Since the last SCN update was 3 months ago and there seems to be a lot of misconceptions around it in the fandom, here's a brief reminder for those who struggle to follow the plot 🫶
🟢 Amen has a traumatic past and a sh*tty job, that does not make him a bad person.
🔴 Amen isn't abusive to Eva, on the contrary he's the only one who ever tried to give her a chance at a better future.
🟢 If romanced properly Amen deeply loves Eva to the point he basically already proposed. All comments about how he only want s*x are invalid as the truth is he stopped/refused s*x multiple times when Eva offered
🔴 Shesmu are canonically power-hungry and often violent criminals so corrupted by dark magic that their souls turned cold. Eva is the exception to this and not the rule. Playing as a shesmu doesn't mean they're the "good guys".
🟢 Hunters are law enforcement, if the law doesn't differentiate between "sort of decent" and "worst ever" shesmu that's not on Amen or the hunters as they have no hand in law-making
🔴 Dia and Eva were never close friends, Eva's bestie was Isman before and later Livius.
🟢 Dia was lawfully executed due to her own crimes and Remmao's setup. Had she been innocent the hunters would've had no reason to touch her.
🔴 Amen never caused Eva nightmares or PTSD, her dreams started before they met
My (not so) short review that nobody needs hear for this update - KFOS and SOCN
*sighs* Boy, where do I start?
TLDR: KFOS and SOCN turned out disappointing. This is my personal impression, reasons below, warning - lots of letters.
KFOS - first, my minor pet peeve - I don't like that they stopped giving cutscenes with the favorites except Christian. Ram, Kamal and Sara have much fewer of them with Devi compared to him. I also noticed that the cutscenes have lost quality? Just close-ups? I've had the impression before that stories that drop in the rankings get less resources.
Second - I think Stasya doesn't "feel" the story yet, because the only emotions I experienced while reading were my disgust and tension during the dinner scene.
Well also Doran turned out well, his not-so-passive agression with wishing a long life to the queen (especially in the context that he can't express his displeasure with Englishmen directly and he can't kill them all, so he turns to caustic sarcasm) is just slay king energy.
Third - and here starts my rant - a lot of interactions feel artificial and underwhelming. Devi's confrontation with Clara in the street seemed just like that - artificial and not really well thought out. The concept of the scene itself is good - Devi sees how Indian servants are bullied in Britain and lashes out. But the tone, the consequences that author chose to portray is just.... Devi just pulls Guy Richi and shuts the racist arrogant lady up. Yayslay, but… was it me or it was underwhelming?
RANT
Come to think about it, you didn't have to go to Britain to see that behavior (or all those Indian movies I watched and a few books I read kind of misled me). AFAIK this attitude was common in occupied India, as some of the British upper and not so upper class moved there to occupy and make easy money there. They built districts to their taste and style - all those clubs and establishments where Indian servants worked and where Indians were not allowed to enter. The police, too, were subject to the British. This apartheid and humiliation could be seen in India at every step, but Devi notices it only in England? And, bear with me, but I really think she couldn't just go to a high society lady and berate her for the way she treats her servants without some consequences to her and to Christian reputation. Devi has not changed Clara's mind with this argument, and she certainly will not change the mind of the whole of English society, which stands on the opinion of the exclusivity and superiority of the British Empire over all nations that have not risen to the level of their greatness. That's how empires work. Devi's act was from the good heart, but impulsive, and she would be spoken of not with respect but with contempt, saying that Christian had chosen “a rude savage” as his bride. Because Devi is not at home. She is in the land of her enemies. Because the whole thing was truly none of her business and it's not her servant, and also doing that she could have made things much worse for the servant-girl and for Christian's reputation (breach of etiquette! that Devi likes to bring up when someone's rude to her). And in this situation it doesn’t matter how angry Devi and we as readers would have felt, because we are in a different world and we’re not making the rules there. We should be uncomfortable with this scene, we should feel anger and frustration in this scene.My point is that the scene would have been more realistic if at its outcome Devi was faced with indifference, condescension and judgment, as if Devi had done something wrong (she hadn't, she just ended up in a world where such attitudes were the norm). Devi should have felt like she was in the Looking Glass, she should have been thrown off balance by the situation. Girl power slay in the style of "I'm Basu and who are you?" doesn’t work here. Or rather it doesn't give you a nuanced outcome of the situation. Even if Devi had come out of the verbal confrontation victorious in her own eyes, society would have gaslighted her. And because of that sence of powerlessness, her anger would have gotten even greater, and she would have actually cursed Clara with the help of the Dark Mother. And Devi would realize that she can't behave in England the way she did at home. It must be infuriating, annoying, but it's something she and we as players have to put up with. It resonates with us, we have to feel these emotions. I would read, of course, how the heroine deals with injustice, but if we have a story about colonialism and the Dozen trying to throw off that yoke, why aren't we shown such scenes in all their colors? Because mere words and knowledge of the etiquette are not enough. I also think Devi's connection to the Dark Mother's anger could have played out as a sort of Death Note, where Devi curses someone and then misfortunes happen to those cursed people.
