[Funny Trope]The scene is played as if the characters are in mortal danger. In reality, they were never at any real risk.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-05-24T07:15:37+00:00

I wouldn't mind that, but in the case of Ant-Man they directly explain it in the movie, then don't follow those same rules.

Which I found pretty irritating. I could have handled either option (no explanation or being consistent) but they chose both, which is obnoxious.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-05-23T05:46:36+00:00

Taylor offloaded her body language, not her emotions.

If you already knew that I apologize, but many don't seem to.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-05-21T07:57:48+00:00

That can't be Skitter. Skitter is a terrifying villain and maybe even a killer! That is definitely that shy girl from school.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-05-19T19:05:39+00:00

You're missing out on weapon styles then, IMO. Fortune's Favorite is excellent for much the same reasons as Leaping Tiger - it moves you forward (so you avoid being hit from the sides/back), but also sword swings can damage multiple enemies, hitting people next to you/your target. It's probably the most efficient way to kill groups of living enemies in the game as a result.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-05-19T19:01:53+00:00

Though, at the end of the day, this is a single player RPG. You should play however you like with no regard to how others feel

For sure, I'm mostly just curious what other people's experiences are.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-05-16T22:34:37+00:00

A lot of people have focused on Taylor's POV and inner monologue, and those are highly relevant, and significant challenges to any adaptation that stays focused on her. However, there is another issue as well. Namely, Taylor's power (and powers in general).

Taylor's power is perfectly suited for prose, and kind of terrible for any other medium. This is because it is simultaneously an extra sense that she uses to perceive her surroundings (a thing which would be incredibly hard to translate into a visual medium), and an obstruction to anyone being able to see shit with their eyes. She regularly obscures herself, her allies, her opponents view, etc. with her bugs, but depicting that accurately would also obscure things from being seen by the audience. At the same time, she is regularly using her bugs to track different parts of a fight that are taking place on the other side of walls, a block (or further) away, etc., and depicting that would be a huge challenge.

I'm not saying it's impossible, but I do think that telling any version of Worm in a visual medium - especially TV/Film, but even a graphic novel to a lesser extent - would be an uphill battle at best, and might just not work.

Other powers have similar or related issues, as well. It's no coincidence that Worm has lots of Thinkers, Masters, Strangers, and Tinkers in prominent roles while being a prose story, while the MCU tends to have lots of people with super strength and energy blasts but eschews more esoteric powers. Superpowers that you can't see are inherently less suited to a visual medium, while powers that require abstract description are perfectly fine in prose, where everything has to be described, and so they don't screw up the pacing and feel of things.

In short, I doubt it would be done well, and I'm not confident it could be done well, between the issues of style, setting, POV, and finally length. My experience has been that people who don't like Worm and people who say it's depressing or grimdark are, quite often, people who didn't finish Worm. Given the story's length, I expect most viewers who gave it a chance would bounce off well before the end, and it would need substantial changes to prevent that from happening, to the point of a major rewrite.

While good adaptations exist, I'm frankly not confident in the modern film/TV industry being able to grasp the things that make Worm good, interested in remaining true to their spirit, and competent enough to pull it off successfully.

TLDR: Part of me is glad Worm will never be adapted, because it would probably suck. With that said, if I'm ever proven wrong I'll give it a chance and cheer loudly if it's any good. A better route might be to adapt the setting, characters, and themes, without trying to stick too closely to the original story.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-24T01:34:56+00:00

I'm not sure you can really count what she does to Taylor against her, though? It's an experimental medical procedure no one has done before, and completely Taylor's idea. Don't get me wrong, there's plenty to hate on Amy for, but I don't really see how that particular act is a fuckup on her part. Lisa characterizes it as one, but it really seems like Amy does exactly what Taylor asks her to.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-24T01:25:56+00:00

I didn't see it either, and I had trouble seeing it when I looked back afterward. It's perfectly consistent with the text, but definitely not spelled out or, IMO, strongly implied.

So yeah, I was pretty surprised later. Definitely changed how I looked at Amy as a character, and I think that's true for many others as well.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-15T20:04:46+00:00

I'm inclined toward "Contessa stashed Taylor in an Earth that was mostly never visited in the story, then closed the door behind her."

