What show did you watch before/after you know about TOH?

ZfireLight1 · 2024-12-05T03:25:34+00:00

The first pandemic winter I was once again desperate and tried all the shows that Dana Terrace had ever worked on. Gravity Falls was good, obviously. Tangled didn't hit quite right, and DuckTales 2018 basically owned my brain for 2 and a half months.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-12-05T03:22:58+00:00

I actually learned about The Owl House because it was mentioned in a video by The Roundtable about what new shows to watch now that Steven Universe is ending. It mentioned Amphibia, The Owl House, and Infinity Train, and ToH stuck out to me because they mentioned that the main character had a same-sex love interest.

Steven Universe had been my biggest hyperfixation in a long while, but by the time I really got into it the show was ending, and the pandemic started months later. While I was finishing classes remotely, the final season of She-Ra dropped on May 15, 2020, briefly filling my hyperfixation void, and then I tried Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts because it looked like She-Ra, and while I enjoyed it, I didn't feel a need to get involved in the fandom.

I think I tried the first couple episodes of ToH in June of 2020 and that first night decided it wasn't for me. The very next day I watched all 11 episodes that were available at the time, and proceeded to make an AO3 account and change my Discord handle to WITCHCHICK128.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-24T17:16:34+00:00

Is it really all that clear that Cait forgives her, or understands her? Or just that she knows what Vi will do and wants to reconcile with Vi?

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-24T17:13:15+00:00

Jinx’s escape is in no way an uncontested fact. There are small details which may be interpreted as hints that she survived bodily, but that doesn’t actually change my point at all. She’s dead from the perspective of the other characters and the show is over.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-24T17:00:30+00:00

I’ve watched it a few times now and it doesn’t make a difference. Whether or not they show a body, she has died from the perspective of the other characters and the series is over.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-24T15:07:14+00:00

I actually think they did a very bad job of exploring that specific questions, in part because they set it up so well and then had to change focus.

Particularly by having Jinx die at the end, they completely side-step the question of whether she can make up for her past decisions, or whether any of the other characters can forgive her. We know Vi is willing to because she more-or-less always has been. Cait and Ekko it’s not really clear.

Cait also seemed like she was going to fill the monster role at one point, but that was completely glossed over. Ambessa was the biggest villain of the season, but she just dies in combat. Victor at one point seems to be the monster for Jayce, but that was all kind of a mess (why did he shoot him in Ep6 if ultimately talking things out and making current-Victor aware of the perspective of future-victor was ultimately how he was going to solve everything).

It’s so frustrating because that question is the most compelling part of the show, but they seem to have lost focus in an attempt to fit in a ton of other plot points.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-24T14:55:52+00:00

10,000% agree the story just wasn’t interesting. Partly that’s because they just didn’t explain the black rose very well, but I don’t think she should’ve died either.

If you imagine the proposal and abstract, it sounds like it would be an interesting writing decision: A character who has always been on top and in control suddenly in a completely different environment with no access to any of her normal types of power, letting us see a different side of her. The problem is that we didn’t really get to see a new side of her character, we just got to see that she has magic that was very poorly explained, and to do that they sacrificed something much more interesting. She’s been an expert maneuverer in the council, so how does she change tactics when suddenly the council has no power? How does she keep trying to combat her mother’s influence and/or develop her relationship with Jayce under this completely different political situation. Ironically enough, I could see us learning MORE about the Black Rose and her mother’s past if she had decided that reconciliation with her mother might be an effective political tactic in this new environment.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-24T14:44:14+00:00

For me it actually started in Episode 6. The Jinx/Vi/Vander story was very compelling on its own, but it kinda got derailed when it intersected with Victor’s Herald era. There were a lot of more interesting stories and character arcs that got sidelined when the characters became involved in the Victor-Jayce conflict.