I think the artificial tone of the story is my main problem with season two in general. Devi finds herself in a foreign hostile country, but now she's acting like Amala in India and by simple demands she shuts up the lords and ladies left and right just by demanding respect and they just listen to her and shut up. And it looks like a safe route, like there are no stakes there. And with change of the “location” we have to feel discomfort - but not with food, weather and new clothes, but with a feeling like we’re walking on eggshells. Devi, in a conversation with lord What's His Face, intimidates him with Christian, and he stops harassing her. But then the same lord makes a shapito show of provocation at dinner, showing that he doesn't give a damn about Christian's opinion and doesn't give a damn about him in general. I'm not saying there shouldn't be provocation, it shouldn't have been so brazen and direct in words. After all, English high society can masterfully insult in a veiled manner, and the author's skill in writing such dialogues was clearly lacking here. Imho (just my imho) storywise here, in England, Devi should realize how lucky she is to be a member of high Bengali society where she is respected, valued and listened to, when in England she should feel that she is looked down upon, trapped and treated worse, like a second-class person, no matter what her background is. Here, if you are on a route with Christian, there should be a test of his and Devi's feelings in the context of the contempt of the entire upper class society for the "second class people" as they see Indian people to be. Christian has to experience that he has become a pariah in some way by choosing to marry a Devi.
I may have a misconception of how things worked back then, but my thoughts are that it's like all the tension is gone from the story. And there should be - it's a story essentially about two factions who hate each other, who don't want to make contact and settle because it's a story built on a colonial takeover. It's toned down here, yes, it's not historically accurate and all, BUT: if this base of historical events gives you an opportunity to use a great source of conflict, disagreement, and drama - you use it (that's why the provocation with beef at the dinner resonated with me - I was fuming!). And alas, I'm feeling less and less of all that. Especially after the first season that SLAYED.
Also, Devi's offer to Doran to team up with Christian, to use him, would have looked different and even more tense if those political and social nuances worked, and their interaction wasn't just some game of "who knows more". What kind of games are these anyway, they're on the same side, behind enemy lines. Devi could have shared her frustration with her experience in England with Doran and then open some cards to him and admit that they need Christian's resources to determine who's sowing turmoil in the Dozen. There could have been some great GOT-style dialogue here, not just the "The Executioner despises the Englishmen and therefore won't even consider it, he needs to be persuaded", but "The Executioner has been through enough in his life to know that if there's a chance, you have to take it, politics is always played dirty". Doran is described as intelligent after all, not just angry walking muscles.
Well, that's just my thoughts and impressions, you're free to disagree with me here. I'm probably asking too much from a visual novel, I never read them with a magnifying glass to look for nitpicks, but…. But I really liked KFOS S1 ._. And I'm sad for the untapped potential.
SOCN - I was disappointed too. I think Remy's original idea to write that Agnia and Amen attack Livius and Eva but were saved by Seth worked better.
Now, it's friendship and magic, no conflict and drama. The two sides of the conflict resolve everything man-to-man, blow off steam and agree on everything.
And I have the feeling that all the seriousness of the situation has gone somewhere and everything has descended into some kind of farce.
Okay, Amen using Livius and Eva to achive his goals still works fine. But Seth, who fights Amen for fun and then agrees to cooperate with him - no. Just no. It's seems OOC. It doesn't work. Even if he's weakened like a God. Even if he needs Hemseth so much. Seth is a god, he has pride and principles, and there's no way I believe he'd choose to work with someone who kills his followers and weakens him. Neither will Amen agree to work with Seth who he thinks is some kind of Supreme shezmu. He hates the Supreme. He wouldn't go for an alliance either.
Has the writes watched too much of House of the Dragon? WHERE ARE MY CONFLICTS I'M ASKING YOU I'M GOING TO START A SCANDAL
I thought that Remy's decision that Amen and Seth couldn't be friendsto MC like the other favorites had to do with this intransigence, but no, some other reason.
What's the point of not being friends with the favorites if everyone's drinking beer and making truces with each other???
On va finir par croire qu’ici, on est discrètement payé pour faire la promo des sorties de Richard Francès, que ce soit ses récentes productions en son nom propre, au titre de son label Hylé Tapes, en tant que moitié de Pointe du Lac ou comme aujourd’hui, sous le moniker d’Acid Fountain!
La réalité, c’est que le garçon est un stakhanoviste, un activiste du DIY musical toujours en mouvement, qui enchaine les projets et les sorties de qualité, donc à écouter et à signaler.
C’est aussi un artiste qui revendique ses engagements, un trait de personnalité perdu depuis bien trop longtemps chez le plus grand nombre. Un moyen supplémentaire de communiquer, de partager, d’inventer, de faire reculer les frontières et les murs minéraux qui étouffent l’indispensable et indiscipliné bouillonnement du sol sur lequel l’artiste a les pieds posés. En pleine conscience.
At first he was seen as a handsome witty flirt that got on her nerves. Later she understood he was gentleman who cared only for his work. He would become her best friend and Protection from pain and wouldn't dare take advantage of her vulnerability
