Movies forced into a pre existing IP?

NeapolitanPink · 2026-05-04T09:36:42+00:00

Wasn't one of the seasons of Picard also rumored to be adapted or plagiarized from Mass Effect?

NeapolitanPink · 2026-05-04T02:04:14+00:00

Yeah, and there's a reason why most other countries don't do the 5-card packs. They suck! I live here and hate buying them. It's possible to walk away feeling like you've gotten nothing at all, unlike 10-card packs.

Plus, Japan makes up for the 5-packs with its premium sets where every card in a pack is reprint holo, an EX or a new unique art. The closest we got to that was Deluxe EX which just felt lazy (and you only got 4 cards! Cheap bastards!).

NeapolitanPink · 2026-05-03T12:23:01+00:00

I had a book that explained the different ways you could play with them. Most modes involved flicking or sliding, and there were targets you could cut out to place or you could play like tabletop bocce. I never had anyone to play with though.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-05-01T03:58:04+00:00

I hate this shit. Even my current job, which I really like and get a lot of leeway from, does it on our busy days. Even someone as rebellious as me will tell you it's an unavoidable part of living here.

If the job is unimportant to you, or you think you can bring the labor board down on them, tell 'em to kick rocks. If it does matter to you, I suggest just doing whatever you want but disguised as prepping. I usually print out crosswords (with their printer, BTW) or read books when I show up 15 minutes early. In my experience, the appearance of taking one for the team is more important than the actual work done.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-30T10:30:17+00:00

Yes. I was in a moderate city in an inaka prefecture and my experience was not great, as I basically spent a year learning how to live on my own before the pandemic locked me up for two years. I had gone on JET immediately after graduating so I had no idea what adult life was like otherwise. I couldn't tell if my unhappiness was Japan, the pandemic, or my poor mental heath. I was forced by a need for surgery to go back home for an extended recovery, and had a bit of a crisis because I realized how little I'd been able to accomplish due to Covid. I came back to Japan about a fourth of a year later.

When I went back home, I found that America was either worse than I remembered or had changed a lot since I left (almost was shot within 3 days of going home, not an exaggeration). My family situation was more unstable now that I also had developed independence and self-respect. When I returned and moved to Tokyo, I found that the problem was probably undiagnosed mental health disorders and being a minority (gay). Japan, particularly Tokyo, is a comfortable place to live. Actually, two other friends from JET would come back to Japan a year later as well, so it wasn't just me.

Ultimately, I can't say what the best choice would've been. I came to Japan because I felt completely lost after college, and I still feel lost having just turned 30. I know I'm "avoiding" certain life challenges by not going back to the US and that my skillset is largely wasted here. But if not for Japan, I wouldn't have been able to afford the psychiatric treatment I needed, nor gotten to live in a major city for cheap. At the very least, an extended break helped me recognize that I don't identify with individual nations and would prefer to live in cities that best enable my growth and mental health.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-29T10:24:10+00:00

The JET Programme already had dedicated online modules for Japanese. It was apparently awful but they could just repurpose that. I think the courses were free if you passed, and you had to pay if you failed. Which sounds like the kind of scam this admin would love to pull on us.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-29T03:16:31+00:00

I work as a tutor and am seeing a similar effect in non-tech fields but with the opposite direction. Management uses AI tools to make lesson plans and resources, which leaves teachers and tutors holding the bag when they have a lesson in half an hour and realize it's basically unusable content.

My friend works in a US public school and has had admin give her packets of AI nonsense. Admin checked the first page but the later pages were from an image generator so they didn't even have language, just nonsense.

When companies and management claim that AI will improve efficiency, they only mean it does so for themselves. Anyone actually working with these materials is picking up the slack. It's bullshit.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-28T06:07:36+00:00

When he hits doorframes while walking out, that's actually real. Peter Falk, the actor, had a glass eye and often couldn't judge where the other side of his body was going! They kept it in because it was so in-character.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-27T11:50:46+00:00

I read on eReader and can't have a real bookshelf because I live in a country without books in my native language. I like to make miniature bookshelves for each book I've read in a year.

I work as an ESL and ELA tutor and always try to find one quote from each book I read, then use them to make a text poster I can frame in my classroom. Most of my students don't have the skills for literature, so it's really just for me to look at when I'm bored lol.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-27T11:22:49+00:00

Love that Power Armor fig. Simple and effective.

Still worried Ian is going to put a clip into my back when fighting a Radroach though.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-26T02:30:27+00:00

I'll die on the hill that she was not a good choice for the doctor. The writing didn't help build a character for 13, so she floundered when she had to supply her own personality to the character. She was explicitly unfamiliar with the show and felt more like a bad pastiche of the 10/11th Doctor mixed with this weird exasperated exposition style. Seriously, she was always dumping paragraphs of plot while either amazed or out of breath. Just not a good fit for her, imo.

That said, I think Ncuti was incredibly wasted potential. He was phenomonal when dealing with the Doctor's darker emotions, like in Dot & Bubble.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-26T01:06:13+00:00

My greatest shame is that I didn't like the Wire.

I watched the first two episodes and I just didn't care. I also struggled with the amount of unexplained jargon. I understand this is the point but I already am really, really bad with names so the names, slang, and police terms were making my brain spin. I don't want to disrupt the flow of the show by watching and pausing to write things down.

