Quarantine entry #95 - June 24

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks. ‘Barkskins’ have finished their run for now, and few people have acknowledged them – it’s a pity, because they were a very good novel adaptation/historical drama TV series. However, they were not very popular, or rather – this genre is not very popular right now, and so ‘Barkskins’ remain very much obscure for now. What next?

Yesterday was the U.S.’ primaries’ voting, (we are talking June 23, 2020 here), and I have to ask: how did the U.S.’ ‘civil unrest’, (let us live the COVID-19 out of the equation for now) affect the voting? Seriously! Especially since we are talking New York and all, where the unrest in question was especially bad. The mass media is keeping mum on that now, just as it does about Seattle, where there was some sort of a leftist commune there; an armed leftist commune, I should add.

But no – the mass media is keeping quiet about it; instead, they’re talking about politics, about elections, about the Donald and his clan beginning to fight his niece Mary for real, as she is releasing, or trying to release, her own book about the Donald, the Trump family, and the presidency. Fun! Or not, since this is the clan that the U.S. has to live with, and the rest of the world has to live with the U.S.

…Or not, since people are still trying to find alternatives to the U.S.’ global hegemony; China, the RF, and the EU are all ‘viable’ alternatives. Idiots! History has its’ own cycles, and it states that after every peak – a semi-global empire – comes a fall, which results in a multitude of small states, (or city-states, whatever), during which the planet recuperates, (however partially), from the whatever damage the human civilization was able to inflict upon it, and everything starts anew. Right now, we are living it, as the COVID-19 and its’ side-effects/after effects demonstrate; already, some human projects are being put on hold… pause.

Yes, by now the global human society is beginning to emerge from the initial global lockdown, initiated in the first half of 2020. But already there’s the beginning of a talk about the second wave of COVID-19, which means things are going to snap back into a lockdown position… or not, and I honestly don’t know which is worse – the devil that we know, (namely the lockdown with all of its flaws), or the one we don’t, (aka if we don’t go back into the lockdown and the second wave of COVID-19 hits for real). What is left?

…Yes, by now, humans are pissed about the lockdown, and a part of the entire civil unrest, (primarily in the U.S. – in Canada it was somewhat different), was because of it – people want it to end, they want out! …Ok, now they are out, and what next? If all of those conspiracy theories are false, then COVID-19 is not going away anywhere, and people will continue to die – maybe at a more intense rate, maybe not, but regardless, they will continue to die. And if COVID-19 does go away, then all of those conspiracy theories are true, however partially, and things for humans will get even worse. Anything else?

Well, actually, today I wanted to revisit out friends the turtles today, just because, but then I came across a news article on ‘The Atlantic’ about how the MLP: FIM fandom has acquired Nazi elements and doesn’t know what to do with them, and how it equates with NASCAR having a lot of racist elements in it still, and I got to admit that any world that has a fandom of small, talking, colorful ponies/horses acquire outright Nazi elements in it, (the MLP-fandom doesn’t really deny it), is a weird one to live in, and while it might suck, I still won’t switch it for any fictional one.

…Well, this is it for now – see you all soon!

Quarantine entry #40 - April 30

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, COVID-19 or not. It’s raining today, so we got to stay inside, and on the DA – which itself is supposed to end at the end of May, aka within four to five weeks – I found a comic about a South Andean deer named Awka and her friends.

…From what I could understand, the South Andean deer are disorganized and scattered, at a disadvantage from the introduced red deer, (better known in North America as the wapiti), who are staying together and who have blocked-off some of the South Andean deer migratory routes and don’t let them pass. Balrog and Gandalf the Grey so understand – been there, done that, ripped the mountains of Moria asunder – where were we?

Ah yes, the deer wars. Some of Awka’s family are trapped on the other side of the red deer blockade and cannot get through – supposedly, because we are never introduced to them at all. Instead, we get flashbacks and the like, as Awka messes with the red deer herd by being the absolute worst. Pause.

Here is the thing. In AoS, (especially the initial seasons), in ‘Frozen 2’, in ‘Trolls 2’ and the like we are introduced to the idea that there are few to none deliberate villains, mostly people that misunderstand and the like. That is nothing new, even the Old Norse, (and I am not talking MCU here), had a saying that amounted to, like, ‘Even a hero had their flaw and a villain isn’t all bad’. That is realistic enough, but when we are dealing with a movie that has a magical snowman (on top of many Norse mythical monsters), or a comic that features talking deer, realism isn’t up there, is it? Tolkien’s LotR trilogy, in particular, was really clear-cut – there are the bad guys, and here are the good guys, no one is in the middle…and there are racist overtones, even though his fanbase, (such as David Day), try to deny it.

By contrast, Mr. Martin’s ASOIAF series never really has purely good or evil characters, (let us leave Brienne out of it). As a result, both in GoT and in the novels, ASOIAF became something of a morass to wade through, as alliances are made and broken, everyone is soldering on – and the unquestionably evil Night King, a fusion of Sauron and the Witch-King of Angmar, (aka the Nazgul #1), is leading an army of White Walkers and the Walking Death onto the living. To Mr. Martin, it seems, humanity is a morass – but we’ll have to hope that in his final books, he’ll show how Westeros defeats the Night King – if they defeat him; plus the GoT version was extremely dissatisfying to its’ fanbase, but we’ve talked about this before… Back to Awka?

…With Awka and the rest of her South American comic, it is the same thing – the author/illustrator is doing their best to depict everyone as well-rounded characters, and as a result, it is extremely hard to root for Awka sometimes, and she is still the main character.

Pause. Modern mass media, such as comics, TV series and movies may try to get rid of outright evil (and outright good?) characters, but that will never happen, because not all characters are equal and because conflict, (outright or otherwise) is still the main plot motor, so good & evil are still a part of media world, and for main characters in any fictional plot, they are especially important; I’m not sure if I’ll be rooting for Awka to succeed or even continuing to follow the comic, but I felt that the above had to be said. What else?

…I confess that I wanted to talk to you about bison today. Why? Because of yaks. You see, there are two species in the bison genus – the American bison that most people know, and the European bison, aka the wisent. The two species of bison are related to each other, naturally, but they look quite different from each other, and the scientists have established that proportionally, the American bison is more closely related to the yaks than to their European relatives.

To elaborate, the ancestral bison species were Eurasian rather than American animals. Then, as they began to go west during the Pliocene-Pleistocene period, they interbred with the yak ancestors and split, eventually, into two species, the American and the European. The American bison consists of several subspecies; the European bison – of only one, (the rest were killed off by humans), but this is how the cookie crumbles; the American bison is more closely related to the yak than to the European bison. Bet you that MLP: FiM, which featured both the American bison, (wrongly called buffalo – both bison and buffalo may be bovine mammals, but they are not closely related to each other within the group), and yaks, did not tell you this!..

