CatMack

I don't really have a prediction outside of it most likely involving Mulan since those two announcements were practically simultaneous. But I do want to point out that literally no one in the show is confirmed straight. By which I mean no one has stated that they only prefer the opposite sex. Bisexuals exist. I am one. But Cat, you say, everyone is in a heterosexual relationship! If someone is bisexual, being in a heterosexual relationship doesn't make someone not bisexual anymore than a sofa bed stops being a sofa bed because you can only see the sofa part when it's folded up. Do I think all or even just most of the characters on this show are bi? No, I think most likely the writers think of most of these characters as straight, and therefore they will continue to be written that way. But a character like Ruby, who's unattached at the moment (since her former almost possible love interest is now a regular on another show)? If she were paired with Mulan it wouldn't make her out of character just because she's been shown attracted to men. It would make her bisexual.

I don't really get complaints about Merlin looking too young. They've already said they aren't doing time travel this season, and Merlin was involved with the creation of the Dark One which happened long ago, so that means the character is actually quite old. So he doesn't look it, so what? Cora could shapeshift into anyone at will, they don't' even have to retcon anything to make an old Merlin appear young. He wants to look young, he looks young, as simple as that. The age of the actor doesn't matter in a character like this. The actor's ability to act like a very old being in a young body is important, but we've seen absolutely nothing of this actor's performance yet so nobody has anything to base an opinion on. I'm as cynical about this show as the next person but this feels like looking for things to complain about.

I just went trough the CS tag up to the last thing I saw posted last night and I have no idea what this is supposed to be referring to.

I get thinking actual real life relationships between costars are adorable. The fact that Snow White and Prince Charming are married in real life is stinking cute beyond words. The stunt doubles for Max and Furiosa falling in love on the set of Mad Max Fury Road and getting married? Again, they're adorable and precious and it gives me a warm fuzzy feeling because happy relationships are delightful and that's a great "how we met" story. But those are actual real relationships. And thinking "hey, that's really cute" isn't a particularly deep emotional investment. It's when people get really attached to the idea of a relationship that doesn't actually exist, to the point of acting like real people are just characters they can move around in a story like dolls, is bizarre to me. You'd think I'd be used to it by now, but nope. And I do think the proximity to actors on social media like twitter, as apposed to back in the livejournal days and before where fandom was more segregated, makes it creepier.

Yeah, I don't really get the hate for her tweets. So she's excited to be working on a big name show and is promoting it in a positive way, so what? We may disagree with her assessment but she's entitled to her opinion and she may genuinely believe they're turning out great stuff. And even if she doesn't really personally think it's the best thing ever and is just saying that to promote it, again, so what? I run the Twitter feed for my job, it's literally in my job description to post positive things no matter what I may personally feel about our product. I have the luxury of that social media stuff being under the brand name, not my name. Writers, and actors, etc, on social media have to promote their work under their own personal banner. She's not being inappropriate, so whether we agree with her or not there's nothing wrong with her posting positive things. That's just not how social media promotion or PR in general works and to expect her to be chastised for promoting the show in a positive way is beyond ludicrous.

Rape victims often take awhile to fully process what's happened to them. That's why sometimes women who have been raped will be "friendly" with their rapists for awhile afterward which is often used as "proof" they couldn't really have been raped. I don't have any problem with Jamie's initial reaction. He's been freed from a nightmare and is with people he cares about. It's not until later after he's had time to really reflect on what happened, and when he's weak and getting sick from infection, does his mental state really start to deteriorate. While there's no "right" way to experience trauma, mood swings is 100% normal and it's pretty dangerous to assume it's not. I have a problem with 99% of the rape Gabaldon includes in the books, but the way she handled Jamie's is relatively well done.