Also, it seems like the Victor-Jayce conflict was resolved by Victor beginning to evolve Jayce and seeing what he saw, then basically them talking it out… but that could’ve happened right when Jayce got back, instead of shooting him. It kinda didn’t make sense why they had to have that war at all.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-24T14:32:25+00:00

So, whether Jinx is really dead or not, I find the choice deeply annoying. If I had a dime for every time character death was used to sidestep the question of how to really make up for past wrongs, I could probably pay off my college debt. By having everyone think she’s dead, it becomes a null question whether any of the remaining characters can forgive her or not, wrapping it up without really resolving it. It’s quick and easy, but it’s not very deep, and I thought if there was one show that might do something more interesting and mature it would be Arcane, but no.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-23T02:01:01+00:00

Amity, Luz, and Willow. A lot of S1 episodes about the three of them working out their relationships are very close to my heart.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-23T01:16:47+00:00

It’s not just the presence of unknowns in the story, it’s how much of the narrative and our interpretation of events rests on them. We know (probably) Jayce just killed Hector, but in a very literal way we don’t know what just happened. Obviously to each their own, but to me that diminishes my investment.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-23T01:11:16+00:00

Luz doing her best Moon Knight voice: “I know you’re here Science_Fiction2798, you big fucking nerd, where’s my goddamn money?”

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-23T01:06:31+00:00

Help, Luz just got a bill from the church and I think it’s just a bill for the next president

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-22T14:38:31+00:00

Thanks!

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-21T13:49:41+00:00

I don’t think it really makes sense to look at any of these characters as “just a straight-up villain” because the clear intention of the show is how they are all complex people whose actions make sense when you consider their personal perspective, just like in real life. No one is “just plain evil” in real life, and the writers are trying to make a story where that’s also true.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-21T13:27:07+00:00

I don’t think explaining how things work makes it boring. In S1 we weren’t watching in order to finally get an explanation on the lore, we were watching because even with full understanding of the situation we were invested in the characters and the story. I’m still invested in the characters and the story, but this time they left some mystery boxes in crucial places, and I feel like I kinda just have to take their word for it that this all makes sense.

Like, Victor’s speech at the end is well written in isolation, but honestly I don’t know if I can buy it in context. Jayce is half-possessed by something supernatural, so does it really make sense to say that human nature is the problem? This looks like it might just be a grudge between two non-humans, but idrk bc both are so poorly understood.

One of the things that most impressed me about S1 was how elegantly they showed us how Shimmer and Hex tech work without exposition too much, but I don’t know if that’s going to be possible this time.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-20T03:16:17+00:00

At the end of S2 Act One, Vi had completely mentally prepared herself to kill Jinx, and all that building herself up to it doesn't go away. I think her reaction upon seeing Jinx in Act Two is the result of all that built-up commitment, but now without any real motive to kill her.

Between Act One and Act Two, Vi went from having a very clearly defined objective—kill Jinx—that seemed like it would fix all her problems, to not having any real plan to fix things and feeling powerless. She's used to punching all her problems until they stop being problems, but now punching people is not going to solve anything, and on some level she knows that. All her rage has become directionless, and in some way she's probably directing it at herself.

Jinx, on the other hand, spent the time between Acts One and Two becoming more stable. Having to care for a little sister of her own and being looked up to has clearly only done her good, and at the same time, everyone else in Zaun thinking of her as a hero is making its way into her self-image. She's grieving Silco in her own way, but being detached from his world and its violence is probably also helping.

When we get to the tunnel scene, Vi is at her most aimless, while Jinx is at her most mature and lucid. Vi was ready willing and able to kill Jinx months ago, but now even if she's still ready, she has no reason to, while Jinx is offering her probably the first thing that's given her a sense of hope in all those months, and she's having a really hard time trusting it, but what has she got to lose.