…Well, I guess that this is it for now – see you all soon!

Quarantine entry #38 - April 28

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks. Just look at the PM Trudeau, whose wife may have recovered from COVID-19 by now, and whose mother has just been diagnosed with it. Harsh, man! Real life is never pleasant, but, still, on the other hand, more people in the news are talking about the middle of May, (aka the next month) as the end of the lockdown/quarantine/self-isolation/etc. Will be interesting to see as to what will come down then. (In some news, the state of Texas intends to its’ self-isolation next week, aka the first week of May, but we will see if anything will come out of it.)

…In other news, no one is still certain if anything has happened to the great steersman, comrade Kim, the leader of North Korea, and no one is more worried than the south Koreans, since if anything goes wrong in the north, it will reach them first, whether it’s COVID-19, some sort of a North Korean civil war, or what else have you. The Chinese have already sent a medical team to North Korea, but so far there’s no information as to what has happened to them, because of course not.

Back in the U.S., people are continuing to fight with each other – see above, so everything is as usual. Ergo, here is a piece of my original fiction, this time – a MLP: FiM fic, because of yesterday’s discussion about the wild bovids, (maybe we will return to them later).

Enjoy:

"I must say, I must say," Rarity was telling Tempest Shadow now that the entire mess with the Shadow King was practically behind them, "your behavior in relation to that reject Yeti was quite wrong by Equestria's standards-"

"I know, I know," the morally ambiguous unicorn agreed, "it's just that since I found myself - as a filly - to be some sort of a variant Earth pony, I have handled it really badly-"

"Hm, you're rude, but you have a point," Rarity agreed, as she used her own magic to levitate Applejack's hat onto Tempest Shadow's head. "You do look like an Earth pony now under right circumstances-"

"Excuse me, Rarity," Applejack channeled her inner element of Honesty, "but this is my family's hat-"

"Yes, dear, but as the element of Generosity I just have to-"

As the Earth pony and the unicorn's conversation degraded into an argument of some sort, Tempest Shadow sheepishly looked at Rainbow Dash. "This, this, this," she muttered to the Pegasus. "I didn't mean for their discussion to go in this direction-"

"Meh, you're rude, but they're just being Rarity and AJ," Rainbow Dash replied dismissively, as she shoved the elements of Honesty and Generosity into a nearby closet. "This is just their public displays of affection. They are decisively above PG-13 rating, so out of the public eye they go!" She took a deep breath and looked around. Pinkie Pie was sitting alongside Gorthaur, (who should not have been in this story, but somehow snuck into it anyways) and examining the remaining bits and pieces of the Storm King's magics. On the other hoof, (but at the same time), the alicorn princess Twilight Sparkle was talking to a couple of out-of-Equestria tourists, (who got caught in the Storm King's takeover), wild cattle of some sort, (though not bison or yaks). The couple's teenage daughter was talking to Fluttershy about Equestria, and while the buttery-yellow Pegasus was somewhat uncomfortable in talking to a stranger, the other female was slowly winning her over.

"They're gayal, or mithung," Tempest Shadow, who was more travelled than the Mane 6 were, explained to the rainbow-maned (and tailed) Pegasus. "I think that they are related to the buffalo or something."

"Mmm," Rainbow Dash nodded sagely. "Got it. I just still think that we're missing someone-"

"Will someone break the spell upon us already!" the still-petrified princesses Celesia, Luna and Cadence called-out - telepathically - within their prison/display chamber, but no one was within reach...

The end?

…Well, this is it for now – see you all soon. All comments and criticisms are welcome!

Quarantine entry #37 - April 27

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, but people are gradually beginning to shift away from the lockdown/quarantine/isolation/etc. Well, not ‘people’ as in ‘private individuals’, more as in ‘public institutions’ and ‘governments’ and the like. There is a lot of arguing about this, both pro and contra, but the tide is moving, no doubt about it. Even in best of situations, a lockdown is a part-time solution, because no one can hide forever, and, well, not everyone wants to. Things are beginning to come to… something, but what it will be, is anyone’s guess. What next?

Well, today I wanted to talk about the yaks. Yes, we’re talking about the mountain cousins of the common cattle, and-

Taxonomy first. I.e., the domestic and the wild yaks may look similar enough, especially to a layperson, but scientists established that by now they are two different species instead.

The evolution of the yak is rather convoluted as well; it can hybridize with the common cattle; the males are infertile slash sterile, but the females are not. Moreover, the yaks can hybridize with the American bison, gaur and banteng – and the latter two are worth a special notice, because the banteng is a domesticated cousin of the gaur, which might be the biggest species of wild cattle in tropical Asia, a beast big, strong and heavy enough to stand up even to the tiger.

…As for the yak evolution, it seems that the yak – we are talking about the wild yak, the domesticated species came later – is more closely related to the bison rather than to the domestic cattle (and maybe its’ cousin, the now-extinct aurochs), from which it had diverged anywhen from one to five million years ago. What next?

On one hand, there are many colored variations of the domestic yak, as opposed to the well-known black – there are even white yaks, (and you can find their pictures on the Internet). On the other hand, the yaks played an important role in the last few seasons of MLP: FiM, now ended, but that merits a special mention as well.

See, the ‘student 6’ of MLP: FiM embodied racial variety and interracial cooperation, which proved to be important in the series’ finale. Yes, CG (and her cohorts, maybe), embodied racism on the show, (sort of), but it worked. By ‘worked’, I meant that she got to be a good villain, and as for her fate… well, with the conclusion of the series the franchise is getting rebooted and revamped, which includes – the ‘Equestria Girls’ series. In it, the more human counterparts to the mainline little ponies are beginning to aim at teens, whereas the original series – more at prepubescent children, especially of the female gender…at least that was the initial target audience. Somehow, over the years and the seasons, the MLP: FiM franchise grew into something else, and it will continue to grow as years and seasons go by… hopefully, COVID-19 or no. (Cough, Comic-con 2020 cancelled, cough). Is it a good reason to be optimistic? Normally not, but at this day and age, given that real life sucks more than it normally does, any port in a storm and all that.

…As for the yaks… yeah, I do not know why the franchise decided to include them, especially since they had the American bison already… there are also the European bison aka the wisent, and both species consist of several subspecies. Neither species is particularly flourishing, but the American bison is proportionally better off than its’ wisent cousin is; as for the wild yak, right now, its’ status is ‘vulnerable’; I suppose that that’s fair, given how poorly some of the other species of wild cattle have fared, (cough, the aurochs is extinct, cough)…

Well, this is enough for now, I reckon. See you all soon!

