi: I hate Excel.

Sora: I do too, but I’m more impressed that she remembers the numbers she gave us back in episode 6.

Taichi: Impressed? More like filled with a sense of impending doom

Only Taichi seems to understand Mimi’s unique power bahahaha.

But back to what I said earlier, about Mimi being the real leader: I don’t know if the show’s gonna keep doing anything with this at all, but I really like that they didn’t NOT do this in order to ensure Taichi’s the only leader. (I mean, Yamato’s so far not made much of a bid for leadership so he’s been pretty uncontested thus far. He also hasn’t had to do all that much leading given how often the group is separated... but I digress)

I love the idea that Taichi can step back and let someone else take the reins when they’re best suited. Which Mimi is, due to her easy ability to make friends and gain trust. Mimi had this ability in 99 as well and it was used in the final battle to muster the troops, so to speak. It ought to have been a bigger deal but wasn’t since she missed most of the final battle :/ But I loved that “social, able to make friends” wasn’t some stupid “Girls talk too much” trait, it was actually something that was useful. This is a great place to take that with the reboot.

At the same time, while Mimi and Taichi both have similar leadership traits, there are places they diverge that potentially make them leaders for different situations. Taichi’s pretty cool and strategic even in emergencies. He was more of a hothead in 99, but Mimi’s always been quick to anger. (And quick to cool down.) As we’ll see in this episode, that’s sort of where Taichi’s true ability lies: he’s serious, determined, strategic, and reliable as well as brave. But this is Mimi’s episode, and Taichi isn’t going to get to be the hero anymore than he (almost) was last week with Koushirou. Because more than one character can have positive leadership traits! Hallelujah.

Quick nip over to Komondomon and the others - Koushirou’s group is going to try to find them, but Komondomon falls asleep. Oh noes. I wish someone (Koushirou) would ask, out loud, “Gee, what are these strange symbols that appear when we communicate via digivice? Do they mean something? How were they assigned?” I really thought we’d get a hint what with all the conveniently colorful gemstones this episode, but still nope.

My girl looking like a BAMF!

Mimi explains her plan to her servants employees. She is surprisingly artistic!

Sora plays the role of bait to create a diversion while Greymon digs a tunnel to get to where the gems are stored. Mimi congratulates herself on a job well done.

Taichi: A job well done? Who d’you think has been doing the work here?

Greymon: That would be me.

Taichi: Right, right I was going to say you >.>;

So we do see bits of Mimi’s self-centered side as well - she’s not perfect, but who is? Taichi just lives with it. Mwehehehe.

... will be fired! LMAO

No. 72 is Taichi, btw. Mimi gave up calling people by their names for Lent.

Taichi: Lent’s not for over a month.

Mimi: It’s never too early for religious sacrifice.

Taichi: And you’re not Catholic.

Mimi: I celebrate Mardi Gras.

Taichi: yOU JUST LIKE THE COSTUMES AND KING CAKE

He’s miffed and he.... just lives with it. Again. xD

It’s hilarious. And adorable. I love both that 1) Mimi is an awesome boss while being, in fact, rather bossy, and that 2) in spite of being a boss type himself, Taichi not only listens to Mimi, but he totally indulges her like he’s her older brother or something x’D He wouldn’t be out of line for saying “I have a name you know!” On the other hand, I guess he knows her well enough to understand that she doesn’t mean anything by it, and... there’s no stopping her when she gets like this :P

Feel the wrath of Tachikawa Mimi!!!

So Mimi’s plan has worked so far, and she’s got everyone listening to her despite her questionable business practices, and then she... suddenly rushes off in another direction.

Taichi: That’s it, I am through being her personal assistant if she’s just going to change the plan on a whim!

Taichi: ... I don’t want to see her get hurt or be sad though...

Greymon understands Taichi’s heart ;___; and enables him to go after Mimi. I don’t really get why it’s wise to split up given that Taichi can’t fight big rock Digimon without his partner... x’D So I’m going to chalk this up to, Greymon understands that Taichi is, at his core, the team Dad. He’s got to be allowed to worry and check up on the kids, even when it’s not so advisable. Awwwwwwwww.

Indeed, Taichi doesn’t get to be the hero this ep, but small moments like this give us waaaay more character development than always being the hero!

Fortunately Mimi does have her own partner and she’s not afraid of the enemy’s rock hard abs. :P

They make it into the storage center for all the gems. IT’S SO COLORFUL. Ten year old men is squeeing just like Mimi.

Come on!! She’s holding yellow/orange topaz and purple amethyst! It could be the material for Taichi or Takeru’s and Koushirou’s crests! (I always liked fire opal for Taichi though xD)

Taichi’s been promomted!! To chief pack animal x’D Just because it’s a cool name doesn’t mean that’s what the job is, Meems.

Taichi’s just like, “I think I’m too young for that position.” Bahahaha.

He’s going to be carrying her books to school before long.

Then something big and hard hits Taichi in the head!! He freaking starts to cry, it hurts so bad!!

Taichi: Owww! Omg I think I got a concussion from that! Help someone call an ambulance!

He was hit in the head by a diamond, which Mimi loves. So she goes off on a monologue about how much she likes diamonds. She never asks him if he’s okay x’D

Taichi: Don’t worry about me, I’m fine, not that you asked or anything.

Mimi: Please, everyone knows your head is already harder than diamonds.

Taichi: ...

The pile of gems looks like Fruity Pebbles. Mmmmm

It turns out the mastermind of this whole operation is Gogmamon, who is the bastard child of Gogmagog I assume :P He eats the gemstones as well as Gotsumon for power. He then produces the diamonds?? I didn’t quite understand if he was spitting out the diamonds because he didn’t like them, or he was creating them inside him when eating and then spitting them out like... diamond turds...

...

they’re diamond turds aren’t they >__>

Mimi is not interested in big business bulldozing the mom and pop shops and small upstarts. And she hates sweatshops! She is pro-Fair Trade all the way! And she will yell it in your face!

Taichi: It’s the yelling part that I’m having trouble with.

Mimi: A good speech from the boss is what keeps up employee morale!

Taichi: Yeah, that’s less true when the boss is about to be gobbled up herself...

Golemon and Togemon try to fight Gogmamon and this results in Golemon falling to pieces.

Taichi: Are you okay?

Golemon: My HEAD was knocked off, but sure I’m doing JUST FINE -____- little brat

Taichi stands protectively in front of Golemon’s head. Lol. He’s thinking of strategies... perhaps regretting rushing after Mimi and leaving his own partner behind...

Mimi joins him and Gogmamon finds her a formidable opponent in the war of words. Gogmamon argues that all the rocks, all the Digimon, everything here belongs to him and him alone! And Mimi brilliantly counters with:

“Fuck that! They belong to ME!”

x’D He just like... under his breath... “she admits that’s how she thinks of us...” hahahaha... I laughed out loud...

It might not be 3D but this is an excellent evolution sequence xD I haven’t said so yet but the animation in this episode was good! Good for the show anyway. It was smoother than usual despite some mechanical-like mouth movements and more than that, it had character and expression!

okay important question everyone: Taichi = Kermit, Mimi = Miss Piggy... discuss??

So Gogmamon has a pretty cool-sounding attack, “Curse Reflection.” I have often complained that the villains we fight and get new evolutions with aren’t that scary, but Gogmamon not only seemed pretty formidable (if not the smart, I mean he does have rocks for a brain), he also had a good story build up. My one disappointment in this episode is that the ending is so fast and Gogmamon so easily dealt with. This would have been a good time to introduce Rosemon (like how last week would have been an appropriate time for HerculesKabuterimon). But in both cases, we’re definitely supposed to take away at least that these guys are almost there... Anyway yeah, I would have liked a tiny bit more meant to the resolution but.

So here’s ANOTHER cool thing! Taichi notices that Gogmamon rejects the diamonds, and realizes they’re the key to defeating him. But he doesn’t just tell that to Mimi. He asks her “Did you see that?” And guess what - she did!

So even though the show couldn’t resist telling us that yes, Taichi would have been able to handle this situation - it doesn’t even let him give Mimi a hint towards victory. She figures it out for herself! The most we can say he does is point out the diamond, but she understands the implication and is able to use it against Gogmamon through her own intellect.

TAICHI DOESN’T MANSPLAIN Y’ALL. HE’S NOT A MANSPLAINER. HALLELUJAH AND PAST THE PEAS!!

Mimi is very influenced by her hardworking, CEO grandpa, Tachikawa Genichiro, who’s taught her things about business and things about values, and it really reads as if she’s the one who will inherit the family business - like she’s the family investment. You know, the role that traditionally only falls to sons. That’s changed with the world, and apparently Tachikawa Genichiro-jiisan is totally on board with his granddaughter being more than just a pretty heiress!

... btw what are they making...

“You’re fired!” Mimi yells as Lillymon takes Gogmamon down x’D kill me I love it

Like last time (and it sure was a long time ago that we saw it ;_;), the aftereffects of Lillymon’s powers is plants start growing everywhere. This is such a cool effect, I don’t get why it’s not used more. Right now I feel like Mimi/Palmon are the best set in the show.

(I did think it was funny when Mimi gives the diamond to Lillymon to use against Gogmamon and Lillymon acts like Mimi’s making this huge sacrifice since she loves diamonds so much. But 1) it wasn’t the only one, and 2) they were spat out by Gogmamo! that’s gross! that’s got to cut into the value! hahah)

The others finally catch up and the day is saved. Golemon is an employee for life now. Awww.

AWWWWWW.

I gushed about all this before so I won’t repeat myself, but yeah, I’m so happy with this episode.

Lol Sora and Taichi have accepted their places in Mimi’s world, in the end. They might have numbers instead of names and their boss might change her mind about things every five seconds, but other than that it’s a pretty nice gig overall.

Again the art, so sweet. This reminded me of Miyako yelling to Mimi about how she wants to be like her when she grows up in 02 so I capped it.

And I absolutely love this little play on words since it’s in English! Wow!

SO CUTE. How did a Mimi episode kick every other episode out of the water? Scratch that, we always knew Mimi was fantastic. A shojo hero for the 21st century.

Well I said a ton and this is really long now so I’m gonna assume you all get my thoughts on this episode. 9.5/10, really awesome, totally unexpected but perfectly suted to Mimi. I’m so so happy this show seems to have figured things out and remebered that it’s supposed to be freaking Digimon Adventure, it seemed like it forgot for a while there. I just hope we haven’t wasted too much time on those more lackluster episodes, I want so many more stories like this one.

Next week looks like another winner:

OK, that concept is hilarious x’D I’m so sorry. But also, leave it to Yamato and Gabumon to get the tragedy episode.

The mood maker will be this guy! I’m totally psyched for Yamato and Jou. Taichi’s been important in the past two episodes even though they were centered on Koushirou and Mimi, so I wonder if/when he’ll be involved this time? Or maybe it really will be just Yamato and Jou - my dream combo?? I can’t wait either way.

DID NOT CHECK FOR TYPOS! See y’all next week.

#fizz watches digimon 2020 #digimon adventure 2020 #digimon adventure:#digimon adventure reboot #digimon #digi spoilers #this took forever because i loved it so much #so many caps so many comments hahahahaha

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thebeltanequeen · 3 years

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The (Blurred? Nonexistent? Inconsequential?) Line Between Canon and Fanon: An Impromtu Essay by Me

I’m currently have an existential crisis. An absolute, balls to the walls, pull my hair out, stare at the walls wondering what the meaning of existence is, kind of existential crisis. Why, you may ask? Because the older I have gotten, the more Fanfiction I have read. That’s normal. Millions of other people read fanfic like me. Well, in the past few years, I have also realized that the more fanfiction I have read, the less shits I give about the actual canon of the media I love. I care less and less about what “actually” happened, and delve into fanon instead. It’s as if the two have SWITCHED ROLES in my brain. The canon is the lie, and the fanon is the truth. This used to not be the case though, so how did we get here? And why… why is this realization sending me into an absolute spiral of insanity? Why do I feel like I have been sucker punched in the jaw? Let me explain.

I’ve been reading and dabbling in writing my own fanfiction for over twelve years. It used to be an escape, a way to further delve into my latest obsessions and become consumed by them. I have this annoying habit of also picking ships that do NOT become endgame, so I’ve always sought out fanfiction as a balm for my shipper’s soul as well. I still read fanfiction as if my life depends on it… but now it’s at the expense of reading new books. Watching new media. When I do eventually dip my toes into a new fandom, I either reject it quickly or become consumed again and make a grab for fanfiction… but in the past few years, something in not only me, but in fandoms in general has shifted.