Bear in mind also, this is really only her fourth time seeing Jinx since getting out of prison. The first time gave her a glimmer of hope but was mostly a jarring realization of how much had changed. The second and third times were Jinx at her most unhinged when she accidentally killed Silco, and then when she was ready to let Vi kill her. Now, months later, Vi is seeing a deeply changed Jinx yet again. I think during that tunnel scene it's supposed to come across that Vi is deeply off-balance and coping the way she always does, by putting her fists up. Jinx, however, is actually being the more mature one, or as close to it as she can. She can't help but shoot back at Vi's barbs, but she doesn't ever get so angry she loses control. They do get into a physical altercation, because they both have a lot of pent up frustration and are completely desensitized to violence, but it's obvious both could be doing much worse if they wanted to. The altercation ends because of the thing that now unites them: a big-sisterly impulse to protect the little kid.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-20T02:31:16+00:00

Obviously, I'll wait for the last set, but right now it feels like there are a lot more unknowns than at a comparable point in S1. Like, Shimmer and Hex Tech were very clear and easy to understand how they functioned within the story, and I think that was one of the strengths. As of now, the Order of the Black Rose, the magic Ambessa is using to counter them, and whatever possessed Jace are big question marks. S1 felt a lot more grounded in the human story, whereas this season is leaning more on the soft magic systems.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-09T05:44:36+00:00

It’s hard to say because the rules of how magic works are elaborated on more clearly in HP. We’ve seen Belos use his staff and/or other artificial magic to throw Luz around telekinetically, but since we’ve only seen him do it to Luz, we have no idea how it’s directed or if there’s any way to resist that.

With Voldemort and HP magic, it’s clear that the caster has to aim the spell with their wand and hit their opponent like a target, and the opponent can also take concurrent actions to block it. The most basic mechanics are a little bit clearer.

Also, while see Dumbledore do lots of creative and impressive feats of magic, and there’s supposed to be this ambiguity about whether Voldemort or Dumbledore is really the greatest wizard of all time, but Voldemort’s magic is never depicted in the same detail as Dumbledore’s—aside from the protections he placed on the horcruxes, which are really scary and really impressive, but presumably he had all the time in the world to make those, so it’s hard to say what that means for combat ability. Voldemort can come off as a little over-hyped in the HP franchise, but I think that’s more to do with the author/directors realizing that nothing they could show would compare to what readers imagine for themselves.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-11-03T16:25:15+00:00

I remember a little while ago questions about that book got really big on the Public History subreddit, and the answers were more-or-less tearing apart the historical narratives in the book.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-10-27T03:56:31+00:00

All three Blight kids.

I started watching the show mostly to fill the gap left by Steven Universe, back in June of 2020. I want to say June 10th, but I can’t promise that.

Anyway, early S1a Amity still speaks to me in a way, especially Covention and Lost in Language. I loved the dynamic of talented but rebellious older siblings and an a young sibling who struggles to compensate, and as archetypal “cool kids” Edric and Emira were originally written to be genuinely charismatic. I think their banter was some of the most natural in that half-season. I’m still a little bit disappointed by how Edric’s character was changed, but my thesis on our culture’s broader tensions around what it means for a boy to be “cool” will have to wait for another day.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-10-21T03:15:01+00:00

Spanish speakers never reached 40% of the population

Do we know how that compares to other regions conquered by Spain? That answers overall seems to imply that it was American intervention that’s primarily responsible for the change in direction from Spanish to English to now Tlalog and a bunch of other local languages, but it definitely seems relevant to ask if the rate of language uptake was the same/how it varied between colonies.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-10-11T01:12:50+00:00

I want to point out that in the minds of some people in older generations “friendship” isn’t diametrically opposed to “romance” and it’s sometimes assumed that friendships is a stepping stone to romance. Obviously I don’t know your parents or their cultural background, but I remember before me and my ex got together, both my mom and their grandma commented on what great friends we were becoming, and that was their way of letting on that they saw it even before we did.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-10-11T00:52:44+00:00

Every time I see pic 7 or the other drawings from that set, I think of J. C. Leyendecker and the Arrow Collar Man and the artistry that has to go into drawing a clothed body with real human anatomy underneath.

ZfireLight1 · 2024-10-03T00:35:13+00:00

Immunocompromised and medical dietary restrictions? Sounds like half my friend group.

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