#ramble rabble

[tarkya]

I will not fall into the trap of restarting a fic from scratch, I will not fall into the trap of restarting a fic from scratch...

(I'm totally falling into the trap of restarting a fic from scratch.)

(You know, if I don't cringe into a 1-dimensional point from rereading what I already have...)

[tarkya]

I stand at the precipice of a dark pit called “getting way too deep into contemplating the metafictional cosmology of the Lego Movie” and the edge is crumbling beneath my feet. It’s too late for me, but before the inevitable slide into Lego Movie Lore Heck occurs I might as well ramble about some of my various feelings after seeing the movie. Obvious spoilers for the Lego Movie 2 beneath the cut. also oh god this got long.

First of all, I sort of went through the entire movie with a perpetual “:D” face on and mostly took the whole thing as it went. Because of that I was pretty thoroughly blindsided by the whole time travel thing even though Finn explicitly mentioned it during a vision. I just went through it thinking “haha Chris Pratt is talking to himself and one of them’s the cool movie actor version” without thinking about why they’d make that choice in the first place. Good on you, movie writers, I missed every single breadcrumb on that one.

The amount of more visible interplay between the imagination world and the real world was sort of strange at first, but I guess it makes sense that they’d do that. Considering they lifted the metaphorical curtain in the first movie it was either ignore it entirely or go all in on it. I’m kind of glad they went all in, though boy I have some questions. Questions I will probably go on for far too long about later.

The whole “apocalypseburg” thing and the plotline of Finn is a Teen and Must Be Edgy was great. And by great I mean I’ve been that person. Possibly still kind of that person. Woops. I did like Bianca’s builds, though! I wish they’d let her escape the trap of only working with “girl” blocks, but at least the builds got to be as elaborate and cool as Finn’s stuff. and I’m a sucker for the space fantasy aesthetic so

Animation was good. Watching Queen Whatevra move around was always a delight in particular, as was Unikitty’s ragebeast mode. So many moving parts, I can only imagine how much time that took to make look right...

The whole thing of “oh they’re not actually evil/brainwashed” thing sort of felt... weird, though? It felt like it came out of nowhere after a whole lot of “this is weird! they’re evil!” setup. I imagine in the context of the story and it’s themes it made sense, since we were firmly locked into Wildstyle’s and by proxy Finn’s going into the situation with preconceived notions about how the narrative was playing out but. come on. you can’t show me superman and green lantern getting along and not expect me to think something’s weird going on.

Also whole thing sure went hard on the lampshades and references. I felt some landed better than others on that front.

Overall, the movie still managed to feel really... sincere, I guess? I mean it was pretty snarky at some points and cheesy at others but at least it wholeheartedly embraced the message it was trying to send. that was nice.

...

man if they end up making a Third Part what’s it even gonna be... they didn’t have a stinger like the last one, I wonder if that means they’re done with it?

...

guess it depends on how much money it makes?

[tarkya]

woops the lego movie 2 managed to hit right in the sweet spot of Tropes That I Like and now I’m doomed for the next week or several.

guess it’s time to start pulling out the old fanfiction ideas again. and probably some new ones

[tarkya]

only you can save blockkind

overtime is hell, but it sure gives me a lot of time to overthink lego movie lore. I’m gonna have to go watch the second part again soon...

or start waiting for things to fall off the internet truck.

For now though, I’ll have to be content with aimlessly rambling on about what I remember from the movie, because if there’s something I love, it’s aimlessly rambling on about meta narratives. Cut for spoilers, hideous length, and general nonsense.

The first LEGO Movie was a story about Emmet learning that he could be special and creative. It was also a metaphor for Finn’s relationship with his father, which got outed in a climax that both established that the LEGO world was an imaginary one while also having Emmet hop around on a desk when nobody’s looking. Maybe it’s Finn extending his narrative into real life. Maybe it’s Toy Story rules. The first movie left it tantalizingly vague. Then the second movie threw a whole box of wrenches into it.

The second movie assumes you’ve seen the first, and that you know that the LEGO world is imaginary - and so it goes all in on that fact. You’ve got two competing narratives going on in it - something that I wrote a big long thing about before I realized that the writers had already confirmed that that was the case. Well at least it makes the post shorter. You can sort of tell whose narrative you’ve fallen into - most of Emmet’s adventure falls under Finn’s 80′s inspired purview, while Lucy and co. have been taken up into Bianca’s room for a nice wedding in Fantasia the Systar System. Overall, you can track the interactions between the siblings throughout the plot.

And then, like the last time, we start throwing minifigs around in the real world, but on a far greater scale this time.

There’s a hint to Rex Dangervest’s truth from early on - Finn talks about his plans to add time travel to his narrative which I missed entirely on my first watch. Terminator is probably to blame there. What’s interesting is that his entire backstory revolves around events in the real world, but things that theoretically never happened in the first place. Emmet falls under the dryer. Finn seemingly gives up on the LEGO thing entirely, or at least on the characters that carried the first movie, leaving them to his little sister. Emmet... figures out moving in the real world, remakes himself into Rex, and travels back in time.

Looking at things from the “it’s all imagination” perspective, it’s sort of interesting that the only way Finn could make Emmet “fit” the world was to basically create a different version of him. I’m sure a lot of writers have had that problem before, though - that point where a character is developed enough in your head that they sort of write themselves. I guess Finn’s got it a little more extreme with Emmet.

Or maybe Emmet’s escaped the fiction because he’s seen behind the curtain of reality. You can’t change a Real Person that easily.

It’d be easy enough to say that it’s all part of the imagination play. I mean, Rex straight up says that the entire fight is metaphorical, even as the fight takes place in a thoroughly real location. His actions throughout the entire movie are meant to change Emmet, and Emmet in any interpretation of What’s Up With the Metaverse is an avatar of Finn. Maybe it’s just an personification of a world telling Finn to be different as he struggles to grow up. Maybe it’s an actual, time traveling plastic man whose trying to upend the works of a god.

Maybe I should *go the frick to sleep*.

[tarkya]

I've spent several years using this FC for an RP character but being afraid to get commissions because the idea of going up to an artist like "hey can you draw this guy from a game I've never played and no longer exists" but

it's been 7 years since it came out. at this point I feel like it's acceptable kidnapping. this green wolf otome guy is mine now. just gotta make a proper refsheet or something

[tarkya]

Thinking of restarting that fic I abandoned a couple of years ago. Would be nice to have a creative project even if (especially if) it's dumb and self-indulgent.

[tarkya]

Helldivers 2 Galactic War is just libertarian Blaseball and I don't know how to feel about that.

[tarkya]

For april fools I forgot tumblr does april fools stuff. woops!

I got my boop badge though and that's all that matters