The difference between me now, and me back then is this… I used to uphold the canon as sacred. Untouchable. Set in stone. The only credible source for the media I consume. All of the fanfiction I read was just beautiful window dressing. A lovely past time to further increase my dopamine intake.

This is no longer the case.

Now, when I read and write fanfiction, it’s as if it is an act of protest. I am actively seeking to reform the narrative. It’s to “take back” the story, the characters, EVERYTHING, for myself. To make it anew. To make it perfect. I’m not alone either. I see you. I see all of you. Now more than ever, I see more and more of us doing this exact same thing.

THIS is why I am having an existential crisis. I have just realized that I will no longer be content with the canon. Ever. Even the canon of my favorite media. It’s not enough. It’s no longer enough. It won’t ever be enough again. Why? Because there will always be places where the canon is falliable. The authors of the canon, are falliable. As an author myself, this is at once an alarming yet powerful realization.

I went to college for creative writing. At the beginning of my academic career, I thought of fanfiction as a beautiful fairytale world. It was glorious, but it was other. Separate. Not as credible as canon. Had I read fanfiction better than the media it was based on before I entered college? Absolutely, but in my head it still didn’t matter because the canon was the word. The canon was the law. As a writer, I held the power of the author (and by extension the power of myself) as sacred. By the end of college, that began to change.

The more I was taught about writing, the more I came to realize that sometimes, authors are just straight up WRONG. Sometimes, there’s soooooo much potential… AND THEY JUST FUCK IT UP!!!!!!! The bones are incredible, but the canon is weak, the logic is lacking, the story makes no sense, the characters don’t reach their full potential and you know what? I’m tired. I’m tired of it. This is why fanon is canon’s salvation. Fanon makes canon look pathetic. But… if I accept the fanon as the reality, and make the canon the lie, does that still make it fanon? No. I don’t think it does. I think fanon has become something other. Something greater.

I have become disillusion by “published” or “credible” books. 95% of the novels I actually buy at the store today are garbage. Trash. Half written nonsense that only serves the purpose of paying people. I’m TIRED OF IT. I’ve become disillusioned by the “power” of the author. I have become disillusioned by canon. FUCK canon, quite frankly. Rip it apart. Dissect it. Take out it’s beating heart and transplant it into a new body. Give it the soul that the narrative was begging for. REVIVE IT. LET YOUR OWN IMAGINATION MAKE IT ANEW. Characters mean too much to people. Fiction means too much to people. Stories mean too much to people for anything less. Only then will you or I be satisfied.

Now, even an impromptu, unedited, gibberish essay is not complete without examples. I’ll start with one that you probably thought of while reading this. Game of Thrones. I think that two years ago, the ending of the most influential show of the entire decade, is where my subconscious began to shift in this direction. Now, I doubt my opionions about GoT are the same as yours, but you know what? It DOESN’T MATTER because FANON CAN FIX THE CANON. The stories that meant so much to millions can be fixed by accepting the fact that THE CANON ISN’T THE LAW! IT FUCKED UP!!!! CANON DOESN’T DESERVE TO SPEAK ANYMORE!!!! TAKE BACK THE STORY AND TRANSFORM IT INTO A VERSION TRULY WORTHY OF THE GLORIOUS BONES IT HAS!!!!!

We also can’t ignore the role that monetization plays in the media we consume. Why leave our fiction in the hands of just the big names? Why let money dictate what is real and not real? WHY SETTLE FOR MEDIOCRE STORYTELLING JUST BECAUSE IT WAS SOLD TO YOU AND THEREFORE IT’S “LEGIT CANON”??? FANFICTION IS FREE, AND THE MOST BEAUTIFUL PIECES OF WRITING I’VE EVER READ WERE WRITTEN BY FANFIC AUTHORS WHO DID IT FOR THE STORY. WHO DID IT FOR THE ART. WHO ACTUALLY DID IT JUSTICE. FUCK THE CONCEPT OF FANON AND CANON. THE STORY WE WANT IS ALL THAT MATTERS. GET MONEY OUT OF HERE.

Ahem. To avoid going on even more of a tangent, I’ll move on and give the example that triggered my existential crisis in the first place. Sailor Moon. To give some background, Sailor Moon is it for me. I have grown up with it. I’ve watched it my entire life. As a child, I ran around with my toy moon rod and desperately wanted to be Usagi. Ironically, I grew up to be quite a bit like her (but with Rei’s temper admittedly). It is my comfort show, my happiness. It makes me laugh, it makes me cry. I never tire of it. It makes my heart swell. I have never, nor will I ever, love any piece of media the way I love Sailor Moon. Flash forward to today, I watched Sailor Moon Eternal, the two new movie adaptations of the Dream arc in the manga (stick with me non-manga and anime lovers). I liked the films, but I was left with a deep, disatisfied yearning. I want back the feeling of complete bliss I experienced while watching the 90’s anime as a child. The problem with this? I’ll never get it back. I’ve just realized this. I’ll NEVER get it back. Why? Because it’s no longer the perfect version of Sailor Moon that it was to my young eyes. Crystal, while good, is also not the perfected version I seek in my adulthood, and Eternal has not scratched my insatiable itch. I am heartbroken because I’ve realized that Sailor Moon in its perfect form doesn’t exist anymore. If I held any canon sacred, it was this. But the story is flawed. The manga is flawed. The anime is flawed. It’s not infallible, as much as it truly, deeply hurts me to admit to the world and to myself. The only perfect version of Sailor Moon is the one in my heart. It’s the one I choose to piece together for myself with the building blocks that others who came before me have handed over.

Another, more recent example of falliable canon is The Grisha Verse. More specifically, the Shadow and Bone trilogy. I was brought in to the fandom by Ben Barnes’ depthless eyes and magnificent scruff. And you know what? I liked the story, but I stayed for Ben Barnes. I liked the Darkling so much that I bought the entire grisha verse books. It was a premature decision. I’ve only made it halfway through Storm and Seige, and you know what? I’m tired of the canon already. It’s not that great. The bones are there, but it could be SO. MUCH. MORE. I haven’t read the crow books yet, and by all accounts Leigh Bardugo has improved tremendously as a writer. Which incidentally proves my point. Authors are falliable. Ergo, the canon is falliable. I can’t help but think while I read these books, “Damn. I could write this better.” and you know what? I’ve read fanfics that HAVE written it better.

Am I saying this to trash Bardugo? Or even GRRM? (Yes I admit to trashing D&D but that’s beside the point ahem…). NO. I am NOT trashing the writers. I’M A WRITER. I GET IT. YOUR STORY IS YOUR BABY. I G E T I T . But I’ve realized, and what I think future authors will also have to realize, is that fiction doesn’t belong to anyone. As soon as it’s out the door, the fiction no longer belongs to the author. It belongs to us. The people. That’s what is beautiful about fanfiction. It’s not here for the money. It’s not here for the clout. It’s here for the fiction itself. Plain and simple. It belongs to no one and everyone.

In the past, I would have fought this. I would have wanted my work’s canon to be law. To be the word, the truth, the way etc. Now? I can’t be a hypocrite. I can’t be selfish. It isn’t about the author. It’s about the vision. It’s about the story, the narrative, the characters. It’s about art. And sometimes, the authors give birth to the idea (and they deserve credit for that without a doubt), but it’s also true that sometimes, someone else just writes it better. Someone else quite simply saw the vision, the story, the characters, more clearly than the author did. I make this vow now, as an author, to strive for the vision. If someone takes my vision and does it better than me, that only improves my perspective of my own story. It improves the world of fiction as a whole. It makes me better.

So, canon? Fuck the canon. Take back the story. Take back the characters. Take back the art. Fiction is ours. It belongs to us, and we can do with it what we please. Let’s strive for OUR OWN perfected version of the media we love. Canon doesn’t truly exist. The concept of Fanon doesn’t even exist anymore in the way we used to think of it. The author’s version of events is their own Fanon of the story. Canon is meaningless now. There is only the story that you accept in your own mind. There is only the story that I accept in my own mind, no matter how different it is from yours. There is only the art. There is only the limitless potential of countless people’s imaginations. Let’s continue to collaborate and celebrate beautiful stories together, in any conceivable way, over and over and over again, until the end of time.

Fin

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docholligay · 4 years

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A Crack in Everything

For @yamadara87‘s fic, I combined two things I know she loves: Michiru, and Michiru being warm to Usagi. I hope everyone enjoys this nice MaS fic!

Whether she was atoning for her own sins or for Mamoru’s, even Michiru did not know. The divorce had gone through quickly, thanks to the application of good lawyers and the lack of fighting. Usagi had surrendered, after a few awkward weeks of her claiming that she could love Mamoru enough for the both of them, and a dinner out with Rei where anything might have explained, but Michiru imagined was along the lines of, “Usagi, some people are the homosexual kind of gay.”

Whatever frustrations Michiru might have with Rei in the day to day, there was something to be said for her ability to wield, not a rapier, as Michiru did, thin and sharp and quick, but her own certain style of conversational poleaxe.

Michiru would have told anyone, not even four years ago, that she knew herself entirely. She knew her own mind, and her own heart, and what she wanted and did not want. Michiru knew who she loved, and how, and she knew what she would do in any given situation. It might have been true, when she said it, but at that time, Michiru knew, she was a much simpler creature.

The stories are lies, she often thought. Love does not simplify things, it complicates them. The more love one holds, the more complicated everything becomes. It was easy to live solely for Haruka. It was more complicated to live for the intricate web of love she had formed in the rubble of that last battle. It had softened her in places she had not expected, lime dripping on the stone of her garden walls until they began to disintegrate in places. They would never come down--Michiru had built them too well--but there would be spaces where birds and squirrels could slip in and out, spaces where bees and butterflies could bring it to life, and bloom.

And so it was that she found herself having a sleepover with Usagi Tsukino.

They had been working furiously on her new place, a lovely apartment in a nice enough district that she had purchased as part of the settlement with Mamoru, his own brand of atonement. Usagi had been shockingly prudent, Michiru had first thought, and then remembered that Rei was ever at her side, and had likely reminded Usagi that it was only her now, and anything more than a small one bedroom was a bit of a stretch.

Michiru Kaioh had hated Sailor Moon, Princess Serenity, and, by extension, Usagi Tsukino, for so many years that she had quite forgotten she had ever felt any other way. The Moon had bound her, the Moon had conscripted her into some ridiculous holy war, the Moon had taken the person she loved most in the world and bent those lovely qualities of chivalry and courage in her into weapons against herself. The Moon had chewed them all up and left them spat upon the sidewalk, and Michiru had hated, hated so deeply she felt it poison the soil.

“Michiru!” Usagi popped cheerfully into her view, “Do you want some popcorn? I think we’re going to watch Spice World first, but if there’s something you want to watch, I’ll put it in the stack, for sure. I’m so happy you came!”

She went to hug Michiru, and then didn’t, and Michiru smiled softly. She wasn’t the only one who had grown, it seemed, with the passage of years.

“Usagi, this is rather meant to be a party for you, and so my selection is whatever would give you the most pleasure.”

Usagi nodded, sat on the floor in her bright pink pajamas. “But you did so much!”

“Oh, I made a few phone calls,” she waved her hand, “let’s don’t pretend I’ve done anything too onerous.”

It was true that Michiru had volunteered her greatest skills: Her connections, and her wealth, to spoil Usagi a bit in her new home. A couch in bright turquoise, seeming almost as a living pillow with its fluff, something she never would have afforded for herself, but of course Michiru knew someone who knew someone, and the fine handmade couch was delivered to Usagi’s door. She had brought the food for tonight’s event, as well, a catering company setting up a table that took up her tiny kitchenlet, with pizzas and chicken nuggets and takoyaki and all manner of junk food.

The walls had holes in them, and it was through these holes she had begun to see Usagi. They were kin, of a kind, both a bit out of step in Japan. Michiru in her own continental way, and Usagi in a way she hardly seemed to recognize as different. There was nothing expected in her new living space, a bright pink wall and lime green and silver sequined pillows on that new couch. She was too loud, and too bright, and overly familiar, but she could not see, or perhaps she refused to see, how she differed so from her place and the people in it. This was the most winning thing about her, Michiru thought: Usagi and she were both different from others, but Usagi would not assist in any separation. Michiru used her differences as a fence, but Usagi used them as a glue.

If you wanted to be rid of her, you would have to try.

“Everyone!” Usagi stood at the front of the room, clapping her hands together joyfully, eyes sparkling with the sheer delight of having her beloved former soldiers, now only her friends, in the room with her.