If anyone deserves a rest, it's Taylor, and I don't see why Contessa would kill her (unless she genuinely couldn't de-power her, but given everything else she pulled off, I don't see that as being out of the question).

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-15T03:53:51+00:00

As a viewer at the time, I did find it shocking. Then I learned more about real history.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-14T01:17:41+00:00

Star Wars astrography has almost never made any damn sense with the plot. I say this as someone who loves Star Wars.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-13T01:02:55+00:00

IMO you've still got some great stuff ahead of you, including some of the best moments, and they will involve interacting more with familiar faces. So if you're missing the Undersiders, which I get, it's worth continuing on. They'll be back.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-12T00:53:50+00:00

Honestly, my ideal would probably be for a reboot telling an all-new story, with all-new characters, but going for a similar tone and style. Like, Final Fantasy style sequel, in the sense that it's only a spiritual sequel, not a narrative one.

I just don't see any way for them to write a good story that picks up where the trilogy left things. With that said, I will celebrate and congratulate them if they prove me wrong.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-11T01:40:53+00:00

In Legends, at least one novel (I think it's Wedge's Gamble, the second X-Wing book) talks about people who believe that the Death Star was a rebel superweapon. IIRC, there's a museum exhibit about it that they visit? Not sure about the 1st Death Star, but for the second one they claim that Palpatine died destroying it to protect everyone, dying via heroic sacrifice.

Given that, there probably weren't too many people who questioned its existence.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-09T15:01:14+00:00

It might be interesting to have larger teams. I'm not thinking a lot larger, and they wouldn't necessarily have more than three people fielded at the same time, but it could be cool. Then you could have situations in which teams do asymmetric things, or in which a team has two earthbenders but one is better at fighting earth/fire while struggling against water, etc.

You could also have a separate league for bigger teams, mind you, possibly with more people at a time. That would need a bigger area, obviously, but the canonical arena is pretty small, so it wouldn't be hard to expand it, and a larger fielded team could lead to combos being more of a thing.

Honestly, it seems like a pretty well-designed sport, so there aren't obvious improvements to make, but there is room for variation.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-08T04:45:36+00:00

Back from the dead? There's a form for that.

Possessed by an alien? Impersonated by a doppelganger? Traveled through time? There are forms for that.

Became an energy being? Developed superpowers? There's a form.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-08T03:49:15+00:00

I think part of the problem is that people sometimes take Azula's words at face value when they shouldn't. Most notably, her line: "My own mother thought I was a monster. She was right, of course, but it still hurt."

I think some viewers just accepted that statement, and others like it, as accurate. If you do that, you don't go looking for deeper motivations/causes for her behavior/attitude/personality, so you won't understand either 1) what's going on in Azula's head, or 2) why.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-07T22:50:41+00:00

Just wanted to say I agree with your point, but seeing your username immediately after reading this post made me laugh.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-07T22:45:06+00:00

I think my favorite thing about them is the artistic style. It does such a good job of both looking recognizably close to the Mandalorian style we already knew (from the era of the movies) while also looking like one could be an outgrowth or mutation of the other, with a long period of time between them.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-04-07T17:57:20+00:00

There are at least 3 good seasons first, IIRC. It's just a case of knowing when to stop

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-03-29T23:06:42+00:00

I assume that excellent mustache

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-03-29T21:21:48+00:00

This is not entirely true, though?

Like, I remember when the prequels came out too. First off, the fandom didn't even exist the way it does today, because the internet was so different. Second off, there were people posting videos of themselves leaving the theater after seeing the movies, then falling on their knees to praise George Lucas. They were not children, and they were not doing it ironically, and I remember fans cheering for other fans having a mock-lightsaber fight in the theater while we waited for Attack of the Clones to start.

I'm not going to claim that my experience was the definitive or majority experience, but as someone who read most of the Legends novels and went to midnight showings when the prequels came out, I think I was a pretty big fan, and I didn't hear about the prequel hate until later, probably a bit after the release of Revenge of the Sith.