Quarantine entry #10 - March 31

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and sometimes it sucks because of something that you have done – everything was more or less fine before, and then you do something stupid, and clog one of the sinks in your home. Idiot. Yeah, talking about dinosaurs is just what you need – not. End irony. Today I got to revisit another miniseries, called ‘Beast Legends’. It consisted of one six-episode season and was never rebooted. Why?

Well, for one thing, it was supposed to be a reboot by itself – of MonsterQuest, another show that ended a long time ago. MonsterQuest itself raises mixed feelings in my chest – it was a show about all sorts of cryptids; an episode would begin with a CGI depiction of the cryptid in question – an alien, a giant shark, Chupacabra, and beyond – and then for the next hour or so a group of experts would go someplace where the cryptid in question was seen most recently, and do everything in their power as to not to find anything at all that would upend the status quo. They would not just laze around, but everything they did was so perfunctory and minimal that it became evident eventually that they were just killing time there and making it look convincing.

By contrast, ‘River Monsters’, which also got cancelled, never had JW go for the minimal – rather, JW did his best to be, well, JW, and to sell his show as best as he could – which was pretty damn good. Sadly, in the latter seasons, ‘River Monsters’ jumped a shark that had little in common with real-life fish…and so I lost interest in it, sadly… Where do ‘Beast Legends’ fit?

They never did. Rather, each episode was dedicated to recreating one or another mythical monster – whether a potential cryptid, like the kraken or the Vietnamese analogue of a Yeti, or a pure myth, such as the gryphon episode. Why? Because it was the most well delivered. However, the reason as to why it was the most well-delivered was because the biggest part of the BL’s budget went into it, leaving the last two episodes, dedicated to the Native American thunderbird and a dragon, (eh, maybe more about it later), with much less cash. I am not saying that BL blew its’ budget on the gryphon episode, (named the ‘Winged Lion’, if I remember correctly), leaving the last two episodes with much less cash. Budget issues are important issues in production of TV series and movies, and it may be why BL vanished after a single season slash six episodes. It just never had a defined audience, a defined niche for itself. The gryphon episode was quite fun to watch though. Anything else?

Sadly, not. Unlike the dragon, which remains a popular mainstay in fantasy, the gryphon…also does, but is more secondary and less popular than the dragon is by far. Pity, because it is an impressive-looking mythical monster. And yes, part of the reason as to why I have watched the gryphon episode of BL is because we’ve talked about the Protoceratops in the past, and its’ fossils may’ve been a partial inspiration behind the gryphon myth, so I thought that I should mention this dino, (a distant cousin of the more famous Triceratops, remember?).

Another bit of trivia is that the gryphon was a primarily Middle Eastern s (Asian) mythical monster (yes, the Ancient Greeks and Romans had adopted it, but only slight), unlike the dragon, which was found on all continents, except for maybe Australia and New Zealand, and even there are some dragon-like creatures to be found in their myths… Gryphon and its relative the hippogriff could never top that.

…Yes, both gryphons and hippogriffs were featured in the MLP: FIM cartoon, but if the gryphons were depicted quite canonically, then the hippogriffs were shown to be shapeshifters of sorts, shifting between a bird-horse and a fish-horse mode, with the latter being named the hippocampus instead. 

Yeah, someone in MLP: FIM had hit the obscure mythical monsters quite hard, which brings us back to the gryphons – kind of. In one of the episodes, the viewers saw some sort of a one-eyed monster harassing the gryphons – it was supposedly an Arimaspian. In real life, the Arimaspians were a race of one-eyed humanoids who constantly fought with the gryphons over gold, which the gryphons hoarded just as the dragons did. Fair enough, though I do not know as to why the Arimaspians were not classified as just variant Cyclopes, but the MLP: FIM’s Arimaspian had distinctly goat- or ram-like features, especially the horns. This, again, implies, that the final season’s Discord-as-Grogar story arc was the result of some sort of a reboot, just a behind the scenes one. Well, fair enough, this cartoon incarnation of MLP: FIM is over now, and we just got the last bits to pick over in the form of various comics and what not. Anything else?

Nothing, save that I just might be turning back to DW after all this Middle East discussion that we did in regards to the gryphon. (Yes, the name can be spelled in several ways in the English language and all are correct. Live with it). Consequently, this is it for now, see you all soon!

Lady & Tramp 2019 - Nov 12

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks. In the ‘Canadian’ edition, this was demonstrated by Don Cherry, who was fired after he was carried away and said some distinctively politically incorrect & unsanctioned statements on the sports’ channel.

Here are the facts: as far as I can remember, Mr. Cherry was spouting this anti-immigrant bull-crap since the 1990s, and no one did anything about him. That said, under Mr. Trudeau’s leadership, the Canadian government changed its’ views on immigration, especially that of POCs, but there are plenty of Europeans also still coming to Canada, i.e. Ukrainians and the like. As the numbers of ‘new’ immigrants and their immediate descendants continues to grow and to accumulate, Mr. Cherry’s statements grow increasingly politically tone-deaf, and so he was given the old heave-ho, aka the boot. Will he be missed? I have no idea, but aside from his ‘political deafness’ the fact is that a sports’ channel isn’t the most appropriate place to discuss socio-political issues that aren’t related to sports at all, either.

No, seriously, Mr. Cherry did not even try to pretend that his rant is sports-related – he just vented his spleen, his own personal opinion, on his job. Seriously, man – get an online blog and do just that, rather than confuse it with your work. No wonder than he got fired – he is either politically incorrect and unprofessional, or old and marasmatic, (chronologically and biologically speaking). People are trying to pretend that this is an end of an epoch, but in reality, it is anything but – merely an old man, who either took his privilege too far, or who had simply lost ‘it’. Onwards to the TV shows?

…No, let us talk about a Disney+ movie – the 2019 remake of ‘Lady and the Tramp’. Unlike TLK-2019, Disney did not put this remake into theaters, but rather – into its’ own new and personal streaming service, aka Disney+. Yay?

Well, certainly ‘yay’ on a certain level – on some level, L&T-2019 is better than TLK-2019, in no small part because it does use real-life animals, (at least some times), and only adds CGI-facial features to them when it is necessary, rather than uses precise and accurate, (realistically authentic?) CGI models as they did in TLK-2019.

Of course, the difference is understandable: proportionally, domestic dogs, (used in L&T-2019) are much more trainable than the African lions and similar animals are, but regardless, it kind of makes TLK-2019 even more redundant, unnecessary and etc., when compared to L&T-2019 – honestly, what was Disney trying to prove with it? When ‘Dumbo’ was remade, for example, it was really remade – we’re talking about a different movie entirely from the old one, (which was good, because the original ‘Dumbo’ didn’t age well at all – just as Canada’s Don Cherry didn’t), whereas TLK-2019 wasn’t, not really: it was the same movie just with some cosmetic changes.