Rei and Mina sat on the floor, sharing a soda between them, Rei trying to hide the newlywed sparkle in her cloudy eyes, like stars through a stormy night. Mako chattered happily to Pluto over the baked goods she’d brought--Michiru had not been so foolish as to deny her the pleasure of contributing that--and turned her head to Usagi’s voice. Haruka was nestled into the corner of the soft and lofty couch next to Michiru, a plate of food on her lap and a soda in her hand, relaxed and happy.

“This is the first time we’ve all been together since…” Usagi looked around at everyone, and her eyes misted with tears, “since things…”

“Since Haruka had to worry about quality footwear!” Mina toasted the moment with her slice of pizza, and Haruka laughed, playfully calling Mina a bitch, and it seemed to break the spell of sadness over Usagi.

She nodded her head, and grinned. “And we’re all finally together! Again!”

They looked at each other for a moment, astounded both by the truth of the matter, and the fact that Usagi had been keeping track. Haruka and Michiru had not attended Usagi’s wedding. Pluto had been unable to attend Mina and Rei’s wedding, trapped as she was in her duties from time to time, hoping always that she would not be called back permanently.

“Except…” and the sadness returned to her voice again, oh Usagi, so mercurial, able to feel everything at once and oh so deeply.

She did not have to say the rest. Ami and Hotaru would never return, and so the group would never be complete except in it own shattered way, a chipped vase that still retained some form of loveliness.

“And how very fortunate we are to be gathered here,” Michiru lifted her glass of seltzer, “with you.”

I’m sorry, a note had said, slipped into their mailbox. She sent a note every week, since Michiru had sent her own notifying Usagi that Michiru had served her tour of duty, and was disinclined to continue any sort of relationship now that she had fulfilled her obligation. She returned them to Usagi, for the first year. Michiru returned the gift Usagi had purchased for M.A., a striped cotton onesie and a few French baby books with a glittering card telling her she’d ordered these specially, because she thought no one else would get them and she remembered Michiru was half-French. She rejected flowers, and closed the door on a pizza boy once, to Haruka’s horror.

Then a card had said, I’m sorry. It had not been in any envelope and so Michiru had no choice but to read it. There were small spots on it where she must have cried, and Michiru tried to stop reading but she could not. There were words about how she loved Michiru, how she loved Haruka, and how she felt guilty every day that something she had never asked for had ruined their lives. It had killed Ami. It had killed Hotaru. It had hurt the rest, except Minako, even Usagi not able to see Minako had been hurt worst of all. Usagi wrote that she was sorry, and sorry again, that anyone had done it for her.

Usagi wrote that she hated the Moon, for hurting her friends. That Michiru never had to talk to her again.

Atonement.

Michiru had sat there a long time, when she read it, her daughter burbling happily in Haruka’s arms in the next room. She hadn’t forgiven Usagi, not in that exact moment, but for the first time, she began to see a chubby little blonde woman, with bright eyes and a crisp pepper of a voice, and saw that she looked nothing like Princess Serenity. That the Moon had used her, as well, and tried to impose its will upon her. She remembered that day in the cathedral, when Usagi had barely known them and saved their lives. Usagi had done that, and she had stolen power from the moon to do that.

And so a stone had slipped out of her wall, a hole through which she could begin to see.

It had only come to her recently, in how quickly she had come to Usagi’s aid when Mamoru had decided to take the tiniest bit of real courage in his life, that though she had nothing but hatred for Serenity, she did, somewhere, love Usagi. It may never be that they were close; Usagi was still very garish, and still had all the subtlety of a marching band. But she had learned that love is not an on and off switch, but instead is the light that comes through stained glass: shaded and colored and shaped, each bit making up the whole of the human heart.

Usagi and Michiru looked at each other in that moment, the room held silent by the excitement and gravity of everything that had come before, and everything that was coming after. They were perhaps the two most different people in the room, here now, together, and not simply sharing space, for perhaps the first time in their lives.

Usagi giggled, each titter a glimmering bit of the shattered silence carried away on the joy that overwhelmed the moment.

“And thank you to Michiru for all the food!” She raised her pink moscato, a recommendation of Michiru’s toward the ceiling, spilling just a bit on the floor.

Haruka scowled. ‘I helped pick it out!”

“Oh of course, Haruka!” Usagi nodded, “You did a really wonderful job, and Mako! Mako made all the cupcakes and they’re so pretty! I love the pink glitter it’s so beautiful, and Rei helped plan the whole thing, and Mina…,” she searched for the words, not quite remembering what it was Mina might have done, ‘She’s just the best--”

“I brought porn!” Mina brightly held the video aloft, “Pirates! Really high production values, I think even--”

Rei snatched it out of her hand. “Did you seriously?” She held it close to her face, and then her eyes grew wide, and she looked back at Mina, “Minako!”

“Okay, Usagi said to bring a movie that reminded us of our--”

“Are you suggesting,” Michiru looked down at Mina, trying to hold her face serious but feeling a smile crack, “that we remind you of a group of porn stars?”

“Michiru, they’re not porn stars they’re pirates who are just enjoying some high seas adventure, it’s called acting, you can watch like Dame Judi Whateverthefuck and be fine with--”

Rei shoved her. “I am NOT--”

“Okay Rei, but don’t we go into battle bravely?” She held her chin high, “And fuck just as bravely?”

Usagi wrinkled her nose, “Mina--”

Haruka snorted. “Bravely?”

“Bud, you tangle with the kraken, I can only imagine your courage. Respect.”

Usagi stomped her foot, “WE ARE WATCHING SPICE WORLD.”

There were seven sleeping bags piled in the corner, all touching one another, together because their owners had placed them there, and no accident of fate. The clamor went on, and Michiru sat watching, and through the holes of that wall inside her the sunshine streamed in, and she felt flowers she had never known lay beneath the soil beneath to bloom.

It may have been poisoned, once. But the rain had washed it clean and dark and deep and filled it with life, and Michiru realized she was atoning for no one’s sins at all.

She wanted to be here, with friends.

#Au of Mystery and Shadow

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kuuderekun · 4 years

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I think more Sailor Moon fans need to check out other Magical Girl Warrior Anime

Back during the era of Nolan's Batman movies it was in certain places online like IMDB message boards very popular to express the opinion that Robin's existence is inherently bad for Batman. That Batman should be a loner and throwing in this kid sidekick only dumbs the stories down. I was always agaisnt that mentality, and today most major voices in the internet Western Comic Book Nerd community reject that as really narrow minded and know that your really not much of a Batman fan at all if you completely reject such a large portion of what the Batman mythos are. As someone who remembers all of that while currently being a Millennial Otaku in an era where our current Nostalgia cycle has brought a number of old 90s Anime back into public conciseness. I feel like the Anime equivalent of that is the prevalence of Sailor Moon fans who wish Tuxedo Mask didn't exist, that position is nearly unanimous among the guests on the Sailor Business podcast. I actually have more sympathy for this position even though it's less supportable (Tuxedo Mask was there from issue one unlike Robin) because my own preferences for female lead Anime and Superhero stories are often similar, I'm a Yuri Fanatic who likes watching Anime where it's possible to pretend men don't even exist in that fictional world. But when it comes to Sailor Moon my position is Mamoru/Darrien is just as essential as Lois Lane is to Superman, or Mary Jane to Spiderman, or Iris West to Barry Allen, or Sif to Thor. Now talking about Tuxedo Mask is complicated by how the 90s Anime handled him very differently. This may shock some people to learn, but there are Sailor Moon Manga purists who hate everything about the 90s Anime. He's not in High School not Collage in the Manga (and in the Japan the age difference between middle school and high school is smaller then it is here, they are in fact only 2-3 years apart) Mamoru isn't constantly a jerk to her early on, Usagi isn't nearly as childish and Tuxedo Mask actually contributes more. That element also fits the Robin comparison, the rejection of Robin was partly from how for a long time the mainstream public perception of Robin was Burt Ward and Chris O'Donnell. And indeed I think the best western Comic Book analogy for those Manga purists who hate the Anime are people who still hate the Adam West and Shumacker takes on Batman. Those of us who have read Robin(s) as written by for example Chuck Dixon or Marv Wolfman know the concept can be taken seriously. However some people don't like Mamoru even in the Manga, or heck some even find him worse in the Manga. These people simply hate the idea of tuning in to a show about a Superheroine (or "Female Superhero" as the CW's Supergirl pilot kept insisting on saying) where she is also constantly being rescued. Now most of those "rescues" range from cheer-leading her to adding a little minor assist like female love interests of male superhero get to contribute all the time, and the final climax of the original story-line is her saving him. But these fans want male love interests to contribute 0% to their Superheroine stories. Thing is that apparent contradiction is not a bug but a feature, it is kind of the entire premise of Sailor Moon. Film Flux did a video on the Sailor Moon Manga that helped me to clarify this. Superhero stories are at their core wish fulfillment fantasies, and like it or not many young girls fantasize both about being a Superhero and being a Damsel rescued by a handsome prince (and some young boys have the same fantasies). While most Mangaka might have written two completely separate stories to express those fantasies Naoko Takeuchi said Frak It and did both simultaneously, she wrote a story where an average Japanese school girl gets to be both Snow White and Wonder Woman at the same time. The premise of Sailor Moon is foundationally about having your cake and eating it too. Now you don't have to also be into that, my point is that this Prince Charming isn't something that's part of the story because of executive meddling. (If anything it's having other Girls helping her that was, Takeuchi's original vision was a solo Super-heroine, it was Toei that wanted a team so they could sell more toys.) And so if you fundamentally don't like that, you kind of don't like the premise of Sailor Moon. The reason why in America Sailor Moon is popular with many people who actually share only half of Takeuchi's fantasy is because on mid 90s television she was the only Superheroine we had to choose from at all. Thing is it's now possible for Americans to watch almost any Anime they want to, and the sub-genre Sailor Moon spawned has evolved to provide plenty of shows that can better provide what these Sailor Moon fans actually want. I think there are plenty of people who might actually like the rest of the genre more but have still only seen Sailor Moon because they've never searched for Anime beyond what airs on Toonami, or because they're assuming them to be Sailor Moon knock offs with no actual creativity. But the truth is even the ones most similar to Sailor Moon are still just as distinct as Green Arrow is from Batman. All or at least most Pretty Cure shows have no Tuxedo Mask analogue, a few have Het love interests who are civilians, like Peter Parker crushing on Liz Allan or Mary Jane in the Raimi films, but most don't even have that. Madoka Magica and Yuki Yuna Is A Hero and Symphogear provide no Het romance for the main character at all. Pretty Sammy and Nanoha also work, and Prisma Illya is....... not a good one to start with. Corrector Yui doesn't seem to have a Tuxedo Mask figure from what I've seen so far, on Kamikaze Kaitou Jeanne there is one kinda but he's a rival thief. On Saint Tail the love interest is the guy trying to catch her, so it's like Batman and Catwoman but if Catwoman was stealing things because God wanted her to do it???? I'm still not sure what show's premise actually is. In Galaxy Fraulein Yuna there is a Tuxedo Mask but she's a woman, so those of you who enjoy having your sexuality confused by Takerazuka style Mamoru in the new Musicals might enjoy that. Even Wedding Peach is distinct on this issue since the person who could be called the Tuxedo Mask of the show is not the title character's love interest. So I'm hoping once these Sailor Moon fans can get their no Tuxedo Mask Magical Girl fix elsewhere they can be open to appreciating Mamoru once they seem him portrayed correctly on Crystal( just make sure you're watching the BluRay rips) or even the Live Action show PGSM. I also still recommend that Sailor Moon Fan Film from 2016.

https://jaredmithrandirolorin.blogspot.com/2020/08/i-think-more-sailor-moon-fans-need-to.html

#Sailor Moon #Tuxedo Mask #Batman #Robin #Batman and Robin #PreCure #Pretty Cure #Madoka Magica #Nanoha #Pretty Sammy #Saint Tail #galaxy fraulein yuna #yuki yuna is a hero #PGSM

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gffa · 5 years

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Name ten favourite characters from ten different things (books, tv, film, etc.) then tag ten people

