Posts made by Jabberwok

Ah, so his mask was a mercy on us all.

@Nobodyman said in Academy Awards:

Also, if possible, maybe we can just change the thread title to Academy Awards.

Done!

Michelle Yeoh's probably got a slightly uphill battle for Best Actress since Cate Blanchett feels like a clear but not overwhelming favorite. EEAAO leading all films with 11 nominations is pretty incredible, especially since it somehow wasn't nominated for visual effects.

It also looks like a pretty good showing for Netflix. Don't know how many awards they'll actually get but loads of noms for All Quiet on the Western Front plus a nomination for The Sea Beast (over Lightyear, etc.) is already quite validating.

Yep, fully called it. Nagant showing up surprised me though. I get the feeling this chapter will be a big one for thematics once the series is done.

@Nectar said in My Hero Academia II - A true Hero:

I'm shocked Gentle stopped the prisoners by himself. Was sure Rappa helped. And then he bounced U.A.... Just how powerful is he?

Gentle's getting boosted by La Brava's Quirk too.

Theory time: Shiryuu is on Egghead Island and is the one responsible for the Frontier Done defenses going down. He and a few other BB Pirate members plan to use the CP0 chaos as a way to coerce Vegapunk into joining them or kidnap him if that doesn't work.

I'm like 90% sure that the La Brava won't be able to stop Skeptic in time and the school will fall, but Gentle will show up to bounce it back.

Wednesday was decently fun. I have some quibbles with Wednesday's role in solving the mystery and the death of one of the characters, but overall it was enjoyable and the right amount of camp. Season peaked with her dance number though.

@Sakonosolo Underworld is effectively two episodes since the previous one manages both set up and moving Ermes and Jolyne into the main trap. Sky High is definitely a bit compressed.

@zeltrax225 said in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part II: Do the Dio Walk!:

@Jabberwok Except if the release wasn't earlier, the gap would have been wholly manageable. It doesn't take anything more than a bit of common sense to look at the situation that oh hey, Netflix brought Jojo over to the platform and announced it at a major Japanese anime event, so perhaps there are some changes that they want from David Productions. Maybe the use of entirely in your original comment should be reconsidered when DP has worked on the series for so long and would have a way better grasp of pacing and schedules than anyone else. Why would they shoot themselves in the foot like this without a third-party interference? Of course, they are not entirely blameless for accepting the deal but any thought given into this situation and anyone can see what's going on.

You might have heard that there were some major structural changes within David Productions in the last few years that resulted in JoJo changing animation teams. You might have also heard about a number of other properties and productions being delayed due to the global pandemic.

I think it's unmistakably a hate crime. Shouldn't be a surprise though, unfortunately, given the scapegoating and fear mongering regarding trans people (and drag) in the recent years.

It feels incredibly disgusting and depressing to think this was only a matter of time.

I think the Spinner stuff has been pretty effective, but yeah the resolution to the racial violence is rather trite. That kind of thing is rather difficult to write effectively when it's suddenly shifted to the forefront after never getting that much focus, so I wasn't really expecting much.

@sgamer82 I believe she actually said she enjoyed working with three presidents, not that she only worked with three.

Nancy Pelosi announces she's stepping down as leader of House Democrats, honoring a 2018 informal agreement to set term limits on senior positions.

https://apnews.com/article/nancy-pelosi-house-future-plans-updates-3839ff31c605efa0ec1ee4ff004b72d2

It's Washington who famously warned against partisanship in his farewell address. Jefferson was one of the founders of the initial opposition party (Democratic-Republicans). He pretty much whole-heartedly embraced the idea of political parties.

@Envy said in American Politics: A Brand New Day:

Can someone explain to me why people are being so positive about this election? It looks like we'll end up with a Republican House and possibly Senate. But people are like "We avoided the Red Wave!1!!". The way I see it, even though the Republicans did not pick up every seat they wanted, and it's a strong midterm showing for Democrats being the party in power, but... all of that can not make me feel better about us losing the congress. It's like, sure pat yourself on the back for it not being the worst case scenario... but Republicans are extreme, and Republicans in the majority in anything is very dangerous and nothing I can feel good about.

We're not getting abortion rights back in my state. There's no chance of a bill passing that would codify abortion laws nationally anymore.

True, most major national legislation will grind to a halt, but Sinema and Manchin we're already blocking much of that. A Democrat-controlled Senate will still allow Biden to appoint and confirm most judges of his choice, and sets up the Democrats better for 2024 and 2026. The House by itself can't enact anything, just stop stuff. And who knows, Pelosi might be able to strike deals with a few moderate Rs here and there.