True, you can say the same thing about L&T-2019 – it is the same movie that was made in the 20^th century, but with some cosmetic changes – i.e., in the original film, it were some live beavers (from a zoo) that freed Lady from her muzzle, whereas in the 2019 version, it is a beaver statue in the park; or in case of the cats, in the original film, they were Siamese, (and also racial stereotypes, let’s be honest), while in 2019 they’re more like hairless Sphinxes, or some similar breed, (still creepy as Hell though), instead. Disney does know political correctness, it seems, but then we come to the human aspect and this is where things took a strange turn, as IGN noted on its’ own review of the movie.

I’m not the biggest fan of IGN these days – it seems to be at least partially paid by various movie companies to review its’ movies and give them ‘the right’ reviews; in a not-too-distant past someone was actually fired from IGN for given a ‘wrong’ review, but here we’re not talking about the ‘quality’ of reviews, but more about their content, what they’re talking about, and in case of the L&T 2019-reboot, it is the fact that Lady’s owners, are an interracial couple. Considering that L&T took place in the first half of the 20^th century or so, when interracial relationships and marriages were illegal in some countries and states, this is simply an anachronism – and also a case of ‘wokeness’ done wrong, not unlike as to how it happened back in ‘Dark Phoenix-2019’, (remember, the Mystique-Xavier interaction scene? Yeesh), only more blatantly so. This is nothing new for Disney, of course – for example, the current ‘Spider-Men’ films try to match up the Anglo-American Spidey with ‘people of color’ – Elizabeth Toomes, (herself a daughter of an Anglo-American father and an Afro-American mother) in ‘Homecoming’, and MJ herself in ‘Far From Home’ – but because these movies are good movies and are set in modern times, rather than in the past, unlike a ‘King Arthur’ or a ‘Robin Hood’ movie, this works.

Again, in real life, there are several aspects to the interracial issue, especially in North America. In Canada, I have seen plenty of interracial couples – on bus stops and in buses, in stores and on streets, and so on – and no one cares. Even Don Cherry seems to have issue not with the interracial aspect of immigration; rather he is rejecting all immigrants outright, by claiming that they are not true Canadians, but are rather taking advantage of them and Canada itself as a whole. This… is clearly the case of the horseradish that is as bitter as the bitter radish is, but while we seem to be splitting hairs between the rotten apples, it seems that Hollywood has gone the other way around, and lumped this current stage of social affairs with the past.

…The current state of casual interracial affairs has taken years, if not decades to develop, and both U.S. and Canada underwent a lot of hard effort to reach it. By comparison, in the time set in L&T, both the original and the remake, this effort – aka the integration – was not even in the works, though it must be acknowledged that it is there, sort of: we’re talking about a relationship between a ‘posh’ Lady and a ‘street-smart’ but ‘poor’ Tramp: a social interaction slash integration… minus the racial angle. In the 2019 remake, Disney tried to take this one-step further, to the modern level, but because the movie is still set in the past, it does not really work. God knows why, the movie is primarily about dogs, rather than people, they could’ve just set it in modern times and then an interracial human couple would’ve seen perfectly natural, but there you are, a genuine social anachronism in a Disney movie, one that not even IGN couldn’t ignore.

This brings us to the upcoming Sam & Bucky ‘Captain America’ Disney+ show, again because of the entire interracial issues in the USA. From what we were told, Sam & Bucky will not have it easy by transitioning to the new Cap – on one hand, MCU’s version of Zemo is coming back, complete with his trademark purple mask now, (but keep in mind, that in MCU he isn’t supposed to be Hydra, unlike in the comics), and on the other, we’re going to get introduced to MCU version of John Walker, the US agent. He is supposed to be one of those Captain America variants done wrong, who is violent and prejudiced and evil and so forth. I remember a comic arc when Cap encountered this sort of a character – it was Nuke. That comic arc was set in the so-called ‘Ultimate Universe’ (Earth-1610 if anyone cares), and so Nuke was Frank Simpson rather than William Simpson… as he is known in MCU. In MCU, Nuke/William Simpson was part of Netflix’s ‘Defenders’, but it does not mean that he could not appear in its’ other parts, (especially since his part in JJ was not that big, actually), but instead we are getting John Walker/US agent in Sam & Bucky. Fun.

…Rounding out the cast is MCU’s version of Sharon Carter, (agent 13), who, for a while, was supposedly a love interest for Steve Rogers, but sometime after the CA: CW film she just vanished from MCU. It will be interesting to see as for how long she will stick around this time. Anything else?

…Well, people are beginning to compare the conclusion of MLP: FIM series to MCU’s AoS, claiming that both shows used plot twists and turns incorrectly, but they are wrong. Rather, MLP: FIM is Hasbro’s answer to HBO’s GoT, as both were great and long-lasting shows that did more poorly in their finales, as both were about gone and done officially and for good, while pissing-off the fans in the process. …But it does not matter! They are over! Only not! They are still around! Hasbro is already talking about the G5 ponies, while HBO is already working on the Targaryen family saga, as presented by one George Martin, so yay, really. Pause.

We have steered far off course, and it is time for us to take a break. This is it for now, see you all soon, (hopefully).

MLP: FIM over - Oct 20

…And so, MLP: FIM has ended this year, at this time – autumn 2019. Hurray, or boo, or whatever you want to call it, the end. This incarnation of MLP is done and gone for good, (‘Equestria Girls’ might be a different matter – if anyone cares). What is left?

Firstly, the obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks. Considering that next week is the election week in Canada, this suckage will take on a new, political dimension: while Canada isn’t U.S., it had its’ share of ‘FLAWS!’ and ‘EXCITEMENT!’ regarding the election month loud and clear, and right now all of the political experts aren’t sure as to what will have once the elections are over, what kind of government that Canada will have. It might still be a better, more decorous and professional than whatever is going on south of the border, but at 2019-2020 it is a low bar to clear, sorry. Back to MLP?

Meh, the MLP: FIM ended on a predictable note, except for one element, (pun intended), and no, it’s not the dastardly trio get petrified at the series’ end. By now, the MLP: FIM franchise has had plenty of redeemed villains, such as Flim & Flam, or the speciest councillor from the penultimate season, as examples. Yes, having a designated irredeemable villain can be bad for the show, if handled incorrectly, as MCU’s AoS has handled Ward, and to a different extent – Palamas/agent 33, but here MLP: FIM is less reminiscent of AoS, and more of the ‘Avatar’ cartoon series. At the end of A: TLA, there were two of such irredeemable villains in the show: Ozai and Azula. Ozai had lost his bending, Azula became insane, (and you do not usually get such a detailed depiction of progressive insanity in cartoons, you know, as A: TLA did with Azula), and the cartoon series ended. Then there was A: TLK, and between them, the ‘Avatar’ franchise is releasing a series of comics/comic books that depict what happened between the two shows, (as well as some post A: TLK events). In them, Ozai is shown to be still a very formidable villain, bending or no bending, while Azula actually escapes and goes on to become a force to be reckoned with, complete with a legacy, that would surface in a roundabout way in A: TLK… so who’s to say that CG, LT and QC won’t resurface in some new way in the next variation of the MLP saga, the way that Ozai and Azula have in the world of the ‘Avatar’?