Tagged by @thewillowbends. These lists are always hard, but that’s kind of the fun of them! And that’s why we cheat and sometimes have lots of ties because no you can’t make me choose. 1. Thor from Marvel’s Cinematic Universe - I am a sucker for a character who has their shit together but can still be human and face ridiculously traumatic experiences and come through them whole because they had a rock solid foundation to begin with. From being thrown out of Asgard, made mortal, and taking that chance to suck it up and make himself better that he did that himself to the loss of pretty much his entire family and most of his people and his sense of purpose, the thing I love about Thor is that he keeps getting back up. That kind of fortitude is even more appealing that the ridiculously hot lightning powers. 2. Tsukino Usagi from Sailor Moon - I always loved her in the ‘90s anime, but reading the manga skyrocketted her into this special untouchable place in my heart. The beginning of her journey is a girl who is so fragile that she would kill herself if she didn’t have the emotional support around her, who had to take step after step forward to find her inner strength, who wasn’t weak or terrible for her fragility, but instead her story was worth telling for it, that the point she started out as was just as valuable as the place she ended up, where she could be the one to stand up to save her friends and get them back herself, that journey was worth telling. I LOVE HER TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH. 3. Thranduil and Maedhros from Tolkien’s Legendarium - It was really hard to choose, because I love a lot of the characters (and I feel badly leaving Thingol and Maglor off the list and I will fight a bitch for Galadriel and Elrond and listen Glorfindel is pure joy and also the internet is too mean to Elwing and I kind of want alllll the Melkor and Manwe fic because sobs they’re brothers shut up you can’t make me not have feelings about that, but also trashbag Melkor/Sauron and--) but those are the two I usually wind up wanting to know their pov in a fic I’m reading or have them around when shit’s going down because I want to see what they’ll do or I just miss them the most when they’re not there. 4. Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi from Star Wars - If you asked me to pick between them, I don’t know that I could. Yeah, sure, I love Obi-Wan ridiculously, but if you give me five minutes, I’m pretty much always going to drift back to talking about Anakin and his issues instead. I’m not sure I can even boil them down into a nutshell about why I like them so much, they’re the kind of characters that I love so intensely and with such big, sweeping thoughts, that I’d have to write a whole essay. But my best attempt: Anakin’s being both dumbass and genius at the same time, being charming and magnetic while also being a bag of garbage at the same time, who had such good in him but was also an absolute monster, who I desperately want to be happy, but I also struggle to forgive him sometimes and that’s saying a lot for a fictional character, he’s brilliant enough to truly carry an entire Saga about him. And Obi-Wan is the bedrock of all goodness in that galaxy, he could be obnoxious at times and he didn’t always see Anakin clearly, but he always cared and he remained good and hopeful, he continued to serve the galaxy, no matter what it threw at him, and even forgave Anakin in the end, because he always rose above. That’s it, that’s my shit right there. 5. Inoue Orihime from Bleach - ORIHIME WAS MY GIRL FROM THE VERY BEGINNING, her unwavering kindness and care, her desire to be soft in a world (and, frankly, fandom) that wanted her to be hard and to fight everything, when she didn’t want to fight, she wanted to heal, she wanted to have fun and be weird, she wanted everyone to be happy, all of that made me love her. Her loopiness is an absolute delight, but what I loved so much about her is that Orihime had the powers/abilities to be quite possibly the most OG of the entire cast, she could reject reality itself, and she never once wanted to use it to beat anyone up or to destroy anything, she wanted to make friends with her fairies and she wanted to help people. That girl refused to let the world make her anything less than kind and caring and sweet. She was THE BEST. 6. Hara Akiha and Umeda Hokuto from Hanazakari no Kimitachi e/Hana-Kimi - Sometimes we all fall in love with those minor characters and they just fucking consume us. A lot of it came from that they were both hot, they were both hilarious, and so they were just really fun, but what really got me was that I genuinely loved everything Nakajo did with Umeda’s character. There weren’t a lot of gay characters in shoujo manga that weren’t complete comedic relief, where their sexuality was the joke. Yes, Umeda was often a humorous character (all of the cast was) but he firmly was completely uninterested in high school kids, he liked adult men, and his advice to Mizuki may have been crabby as hell, but it was genuine and good. His sexuality wasn’t the punchline of his character. Then there was Akiha, who was also comedic, but his bisexuality (another rare thing to find in manga!) had nothing to do with the humor of his character, all of it was in the way he chased after Umeda. He was a genuine suitor (and, reading the post-manga character interviews, apparently they got together, OMG MY HEART) and the kiss they shared was treated just as seriously as any straight kiss would have been. That meant a lot to me, even though I’d have loved the characters just because they were so interesting and Umeda’s struggle to get over the guy who never cared for him and to let himself be vulnerable with someone that he could actually care about, was so great. 7. Yuki Eiri from Gravitation - I can’t begrudge anyone for giving this show a lot of shit (and I definitely am going with anime!Yuki here, rather than manga!Yuki) or dismissing it as being god-awful, because it probably was pretty cringeworthy. But Yuki got under my skin because he was one of the first characters I resonated with where his depression was real and it was ugly. He could be cruel to people around him, he pushed them away, not just half-heartedly, but genuinely, and he couldn’t stand being vulnerable, because it touched on all the terrible places that had been damaged by what Kitazawa had done to him. And he couldn’t just be magically fixed by Tohma’s devotion or Shuuichi’s unwavering amounts of love poured into him. He couldn’t just be fixed with a hug or one good crying session. He was damaged and it was going to be a hell of a long hike back up to anything even a little bit normal. Especially back at that time, I felt like depression and trauma were never given any real weight, then along comes this ridiculous BL series that just refused to make Yuki anything less that genuinely damaged and it hit all these places in wee me that was struggling through my own depression that couldn’t just be cured with some hugs and people telling me they loved me.

8. Hashiba Touma from Yoroiden Samurai Troopers - I’m not sure I could even say why this character got under my skin the way he did, other than that there was definitely a group of us who were SUPER into the show and it was fun to make a playground for ourselves, and Touma just really got to me. The brilliant character who didn’t always know how to relate to others, but who cared very deeply about them, who gravitated to those who were better at social interaction than he was, who were better able to connect to people than he was, that he found this group where he really belonged, that just really touched wee me’s heart. 9. Tendou Souji from Kamen Rider Kabuto - THIS OBNOXIOUS HOT MESS I LOVE HIM SO MUCH. It was hard not to put Kagami on the list as well, because so much of what I love about Tendou is illustrated through his relationship with Kagami (whom I also love on his own), but I think I keep coming back to that I love his issues the most. He’s the best at everything and so it puts distance between him and everyone else, all the more so because he’s so obnoxious about it and doesn’t slow down for anyone else to catch up, but the thing is that there’s a very caring heart underneath all that. He loves his sisters, he loves Kagami, he even kind of tolerates the rest of their weird gang, and trying to find that difficult line of his superiority over the others versus that he wants them to catch up to him in his own way, all while being the most condescending dick ever, is absolute joy. 10. Relena Darlian from Gundam Wing - I had a difficult path to liking Relena, because so much of fandom boiled her down to either being a creepy stalker who got in the way of Heero/Duo or they only ever wrote her in romantic pairing stuff with Heero, neither of which really encouraged me to like her. But, as time went on and I rewatched the series a couple of times, I realized there’s so much more to her. She’s a character who has to walk an impossible line between both of the legacies that weigh on her, the birth family that she never knew but maybe she could help bring peace to the world by taking up that name, by trying to bring back the Sanq Kingdom that promoted absolute pacifism and peace. Yet, ultimately, for all that her relationship with Zechs is really important and she was the heir to that kingdom, she chose to be Relena Darlian. She choose to try to bring peace to the world by standing up on her own as a politician, not a figurehead queen of the world. The struggle to figure that out, who she wants to be and how she wants to achieve it, to go from a sheltered young girl at the start of the series to someone who has seen how terrible war is, is far more interesting than either of those first options for me! And I’ll tag @forcearama (and if I couldn’t put Obi-Wan as all ten entries, neither can you!) @belldreams @subskywalker @cacchieressa @bpdanakins @glompcat @writegowrite @fireflyfish @evaceratops @amarielah and anyone else who wants to do it that I’m not sure I feel quite like I’m able to try peer pressuring you into it. ♥ I love seeing these from anyone who wants to do them, I’m just never sure if I’m allowed to go HEY YOU DO THIS THING. orz

#i should have a personal tag around here somewhere

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datshq · 5 years

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Honestly I get more Usagi/Mamoru vibes from Shigure/Akito than Ail and Ann tbh, like Usagi/Mamoru it seems like their romantic connection is framed in a sort of "destined" narrative. Didn't Shigure only develop feelings for Akito due to that dream he had of her? (Man dreams of your destined partner recalling echoes of a past, who does that remind you of?) That's kinda what leaves me cold on the pairing, I've never been big on ships determined by destiny when it comes to shipping (part 1)

These ships always come off feeling like an "easy" way out. Also just like Mamoru, Shigure is eventually regulated to obligatory, fantasy fanservice Shojo boyfriend accessory that exists purely as a reward for the heroine with no character development, arc or epiphany all on his own. In the end Shigure/Akito just felt like a toxic take on a Miracle Romance (isn't Shigure also much older than Akito like Mamoru is for Usagi?)(part 2)

I feel like the ship had great potential to be a deconstruction of destined romance narratives, especially in chapter 111 where Shigure all but admits that that dream could've been about anyone and he would've fallen for them and even WISHED it was about someone like Tohru, but in the end the mangaka played it straight, too bad. It's sad that shojo mangaka are so beholden to their tropes, so far I think Utena is the only shojo series I've seen that was willing to think outside the box. (part 3)

- - -

You make some mighty fine points, Anon. I’d say Akito/Shigure is more “Mamoru/Usagi on it’s way to becoming Ali/En”. I mean, if Usagi and Mamoru were isolated with no friends or support group or if they wouldn’t keep picking each other over other people and couldn’t trust each other to do so, although Super S sure tried to turn Usagi into an insecure creep. The only good thing to come out of Sailor Stars (which I still need to finish) was that it confirmed that, even when given an appealing alternative, Usagi would still prefer to be with Mamoru not because they’re destined for each other, but because she likes him better.

Although the show never does properly engage with the whole free will vs destiny dimension of the pairing. Mamoru plays it lipservice in season two when he’s faking being over Usagi and the primary concern he raises is that he doesn’t want to be together just because destiny says so. But then, when they do eventually get back together in the season, it’s because destiny is literally on their side, which defangs the entire arc. Then again, the whole bit was apparently just the director not wanting to make episodes with Usagi and Mamoru as a couple so it’s no wonder it never went anywhere.

In that I fully agree. Mamoru is the ultimate idealization of the Shoujo Destined Partner archetype. Mamoru isn’t just a chance meeting that unravels a soulmate like the romance shoujo genre adores, he’s Usagi’s literal soulmate and reincarnation romance. Fruits Basket tries to subvert the trope by having the destined meeting leading to romance between Shigure and Akito initially not work out but, in the end, the series falls into the usual shoujo tropes. We can count how many Fruits Basket couples are based on a chance meeting, which is shoujo fasthand for destiny. It’s a lot. So the parallel is there too.

Fruits Basket is one of those shows that straddles the line between challenging tropes and playing true to type. A lot of shoujo threaten their leads and other characters with extreme forms of trauma and violation (Peach Girl’s protagonist was threatened by classmates to have her hair set on fire among other threats and staged threats), but Fruits Basket actually goes through with it, with Akito’s acts of violence towards others, especially the torture of Rin. However, just like with other typical shoujo, it either can all be fixed with the characters just talking things out or the characters who actually are not shown to magically get better, like Rin, not being important enough for anything more than a throwaway line directed at her attempts at a recovery. Just like in most trope-tastic shoujo, collateral damage doesn’t matter. Rin’s purpose was not to have an arc about her abuse and rejecting her abusers, her purpose was to show the extent Akito was willing to go to.

So, yeah, while Sailor Moon is in many ways the ultimate shoujo, Fruits Basket tries to be the dark flipside but doesn’t commit and just ends up ruining the effect it was going for and just being more of the same generic shoujo in many ways. I mean, the trappings are very different at least, so I do like it even as the tropes kinda annoy me.

#sailor moon #fruits basket #fruits basket spoilers #dats chats

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fumikavicky · 6 years

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Nezumi’s wish

I just finished the last episode of Juuni Taisen - Zodiac Wars. I have to say I have mixed feelings, I'm not saying I did not like and did like the episode - I loved it. But let me go part by part of how I felt, so spoilers in case you wanna see it with your own eyes

I liked the fact that they showed us, not only Nezumi's life after the Juuni Taisen, but everyone's wishes, or almost everyone.