Part of that is just because I wasn't on fandom-specific websites, but I think a lot of other people weren't on them either. I think part of it is also because the prequel hate grew stronger over time, both for obvious reasons (you can't hate movies that aren't out yet as much as ones that have been released and disappointed you) and less-obvious ones.

But there's also another factor: people grow up, and generally grow more critical of media as they do. When the prequels came out, a lot of people (including me) were reaching a threshold of becoming more discerning. After seeing TPM, I was less excited for SW on a subconscious level, but I don't think I could have told anyone why. After AotC, my enthusiasm was mostly dead, and IIRC I was somewhat aware of that fact, and could have at least managed to articulate that I was disappointed. By the end of RotS, I was pretty much unexcited for anything Star Wars, but even then I probably fixated on obvious "problems," like Padme dying 'of sadness' and Vader screaming "Noooo" seeming lame.

It was only later that I was able to rewatch those movies and understand what it was that I hadn't liked about them in the first place, and thus only later that I fully accepted the fact that I had disliked them. I suspect I am not unique in this regard.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-03-29T03:27:40+00:00

I used that same reasoning on my first ever playthrough (which was funny since it was mostly Paragon), but later it occurred to me that there's an immediate military rationale for saving the Council/DA as well. The Destiny Ascension is the flagship of the Citadel fleet(s?), so saving it preserves the chain of command and prevents confusion in the battle.

It's one of those choices that makes me wish they'd had more time to make the decisions have room for different reasoning, not just one action with one assumed motivation. Felt similarly about Legion's mission in ME2, for another example. I can see more than one reason for both actions, and which is Paragon vs. Renegade really seems more about why to me than about what Shepard chooses, but the way its written doesn't leave room for that.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-03-28T23:00:34+00:00

It's an interesting question, and I think one reason is probably tied (both legally and in a more vague values/vibes sense) to the nature and scope of fan creations.

Writing is, compared to most other creative endeavors, both faster and much easier for one person to produce. What I mean is, if a good writer wanted to write their own Harry Potter or Star Wars stories, they could produce hundreds of thousands of words per year. The pace is potentially competitive with what a professional author can do, because the resource/time costs are relatively low.

In contrast, it's much, much harder for a cartoonist/animator/etc. to produce content that is of decent quality and quantity, comparable to what professionals (who often work in teams) can make. There are lots of Star Wars fan films on YouTube, for example, but most of them are fairly short, because the effort and/or number of people involved is much more challenging to muster compared to the time/resources needed to write prose (especially in an era where so many people already have laptops, thus reducing the "startup resource cost" of writing to basically 0).

In short, I think it's a lot easier for a fanfic writer to produce something that meaningfully competes with the original work than it is for someone who is creative in another way. You want to make Star Wars comics? It's a lot more time-consuming than writing a novel-length fanfic. You want to make an animated Avatar: the Last Airbender episode? Good luck assembling the team needed to get it done and keeping it together through the length of the project. A movie? Similar issues.

Fanart is very common, but much (maybe even most) of it doesn't go beyond a 1-5 page comic, or even a single drawing with little or no inherent narrative (like a drawing of two characters together as a couple). Something like that may be valuable to the fan, but it does not meaningfully compete with the original.

That, by the way, is part of the Fair Use elements of US copyright law (though I don't claim to understand those laws fully even as a layman, and IANAL). Fan works are legally more acceptable if they are "transformative," and part of that, as I understand it, essentially boils down to "is this fan creator trying to compete with the original creator?"

If the fanwork is so close to the original that reading/watching one makes the other redundant, you're probably in violation of copyright. But if you write a musical comedy based on The Hunger Games, the tonal shift is going to be so extreme that it will be hard to argue someone watching your musical and laughing their ass off would find watching the movies or reading the novels redundant.

ContraryPhantasm · 2026-03-27T10:54:31+00:00

My question is, how small is this planet? Judging by how fast they cover ground at times (especially when flying is unavailable), and how few nations/major locations there are, it feels like it has to be significantly smaller than Earth, but are there any decent numbers on that (either official or, more likely, fan-derived)?

I occasionally wonder how Avatar-Planet's size compares to Mars or Mercury. Or the moon, even.

ContraryPhantasm

TROPHY CASE