I may be stupid but I'm not clever

Not a very nice person | 30s | He/him | Star Trek | Harry Potter | Marvel | Random complaining

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

X-Men 97 S2E8 *spoilers*

What the heck was that? (spoiler waffle under cut)

No really, that whole episode just seemed really disjointed and off. Maybe it was heavily rewritten after DeMayo's exit? All the other episodes, I thought worked as episodes even if not for the season as whole. This one doesn't even have that. So I was wrong that X-Force and X-Men must have met to drop off the rescue student because clearly, they've never met and the X-Men dislike X-Force. And Cable's back to giving Scott and Jean the coldest of shoulders? What? This tension has not been set up. God mode Gambit, gets... one episode and just... isn't fun or interesting? And Rogue goes along with marrying him in that state? I did lol and possessed Nightcrawler just demolished the whole team single handedly though, even if they did turn the tables a couple of seasons later. The mental battle was alright, could have been a lot better. And Val teams up with X-Force because what all she cares about is taking down Xavier now or something? I do not get it, at all.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

i'm going to have to swear off tumblr for like a week, there's too many variations of spider-man brand new day tags to block.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

X-Men '97 S2E7 *spoilers*

What I'm coming to regard as a pretty standard episode for X-Men 97, not bad as an individual episode but taken as part of a 9 episode season...

Because, yes, a Nightcrawler and Colossus spotlight episode. Sign me up! Bishop and Polaris being awesome neat. Brawl between X-Men and Acolytes while Nightcrawler and Exodus have an full on power using sword duel, heck yeah.

But as part of the continuous plot, it's yet another episode about a subset of a team we've not seen before and not seeing again and the only Apoclypse part was a tiny stinger at the end (featuring X-Force at least.) It's a lot of... stuff happening.

Oh and they threw in a bit of The Trial of Gambit reworkd for... Nightcrawler and Graydon Creed huh.

And Colossus joins the X-Men? Or at least the school, since the X-Men aren't supposed to be operating out of NY? Like this team is getting huuuge. I still feel like the series would be improved with more episodes, or concentrating on a smaller cast. Even though I like a lot of individual elements they have no time to breathe.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

On MCU Blade

I've seen a few posts and commentary on the line that Fiege should be ashamed for the lack of Blade film and a Blade film is easy. Look at the 90s films! But Blade in the 90s was a clean slate. MCU Blade has to account for Blade in the 90s and 21 other films in the franchise.

blather under the cut

MCU Blade has to be. a) a good film b) that's comparable to/better than the snipes one c) doesn't feel like a rehash of the snipes ones d) sets up a secret world of vampires in an already existing franchise that has no hint before hand. e) the expectation that he'll interact with the heroes of that setting and thus they'll learn of vampires and then... not do anything about them. (Blade is weird in a shared universe.)

I imagine that's why one version of Blade film was a period piece given it's costumes got used in Sinners which sort of avoids issue E.

Blade also had the bad luck to be involved in Eternals which they seem not to want to follow up on. So either than direct link made it poison, or they soured on the concept on more hidden worlds the heroes don't know about because of it.

Obviously none of this is insurmountable, 90s Spider-Man did Blade via the Morbius vampire connection and wasn't allowed blades or blood or vampires biting people but of course... Sony did live action Morbius themselves.

And the MCU has already introduced a secret monster underworld with Werewolf By Night so that seems the place they should build that side of the verse from but even there it has next to zero connection to anything else in the MCU and people want more connections not less.

tl;dr: I think Blade is more complicated than people give it credit for as you have to make it distinct from Snipes' version and fit into the existing verse.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

It's weird, thinking back to The Martian, I don't think Mark Watney ever references having a girlfriend but does crack several jokes about how horny he is. whereas Project Hail Mary's Grace definitely had a college girlfriend but absolutely no horniness whatsoever in his narration.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

I'm shallow and hypocritical as hell.

I don't like any of the Doomsday teasers or trailers because I don't give a shit about any of the old tired out actors and characters they are dragging out with vague portents and action scene.

But if it had been "kate bishop will return" or "kamala khan will return" or maybe even "monica rambeau will return" my ass would be in a seat for sure.

At the moment i'm just not sure.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

X-Men 97 s2e6 *spoilers*

Latest episode spoiler blather under a cut:

Ha, so much for the hit back at the black leather costumes. New X-Men movie inspired costumes, it is. Rogue's shows a lot of skin. Did she have a black one originally? I thought she was in the all Red X-treme X-men number at the time.

So once again, I think the chief weakness of the show is that it's doing so much in 9 episodes. This one does at least follow up on Xavier and Polaris's plot threads.