I felt that Inonoshishi was still lying, because of her father she was never able to be honest, not even with herself, so her wish may not be what she really wanted but she cannot help that

For Dotsuku I felt it was a great descicion to show us his background this episode because you could feel the connection between his life and Nezumi (I will explain that later) and I have to say I felt complete seeing him as a father

I still do not know if Niwatori was honest or not, but if she was then I felt bad for her in a way I'd like her to have a normal life, she did not choose the life of a warrior

Oh god, Sharyu, I have to be honest, I was dying to know about her plan but we will never know it. She knew peace may be a dream but she fought for it. I also feel bad for her boyfriend, he jsut wanted to have a happy life with her and she wanted to give him a paceful life at all costs

Hitsuji, being the old man he is, of course he would wish for youth, considering his last wish, he would love to spent more time with his granddaughter, it’s an understandable wish

We knew Uma was insecure about himself so he wanted the talent or be confident about himself, having as a role model Ushii: The perfect warrior. I didn’t feel a real conection with him, I just felt sorry for him

Tatsumi brothers, the characters I didn’t expect I’d love this much. We got two episodes of background and I’m thankful for that, but seeing this last episode I felt I really don’t know them. ‘We want money’ That’s what they said, but when Nezumi talked to them in private they both said that the other twin didn’t mean that, they just see it as a way to kill time and not being bored, so, what did they really want? But I have to admit I felt happy when Tatsumi Ani got mad at Ushii when he killed his brother, I felt that brotherly love at the battlefield

Usagi, the character that will have mixed opinions. Yeah, he was this chaotic character, the mysterious guy that everyone was dying to know about him but we didn’t get a backstory; I have to say I’m thankful for that, why? Because having a character like him is hard to give him a backstory that everyone would like or understand. Leaving him as a chaotic character instead of a bad or dissapointing story seems the best option for me. This last episode, oh god, my heart broke when he told Nezumi he wanted to be friends with every person in the world. He seems like a lonely person, who wouldn’t be afraid of someone like him? Because of his power you can tell he doesn’t know how to act around people, what if his true wish was to ‘Be normal’ so he could have friends? But then again, we will never know

As Nezumi said, Tora was the only one who got her wished granted at the Juuni Taisen, the person she admired acknowledge her, but when she talked to Nezumi she meant her real wish was to have a life with Ushii? If it’s that, then her only wish if she won would be bringing him back to life, but how would he react? Would he go along with it? Or his pride as a warrior would be hurt?

Ushii, what was his wish? We didn’t get to see a backstory and I’m not counting Tora’s episode because we didn’t get to see how he became the warrior he is today. But I really liked his character, a true warrior and gentleman, someone everyone could admire

And now, the winner, Nezumi. If you get mad at his wish then I think you didn’t understand his character. Yeah he was someone without ambissions or wishes, but I can understand that. His power allows him to see 100 different paths, he knows what will happen if he does this or that, why would he bother in anything knowing the result? He experienced death 99 times, he experienced being rejected 100 times. When he started thinking about all the possible wishes he also thought about what would happen after that; he can’t help it! It’s his power. Remember when I mentioned him with Dotsuku? Well he thought everyone had one wish worth of be granted, everyone but him. He even thought if it was the right thing to win, to the point he would revive everyone, not only Sharyu, whose wish he liked. I felt his wish was the correct one: A 15yo boy, who was sent to a battlefield, experienced death 99 times; wishing to forget everything was a good dessicion for him and no one else. If he really was an inmature character, his wish would be killing all of his classmates, but he knew it was dumb to wish that

tl;dr Nezumi did the right wish and I enjoyed this serie, I wish they animate part two

#wow I wrote more than I expected #feel free to give your opinion #or ignore me #it's so long i don't know if its worth #it's the opinion of only the anime #Juuni Taisen #juni taisen #zodiac war #nezumi juuni taisen #ushii juuni taisen #tora juuni taisen #usagi juuni taisen #Tatsumi brothers #uma juuni taisen #hitsuji juuni taisen #sharyu juuni taisen #niwatori juuni taisen #dotsuku juuni taisen #inonoshishi juuni taisen

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crystalelemental · 6 years

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Good morning, and I hope you all prepared yourself for this inevitable gripe-fest that’s about to occur! That’s right folks, I am Back On My Bullshit and ready to rant! It’s been so long since I’ve been this intensely irritated about something, but I guess Sailor Moon season 3 wanted to remind me what this was like. Hysterically, they’re even keeping with the theme of 2017 that’s been ongoing since Atelier Shallie: I get it, you’re trying to market as a light-hearted fun adventure, but you can’t fuck up your heavy plotline on purpose because you’re trying to maintain an image goddammit!

Let’s start with this: season 3 is, by far, the best in the series so far. Uranus and Neptune are spectacular characters, I finally get to see Pluto in action, and Saturn...god, we’ll get to that, but best. No contest. They even salvaged Chibi-Usa’s character. Chibi-Usa! Who was among my most disliked characters by the end of season 2! She came back and was great! That shouldn’t have been possible, but here we are. The Professor and the Death Busters actually seemed entirely unique, and were a huge step up from previous villain groups.

But you’ll notice I started using past tense there. Yes, unfortunately I have to use past-tense. They’re still better than the others, but no longer as interesting. It’s another issue of excellent setup but terrible resolution. At the end of the day, the Professor is just infected by some virus monster, and his motivations are as vacuous as any enemy that came before. Unleash strong nebulous evil force, ???, profit. For such a goofy and fun character, his motives...pretty much didn’t exist. I’m all for the whole parasite thing to establish drama, but it’s going to be a lot less engaging than if a character had their own agency and motives. It’s like my issue with the “Lusamine was just infected with Nihilego’s toxins” argument. It removes Lusamine as a character entirely, and insists that what we see was not a person, and their actions had no bearing on anything they personally wanted, it’s just things that happened. And that’s way lamer than having the character be in control and acting for their own ends. For the professor, it’s unfortunately just the infection working toward infecting the entire planet.

Which leads to other, major issues. (1) Why is the holy grail there at all? It can’t be designed for this inter-dimensional virus creature. So what’s the point? (2) If there was no point in that, what was the point in Uranus and Neptune’s quest? I guess if the Messiah they were looking for got it, things would immediately turn in their favor, but... (3) What’s the point of the Silence? Why is this a thing we have a name for? I had assumed the whole time that there was precedent for this. Like, someone knew what was going on, approximately, because something similar happened before. Given they know what to do to combat it, it seemed like everyone had an inkling of what was going on, but were lacking in specifics. But this nonsense about a Messiah of Silence? It’s just a virus. It might not even be sentient, beyond manipulating the sentience of those infected. I doubt the virus is like “Ah yes, the Messiah of Silence, who will draw us into this world so we can do vague but evil things to it.” None of these elements make a lick of sense anymore. They were cool as a setup, but I feel like it’s wasted potential. Especially considering that the outer scouts gave you the optimal setup already.

...you know, before we even started watching this, Callie told me that Hotaru would be my absolute favorite. And when we finally get there, what do they give me? A sickly child, who tends to dress all in black, has burns all over her body from an accident she was in, idolizes an athlete who was also sickly in his youth because precious, just wants to make friends but has weird blackout moments where people around her get hurt so they shun her, and has turned around from being almost completely closed off from the world to making close friends with Chibi-Usa and the sailor scouts. She’s the best. Easily my favorite. Not even a contest. Well, turns out, she’s Sailor Saturn, and the Guardian of Destruction. Can apparently blow up planets, so...that’s awesome. Her weapon is apparently even called the Glaive of Silence, or at least that’s what Michiru had called it at one point. For the latter part of the season, the outer scouts are basically shitting themselves, knowing that they either manage to kill Hotaru before she awakens as Saturn, or the world could be destroyed. Obviously, since the other scouts are friends with Hotaru, it creates that conflict again between inner and outer planet scouts around an “ends justify the means” approach, or the altruistic “We have to save everyone” mentality. And that’s great! I love that setup. I’m all for this kind of conflict, and how it hits harder because Chibi-Usa and Pluto are on opposite sides. Excellent setup!

...terrible execution. Hotaru’s issue wasn’t that she’s Saturn, silly! It’s that she’s also infected with the virus, and becomes Mistress 9! She’s a vaguely evil mastermind trying to summon the nebulous Pharaoh 90 virus, which is apparently a planet from another dimension?, into this world to infect the whole planet and...not really destroy it, but eliminate all life or make everything a host for its virus self? Which Mistress 9 and the Daimons may be a part of? Objective unclear; listen, why not roll with Hotaru as the final boss? If Saturn is so intense and terrifying, that’s a better angle. You keep building the conflict for Chibi-Usa and the inner planets vs. the outer planets, and your resolution is easy to make a happy one since Chibi-Usa and Hotaru are friends. The outer scouts can still insist this has to go with conflict, but ultimately it’s the friendship the inner scouts developed with the Messiah of Silence that causes her character to make an active choice to keep things as they are, and avert it. I’m all on board for Uranus and Neptune acknowledging that there was no Messiah of Light, and that the good ending had to come about from their own actions. That’s fantastic. But you know what would’ve been also great? If there was no messiah for either side. If the whole Messiah thing was just both sides trying to pinpoint a champion with the power and ability to carry out their own goals. Give the professor an honest reason to want the world to reach its end, and you’ve got the ideal setup: a father who manipulates his child to destroy the world for his own ends, massive conflict among the two groups of scouts, a positive and happy resolution with Saturn through connection and friendship, and a legitimate reason to seek the grail and to have a name and concept for all this stuff since it happened in-universe.

We do not get that. Obviously. I wouldn’t be here if we had. Instead, we run with the virus angle, the grail calls Pharaoh 90 to their world, and the only thing that wins the day is that the Professor and Usagi call to Hotaru and get her to awaken as Saturn, who then blows up the virus planet. (1) Not Chibi-Usa? The one pretty much designed to be the point of connection for Hotaru? ...alright. (2) This could’ve been avoided by just...not handing over the Grail, Usagi. Callie said Uranus and Neptune were being jerks for fighting Usagi over her decision here, but they’re super in the right. Had you not done that, the human connection still would’ve made it to Hotaru, only the death virus planet wouldn’t have been called, and Saturn wouldn’t have had to die and be reincarnated, which is really my biggest issue here.

WHY IS HOTARU A BABY NOW?! I HATE this reset-button shit, and I’m having trouble thinking of a time I’ve been more upset by it. Hotaru is the best character for me, bar none. The struggles she has going on, the difficulties she’s faced, and her entire arc being about establishing those connections and making friends to overcome loneliness and fear, all of it is excellent. And their resolution? Their big way to fix this? Let’s have her die and come back as a baby who is fine now. Also her dad’s memories are all gone, except for the ones about how he has a kid, so no one will even know the difference! Hooray! Fuck you. Fuck you, that’s stupid and awful. You not only killed the best character, which is something that’s happened to I’m pretty sure everyone in the series at this point and they got better from, but you reincarnated her as a baby so there’s no hope to get this character back even. All in the name of “We had to have a happy ending for this character, so we just got rid of all the bad stuff that happened to her.” It’s lazy, it’s stupid, and it’s a complete rejection of a far more interesting conclusion where Hotaru gets to recover and move on. Not to mention, if Saturn’s so damn strong, bringing her back as a completely healthy baby means she’s gonna be absurd. Haruka and Michiru were already stronger than the inner scouts by a noticeable margin, and Saturn apparently had enough power to make them terrified of her just waking up, even when they had Pluto on their side. Keeping the injured version of Hotaru not only keeps the difficulties she had and her character in tact, but also serves as a limiter. She’s not an instant-win condition; she has physical limitations and isn’t always going to be at full strength. But no, baby version now. Maybe because she’s younger she’ll be weaker or can’t use her full power or something arbitrary like that.

I am so goddamned salty about this. I get really attached to my favorites, and this seriously feels like we’ve just removed the best one. I know she’s alive. I know a lot of traits are probably going to stay the same, and when she inevitably comes back and is a regular scout I will love her to death. But this is such a bad way to handle the resolution for this character’s conflict. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a figure to find.

#sailor moon #hotaru tomoe

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canvaswolfdoll · 6 years

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CanvasWatches: Violet Evergarden

Ugh, I hate writing about good shows. It’s always so difficult to find something to talk about. With bad or average material, it’s so much easier to point at weak points and say ‘Yes, that wasn’t good. Here’s what I would do.’ Which is my favorite exercise when watching things.

But Violet Evergarden is good. Real good. The only complaint I could imagine lobbying is that Netflix didn’t simuldub it stateside. The villains.

I mean, it’s a show with a blonde protagonist who, out of love, lost limbs and had them replaced by mechanical prosthetics, with the actual story happening in a quasi-european setting approximately after a WWI analogue. Somehow, it’s not Fullmetal Alchemist, nor does it try to be. Freaking Magnus Bride had less superficial similarities, and it still fell into that trap.

It’s laudable.

What Violet Evergarden does do is done amazingly.

Spoilers, by the way. Go watch the show now, it’s that good.

I don’t cry for fiction. This isn’t a macho claim, I honestly view it as a minor failing of mine. I can identify sad and tragic parts of a piece, and I have emotions,[1] but when it comes to fiction, there’s just too big of a separation for me. I can see the strings.