…Personally, I was more impressed by the sign of the united ponies/griffons/yaks/changelings/dragons/etc. as they moved against the villains as a single front at the end – Union of Equestrian Socialist Republics here we come!

…Yes, this probably won’t happen…and not just because by now the U.S. is admitting, however reluctantly, that its’ dream of a ‘global village’ is currently at an end and even if the Donald doesn’t run for the president at 2020, (if he gets impeached, for example), it doesn’t mean that the Democrats will win this election, (so far it isn’t even fully clear as to who their candidate will be on that year – everyone is so busy with the impeachment), which means that whatever that had went down at the MLP: FIM’s series’ finale, is a pure utopia that isn’t truly realistic at all. This brings us to the actual point: the show’s conclusion: Twilight Sparkle has become a proper alicorn ala Celestia and Luna, (and Cadance too, I guess), while the rest of the Mane 6 have aged and by now are more to Mayor Mare’s age when the show has started.

…When TS became an alicorn in the past season finales, the show’s crew promised that she would not outlive her friends, but now that the show is over, the finale has come and gone, and everything is said and done…TS probably will. The show’s crew broke their promise, but because the show is over, its’ main villains – and the Storm King, does anyone remember him by now – are finished, and no one really cares about the canon anymore. True, if a show goes on long enough – the current incarnation of ‘Supergirl’, for example – no one cares about the canon anymore, unless it throws a real twist, as the second and last season of AC had, but still. It is a statement broken, a lie. Ouch! Remind me not to believe what the people in TV-land say anymore, would you?

Anything else? Real life sucks and family always makes it worse; a new kind of apple – a Cosmic Crisp – is hitting grocery stores in real life soon from this date, (October 2019) – and this is it, really. Real life sucks, sometimes hatred is the only thing that can carry you through and, oh yeah, today is the international sloth day! (The animal, not the deadly sin). Enjoy!

…This is it for now. See you all soon!

S.H.I.E.L.D. 'Planet Kitson' - May 24

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks. Which is why this week’s AoS episode, ‘Planet Kitson’, tried to do something about it.

More precisely, ‘Planet Kitson’ was largely a comic episode, where almost every scene was done in a humorous manner one way or another. Very clever, and for those people who like American humor – namely the majority of Americans and maybe just as many Canadians too – very funny. For the humorless minority this was more of a filler episode where Elisabeth and Chloe (namely Daisy and Jemma) got to act drunk slash wasted, and Ian and Joel Stoffer (Fitz and Enoch) also showed to be a very good comedic team. Put it thusly, why did they need to bring Jeff Ward’s character into the second half of AoS S5 and beyond? It’s anyone’s guess, and it is little messes like this one that keep AoS from being truly great, but-

But the fact of the matter is that ‘Planet Kitson’ does not have much in plot advancement, save that some Boba-Fett-like character kidnapped Fitz at the end of the episode and prevented it from being this a happy ending. By now even fans of Fitz and Simmons are tired of their beloved characters being constantly apart save for brief periods of togetherness – it’s time for them to get it going on, especially since they will have at least one child, a daughter, the mother of Deke Shaw, so maybe this forced separation is enough? We will have to wait and see, again.

On the more immediate level – since otherwise this would be a blog entry that is too short even by my standards – we can also pay attention to C&D; in the previous C&D entry we talked about AoS, so let’s do an about-face and acknowledge that the good father Delgado isn’t doing so hot in the MCU: his role is constantly downplayed and minimized. A very possible reason as to why Adina Johnson – Ty’s mother – is acting OOC by S1 standards is that she’s doing someone else’s lines – either Mayhem’s or Delgado’s. In the first half of S2, we had some sparkage between those two, but since then Delgado’s character was increasingly pushed to the sidelines, while Mayhem had issues of her own, both within the Marvel Cinematic Universe and without. Yet again C&D handled whatever real life issues it had behind the scenes better than AoS does, so again, it is coming ahead. AC, cancelled or not, is and was still the best MCU show so far; ‘Runaways’ are very different, the Netflix were a mixed bag, and as for the ‘Gifted’ and ‘Legion’, they actually aren’t a part of MCU, but have their own universes.

…Marvel (& Disney) have merged with Fox, so now mutants may be a part of MCU – we will have to wait until the end of June for the ‘Dark Phoenix’ X-men movie to see what is going on there, but for now there don’t appear to be any mutants in AoS, (or C&D, and ‘Runaways’ are something else entirely). Anything else?

Firstly, the scriptwriters for GoT appear to have read the source material – Martin’s ASOIAF novels and reached the readily available conclusion that Westeros should throw out the entire hereditary autocratic monarchy out of the window and try something new. Sadly, since HBO is American, it ended with Westeros being a proto-democracy – supposedly. In reality, immigrants from Great Britain, Europe’s first, and best, constitutional monarchy, heavily influenced the U.S. democracy – and unlike it, Westeros got zilch in this department, so many critics of the GoT finale expect that it will collapse and things will fall apart into several kingdoms slash countries.

Again, it is a tendency that was implied even in the original novels and related materials: only the Iron Throne and whoever-was-sitting-on-it, write-in the name of the king/queen of the month kept the seven kingdoms together; the memory of the Targaryen glory days helped to make the Iron Throne desirable, and now that it is all gone and done and the North is independent, say hello to separatism, civil strife and further warfare. Pause. Yes, ethnic Westerosi probably call it the daily routine, but those of us who live in the real world find this turn of events rather sad instead.

A special mention goes to the separate North of GoT. In ASOIAF series, the North and South had a strong Scotland and England feel, with Dorne having a special mention as quasi-Wales, something that carried to the first five or six seasons of GoT so with North seceding from the Union…I mean Westeros, um. The Scots in real life are upset with the whole Brexit situation and while they are not fully interested in seceding from the U.K. in favor of the EU, that possibility is on the table too. Apparently, HBO is trying to make a comment about real life politics literally, and are also being all-American in regards to a largely European issue. Um. Can’t we try this again?

Mr. Martin seems to have made his peace with GoT and HBO, and besides, GoT is over; there are spinoffs in the work already, but the main, basic plotline, one that depended the most on ASOIAF, is done and finished, so that’s that.