Do we know for sure that Guinevere betrays Arthur on Once or are we just assuming because that's the most common telling? After all, the most recent TV incarnation of the couple (on BBCs Merlin) was portrayed as true love that ha to overcome obstacles to be together, with Lancelot being a complication but not a permanent obstacle. I'm not saying A/G will be all sunshine and roses on Once, but there's certainly precedent for alternate versions of the story, and Once loves to change established narratives. So unless there's been confirmation that I missed that Once is for sure going with Guinevere betraying Arthur with Lancelot, I'm not going to assume paralleling CS with them is meant to foreshadow horrible betrayal on the horizon.

Dammit, every time this show (or the spoilers, in the case of the last couple weeks) makes me angry and I consider dropping it, they trot out these two to be amazing and I just can't seem to quit.

How about Max: Get Knocked Down, Get Back Up.

You know, this thread title really kind of bothers me the more I think about it. This entire show is about people struggling to eek out the best existence they can from a shitty way of life, which often involves making drastic and potentially disastrous decisions, which often involves being in a constantly perilous position where one wrong move could send their plans crashing to the ground. Like, that is literally true of every single character on this show. Even the men, who are generally in a more favorable position given the sexism of the time period, are constantly at risk because of the lifestyle and the choices they make trying to survive and better their lives. Yet somehow Max is the only character who seems to get constantly insulted for taking risks. And despite being called some form of stupid pretty much every episode no matter what she does or how it turns out, she actually had arguably the best season of all the characters in terms of her plans coming to fruition. She's coming up aces by the end of season 2. And yeah, that might change next season. Just like the fortunes of all the characters might change drastically at any moment because that is literally the entire point of the show. Maybe we should stop insulting Max's intelligence when so far she seems to be the only character capable of keeping a plan together and not fucking it up by fucking her ex or impulsively killing her best friend in a panic or any of the other horrible, stupid decisions we've seen other characters make.

Does anyone know what the tweet was the he's apparently deleted that caused people to accuse him of saying Zelena didn't rape Robin?

It's so hard to decide. It's a trainwreck and it's absolutely ridiculous and I can't look away.

Sometimes this show makes me want to drink. Sometimes the fandom makes me want to drink even more.

People called Agent Carter a bomb too even though it pretty consistently won its timeslot and the TV execs were consistent with saying they were happy with the numbers. People were shocked, SHOCKED, when it was renewed even though anyone paying attention shouldn't have been. I think people just want to see Marvel fail, it's become such a juggernaut, any sign that the bubble is bursting and people are all over it ready to declare something a failure. I may have my issues with the movie but it's clearly performing perfectly acceptably, even if it's not Marvel's biggest runaway hit ever (which no one ever expected it to be).