This remains true for Violet Evergarden, but there are some real strong attempts to coax tears. Strong and original.

I like the ‘Girl learning to be Human’ trope.[2] Well, Person learning to be human, but, well, cute girls make everything better.

Point is, there’s a charm to watching someone who, through their personal circumstances, has zero idea how to operate in society, and approaches everything with naivety and a hunger to learn.[4] It’s a good character premise that gives ample comedic potential (Faux Pas, satire, general oddity), dramatic potential (lost time, awkwardness, satire again), and fanservice if you feel the need to provide it. It’s a great tool for side stepping ‘As You Know’ exchanges and still actually teach your audience about your fantastical world![5]

Violent is given this status by, initially, being raised as a tool for war. She doesn’t know her family, her age, nor have a name when she’s gifted to The Major by his brother, and from there begins her journey to learn to be a human.

It’s not until she’s finally removed from the context of war and loses the man she devoted herself to that she can truly begin learning the hardest part: empathy.

And you thought my ‘don’t cry at media’ tangent was unrelated! Ah-ha!

Up until Violet begins her job as an Auto Memory Doll[6] people existed in one of three categories: Enemy (people to kill), Allies (people not to kill), and The Major (Person to take orders from). Sure, The Major gave her a name, and taught her to read and write, but on the battlefield, where most people have to be broken down into a state of “Kill or be Killed”, it’s hard to teach a young girl to be a person.

We begin the story right at the point of transition: Violet has lost both her arms, hasn’t heard from The Major since their last operation, and the war’s pretty much over. And her broach is missing. A lot’s happening suddenly, and she’s being taken off by a retired officer turned postal company president, Claudia Hodgins. It’s a confusing time for those involved.

Here’s a fun trivia fact I had to have explained to me: you may ask yourself ‘Why does Violet bite things? It sure helps make her seem alien, but why did she develop the habit?’ Well, Violet doesn’t have hands anymore, so that leaves her sensitive lips to feel things with![7]

Anyways, per The Major’s wishes, at first Hodgins attempts to leave her with some of The Major’s relatives (The Evergardens), the matriarch of which expresses hope that she and Violent can help comfort the other after losing family to the war.

Violent, of course, misreads the intent and explains she won’t be able to replace to Ms. Evergarden’s son. Violet is also generally uncomfortable with this prospective life of not doing anything or receiving orders, so runs after Hodgins, rejecting the Evergarden home.

She does, apparently, have no qualms taking the surname, which seems like a weak justification for it. She’s closer to The Major, shouldn’t she have adopted that complex noble name instead?

Speaking of which, an anime trope grosser than Student/Teacher relationships: The Usagi Drop![8] It’s a romantic relationship where one of the participants (literally or essentially) raised the other! Ah-ha, what a disgusting abuse of a power structure.

Now, to the anime’s credit, there’s at least ambiguity to Violet and The Major’s exact feelings towards each other. The Major isn’t around to clarify if he views Violet Paternally or Romantically, and Violet’s still working through being emotional stunted. However, it’s ambiguous enough to make both options equally likely.

During the first couple of episodes, the meaning of The Major’s ‘I love you’ being a romantic confession could’ve been kosher, and even expected. But as Violet’s backstory is revealed, and we learn that The Major pretty much raised Violet, romance ceases to be charming and instead shifts into worrying.

This isn’t helped when a parallel is drawn with a diplomatic engagement between a 14-year old princess and a prince at least 10 years her senior.

Surprisingly, when it comes to royal pairings, I find myself a bit more forgiving about more squickier elements. Yes, the massive difference in ages isn’t an ideal depiction, and the princess being underaged by modern standards doesn’t help, and the fact it always seems to be an older man courting the younger woman is troublesome.

However, what the situation does have is extenuating circumstances. It’s not just a precocious crush being exploited; it’s years of bad tradition, diplomatic planning, and the fact that it’s two individuals obviously trying to make the best of a bad situation.

The princess is going to get married off to someone for diplomatic gain, might as well be to someone who’s shown empathy for the princess and the situation.

But for Violet and The Major, I would hope the final call comes down on The Major viewing Violet as an adopted daughter

There’s a second major point of ambiguity surrounding The Major to drive the plot: is he dead? Most of the cast accept that his Missing in Action status after a major bombing of the building Violet was found in means the man’s likely dead, but Violet holds out hope.

In most stories, if The Major was still alive, there’d be more hints than provided by the anime, or they’d just accept he was dead and continue forward.

The Major being dead provides a stronger break and arc for Violet. Not only has the war she’d been existing for ended, but the man she’d been devoted to entirely is also gone. At the start of the series, Violet has nothing and must rebuild herself. To deny closure of that chapter by letting The Major be in hiding would just undermine the entire opening premise.

So, of course, the last shot of the series is an ambiguous shot of Violet arriving at the house of an unseen client and stumbling with her well rehearsed introduction, giving the audience a winking ‘Is he?’.[9]

If he is alive, it’d be a massive jerk move because it’s not just Violet’s life he’s derailing and introducing tragedy to. Major Gilbert Bougainvillea has a family, after all, including a mother who mourns him and a brother with undirected rage over the loss of his younger brother. Also friends probably. We’re not given any real reasons for The Major to crawl out of that final battle, put his fists on his hips and say ‘Sweet. I’m gonna abandon my old life!’ Admittedly the backstory of The Major is very light in the anime adaption, but that lightness also paints a lack of past tragedy.

The rules of ‘show don’t tell’ and ‘write the story about the most interest point in the character’s life’ also implies that which is not depicted is not interesting.

Thus, The Major should be dead and should stay dead.

Which concludes my… review of a single character…

Let’s talk about the show proper.

Much like Isle of Dogs, it ticks off a few items on my favorite things list, but more of the narrative devices.

It’s a series of vignettes with a reoccuring protagonist acting as bridge, set in a light fantasy world that is much closer to modern day than is traditional, and has major emphasis on writing as a narrative device. And alsi fantasy prosthetics, a fondness that will go unexamined today!

Also, one of the other Auto-memory Dolls wears glasses.

It’s produced by Kyoto Animation, which I think is tying with Studio BONES for my favorite studio (based solely on the works they produce), which is a major plus.

The individual episodes are very character-driven, including one about a playwright that made me really want to get back into writing plays myself.[10]

Most episodes explore Violet from the perspective of the episode’s client, while offering some world building. Episodes one and two, as a pair, exist to introduce Violet and the world, and thus don’t have much for Hodgins (who gets his development through the rest of the series) and Erica (who doesn’t actually get much besides explaining the origins of typewriters and the term ‘Auto Memory Doll’).

Episode three is when the series rolls up its sleeves and says “Ah, we’re learning what it means to feel emotions? Get ready to choke!” and sends Violet to school, where everyone’s soul goes to die!

While trying to earn a coveted accreditation, Violet meets Luculia, who lost both her parents in the war while her brother returned home with an injured leg and a chip on his shoulder. During the course, Violet shows she can get the practical skills down easily enough, but when it comes to putting any actual soul into her letters, she turns in only tense reports.

Luculia graduates top of the class while Violet does not. Still, Luculia has decided she’s friends with Silver Arms, and sets to help Violet do better. Luculia’s attempts fail, and instead the two have a short heart to heart. Luculia’s brother has fallen to drink and hasn’t come to terms with coming home from war to find his parents gone, and Luculia doesn’t know how to tell him that it’s nice that they still have one another.

Violet takes that in, writes a letter for the brother, and repairs the relationship! Yay!

But that’s the formula. Everyone knows those beats! Got to earn the heart-wrench.

Episode four, Violet escorts her co-worker Iris back to Iris’s hometown for a surprise birthday party. Iris isn’t happy about this turn around, due to a rejection of her feelings and her parents not really supporting her life path.

Again, Violet writes a letter, makes everyone feel better. As you do.

But we also learn the origins of names: Iris got hers from the flowers blooming when she was born, and Violet… got hers at the training center when The Major awkwardly realized Violet didn’t have a name. Thus strengthening the parent/child relationship of The Major and Violet and they better not make this gross, I swear!

Then we reach the royal engagement. I mostly discussed that in the relationship dissertation, but episode five is a strong examination of making a relationship work, despite distance, age, obligations, and other fragile matters. The episode also gently nods to the fragile state the continent’s in after the war, with dissidents to the results of the war still out there, waiting to take center stage.

Episode six is fine. It is. Massive library, Violet meets a reclusive nerd scared to follow the path of his parents. Reclusive nerd crushes on Violet. Violet is ignorant of his feelings because of course, and she accidentally inspires him to change jobs from researcher to Action Archivist! Roaming the world searching for lost texts! Good world building, not heavy on the emotions.

And so we come to Episode Seven: probably the closest I’ve arrived at crying in years.[11]

Violet is hired to transcribe a famous playwright’s newest play. He’d been out of the public eye for a while, but he’s much lauded. However, his house is a mess, he’s slow to get the work started with Violet, using her as a maid for a bit and inspiring her to try cooking.[12]

Anyways, Oscar Webster is writing a children’s play. His first, I believe. Which is a dead give away for his emotional problems. Still, the snippets we get really showcase the creative writing process and hit me with nostalgia for the Theater for Young Audience class I took once, and the child’s theater summer camp I worked for.

Then we get flashbacks to Oscar and his daughter moving into a new place after his wife’s passing,[13] then watching his daughter progress through what is one hundred percent cancer as we get the snippets of what inspires the play.

And Violet meets him living alone in his ill kept house.

Which is where I’m ending my summary.

Violet Evergarden is a good anime. Beautiful visuals, distinct characters, strong world building, and amazing writing.

Go watch it now.

Though, on your way over, consider supporting my Patreon. Then, after you watch all of Violet Evergarden, come talk to me about it. And maybe check out the other things I’ve written and drawn and otherwise created. Especially since I’ve decided I’ve procrastinated long enough on a certain project.[14]

After all, August 1st is coming. Sounds like a good day to go camping and/or catch a wave.

Kataal kataal.

[1] Often strong ones! [2] A specific variant of the Fish out of Water trope that, unfortunately, TV Tropes doesn’t seem to have an entry for, as it hasn’t been applied to Violet.[3] [3] Wait, found a video essay. “Born Sexy Yesterday”. Which, admittedly, examines the trope’s problemsome aspects, but,eh, I stand by its strengths. [4] This is why Starfire is the best character on Teen Titans. fight me. [5] I keep meaning to use it myself, but the concept I have would spoil a major setting secret for my current project. [6] A scribe with a typewriter. Anime has an ability to give fanciful names to things at a level I hope someday to emulate. [7] Why she did it during the flashback when The Major got her the broach is anyone’s guess. Maybe it relates to that anecdote about a kid eating a letter from Maurice Sendak. [8] Named for a manga that was apparently pretty cute until it suddenly really wasn’t. At all. I haven’t read it, but reputations do flourish. [9] The light novel isn’t as ambiguous, but I won’t spoil it. Also, totally looking forward to picking it up once it gets translated. [10] I guess I do have that play about tabletop rpgs that needs another draft with a better plot… [11] Since I came downstairs after bedtime at exactly the wrong time of a medical drama show. Was like, four or five. Saw a man coughing up blood. Good times. Before my soul froze up and withered to the merry husk I have now. [12] I really like seeing cooking used as a narrative device. [13] Moving after a spouse dies is a very sad and subtle trope. [14] Though a Three Leaves, Three Colors review may pop up first. It’s the current bedtime anime.

#CanvasWatches #violet evergarden #anime #netflix #CanvasReviews

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keyofjetwolf · 7 years

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Which brings us to Minako, and here’s where things get even more interesting. It’s similar in style and content to the others, including Usagi’s part in many ways, but it’s just different enough. Even Usagi’s sticks to the elements better than does Minako’s

MINAKO JUST HAS TO BE DIFFERENT

As with the other posts, we’ll start with a look at setting, and immediately things aren’t the same. Whereas the others start with longer, distant shots that slowly reveal the Senshi in question, we go directly from the establishing shot to a close-up on Minako playing the game. As the sequence progresses, we get closer still. We’re never afforded distance with Minako. In truth, she could be in the one crowded place out of all the Inners, surrounded by people and noise on all sides. But we actually don’t know because the camera never goes wide enough to say.

That’s the point. From the moment her part begins, we’re focused solely on her, so even if she IS in a sea of people, she’s still functionally alone. (And let’s take a moment to appreciate that as a basic essence of Minako.) The camera opens close on her because that’s how intimate this is for her. How personal.

Make no mistake: this is VERY personal for Minako.

