Weird that they are placing so much emphasis on having bio kids as the ultimate form of happiness and legacy, when Mr. Miyagi is like, right there. Do the writers think of him as different/a tragedy because he would have had it if his wife and son didn’t die, or did they just forget?
I answered and I deleted and I answered and I deleted, because I agree so much with you and I don't want to ruin the enjoyment for anyone, so let's put this below the cut:
THE ANSWER/VARIOUS RAMBLES STUCK TOGETHER WITH TAPE THAT I ACKNOWLEDGE DID NOT STICK WITH YOUR ORIGINAL ASK APOLOGIES (we did start there though):
maybe miyagi was actually secretly evil the whole time........ 🤔🤔🤔(joke)
that family structure is suspect dude, sounds queer to adopt a kid who's being bullied, years after your wife and child died and then not even knock up his mom, what are you gay?
at the very least don't pretend it's a real family you've got there, you'll always be a tragic sad man, without your biological progeny, which is the only kind that matters, and only if done in the Correct way (single parents need not apply)
weird we had the "tanmee" line in s3, but this season just straight up forgot a lot of its own building blocks in favour of some weird aggressive and regressive heterosexual bullshit -- the more I think about it the more discomfort I feel, which isn't to make this deeper than it is, I don't think there was bad intent. I think there was a tragic lack of imagination and it coincides with some real-world Politics that the show doesn't care about and is tacitly conservative about, but I sign onto the show not to be reminded of that world
a lot of people have mentioned that the show bears very little resemblance thematically to the core of the original (two) movies -- it's always been conservative in its depiction of military and war and violence, and simplified an actually incredibly complex, and yet incredibly clear-cut messaging that positions Miyagi (and his ideals) on one side and Kreese (and his ideals) on the other, with very clear reasoning as to why one is right and one is not
the show has been antisemitic, it's been racist, it's had a lack of queer characters that is all the more obvious in a story about a group of outcast kids with found family themes (first produced in 2019), and it's been sexist/underwritten the value that women have in a story about legacy and toxic masculinity and gender roles
and in fandom there have been interesting bits of analysis and writing from very talented and clever people to acknowledge these unexamined prejudices and flaws. they have been challenged in art and in narrative, and there has been plenty of discussion about where we can suspend disbelief and what we (individually) won't take onboard in our own various tellings of the story
up until s5 I have been able to hold that tension, because I truly enjoyed the story and the underlying themes and characters and was baseline expecting those themes and motivations to still matter
but oof the way that this season became entirely divorced from any of the show's own grounding themes, hasn't only made the characters hollow to me, but it's also made me realise (and hey, maybe I should realised this sooner, more fool's me) that they really don't give a shit about Miyagi
which is crazy because the story's about him.
EDIT: and i do still feel deeply uncomfortable about the final fight, and generally how daniel “defeating” anything was done totally absent of miyagi’s ideals -- the only way to solve anything is violence now. beat the other guy into submission to beat your fear i guess. meaningless to what daniel’s journey was, but good to know he’s also manly enough now
and more importantly than anything in a story that's just about liking or disliking trajectories and reads... I am deeply uncomfortable with its politics now
I think how I felt about s4 was that it had some moments I didn't like, but the trajectory made sense to me. with s5 there are moments I do like, but it's empty. I don't know why anything in the last episode happened. I feel intense discomfort about the treatment of women and girls. And to be clear I don't think that there was an intentional drive to make the messaging... that about queerness versus dominating toxic heterosexuality, but honestly I'm living in a pretty shitty world these days with a lot of backsliding in equality and I don't think that I can happily shut off my brain and watch something that conservative anymore
it's not technically anything deep as such, it's not real life. I've really enjoyed the show, I've made some lovely friends through it, and read some of the best fic, and gotten to hype up some wonderful artists and I'll stay in fandom, but I think I might be done with the show itself
but hey, miyagi adopting this skinny little punk from new jersey and giving him some valuable life lessons only for this kid to adopt him right back, that I can rewatch a million times and like I said -- the story is all about that (and it most certainly isn't a tragedy)
The North Sea was clashing against the tall cliffs, foaming at the edges, white and washed away blue and rocky grey all combined. Maybe picturesque, but a sight that could have been turned into a painting that could have made it to the museum. In the back of the art gallery, because something so lifeless would never be the center of attention, but it would be a secret of those who dared wonder further, who wanted to learn its secrets.
The sky was of a light, dull grey, riddled with clouds, and the distant rumble of thunder predicted a storm. It was already raining, a soft pitter-patter that could've slipped unnoticed.
Everything was quiet. The Cave was empty. The last person that had been known to have gone there was Regulus Black, the heir of The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, who had disappeared and never came back in 1979, four years before. The funeral had been bodiless; the heir hadn't been found.
They all said he's dead, which must have been true. After four years, no one could fathom the possibility of even seeing him again, let alone being alive. Something or someone must've dragged him away and killed him. Some said they might have been his own Lord's orders, for betrayal, or for lack of cold blood. But those were just unimportant details. He was bound to die either way, sooner or later. Hadn't it been for his poor mother, mad with grief and the need for vengeance for her only son, no one would have investigated one bit.
The thunder rumbled loudly that time, and lighting flashed somewhere in the distance. The atmosphere was filled with death.
Or the lack thereof.
Light panting. And there he was, standing in front of The Cave, Regulus Black, all bloody and slashed across his face, his clothes ripped apart, clutching Salazar Slytherin's locket like his life depended on it.
also y'all don't understand. my mom has been hounding me to make fucking t-shirts for YEARS. for the last 5 years whenever i've spoken to her she's blamed me for not working smart and told me i'm poor because i draw these stupid comics instead of inventing the next skelanimals. i have AGGRESSIVELY avoided doing this or producing ANY merch largely because it's unspeakably horrible for the environment. one pound of cotton (enough for 1 shirt) takes like 2,600 gallons of water. that's not even counting the gasoline used to ship and slave labor used to process and create the cotton and shirts. i can't fucking handle her constantly repeatedly chewing me out for without exaggeration HOURS weekly about this, i've cried an amount if time i can't even count over the years because she's dead set on killing the planet for some stupid merch, it feels humiliating that my career has just stuttered for years enough that i feel forced to eventually back down on this
Nah it's so frustrating seeing people on Tumblr think that fan edits only exist on T*k t0k when the editing community has been on Instagram since like 2016. We're out here spending hours on edits w mad transitions, effects, colourings, time remapping ECT all for celebrities and people on Tumblr to only acknowledge TT fancams, the fukn dregs of the editing community I'm sorry but ._.