MLP, as we’ve mentioned, is in its’ final season as well, and like GoT, it is beginning to play loosey-goosey with the script; the season’s premiere – Mane 6 vs. Sombra – had the cheesiest, the over-the-top, the blatant dialogue, not to mention that it completely disregarded the MLP comics, Hasbro’s own – so it seems as if Hasbro had settled its’ own affairs by now too. MLP is coming to the end, and though Grogar’s little cabal is coming together, they are still evil and thus will turn on Grogar, (made obvious by ‘Frenemies’ finale) and on each other, unless Grogar does so first, giving them (and the script) an opportunity to join the Mane 6 and allies and begin redeeming themselves for real now. Or not, and they go back to Tartarus, or get exiled from Equestria for real or whatever. You cannot really force redemption; both AoS and ‘Blindspot’ showed that, though only ‘Blindspot’ – intentionally. Anything else?

Well, there’s ‘Aladdin 2019’, and surprisingly, it is not a failure, so yay! However, that is also a topic for another time, and as such, we will talk about it at another date.

For now, though, this is it. See you all soon!

The end of GoT? - May 21

Obligatory disclaimer: sometimes life sucks, sometimes it does not, but everything always comes to an end, not just your life, (as the book of Ecclesiastes says), but also all times, good and bad. Most likely, I will not be around to write anything, especially in my blog, next week (i.e. the very last week of May), so let us try to put something extra this week, ok?

Let us start with Ms. Chokshi’s next novel about Aru Shah – ‘the Song of Death’. In it, the titular heroine and her soul sister Yamini meet another one of their number, as well as Aru’s love interest, a boy from her town, one that lives across the street or down the street or something along those lines. And?

When compared to the first novel – ‘the End of Time’ – ‘the Song of Death’ feels more mainline as far as the promoted children’s books by RR go. In ‘End’, Chokshi was all over the metaphorical place, treating RR no different than she did J-Ro of the HP novels; in ‘Song’ there are no references to such novels, but there are some references to Disney movies, especially ‘the Little Mermaid’ and ‘Moana’. It should be noted that RR did something similar in his ‘Magnus Chase’ series, especially the first books. Ergo, it looks as if Ms. Chokshi got her gear in, well, gear, as ‘Song’ is now more similar to the mold of RR, less clumsy, and with far less specifically American-Hindu social stereotypes.

Yes, Ms. Chokshi herself is an American woman of Hindu origins who lives in the American state of Georgia, and yes, her mother is a Filipino, (hence Yamini, Aru’s first friend and closest Pandava sister in her series), but firstly, that culture never got as much spotlight in her Aru series (so far), so clearly, there’s some conflict of interest and culture that is going on in her background and in the background of her Aru novels. Yes, ‘Song’ does not offer any social stereotypes, not directly, as they happened in ‘End’; covertly – yes, about as much as you would expect in RR novels about Percy, Jason and Magnus, meaning that Ms. Chokshi got more help in writing ‘Song’ than she did with ‘End’ previously. So?

So, it is hard to say, but in ‘Song’, one of the main protagonists is ‘Lady M’, sister of Ravana, the greatest Maharajah of the Rakshasas, period, and of Kunkarna, their greatest champion, and ‘Song’ talks about how she wasn’t entirely evil, she was also partially misunderstood and abused. Sure, she was still evil, but-

But in truth, that story of which ‘Song’ talks about started before ‘Lady M’ encountered Rama, Sita and Laxmana in the forest; it began, when Ravana, by acting pious for centuries, tricked the Hindu gods into making him almost invulnerable; only a mortal could kill him. So, a certain Hindu god (no spoilers, you want to know more, Google it), reincarnated as a mortal man, Rama, and eventually killed Ravana; ‘Lady M’, yes, was treated beastly by Rama and his exiled family, but in the end? She was only a piece in a greater game of thrones: who would win, gods or Rakshasas (demons, essentially).

…Yes, this brings us to GoT and the series finale. The Internet is an uproar regarding the eighth and last season; some claim that the characters changed too much, others – that not enough or reverted to their initial selves (think the very opening episodes of the series). My take that the main problem here is that HBO and co. did a hatchet job by combining two versions of the final season into one: the first 3 episodes and the last 3 have two very different feels.

What says the Bible? Nothing is new under the sun? Right on – for me, this is reminiscent of the last ‘Jurassic World’ film, which also tried two combine two movies into one: the first where Claire, Owen and co. go to the dino isle one last time, and the second, where the evil E holds his dinosaur auction and it all goes south, thanks to our plucky heroes. Ditto here, where the Night King and the King’s Landing plots make two different stories that are only loosely connected to each other; and what’s more…

What’s more, not unlike what has gone down in AoS for a while, GoT’s S8 has the feeling of characters – and plot lines – getting reshuffled, especially with Jon and Dany having very strong Jaime and Cersei vibes. Of course, there is a perfectly valid point about how HBO handled GoT S8’s characters and plot just fine, with GoT’s characters remaining true to their nature: i.e., Jaime went back to Cersei because he always went back to Cersei; Arya went away because she was always on the run, and so forth. The problem with that statement is that GM spent the entirety of his novels having Jaime, Arya, Brienne, Sandor, Sansa, Gendry, and etc., etc., breaking free of their mold and becoming something new: character development, put otherwise. In S8, (and to lesser extent in S7), all of this went out the window…just because. The actors, probably, didn’t care, (their counterparts in AoS aren’t that unique, it seems), and neither did the crew, seeing how they rushed through S8 – forgotten Starbucks™ coffee cups and plastic water bottles? Really? That is just inattentive – and rushed. Guess they are now all-focused on the following GoT spinoff or something, yay. What next?

Well, GM is keeping his opinions to himself, mostly – he may not be the biggest fan of GoT fan works, but HBO has never been a ‘fan work’, but rather paid him some very handsome sums of his own, so he isn’t going to be widdling in a good thing, that’s number one.

And number two is last week’s episode of MLP: FIM, aka ‘Frenemies’, where the titular characters are beginning to resemble the Lannister siblings vaguely. Tirek is Jaime at his worst – not quite a musclehead or a jock, but close. Chrysalis is Cersei, a crazy queen who has lost of all of her subjects, with CG being an eviller, and crazier, version of Tyrion while Grogar is Tywin with…minimal personality changes and slightly different goals, true. Sombra’s Joffrey, though it should be pointed out that that shadow pony had had some reboots of his own – in the comics, he even got redeemed, so Hasbro here is trying to be Marvel, I suppose…

But as for the ‘Frenemies’ themselves – Sombra is gone now for good, looks like – they are slowly moving towards a crossroads, where they will have to accept friendship for real and stop being villains, (kind of like Discord, who’s more of an anti-hero these days than a villain these days), or not, in which case their friendship, (or the ersatz that they developed in its’ stead), is done and gone.