There are also a number of victories on the state level. Democratic Governors in Wisconsin, Kansas, Michigan, New Mexico, and Pennsylvania will be able to counteract GOP efforts in those states to undermine elections, women's rights, and more; we still have competitive races in Arizona and Nevada to watch too. There are notable pickups or successful defenses, like preventing a legislative supermajority in North Carolina, taking both houses in Michigan, and finally taking the House in Pennsylvania. The fact that gains were made anywhere in midterms, after gerrymandering, is impressive.

This doesn't solve things for a lot of people, but it's genuinely good and important for many others. The odds were quite low that Democrats would hold on to both houses of Congress, but this is basically the second-best case scenario. And a lot of us are quite happy after expecting much worse.

Given FromSoft games' notoriety with camera issues and locking on, I'd be a bit concerned about anything involving too much shooting.

On the other hand, Sekiro and Bloodborne have been some of their best games so they've shown talent at tweaking mechanics to fit a genre.

Well, looks like the Senate might be a push. Cortez-Masto is slowly slipping behind Laxalt in Nevada but Mark Kelly seems to have a good lead in Arizona. Looks like control of the Senate might once again come down to a Georgia runoff.

Could things have been better for Democrats? Sure. But this has certainly been one of the better-case scenarios for the midterms.

@Robby said in American Politics: A Brand New Day:

Right now in Georgia its 49-49, with Walker about 20K votes ahead. It's probably going to be too close to call until mail in ballots are counted. If it follows the same pattern as 2020, well... Gerogia flipped to blue with the mail ins, but I have no idea if the balance is going to be as heavy this time as it was in 2020 since "the panedemic is over" and all.

Either way the libertarian party looks to be the spoiler.

It's an absolute dead heat, which is probably a decent result for Warnock. He's likely to gain a bit from mail-ins though I imagine not enough to avoid a runoff, but Walker might have been buoyed by other Republicans on the ballot in a way that Warnock wasn't. Warnock should have solid odds in the runoff.

I'm cautiously optimistic so far about minimizing losses. Warnock is in a close race for GA Senate but looks to be maintaining a narrow lead, and results look decent so far in PA. Also noteworthy is that the pro-choice options for amendments in Michigan and Kentucky(!) are both winning.

Also, looks like the MA governor seat just got called as a blue flip. Congrats to our nation's first openly lesbian governor!

It's midterm election night, folks! Hope all Americans out there have voted already.

Early results suggest competitive races are in fact competitive. Florida's a lost cause though, until Democrats can finally put forth a stronger candidate for state office.

@BellisarioFaith I can't recommend them enough. My avatar is someone's fanart of the main character, Gideon. One of the most impressive feats the author Tamsyn Muir does is make each book function as an excellent locked-box mystery of one kind or another while still also maintaining a strong sense of continuity and cohesive overall worldbuilding, all while drastically switching tones and styles between books. I adore the first book but I think the second one is where Muir really gets to show off the depth of her talent. Also, memes.

Additionally, Nona the Ninth has a strong ending that sets up a lot of questions but really takes its time getting there. A lot of the book felt like we were frustratingly locked into a perspective where not only would other characters know more than the audience but the protagonist herself would avoid acknowledging things to us. It's not bad, but it's easily my least favorite Locked Tomb book so far.

Finished The Golden Enclaves. I think I liked it significantly less than The Deadly Education but slightly more than The Last Graduate. I liked that the ending established optimism and a potential change to the flawed world system while also highlighting that change was unwelcome to a majority of the enclaves. I also appreciated the reversal with Orion and El's roles. However, the frequent jetsetting felt excessive and not particularly organic, and El felt more in her own head than ever. I found myself occasionally pushing her to actually move forward rather than just thinking for pages and pages in the middle of action.

I noticed the same thing. Unclear if it was intentional or an oversight on the kids' part.

I think the point Horikoshi is making is reasonably potent, that political forces frequently stoke and ride the anger of the masses for their own gain. Making Spinner into a big stupid brute who can be easily controlled is a great way of silencing the actual opinions of the symbol/figurehead. It's definitely tragic, but it makes a ton of sense from AfO's perspective.