At the end of the day everyone is entitled to their opinion and I'm not gonna argue with people because that gets tedious, but I do want to address a couple points. Marvel has created a lot of awesome female characters, but they've consistently received a lot of criticism, from a lot of different corners, for how they use them (or don't use them). This is the same studio that swore up and down they'd love to do a Black Widow movie that everyone keeps asking for but gosh darn it there's just no time - and then proceeded to completely rearrange their multi year schedule to insert yet another Spiderman movie that literally no one asked for. They have clear priorities, and treating their female characters as worthy of being front and center isn't one of them. They exist to support men, that's it. So I'm not gonna give them any slack on giving Hope almost nothing to do in the final act of the movie, or on having her personality basically disappear once her dad told her what really happened to her mother. And hey, I get that not everyone wants to analyse every piece of media they see, but those debates are gonna keep happening with or without you. As for Ant Man specifically, I didn't necessarily literally need it to be Hope's movie. Have it be about Scott, sure. He's our entry point into the story and the technology. But having Hope actually suit up in the movie itself would have fixed a lot of problems. First of all, no, it wasn't necessary as the story was written. But this is a made up story, the writers are essentially god, they could have written the end of the movie in literally any way they wanted to accommodate Hope putting on the Wasp suite. Having her suit up during the movie would have actually paid off her character arc in the movie itself, instead of paying it off as an afterthought in the credits. Because no, I don't buy Hope reconciling with her dad as the final payoff of her character arc. Part of it sure. But it only works as a conclusion to her arc if you view her entire story as being about her daddy issues, and she was clearly so much more than that. Actually letting her do something is paying off what the early part of the movie set up. Having her find out what happened to her mother and then capitulate to the demands of the men around her for the rest of the movie was a lazy way to get points for having a cool female character without actually having to do anything with her. Having Hope suit up for the finale battle also could have helped their villain a lot. The actor was having a lot of fun, but Cross was about as generic a villain as you can get. Hope actually had a relationship with him. They could have played that up more, and having her part of fighting him in the end could have given the climactic battle more emotional stakes (cuz no, I don't find threatening a 6 year old they're clearly not actually going to hurt or threatening the life of the hero who's already confirmed for future movies to be emotionally effective at all). If Scott was our window into the basic world of Ant Man, Hope could have been our window into Cross and actually making him more dimensional and interesting. Instead we get two random dudes who literally know next to nothing about each other beating each other up because of plot. Which is fine. It's a perfectly serviceable comic book plot. But it could have been better. Captain America: Winter Soldier was one of the times Marvel got it right - that movie proved that it works to give your female "support" character so much importance she's practically a co-lead rather than a supporting player. Hell, Pepper gets to kill the villain in Iron Man 3. Women can have weight and importance given to their character arcs, can participate in the payoff of the plot, without it diminishing the male lead. Like I said before, I liked Ant Man! I didn't think I would, and before I saw the movie I resented that Scott Lang was gonna show up in other movies. I like his character just fine and I have no problem with seeing him again. It's an enjoyable movie with a mostly enjoyable cast of characters. That's been the majority opinion of every review I've read so far, both professional and otherwise. It's fine. It's good. It's entertaining. It's not one of Marvel's best but it works well enough. But I think it could have been better. I think their insistence on keeping Hope sidelined after pointing out over and over again how she was better suited for pretty much everything was a detriment to the story. Scott is an entertaining character but there's nothing particularly special about him, and it became distractingly obvious that they had to hold Hope back so that he could shine in the end. I realize it was an origins story of sorts, but there's nothing really that complicated about Scott or Ant Man, no reason he couldn't have shared the spotlight. Having a lead character who's the lead character not because they're special but just because they're there, that works if that character is the only one around who can fulfill the roll. It doesn't work when someone better suited is around and they're not the hero because mumble mumble contrivance patronizing male over-protectiveness mumble mumble. Scott's the hero because the writers decided he was the hero, not because it actually makes sense. And that's never paid off. That's what I have a problem with.

Really? He's 6 years younger than Sam and looks like it to me.

If someone hacks your tumblr or your twitter, you contact tumblr and twitter support. No one needs to turn it into a witch hunt with creepy IP talking (I barely followed that rambling post but my impression is that a good portion is devoted to bashing a user who had nothing to do with the hacking so...good job not causing additional unneeded drama) I feel like I'm back in the Lost fandom shipping wars. The level of martyrdom shippers are capable of affecting is tiresome. I use tumblr daily, but I don't go into shipping tags very often, precisely because of this kind of childishness.

I didn't realize Richard Madden was scottish until I did a google search for young scottish actors. I didn't think I'd ever be able to see him as anyone but Robb Stark, but he charmed the pants off me in Cinderella. He has a good mix of charming and brooding. He's not super tall, coming in just under 6 feet, but frankly that doesn't really bother me. A) Roger's height isn't ever really a plot point that I can remember, and those kind of details really don't matter to me that much, and B) Robert Downey Jr is practically a hobit compared to some of his coworkers and yet Tony Stark is always the same height as the other Avengers - filming for screen allows cheats. It would be amusing if his next big television roll after Game of Thrones was on Outlander, given the friendship between the authors and the comparisons between the two shows critics keep writing.