Yes, their relationship with Grogar complicates things somewhat: the ‘Frenemies’ episode openly showed that they will betray him, or vice versa, (since he is the biggest bad of this MLP season), but that does not change anything, generally speaking: either ‘Frenemies’ will stop being evil, or they stop being friends, and back to Tartarus they go, because otherwise? Tirek wants to drain all the magic, CG – all the friendship, and Chrysalis – all the love. On their own, every one of them had been a hoof-full for the Mane 6 and associates; together, the three of them would destroy Equestria, which is both resilient and fragile at the same time, period.

Back to GoT – if the ‘Frenemies’ are Lannisters, then the Mane 6 are Starks: Robb and Jon, (who is not a Targaryen, period), Bran and Rickon, Sansa and Arya, with Spike being Theon, and the sister princesses – the Stark parents. (Yes, Ned as a sparkly pony princess is ridiculous, but regardless). Everyone else – you make the equations; what we should keep in mind is that GoT may be gone from live TV (you can always stream, or download it, or something), but it can return in the most bizarre places, and hey, MLP – is just Starks vs. Lannisters these days, (which is GoT at the most basic, really).

Well, this is it for now: see you all soon!

real life is crazy - April 23

The obligatory disclaimer: real life…it does not suck, not always. Sometimes it is just insane instead. If you look on Yahoo’s™ news of the day, you will see why. I, incidentally, got caught on the tail end of the event in question, and just barely made it home. Go me. Not. Several other people got much more unlucky…

Anything else? Just that last week’s episode of MLP: FiM featured more of the hippogriff-merpony weirdness. Again. Yes, it is continuity with the MLP vs. the Storm King movie, but… again, who was the genius behind this idea? The whole sea to sky/land conversion isn’t too different from what Disney™ did in their ‘Little Mermaid’ franchise, but how would this work in a more anthropomorphic setting, (say, the Equestria Girls side-universe)? Merponies are, naturally, merfolk; Equestrian ponies correspond to the humans, dwarves and elves of the modern RPG worlds, so where do the new races fit in? And the hippogriffs, as I said in an earlier time, were an especially inconvenient idea, because – hybrid species, remember? So the entire merpony/hippogriff episode was weird; its’ main idea was sound and important, because it dealt with the fate and status of children of separated/divorced parents (grown-ups), due to irreconcilable, (or nearly so), differences…

So, where does this lead us? Nowhere, for today was just too full of insanity, the bad kind. Therefore, nothing more will be said today, not at the moment.

See you all soon instead!

MLP, S8 - March 27

To be brief and to the point. In seasons past, MLP: FiM has taken on Starlight Glimmer and her godless communism; this time, this season, it seems to be chancellor Neighsayer, and his racial segregation shtick.

No, really, this is how this season of MLP works – Twilight Sparkle has opened a school for friendship, and the focus on this season’s premiere episodes was on six students who were a pony, a yak, a changeling, a dragon, a griffon and a hippogriff, symbolizing or standing in for racial variability and integration. The evil chancellor is against this sort of thing, so yes, he is a segregationist and is liable to get into trouble with the rest of Celestia’s (and Luna’s) government before this season is done. Yay for MLP and its’ way of dealing with the thorny real life issues, superior to the one done by AoS. Anything else?

Not in particular, since real life sucks, especially in Russia – there was a major fire with many causalities in a shopping center, in another city there was a mass poisoning due to a mismanaged garbage disposal ground and the MeToo movement has surfaced in that country at last, so it’s been a very exciting post-elections time there after all.

Back to MLP? Ever since the storm king movie…the canon there is that the seaponies and the hippogriffs can transform into one another…by magic. How high was the mind that came with that idea, as an off topic? In real life myths, hippogriffs are born from griffons and horses, an impossibility because griffons hate horses and would rather kill or eat them instead of mating. And yes, both griffons and hippogriffs are mythical beasts that never existed outside of one’s imagination, yet even in Middle Ages people accepted that the hippogriffs were twice as mythical as, say, dragons or unicorns, because griffons would never mate with horses, both because they were imaginary and hated horses, so if a hippogriff came into existence, it was very lucky…but also associated with a griffon, and – its’ relative. So where did the seaponies fit/came in? Some great wit in the MLP creative team stretched their creative muscle and came with the instance sea-to-sky conversion in the storm king movie? Who knows…

So. The new season of MLP has shown that it continues to be one crazy world, connecting components of reality, and imagination, and myths, and its’ own content. Good luck to it. And – see you all soon!

S.H.I.E.L.D., laws - Dec 6

Last night, AoS’ S4 mid-season finale was aired. And?

In some ways, it was different from S3 mid-season finale, for example. In ‘Maveth’, Coulson rescued Fitz from the alien planet in question, and there was this huge-scale explosion of a castle (belonging to Malick and Hydra?) and in general back then AoS tried to recreated the ‘Avengers’ atmosphere, both then, and at the end of S3 proper, when Hive was destroyed by a nuclear explosion in space. It did ignore the fact that a screen in a movie theatre was a different beast from the screens on a TV or a typical domestic computer/laptop, so the final result wasn’t quite ‘Avengers’-like; plus Luke Mitchell’s departure from the series caused more damage – and now?

The S4 mid-season finale, ‘Laws’, was much smaller in scale; in fact, in terms of special effects and all, it was more like ‘The Librarians’ S2 finale, with few special effects, (if any); but ‘The Librarians’ really aren’t into special effects, (though the first two episodes of their S3 were something different). AoS, on the other hand, was – after all, it is a part of MCU, so there!

However, as I may have written before, this time, with S4, AoS is possibly working on a tighter budget than it did in the first 3 seasons. In part it is because Elena ‘Yo-Yo” Rodriguez (NCB) is getting her own mini-series, (available on Dec 13, 2016), online – fair enough, but AoS/MCU already did something similar between S2 and S3, and it didn’t prevent S3 from trying to go epic, as it was already written.

On the other hand, the ratings of AoS S3 began to fall down very fast, and right now, they do not appear to be recovering, regardless of the presence of the Ghost Rider. The latter, of course, is his own kettle of fish; in S4, AoS tried to do what DC’s ‘LoT’ did with Jonah Hex – something of a special guest superhero on top of the regular team. It worked in ‘LoT’ because ‘LoT’ is a better (right now) TV series compared to AoS, plus-

In addition, ‘LoT’ is a part of the bigger DC’s ‘Arrowverse’ TV-verse, which also includes ‘Arrow’, ‘The Flash’ and nowadays – ‘Supergirl’ (2016 onwards). The four TV shows are not exactly a smoothly functioning machine, they have problems, but as the ‘Invasion’ of last week has shown, their casts and crews can work together without any problems, with each show having its unique identity in the greater DC ‘Arrowverse’ TV-verse.