Earlier, we saw Spinner uncomfortable about being pushed into the public eye as a symbol for heteromorphs. As much as he was ostracized, we mainly saw Spinner looking for companionship from Shigaraki and the others. AfO simply capitalized on Spinner's desire to be like Stain (a symbol) and his own feelings of powerlessness from the MVA and Raid arcs. I really don't think Spinner would be able to offer much in a "battle of wills" because he was always the one who had the most doubts about AfO and Shigaraki's greater plans. We've had hints of this anger at racism against heteromorphs in Spinner, but it was a secondary characteristic that played more into his desire for belonging and acceptance.

So I think this works well as a plot development because AfO gets to use Spinner for his own gain while also removing a source of friendship for Shigaraki. Spinner, as maybe the least villainous League of Villains member, becomes an object of our pity and a much more concrete symbol of AfO's evil than any of his large-scale plans. I find it to be an effective form of telling this tragedy, even if the sudden focus on Shoji is a bit abrupt.

Surprise appearances by Gen 8 starters I guess? I'm aggressively neutral on the song but the art was a lot of fun, and the anime recreation of the Movie was great.

Netflix never had control over when the second cour would be ready for release. That delay was entirely on David Productions/WB's side and you'd think people would have heard that enough times now.

Batch release is only really effective for major or shorter-form properties, though, and it seems like Netflix is realizing that. Popular as it is among the dedicated fanbase, JoJo is made for a weekly release.

@Satsuki said in What are you reading? (Literature):

The Golden Enclaves, book 3 of the Scholomance trilogy by Naomi Novik.

I can't love this author enough. Like Harry Potter? Want something darker or more intense? Want a heroine who's half Indian? Feeling betrayed by J.K. Rowling and can't read HP anymore? This is your series.

Ugh, I'm dying to get to Golden Enclaves but I'm slowly getting through Tamsyn Muir's third Locked Tomb book, Nona the Ninth, first. It's...very clearly a book that slowly spun out of a small gap in a planned trilogy.

Dang, those are some juicy panels at the end. Horikoshi's always been quite good at close-ups of faces.

Mirio is a beautiful boy and has consistently been one of the best characters since his introduction.

Just watched Do Revenge, a generally well-made Netflix film starring Maya Hawke and Camilla Mendes. The first 2/3 of it is a very fun send-up of movies like John Tucker Must Die or Cruel Intentions, but there's a vicious twist late in the movie that's initially excellent but sends the movie careening to recover from. The last quarter involved a lot of hasty, unjustified character development and convenient actions and it's unfortunately apparent how much the writers were struggling to resolve everything. A real shame, since the rest of the movie was pretty good.

Speaking of, HFIL episode 7 just dropped.

It'd be kind of cliché after having a "villain" protagonist in Awakening but I kind of hope this new MC is a Fire Emblem Lord chimera grown in a lab. Lampshade how generically anime he looks.

That's gotta be some of the worst MC hair I've ever seen.

Team Star look like bullies in the same ways that MCU Flash Thompson is a "bully." They're sneaking off campus on their mopeds during lunch to get boba from the mall. Truly rebellious.

Place your bets on the length of this inevitable doorstopper! I'm going to guess 1400 pages.

Alaska's a bit idiosyncratic and Palin is Palin so I don't know how much this win can be extended to the nation as a whole, but it's hardly a bad sign. Peltola won in Alaska's first ranked-choice election over both Palin and a moderate Republican, and will face them again in the regular election this fall.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/31/politics/alaska-house-seat-ranked-choice-ballots/index.html

@Nitwit said in American Politics: A Brand New Day:

Well, saw this.
https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1002434881952948377/1014215593978777653/IMG_1238.png

Don’t know what to think of it but it might piss off a lot of Americans who own those guns as most would refuse to get rid of them.

In the interest of keeping news posted in the News section accurate, please use primary sources/credible links wherever possible. In this case, that would mean linking the original Independent article instead of a discord image of a reddit post. The latter obviously leaves a lot more room for Photoshop or other methods to spread disinformation.

Thanks!

@Ivotas said in Post-Wano plotline roundup: Law, Kid and the other supernovas:

@Trueblade74 said in Post-Wano plotline roundup: Law, Kid and the other supernovas:

I'm still upset that Law vs Hawkins happened offscreen.

I'm still upset or should I rather say confused at the entire controntation between the two. IIRC Hawkins is holding Law's crew hostage and using his ability on them to protect himself from being hurt. And Hawkins agrees to let the prisoners go in exchange for Law because he's afraid that he would go the "I have nothing to lose" route by cutting Hawkins until he is defeated even he might end up hurting his crew. So he really expects that Law, who gives himself up in order to save his own crew would actually really cut through his own crew to hurt Hawkins? Am I missing something here or is this really how this scene was meant to work? Because to this day I believe that I've missed an integral part of the entire situation.