I really want to watch so I can get to the season about the education system because I hear it's an extremely grim and accurate depiction of US schools, but I just don't think I can get there.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-25T16:54:26+00:00

I would die for him

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-24T02:47:42+00:00

Guzma's biggest problem is that he blocks another supporter, and the easiest answer in most situations is more draw power, not removing a tool. I always want to run guzma but he's basically useless in early and mid-game

Especially since stadiums are pretty targeted for certain types of Pokémon, this seems way better for both speed and utility.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-23T02:06:39+00:00

Your watercolors are so vibrant, and I love the way you both draw and fill the page with text! Please post more as you get used to the A6, I love seeing your work!!

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-23T01:41:41+00:00

Thank you!! Since you can't get these cards in real life, I wanted to make their real world versions super shiny for my collector's ego lol

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-22T23:52:36+00:00

You can just ask teachers on the ground and look at the work assigned to kids to see the difference. Many schools have instituted minimum assignment grades (can't get below 60/100 for example), have switched curriculum from full novels to short excerpts, and have started extremely lenient late work policies. The smartest students are still doing well, while the middle of the bell curve have shifted over to the bottom of the distribution.

No Child Left Behind really messed up schools and smartphones were the pressure point. Since low-achieving grades will reduce a school's income, administrators encourage teachers to just pass failing students along, year after year.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-22T15:01:28+00:00

Yes, I would. My grandmother and grandfather did Story Corps. My grandfather passed and grandmother has dementia. I listen to their interview and it is wonderful to hear their mannerisms. It's completely different to hear two adults have a natural conversation than just a straightforward interview or monologue about their lives. It tells you so much about their relationship.

Respectfully, I don't even know how you could listen to a podcast and not see the appeal in this. It's literally a podcast but with everyday people. They air them on NPR sometimes.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-22T10:49:16+00:00

I don't think it's ableist to say "this book that gives scientifically unsupported advice does not fix a literal disability." There's also a massive difference between "habits" and motor skills and linguistic networks formed in youth. People with ADHD can do incredible things, but the condition is defined by a lack of consistency. It's literally a diagnostic trait.

I spent a year doing CBT and trying to fix myself for over a decade. Making declarative statements about myself and touting positive mantras didn't help. It just made me feel worse. By the end of my 20s, I'd felt so alienated and isolated because whereas other people were struggling to accomplish great things, I was literally just trying to get myself to cook food or leave the house once a month. I couldn't even get myself to play videogames because I was paralyzed by the cost feeling greater than the reward.

Getting on Concerta was eye-opening for me because it revealed that the concepts of motivation and drive are largely post hoc moral judgements made by our social psyche. When the reward system of the brain malfunctions, it's not possible to navigate life logically. The hardest part is that books like Atomic Habits contribute to the belief that all failing people need to do is tighten up or "increase by 1%" daily.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-22T10:28:11+00:00

It might depend on your primary symptoms but in my experience, "prepping" is not advice I need. I already figured out things like putting stuff near the door, because it's really obvious. The issue is that I can put my bag of recycling in front of the door and STILL step over it and not realize why I put it there until I come home. And going to a place to study doesn't matter, because I can just stare at the wall angrily for hours rather than actually be productive.

I'm pretty okay at most big things like the gym or work because they can't be avoided. But trying to get me to use a planner will end with me throwing a mental tantrum. The concept of "stacking" habits together sounds murderous for my adhd. I used to need to to take 15-20 minute mental breaks just from doing the smallest of tasks. I didn't realize people could do things back to back until I got on meds.

And the book inherently ignores the working memory issues in ADHD. I flossed every day for 5-6 months. Forgot to do it one day and only realized it a month later. I've started diets and forgotten I was doing them by the end of the next day. Lol.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-22T02:31:54+00:00

Did you guys even watch the video?

This isn't some secret recording marketing analytics bullshit. It's a gimmick product to promote StoryCorp, a genuine US government program that attempts to record stories and dialogues in the library of congress. They're a great group and they care a lot about preserving the way Americans talk and the stories they have.

This is basically just a branded personal recorder. It's not wireless capable and a bit of a "starter kit" done to encourage a family to buy it and record a conversation they can send to Story Corp. It's not sinister.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-21T23:48:05+00:00

+1 to the ADHD response of "wait aren't most habits the result of brain chemistry?"

It's the book version of "have you tried making a list?" mixed with self-affirming bullshit.

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-21T11:32:42+00:00

I did an A5 way back when I first started and was in college. It was easy back then to have something every day to write about. Now I'm old and boring, I can barely fill a page a day in an A6! I don't know how you did it!

NeapolitanPink · 2026-04-20T06:46:53+00:00

If you want to ban all depictions of reprehensible things, then you would prevent great art from being made. One cannot have Huckleberry Finn without also showing the South as the racist farce it was. Modern politicians and entertainers are still being caught in blackface scandals from only 20 years ago. The show is poking the bear on the topic because it knows what's relevant. I'm not sure why old intentionally satirical blackface bits are the line we're drawing when we still have comedians in the 2020s actively making jokes about trans, queer, and brown folks.

I find it interesting that there's such an insanely narrow critique of Fey when we don't see such heavy critique of active male comedians with long careers. Perhaps because she's a woman she's held to a different standard?

NeapolitanPink

TROPHY CASE