It also has Xavier steal Emma's bit from the start of Astonishing X-Men and it's whole, the new X-men and Gen X kids as proper students. I agree they didn't contribute much to the action scene and end of said scene was rather abrupt, I was expecting a 'still in the holodeck' fake out

Plus the kids were rescued by X-Force but no Jubilee or X-Force reaction to the return of the X-Men was shown which is sad. Do Jubilee and Sunspot not want to return to the X-men? How do the X-Men feel about her exploits? I want a 'so proud of you' moment for her, damn it.

All the new costumes, setting up X-Corp, it's throwing in a lot of post 90s stuff. It's just moving too fast and throwing too much stuff at us still I think.

We didn't get Wolverine as Death but we are getting Gambit as Death, ugh. Hate it as a concept.

I also hate Polaris being Magneto's daughter and that mattering somehow. Just let her be her own damn person.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

You know I don't really want them to start using the New X-Men black uniforms (I was also annoyed when then went back to the 80s uniforms) but I find it hilarious after everyone thought the black leather joke last season was a super hard meaningful clap back at the films.

Yeah, turns out they'll use the black leather movie inspired uniforms after all.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

X-men 97 s2 e3-5

review and spoilers under the cut. Individually fine but the season as a whole not coming together

Okay so "rise of apocalypse". Fine but the foregone conclusion holds it back. Also you have to be a big Xavier, magneto or cherik fan and I just don't care about them.

"Weapon X, Lies, and DVDs", huh cute title. The writers must not like Logan because he is an unrepentant dick here. Also doesn't give a shit about the devoted Morph, only Jean. it's also a problem that give skipping about the timeline and other teams. This is Logan's first focus episode. We don't actually see him struggle without the adamantium or appreciate why he'll go to this length to get it back. Needed to be later on to be effective imo.

Like we've had 5 episode and 4 stories and each 4 of the story has been about a different team and different situation. Apocalpyse sort of held it together thematically up until now but we're more than half way through and it's feel very fragmented rather than a cohesive whole. The episode titles don't make me think this will improve.

tl:dr - jubilee is still the best thing this season, I don't care about Magneto, and Logan does not deserve Morph's love.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

X-men 97 season 2

It's back! THe first three episodes dropped today, I've watched the first two, thoughts spoilers abound. Above the spoiler line though I will say the new title sequences are bangers.

okay it's mostly episode 2 i want to talk about. Episode 1 is fine. Kudos to Scott and Jean for saying screw destiny we're going to protect and raise our son.

But episode 2. Wow. What a tour-de-force for Jubilee. Call her the mutant Captain America already. She kicks all kinds of ass in a sequence with more than a little James Gunn envy.

But mostly she's the last true X-Man and she doesn't take crap or concede anything to anyone. She champions the x-men's values to everyone, withholds help from Cable until he does things her way. She gives X-Factor nothing but contempt and reminds Polaris' what's-what.

She leaps off a helicarrier without a parachute.

Amazing.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

Green Lantern Rocky the eridian.

Rocky can't see. Has no concept of the colour green.

Lantern mythos already has you covered.

Rocky the f-sharp bell

[arielsojourner]

I have other fic to finish. I know this. I KNOW this.

But . . .

Imagine on the trip to Erid, Grace is starving to death and they are trying to keep the tauomeba alive but also not eating the fuel and then they need to ensure they don't die due to space radiation and in the middle of it all the Starship Enterprise shows up.

Captain Kirk and crew were heading to Vulcan (the Eridani system) and suddenly they are technically in the same point in space but this isn't their time and this isn't even their reality. There are moments of concern that this may be bearded!Spock mirror universe stuff but then the ship nearly runs into the Hail Mary.

And Spock will be all "Captain, think of the Prime Directive/Temporal Directive" and also "I don't recognize what they are using as fuel but it is fascinating and there appear to be two life forms and one is very weak and human."

So screw the Temporal Directive and the Prime Directive. They reach out to the ship (the human is starving to death, the other species is like if a Horta grew legs and started singing in multi chord harmony). Bones is not having it. ("Scurvy? SCURVY? And what's this? Beriberi?! Why is there no food or vitamins on this ship? Did they send you out here to die?! This is medieval!) Grace gets treated and brought back to optimal health. ("Thank! Thank! Thank!" Rocky keeps chanting, rolling back and forth at the doctor's feet.) Scotty and Spock are eager to get their hands on the astrophage and the astrophage drive. Uhura is enthralled with the Eridian language and Grace's attempt at a dictionary/translator. Kirk finding out all about Project Hail Mary and Grace's decision to save Erid is deeply impressed (it takes a lot to impress James Kirk but Grace has absolutely met and exceeded the bar-- talk about a no win situation!)