On contrast, AoS’ cast and crew have constantly problems – with each other and with other people, I would guess. As promised, Skye/Daisy and the Ghost Rider/Robbie Reyes didn’t have any romance or any sort of a relationship between each other, which is one of the reasons why Robbie (and his uncle) just went off somewhere else in the third quarter of ‘Laws’ – so far there is no final and definite idea as to how to properly integrate Robbie into AoS and S.H.I.E.L.D.

Again, this is nothing new – throughout the series Skye/Daisy had a problem with having ‘an opposite number’ – Grant, Trip, Hunter, Lincoln – they all came and went for different reasons and in different ways, Robbie Reyes is just the latest, and while the writers may think that this helps Daisy’s character development, the audience may just feel irritated instead.

Now, the interactions between a show and fans is important, but it is also less straightforward than people may think. Take, for instance, ‘The Flash’, where people have been giving Iris flak. Now, it may be so because in this incarnation Iris is Afro-American, but in truth, she just is not very contributive to the show, not how Laurel is, or how Felicity is in ‘Arrow’. A crew of a show may have views about how a show is supposed to work, and fans also may have views about that same issue – different ones, so hello – conflict.

It is argued that not ALL the fans are offended when a character gets ‘racebent’ or changed in some other way, as Ms. Rowling tends to do with her characters (the original HP-verse, not the new ‘Fantastic Beasts’ expanded one), just the most vocal and obnoxious ones. Perhaps, but as AoS has shown, ignoring them is not so easy, either…

Well, no, not just AoS – the entire MCU. Hydra is supposed to be one of the bad people, yet there is a strong support for it online (at least). They may not be the biggest faction, but they are there, and they are well prepared to fight-off any opposition – and they have plenty of opposition, because pro-Hydra is pro-evil (sort of). Moreover, since the Internet is that sort of a marvelous invention, any arguments can very quickly either die-out or grow to great proportions.

Wait, isn’t this the sort of an argument that ‘socially-challenged’ nerds can only get involved in? Anyone sane will avoid this sort of a discussion by a mile? Yes, and they avoided the fandom by the same mile too, it seems, as AoS’ viewers’ ratings fell.

MCU instigated controversies – both unintentionally, as it was with Hydra in general and with Grant Ward and Kara Palamas in AoS specifically, and intentionally – Steve vs. Tony in the CA: CW film and Steve becoming Hydra in the Marvel comics. The most…intense part of MCU fandom reacted heterogeneously to these new developments, and sales fell. Viewers ratings’ (especially for AoS) – ditto.

In addition, it is always tricky to calculate a sale – there is no rule of thumb: people may buy-out a comic book issue/series of issues/etc. in one area and ignore the same piece in the other. Just look at ‘Harry Potter and the Cursed Child’ transcript book – it may not be a comic book, but the principle is still the same: in some Russian cities it was completely sold out, while here, in Toronto, Canada, I never saw people buying it, or any other books in Harry Potter series, including the latest edition of ‘The Chamber of Secrets’ with its magnificent new illustrations (by Jim Kay, I think). ‘Cursed Child’ was sold at a flat rate of 15 dollars – cheaper than a novel set in the Pathfinder™ game-verse, and people still weren’t flocking to it…unlike in Russia. Bet you this is not what Ms. Rowling expected when she had realized the transcript…

‘Cursed Child’ is relevant to the discussion about MCU, AoS, DCEU and etc., because it also tried to be culturally diverse, as ‘The Flash’ is, for example. In ‘The Flash’, Iris West is an Afro-American, and people are displeased by this; with ‘Cursed Child’ Hermione and her daughter, Rose, had the same issue. (They got over this by their acting skills, period). Ms. Rowling promptly called them racists and that was the end of that, as far as she was concerned. The same thing is happening in MCU, as Zendaya may be the new Mary Jane in the new ‘Spider-Man’ movie, and-? Racism?

Well, on some level – certainly yes. However, on another – no. It is somewhat ridiculous to treat characters from books, comics, TV series, movies as real-life people, but without this treatment these characters become, well, products that need to be sold and bought, period, and they are usually being sold to, and being bought by, a specific audience, which, in case of AoS (and the rest of MCU, maybe), isn’t really interested in this sort of thing, not entirely, not anymore.

There is also the option of putting a show onto Netflix, for a flat rate. But again, not everyone can afford it, and even among those who can afford it, there are those, who are still uninterested in watching it, and if there are enough of such people – the ratings plummet, and the show goes further downwards, now further depowered by the people who are somewhat interested in watching it, but cannot afford it – but AoS isn’t worried by them, because it is a free show that is steadily losing popularity for the reasons discussed above – it was too controversial for too long and now investors are losing interest in it or getting worried.

Shows hate controversy: when one of the ‘background ponies’ on MLP: FIM began to be controversial, it was showed into background as far as possible, and began to re-emerge only recently, now that the controversy is long gone. AoS did not do the same approach (pragmatic, if not sensible) to Grant and Kara Palamas, and paid the price.

Speaking of Kara… The S4 mid-season finale had Melinda May gotten replaced by a robot double – which was exactly what Hydra did via Kara back in S2. Back then, Coulson very quickly recognized the imposter due to intimate, personal details that Kara just could not know about May. Now… he is fooled, but that is not the point, the point is that AoS is back to recycling its’ ideas; S3 (especially post-‘Maveth’) had recycled many ideas from S2; S4 is not as bad, but it still shows, and that also diminishes its’ chances to be renewed (for S5 and beyond). ‘Agent Carter’ was cancelled after just two seasons, remember?

On the other hand, S4 shows a notable decrease in InHumans – right now they are mostly plot devices; there are Daisy and Yo-Yo and director Mace himself (clearly influenced by Steel from DC’s ‘LoT’), and that is it. Oh, and there is also the senator’s brother, but right now he is a no-show, so who knows? Instead, we are going to get the invasion of robot body snatchers, spearheaded by Aida and Dr. Radcliffe, (who immediately knew that there was something wrong with Darkhold, unlike May or even Fitz, for comparison). It is possible that AoS is downplaying the InHumans specifically, especially at least their own TV show airs (in the upcoming years), but with InHumans being largely a no-show, and Hydra gone (cough), AoS is lacking two of its major elements since the beginning of S3. Again – not good.

So, in conclusion of the rant: AoS’ S4 is still going strong, but not strong, as it was in the beginning. Will it be enough to rescue AoS for the future seasons? Who knows…?