My impression was more that Law could make the confrontation a lot more difficult by attempting to escape or otherwise resisting. I doubt Hawkins was too worried about actually being injured, but perhaps Law's Surgeon of Death reputation gave him pause.

@Ubiq I read this and thought it was a troll post. Had to try again two more times to process the cruel sincerity.

@andre Funny, Nope is my second favorite movie this year after EEAAO in part because I thought Nope's climax went on too long.

You're hitting the slog- Book 6 has some decent stuff but things are noticeably bogged down by now. You'll get a few big scenes over the next few books but for the most part it's rough going until you get to Book 11.

So take your time, avoid getting burned out.

Meanwhile, on my very sporadic first run, I ran straight into the Godskin Apostle at the bottom of Caelid Tower at level 51. I knew I was way under leveled since his heavy attacks were initially one-shotting me but when I finally beat him I was shocked at how many runes I got. Feeling pretty accomplished and ready for the rest of this horrible diseased landscape!

Look what's in a brand new location, complete with specific rules! Please be sure to give them a read- we want this space to be open to respectful discussion.

One thing we touched on when reviving the forum was the possibility of creating a bot to periodically sample news recaps, much in the same way that @sgamer82 has done in the past. If that's something you all would appreciate, it's something we can eventually look into (after a much-deserved break for Cinder!)

The media project in development is almost certainly Mistborn or Way of Kings. Personally I'm inclined to believe it's Mistborn- Sanderson's said he definitely envisions it as a movie and it's a good deal more approachable than Stormlight.

I think you could get some great live-action Mistborn movies but SA would be better animated in the vein of Castlevania or Legend of Vox Machina.

My impression was very much that Bakugo's heart exploded internally rather than getting punctured by Shigaraki- the rupture seemed to extend outward and the impact panel of Shiggy's blow didn't feel clear enough to justify being apparently fatal.

Very curious to see how this is resolved and what it all means. I've seen a boatload of theories on how Bakugo might be saved but my favorite is Overhaul saving him.

In classic Horikoshi fashion, light on choreography but heavy on spectacle and emotions.

Chapter's gonna look great animated.

It's clearly not going to pass but it's a decent symbolic effort and it gets opponents on record, which could be useful for November.

@wolfwood:

Wait, is that Marcos as in i stole your shit and bought an obscene amount of shoes Marcos?

Of course not, that's My parents raised me to appreciate the citizens before we randomly moved to Hawaii, and now I'm an approachable guy running for President on a whim and not because I owe billions in taxes Marcos.

For what it's worth, Democrats have tried to pass legislation to make voting more accessible. 2019's and 2021's HR1 would have improved campaign financing, expanded absentee voting, and made Election Day a federal holiday, among other things. You could very easily argue that one of the reasons turnout was so high in 2020 was because so many states temporarily expanded mail-in voting, so it's easy to believe this bill would have genuinely increased turnout. It died in the Senate, naturally.

NPR did a recent article on possible compromises with bipartisan support. The current idea focuses on both modestly expanding voting accessibility and adding audits/cybersecurity training, all in exchange for federal funding. It's not especially strong but it does have a chance of actually passing.

This fucking sucks.

The Supreme Court has fully revealed its naked partisan illegitimacy, and it's going to put millions of women at risk with this decision. But if there's a silver lining to any of this, it's that Roe v. Wade and the defense of other Right to Privacy issues like gay marriage are the rallying point that Democrats have desperately needed.

The House isn't lost. Redistricting generally helped Democrats, as most Republican states played defensively and Democrats tended to be more aggressive. The national margin Democrats need to win the House went from about 3% to 1%, and some oddsmakers give Dems a 1 in 3 or 4 chance of retaining the House. It's not over.

The Senate also isn't lost. Democrats have a moderately favorable field, as Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Wisconsin are all extremely possible flips. Losing Georgia or even Nevada doesn't mean defeat- the Senate is basically a toss-up according to polls.

It's not over. Keep fighting, keep protesting, keep up the pressure. The agenda may not have been accomplished, but pressure on the left led to the most progressive Democratic platform in basically ever. It stalled out just shy of the finish line, yes, but we've gotten closer than ever. You're still making a difference.

Don't give up hope.

Australia's basically the Canada to China's US, in that Australia is a respected presence but China is very much the economic and diplomatic powerhouse in the region. Except that those two don't share cultural roots so relations can be significantly more fraught.