It was OK. It was entertaining. It had a tighter narrative than Avengers 2, more cohesive (which makes sense given it’s much smaller scale - no pun intended). Paul Rudd’s Scott Lang was a good generic white dude, amusing and attractive and inoffensive. But the movie had a major problem, and that problem was that Hope Van Dyne was clearly the hero the movie both needed and deserved. They point out repeatedly that Hope is better qualified in every way to be the hero here, but can’t be because her dad has emotional issues because they fridged Janet Van Dyne, aka the only female original Avenger in the comic books. And there’s something to be said for how self aware the movie was about this. I’ll certainly take that over just not including Hope or not acknowledging how competent she is. The problem is though that Marvel is entirely responsible for its ongoing issues with the women in its cinematic universe being sidelined for the men, and this feels patronizing, like they want a pat on the back for finally acknowledging the problem while not actually fixing it. Like, if Marvel had a perfect track record regarding women, or even just not a really shitty one, this could actually be a good story, and the end certainly sets Hope up to come into her own as a super hero in subsequent stories. But they don’t have a good track record. So instead of feeling like a critique of the state of women in comic movies, it feels like a weak attempt to placate feminists without actually having to give a woman a lead story. So yeah, Ant Man is fun, entertaining, a perfectly serviceable comic books movie, but would have been 10X better if they’d actually let Hope be the hero she was clearly meant to be, instead of just pointing out that she should be the hero while not actually letting her do much beyond train another generic white guy. Setting her up to be a hero next time around isn’t good enough any more. I’m over waiting for the Marvel Cinematic Universe to get around to making women a priority.

Someone pointed out Emma's Dark Swan dress is very similar to Morgana's evil dress from Merlin. I doubt it means anything at all since the two shows have no connection that I know of, but it's amusing to me since they're doing Camelot.

I'm still iffy on the Dark Swan makeup. I think it's going to come down to lighting, and if they do any effects in post production. The eyebrows are what were most out of place in the early pics, and I don't think any set picture is going to accurately portray how those look short of Jen coming up in full costume and posing up close for people, because it's such a small detail. And the hair looks OK in some pics, and not in others. Like, in this pic everything looks fairly cohesive, even the lightened/no eyebrows look is working for me for the most part - she actually looks kind of otherwordly rather than an actress wearing bad 90s makeup. In this one the hair looks pretty bad and you can see the dark line all the way around her hair line where the wig or the lightening powder or whatever they're using stops. So yeah, still iffy, but maybe it'll look OK on film, whether because of lighting or post production stuff. Maybe. I do love the costume a lot. Much closer to what I was envisioning.

These spoilers are so disorienting and nonsensical. Some of that might be the fever I currently have. But mostly just...wat.

I think Jen's performance was great, I liked the diamond heart dissolve effect, and conceptually I get what you guys are saying about taking her in more of an ice queen direction. But I maintain that as executed the looks is so bad it took me out of the moment completely. It wasn't until I read your thoughts on that stuff and rewatched the scene a few more times that I really noticed any of it. The first time I watched literally all I could think was "what am I even looking at who approved this". Maybe this isn't the final look. Maybe it will progress as time goes on. But until we see otherwise all I can judge it on is what it looks like now, and that is absolutely awful. Literally just typing in "dark ice queen makeup" into google nets a whole bunch of photos, ranging from subtle to extreme, that are more transformative and interesting than this look.

OK, but if being the Dark One exaggerates and twists your worst personality trait in a visible way, what was Rumple's look supposed to be representing? They've been pretty clear that his worst trait is his cowardice, how does his look represent that?

Like seriously, I know I should focus more on the performance, but the more I look at the makeup the stupider it gets. Why? Why does taking on the Darkness and becomming the Dark One make Emma's eyebrows frosted? Rumple looking almost scaley, making him look otherwordly, like the Darkness has twisted him into something barely human, that makes sense from a storytelling standpoint, not just a 'looks cool' standpoint. Emma's transformation? It's like they wanted to make sure she was still pretty and didn't look too monstrous, so they couldn't do anything as elaborate as Rumple's Dark One, so from a storytelling standpoint the visual transformation falls flat and makes no sense, but it also just looks terrible, so it fails from a 'looks cool' standpoint too. There's just no level on which this look works.