And then . . . I mean the Enterprise has to be returned to its time but maybe they stock up the ship with food before they leave and the entire crew is enthralled with what did evolve in place of the Vulcans they know and love (if you've read the novel Spock's World you know that there is a possible tie there with the Eridians and mountains and rocks in general). And . . . help me out here. I've got an incomplete daydream that I need to flesh out a bit more for it to be really satisfying. What does Grace think about all this? What about Rocky? Do they patch him up too?

Someone help with this plot bunny!

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

I'm curious if you'd stick with a Grace who seen and references Star Trek or not. Generally with crossover fic you might fudge the canon so they don't know about each but on the other hand Grace waking up and having to explain to Rocky they've been rescued by fictional characters and ask if he bumped his head or something would be fun.

I don't remember if Grace references anything other than TOS but of course they'd be how he'd treat the Enterprise crew in terms of knowing them and what's coming for them, trying to figure out which season they're from if he should say about Khan... etc or not spoil them.

Definitely a lot you can do with the concept.

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

So say the stress gets to Eva Stratt and she conks out. Everyone (wrongly imo) assumes Grace is second in command, so he gets put in charge.

How well do we think he actually does at being Stratt? And if he ends up playing ruthless boss man, and the accident takes out Dubois and Shapiro does being in charge change his decisions there?

Bonus round: Stratt's incapacitated but not killed, how does she feel about everyone assuming Grace was 2IC and him taking over?

(To explain I think what everyone else reads as "Grace is 2ic" is actually Stratt stealth training Grace as science officer.)

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

How do Eridians walk? (very well thank you /endpost)

I mean they are five-limbed. How many do they usually use for locomation? Four? three? two? All five?

in the book Rocky is described as hexagonal and radially symmetrical but also there's the cracking joke where he forgets Grace only has two hands. So he must be able to balance on two limbs? But if he uses the three limbs closest to something surely he would overbalance?

Or maybe he just sits his arse down and uses all five limbs at once?

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

I watched the film version of The Martian for the first in a while after having read the book and listen to the audiobook more recently and it got me thinking about in and PHM both adapted for screen by Drew Goddard.

They both streamline a lot of stuff. They do things but with less thinking about/issues along the way and just... do them.

they both concentrate on the characters rather than the technical side.

They make people nicer. People do the same thing for the same reasons but are just not as nasty about it (Think Annie Montrose, Mitch Henderson and Stratt)

They both cut out big problems that occur at the end to get to the end quicker. (Mark frying pathfinder and the dust storm/rover flipping in The Martian, the first taumebea outbreak and use of the beetles as engines for the Mary in PHM)

Less sure on this one but they drama up the EVAs. Grace dropping the box in PHM and Mark going Iron Man in The Martian.

Anyone got any other parallels to share?

[moonlithorror]

okay, i'll admit it, y'all had me fooled. with the amount of people I saw posting about how grace was going to die of malnutrition I thought it was going to be a plot point in the third act. is it in the book or is it just a headcanon y'all made up???

[thelesseroftwoweevils]

It's in the book but it happens in between the last chapter and the epilogue, so it's just a couple of sentence's recap in the epilogue that his early days on Erid weren't great until they learned to synthise stuff for him and he had scurvy and other malnutritional diseases.

[cheeseanonioncrisps]

Okay but imagine being the team of Eridian scientists tasked with keeping Erid's Only Human alive for as long as possible while the whole planet's environment is literally trying to kill him. And then Rocky shows up and is like:

“Grace says he would like half of dome to be water.”

“Oh, is necessary for humans to have large amounts of water question?”

Small Eridian equivalent of a sigh. “No. Not needed for life. In fact Grace will die if he falls in water and does not get out.”

“Tell him we give him water in containers that won't kill him. Lots lots lots of water on Erid for Grace to drink.”

“No. Grace say he want water on ground. Also want it with excess sodium chloride compound so it will be unhealthy for drink.”

“WHY QUESTION???”

[cheeseanonioncrisps]

To celebrate Erid getting their sun back on track, Grace asks for some alcohol. There's a small amount left from the Hail Mary and Rocky offers to take it to the science Eridians to see if they can synthesise more.

“Grace want this liquid for celebration.”

“Of course.” They scan it. “You have wrong liquid. This contain compounds which are poisonous for humans.”

“Yes yes yes. Grace say humans like feeling of being slightly poisoned.”

“WHY QUESTION?????”