I’ll come back to that in a second. First, I want to note another important difference in Minako’s scene than anyone else’s, again including Usagi’s. Which I keep bringing up because if anyone was going to be the “odd one out” or given “more” significance, you’d think it would be her. That it’s not is immensely important. In so many subtle ways, Minako’s feelings are being singled out and given particular attention and weight.

Right though, that difference. The others are all in stationary shots, looking out into the distance, never moving. Then there’s Minako. She never STOPS moving throughout this, jerking furiously on the steering wheel of the game. That Minako is MOVING is such an important detail for me, and I really can’t say enough about how much I love the creators’ willingness to break their own sequence and allow Minako to stand out like this. It’s following character over style, because Minako would NEED the extra distraction. The way her mind works, far too fast for her own good most of the time, she’d need the feeling of doing SOMETHING, even if that something is not steering a digital car into a digital highway shoulder. It gets even better, though, because it’s a way to highlight the other critical part of Minako’s sequence that lets it stand apart:

SHE’S SO FUCKING PISSED OFF

Minako’s expression is locked in a snarl as she thinks about Haruka, as she replays their conversations in her head. The other Inners, their faces are assorted degrees of sadness and regret.

Minako’s about to take someone’s fucking head off, and by “someone” I mean an insufferable butch noodle.

Of all the non-Usagi Inners, it’s clear that the strongest bond that’s been forged between the two groups is Haruka and Minako. I was just talking about how Rei didn’t really get any direct on-screen connection with either Haruka or Michiru, but Minako had TWO. She may have shared that first with Usagi, but Minako was the driving force every step of the way. What’s more, Episodes 92 and 100 both have scenes where the other girls get a hint of “the real” Haruka, and every time, those moments are between Minako and Haruka.

So let’s consider this scene’s basics. We have Minako, distracting herself while she thinks about a specific part of what’s upsetting her in this situation. She’s FURIOUS about it, and only getting angrier the more she thinks. And where does she pick to consider all of this? Not volleyball, which would be a perfect outlet and has been a key fixture for Minako this season.

She goes to the arcade. She goes to God Racing.

SHE GOES TO THE SPECIFIC PLACE WHERE SHE KEEPS CONNECTING WITH HARUKA

That decision is critical in placing Minako’s motivation right now. Volleyball is all about her, but God Racing is all about THEM. It’s where Haruka’s repeatedly found her. It’s where Haruka’s made her feel better. Even just the racing element has Haruka all over it. Which wonderfully brings us to what Minako’s actually thinking.

“But we’re the same. We’re Sailor Senshi,” Minako says. “Stop,” Haruka orders. “We’re looking for completely different things.”

Now it gets REALLY interesting, because I see several things going on here. On the one, we have the idea that they’re all Senshi and that should mean something. This comes up over and over again with Minako throughout the season, and has since the first second she met Uranus and Neptune.

Minako’s STILL pissed about it at the end of the season, and it’s kind of beautiful. You’re Senshi, ACT LIKE FUCKING SENSHI. I adore that this is her tact, that she’s just so so so angry that they dare to be Senshi and yet not on the same page as the rest of them. I love it from the perspective of a general trying to deal with renegade troops. And if one wanted to take it to some deeper glorious depths, you could even see Minako being pissed that they walk away from a duty she never can. YOU KNOW IF YOU WANTED. (Accepting here that MInako doesn’t quite understand the role of the Outers yet and is operating under the assumption that they all have basically the same job to do.)

Which is the Senshi level of things, and that would be delicious enough. But why stop there? Let’s consider the personal.

We’ve established that everything about this scene is tied up in Minako and Haruka specifically, so with that in mind, what do their statements to each other mean?

Minako: We understand each other. I get you and you get me. Haruka: No. You never knew me and none of that mattered.

It’s rejection of the friendship they were beginning to build. It’s Haruka’s rejection of Minako.

Minako’s not just angry, she’s HURT. Uranus’ rejection wasn’t just of them, or of Senshi and duty, but of HER SPECIFICALLY, which brings this divine extra stab in the heart to the whole thing.

HARUKA BETTER HAVE BROUGHT BACK A MONTH’S SUPPLY OF SNACKS AND PORN FROM THE GARGANTUAN AMOUNTS OF SEX WORLD TOUR THAT’S ALL I CAN SAY

#JW rewatches Sailor Moon #sms #sm ep 110 #I'M NOT EVEN PANDERING #THIS SHIT IS RIGHT THE FUCK THERE #in each of the girl's cases i think the creators built it from what they'd extended the inter-group relationships to be #and that's why we get minako able to stand out so heavily in a scene that would normally be 'sequence by numbers'#i kind of wish haruka had walked in at that moment though #i think minako might have ripped up the entire god driving machine and beaten her with it #minako aino #beautiful child minako #haruka tenoh #a novel by jet wolf

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ramblingsofthegoldenwitch · 7 years

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Umineko Ramblings: The Structure of The Umineko Universe

Since there’s a lot of confusion in this regard I’ve tried to come up with a graphic and an explaination on the Umineko universe. Note that there’s no clear explanation about it through all Umineko and that this is a fantasy world so, when Ryukishi created it, he made up its rules.

This is how I understand it. As usual I might be wrong so you’re free to reject my interpretation and make up your own.

First the ‘easy’ part as this is, more or less, clearer in Umineko.

Let’s start with:

Prime: Prime is the supposed ‘real’ world. Why the supposed ‘real’ world and not just ‘the real world’? Prime is the ‘real’ world for MetaBattler, MetaBeatrice/MetaSayo and MetaAnge. As Umineko asks us to care for those characters the most, the world they come from is the world we focus on, and we discharge all the others as possibilities that didn’t happen. Note how Lion’s world isn’t in Prime. From MetaBattler, MetaBeatrice/MetaSayo and MetaAnge’s perspective, Lion’s world isn’t real, it’s not Prime. From MetaLion’s perspective though, the opposite is true, His world is the real one, Prime, and MetaBattler, MetaBeatrice/MetaSayo and MetaAnge’s world is just a possibility.

Lion’s World: Lion’s world is the world in which Natsuhi didn’t reject Lion. It’s in a catbox that’s bigger than Beatrice's catbox.

Purgatorio: It’s the land that hosts the wandering souls of Sayo, Battler and then Ange. It’s not quite our afterlife as it can be reached by souls whose body is still alive but that are temporally ‘wandering’ on the borders between life and death. The borders of this land of souls aren’t well defined but, it seems that, if you solve the issues that are tormenting your soul, you can either go back in the living world (if your body is still alive) or move to the next step, heaven/the golden land.

The Golden Land: The supposed heaven. It’s unclear if it’s on a higher level than the Purgatorio or if it is on the same level but, since you can reach it only after going through the Purgatorio I placed it above it. Note that in Umineko places that are the equivalent of heaven on Earth for some characters (for example Beatrice’s imaginary world or the room of gold) are also called Golden Land. It's the place where everything is possible, negative feelings are left behind and nobody is unhappy and also the place that Sayo wants to reach with Battler and all the others who died during those fateful day.

Beatrice’s catbox: Fundamentally it’s the name given to the whole amount of possibilities for what could have happened during the 4th and the 5th on Rokkenjima. It contains the real world as well as the gameboards, the forgeries, the messages in the bottles and… everything else that could have happened. It helps to remember that although the games we saw being played present similarities with the messages in the bottles and Tohya’s forgeries, they also present differences so THEY AREN’T THE SAME THING and similarities are COINCIDENTAL.

Bern’s larger than Beatrice’s catbox: The ‘borders’ of this catbox aren’t clearly defined but it’s easy to speculate that starts in 1967, with Natsuhi being handed Lion and ends in 1986, with the island exploding and creating the catbox. As a result this catbox contains Beatrice’s catbox.

Ange’s catbox: As Ange disappeared in 1996 her fate was trapped in a catbox, spawning various possibilities among which: the one in which Ange went to Rokkenjima without meeting ‘Hachijo Tohya’ and died there (Ep 4), the one in which Ange managed to meet a person claiming to be ‘Hachijo Tohya’ (Ep 6), the one in which Ange killed Amakusa and Kuwabata (trick ending) and the REAL one in which Ange became Yukari Kotobuki (magic ending).

Sea of fragments: Basically the whole amount of endless possibilities that likely contains ‘words’ like ‘Higurashi’ and ‘Rose guns days’ and so on (no, I'm not going to explain what are 'Higurashi' and 'Rose Guns Days', all I say is they're other works from Ryukishi and that, if I didn't add in the graphic all the other works from him, it's just for space reasons, as they probably would all fit in the 'sea of fragments').

The Meta World: This term started, like ‘Prime’, as a term used by the fandom only and was used as a name for the Purgatorio since in the Purgatorio the characters were discussing what was going in the tales (which are in the lower levels). However not just the Purgatorio is a Meta World as Featherine’s world is a Meta world as well. It had been later used in official sources as well as the name of the ‘world of the witches’, so it can be considered ‘official’.

Featherine’s world: so far the highest level known. Who is in it can control everything in regards to the beings of lower levels, making who resides in the purgatorio a mere piece compared to them.

This for what regards the universes. Now… the characters.

Prime characters: The so called ‘real’ characters, alive and kicking and residing in Prime.

Piece characters: While this term is occasionally used by someone to refer to a person or to a fantasy character he’s using, in the Umineko universe this also usually refers to the alternate versions of the Prime characters that appear in games, forgeries and messages in the bottles. They’re considered characters of a lower level compared to Prime characters as Prime characters can control them.

Fantasy characters: Characters that were made up by someone else, and that might or might not have a body (usually called ‘vessel’) but that fundamentally do not exist (the Chiesters, Gaap) or aren’t living beings (Sakutaro) or are imaginary versions of real people (Kinzo after he’s dead, the 7 sisters, Virgilia, Ronove)…

Meta characters: They’re souls. They might be souls of deceased people or souls that are temporally ‘wandering’ in the land of souls or PERSONIFICATIONS of various things (in Japan even objects can have souls...). They’re considered being of a upper level compared to the Prime characters. It helps to remember that the one we call MetaBeatrice is actually the soul of a deceased Sayo, that MetaBattler is the part of Battler’s soul that ‘died’ when he lost his memories, that MetaAnge is living Ange’s soul that’s wandering after she tossed herself off a building. Dlanor instead is the personification of the Knox’s Decalogue.

Now, if you thought I explained till now wasn’t easy… well, take a good breath and prepare yourself for a headache because we get to the REALLY difficult part or, to be more specific, to Lambda, Bern and Featherine.

Although they’re generally grouped with the Meta characters, Lambda, Bern and Featherine are actually of another league.

Lambda and Bern are WANDERING WITCHES, that can move through ‘words’ or, more likely, through the various purgatories of each world. The Purgatorio we see is the one for ‘Prime’, but if we consider Prime as merely a possibility in the sea of fragments, well, each possibility likely has its own Purgatorio and Bern and Lambda seem to be able to visit those Purgatorios and, from here, to look down at the fragment that generated it. It seems they come from a specific fragment (the Higurashi one) but are apparently ‘cut’ from it and now look at ALL the fragments as if they were gameboards, fantasy stories. Due to this they can take someone residing in that fragment and make it ‘their piece’, ‘their alterego’, controlling it. It is speculated that actually that someone is their own alternate version in that fragment but as everything is left VERY vague we can’t be sure.

Featherine is… on a level higher than Bern and Lambda, a level that’s even less explained. For being of that higher level the land of souls are the equivalent of gameboards. To interact with Featherine you’ve to either reach her higher level or she can send her own piece version of the land of soul level.

It is unclear from which fragment Featherine comes from, if from the Higurashi one as well (being somewhat an ‘evolution’ of Hai-Ryūn Ieasomūru Jeda or of Hanyu as the manga seems to hint) or from the Prime one (where she would be a combination of Tohya and Ikuko’s souls or, if you prefer, the soul of their writing duo) or from a fragment we hadn’t seen yet and, due to unknown circumstances, she managed to move to a level higher than the land of souls or if she’s something completely different.

The time in Prime works differently compared to the time in the other levels so it doesn’t matter if in Prime Ikuko and Tohya are alive and well, Featherine might have had birth when Ikuko and Tohya died, or split ways or decided to stop writing as Hachijo Tohya and be around taking advantage just of this, so we can’t even say if she’s the soul of a living or of a deceased or of a ‘personification’. Really, we know way too few about her to tell for sure from where she came from.

Despite those many question marks about her, there are some things we can say in her regard.

First of all Featherine isn’t the same person as Ikuko or Tohya. Ikuko or Tohya are Prime characters. Featherine is a character of a higher level with a version of herself also having access to the… let’s call it middle level. Featherine is likely a soul, Ikuko and Tohya are living people. While they’re somehow connected, Ikuko doesn’t transform into Featherine like Tsukino Usagi transforms into Sailor Moon.

So what about the times in which she seems to do it?

What we’re seeing are actually gameboards. It’s a little like when Battler in Ep 8 all of sudden wears his cape to face Ange and Ange grows up from her 6 years old self.

The Ikuko we see in Ep 6 and also in the first part of Ep 8, is just a piece, not the real person and is placed on a gameboard that lies in the Ange’s catbox. We know that in Prime Ikuko’s meeting with Ange went differently from the one we saw in Ep 6 or at the beginning of Ep 8, so those two meetings are just two possibilities, not the real thing.

Featherine clearly has control over Piece Ikuko… but we don’t know if she has control over Prime Ikuko. Meta Battler doesn’t control his Prime body anymore after all and, while Meta Ange remains in the Purgatory, her Prime body is unconscious. When she wakes up she seems to be able to bring back memories of her adventure in the land of the souls… but in the moment she wakes up Meta Ange leaves the land of the souls so this isn’t exactly helping us to understand how the connection between Featherine and Ikuko/Tohya works.

What now about the Featherine in the Land of souls? We see she can stop time and write off Lambda as being killed.

Very likely the Featherine who stops time is the one in the upper level. The one Lambda was fighting off is the Featherine in the ‘Land of the Souls’ world or middle level… in short the equivalent of a ‘Metapiece’ to the Featherine of a higher level.

So… is Featherine writing Umineko?

Well, actually Umineko is being written by Ryukishi and, unless we speculate that Featherine is his piece and self insertion, she’s just a character in the story… but I get what you want to ask, are we just reading a gameboard that Featherine is writing?

The Featherine in the Land of the soul level comments many times that she’s just RECORDING Ange’s story. In short yes, she’s writing it, but she’s not making it up, she’s just writing down what’s going on.

In short Ange is taking her own decisions and this is her story and Featherine is just writing a… ‘biography’, not a tale. So, back to Lambda, why could Featherine stop Lambda?

Even though this is Ange’s story, it’s possible that Featherine can embellish it as she sees fit. We can see the fight between Featherine and Lambda as a metaphor. Featherine represents Ange’s story that must go on. Lambda can’t stop the story from continuing, hence she certainly dies because the story must certainly continue toward its resolution. We know that Featherine is just a ‘spectator’ in a sense, as she doesn’t plan to stop Ange from doing this or that, she just watches and records. She will watch and record as Ange will come to her inevitable face off with Bern, or better with the truth that A MIRACLE CAN’T HAPPEN and that her family won’t come back to her.

So in Ep 8 Featherine is likely only transcribing what’s going on. Ange remains her own person with her own freedom of choice and is not Featherine’s piece and therefore moved by her. Featherine can, at best, influence her, but, ultimately, it’s up to Ange to decide.

If Ange were a mere puppet in Featherine’s hands the story of her struggles would have no purpose. She wouldn’t be struggling because she’s still finding inside herself the strength to fight against a sad fate but just because ‘the writer wants her to do so’. Even though we, as readers, know that Ange is a character, as long as Ange is a real person in the Umineko world and in control of her own life, we can see her as a person and take her as a model. If she’s just a puppet without will… the theme of the story would fall apart. If the purpose of the story was that Ange is a puppet that fights and win because Featherine says so, we wouldn’t empathize with her.

Ange needs to be like us. On her own, fighting the only way she knows how and writing, with her own actions, her own story.

At least... this is my interpretation of the chaotic universe that is Umineko. As the canon is REALLY unclear on many things I’m not afraid to admit I might have made mistakes in understanding how it works.

As the canon doesn’t really gives us many info, many things remains unexplained and we can only speculate on them.

I’ve seen theories of all sorts to explain Featherine and her ties with Higurashi (same goes with Bern and Lambda) but as long as Ryukishi doesn’t give us confirmation... we’re all making speculations and everyone is free to choose the theory they prefer.

I’m sorry for who’s confuse as I have no idea how to explain things better and I’m not even 100% sure my explanation is 100% right.

I tried my best but I’m just me and so this was all I was capable to do.

Please, don’t stop to just my explanation but keep on reading Umineko and trying to figure things on your own.

You might be capable to find an explanation that’s even better than mine! ^_^

#Umineko #Umineko Chiru #Meta World #Rokkenjima Prime #Gameboard #Sea of Fragments #Catbox #Umineko Places #Featherine Augustus Aurora #Umineko Cast #Umineko Ramblings

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docholligay · 5 years

Note

HaruMichi, "you don't have to stay"

Part of the Talismans rewrite! 1700 words, the entire series is here. I hope you enjoy!

You die, and then you don’t. This was not an understanding Michiru had of the natural order of things, but like so many things in Michiru Kaioh’s life, and death, resurrection had been forced upon her, however she might have felt about it. She died on the stone floor of a half-constructed cathedral, and she woke up in her own bed, with Haruka beside her, and while in many stories this might have been the happy ending, in many stories there was not a quietly stewing butch lesbian sitting at the end of the bed, glowering as she gingerly pulled on an old tshirt, wincing a little as she raised her arm.

Recovery had been slow, from death, for the both of them. Still there was a dull ache behind Michiru’s breastbone, tender to the touch, though if you had asked her she might have quite melodramatically said it was caused as much by Haruka’s cold nature as it was the force of having their vital essence ripped from their bodies.

But Haruka had recovered. She could rise, and dress herself, and feed herself, and so she was packing the small duffel of things that had stayed in the apartment during her convalescence. She had barely spoken to Michiru in the past two weeks. Michiru had hope, once, when Haruka was first coming back to the world, still barely conscious, and reached out for Michiru’s hand, mumbling her name softly. Her eyes had opened, sleepily, still that beautiful wash of grey Michiru saw in all of her dreams, and she had looked at Michiru with love in her eyes.

“You saved me.” She’d mumbled.

No, she had thought, even then, for you died as well, and I cannot bear to ask you how it happened. But I tried, my Haruka. I tried with everything I had in me, and every way I knew how.

As Haruka’s body had healed, the scar had seemed to form over her heart, her face pulling into a scowl, her smile saved only for Mina, and Usagi, and even Mako, once, but never for Michiru.

And now she sat at the end of Michiru’s bed, leaving again.

Michiru Kaioh did not consider herself to be a good person. It had been easy to be cruel to Haruka, she had known where to place the knife between her ribs, she had known to make Haruka hate her, how to stoke that fire until it blazed and blazed even against the torrential rain, she had known that if only she could make Haruka want her dead, Haruka would live.

It hadn’t worked. It hadn’t worked because Haruka was good. It hadn’t worked, because Haruka was the sort of woman who would rescue the maiden even if the maiden told her she was stupid, or low, or that she would never know a royal touch. It hadn’t worked because Haruka was the sort of woman Michiru could never deserve.

Michiru did not deserve her, but Michiru was selfish, and Michiru wanted the things she wanted, and so she stood at the edge of the bed, and spoke.

“Haruka.” There was a waver in her voice that puzzled even her, as if she could not grasp the weight of her own fear.

Haruka looked up at her noncommittally. “Yeah?”

“Are you absolutely certain you’d like to return to your apartment? I have so much room here–”

Haruka shook her head. “I’m not gonna play the same game, Michiru.” She pulled at her shirt, taking her watch from the chest at the end of the bed, the cheap one Michiru had not bought her, “You’ll just do it again.”

Michiru sat down next to her. “I think it fair to say that this experience might have changed things between us.”

Haruka’s eyes were cold. “It didn’t make me any smarter or snootier, and we know that’s the problem.”

Michiru sighed and closed her eyes, trying to channel every ounce of patience within her. “I was cruel.”

“Yeah,” Haruka nodded aggressively, “ and I’m pretty stupid, you’re right, but I’m not so stupid I’ll stay here and get…fucked with again.” She reached over for her sweater, a little too quickly, and shuddered at the pain of it.

“Please stop speaking of yourself in that manner,” Her voice was soft, “and please have a care, you are still healing.”

Haruka gave a mirthless chuckle. “I can’t fucking deal with this anymore. I’m going home. To my low-class apartment, with my bad education, and my scuffed shoes, and my shitty food.”

“Haruka, you perfect little fool,” she huffed, ignoring the pain of it, annoyed, “I was lying. Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Have you not discerned all of this, quite yet? Do you imagine that I only just realized you come from a different world than I? That if it were to be a problem for my heart, I might have divined that sooner?”

Haruka popped to her feet, angier now still, and growled. “What the fuck do you mean?”

“What I mean to say is–”

“You know what?” Haruka waved her off, “I don’t care. I don’t–”

Many things in life had been forced upon Michiru Kaioh. She had been a trilingual preschooler whose playtime hours were filled with violin and painting and manners. She had been made a soldier for some unknown thing, which now seemed to be the protection of a girl Michiru had best known for crying into Rei’s shoulder and feeding doughnuts to squirrels. She had cut out her own heart to save Haruka’s life, only to find that Haruka’s death was just another thing she was required to swallow, with great grace and fine composure.

She was quite tired of it all.

“No!” Michiru stood up and stepped into Haruka’s face, her voice ice and fire all at once, volume raised higher than Haruka had ever heard. “I saw your death in my visions. I saw it every single day, that you would die protecting me. That no matter how I moved the pieces, the only way you would live is if you chose not to come for me. I love you! I could not watch you die, do not ask me, I cannot bear it! I will not! Not even for you.”

It hurt, to yell. It felt good, to hurt.

Haruka bit her lip. “That isn’t true. You’re lying.”

Michiru laughed. “We are soldiers in a vast intergalactic war of magic, but that I love you is what you find so unbelievable? Ask Rei, she rather knows the tale whether she wishes to be a part of it all or not.”

For a moment, anger left Haruka’s face and was replaced by a brief sadness. Sadness that she hadn’t realized, sadness that Michiru had hurt herself in hurting Haruka, sadness that none of it had worked after all. Sadness at some ineffable fact Michiru did not know, and could not touch.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Michiru closed her eyes and gave her head a soft shake. “My love, please do not insult us both by telling me you might have listened. If I had told you,” Her voice took on a false merriness.“Oh my love, I have foreseen your death, and the only way to prevent it is to allow me to fight this battle alone, with roughly seventy to one odds that I will be killed in the attempt,’ you would have ignored me entirely. Your gallantry would not have allowed it.” She touched Haruka’s cheek, “Your gallantry did not allow it when you hated me.”

Haruka took a step back from her, clouds passing through her eyes, sunlight and shadow reflected as each thought turned one over the other. Then she closed her eyes, balled her fists, and slammed one down atop the chest of drawers.

“You should have let me choose!”

The force of the impact rippled through her, and she gave a little gasp as it came to her sternum, doubling her over as she gripped at her chest. Remembering how her heart was removed, reminded that it was put back.

Michiru touched her back gently. “Please don’t feel you must stay. You are right to hate me. I only–” she took a breath, and composed herself, “I only wanted to tell you how I love you. How I was horrid, but only in the service of love. I longed to save you, and to protect you, Haruka. I do, even still.”

Haruka slowly lifted herself to standing, blinking, and tugged at her shirt. “I don’t know what to do.”

“If you could learn again, in a small way, to love me–”

“I never stopped, Michi.” She looked out the window. “You just hurt me.”

Michiru sighed. It was wrong, and it was selfish, to ask her to stay. Haruka was handsome, and good, and despite her minor blemishes she could meet a lovely girl who would understand her better, who she could understand, a woman who was not some unknowable alien of the deep, but a real and warm person. If Michiru would let her go, she could find happiness elsewhere.

But Michiru was selfish, and wanted the things she wanted.

“Haru–”

“Don’t make decisions for me anymore.” Haruka looked back from the window, but did not meet Michiru’s eyes, only took one of Michiru’s hands in both of hers. “I get to say. You can tell me stuff, but I get to say too.”

“I think that seems rather reasonable.” Michiru nodded, and squeezed her hand. “We will face this destiny together.”

“I mean, if you want to pick out noodles and can’t get a hold of me, that’s okay, but–”

“Yes, my love, I rather do understand the point you’re driving home.”

“I’m gonna live with Mina for a while, I just–” Haruka looked up at her and smiled. “Let’s go on a date. You and me. It’s been awhile.”

Michiru slipped her hand over the top of Haruka’s. “Anywhere you would like to go, and however you’d like to go there.”

You die, and then you don’t. Hearts break, and then they mend. Fire burns, and new and stronger things grow in the ashes. There is a destiny, and a girl who feeds doughnuts to squirrels rejects it.

Love abides.

#Man how pissed is Michiru gonna be when she finds out Haruka killed herself #seolh #Hollibirth Gala #Birthday writing day

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