This Musical Slaps You With Reality. One Hour In, I'm Already In Tears.

The way some fic writers on Tumblr commit casual theft (unauthorized use; treating others' creations as free-use because they "found them online") by using fandom art/photos without the creators' permission makes me wonder how they would feel if someone plagiarized their writing.

Even if credited, are they okay with third parties feeding their work into a.i. or posting their fics on other platforms without their consent?

okay i’m really tired of the gaz exclusion💀

i was on a tiktok live of someone playing mw2 and this person was like “i like everyone except gaz” and this other person agreed saying “SAMEEEE” like ????? wdym everyone but gaz???? and so i asked “why do yall not like gaz genuine question” and then one of them asked “gaz is kyle right?” and just completely ignored my question😭 like atp it’s just racism cuz everyone but gaz???? you didnt even know that gaz was kyle???? did u even watch the actual gameplay???? im probably being over dramatic but this really ruffled my feathers clearly💀

sentence prompts ➝  hamilton

❛ I witnessed their deaths firsthand ❜

❛ You have no control: who lives, who dies, who tells your story? ❜

❛ I couldn’t undo it if I tried ❜

❛ But when you’re gone, who remembers your name? ❜

❛ I stop wasting time on tears ❜

❛ And when my time is up, have I done enough? ❜

❛ Talk less! Smile more! ❜

❛ Don’t let ‘em know what you’re against or what you’re for! ❜

❛ Well, hate the sin, love the sinner ❜

❛ No one really knows how the game is played ❜

❛ The pieces that are sacrificed in every game of chess ❜

❛ You got more than you gave ❜

❛ When you got skin in the game, you stay in the game ❜

❛ But you don’t get a win unless you play in the game

❛ I wanna build something that’s gonna outlive me ❜

❛ We dream of a brand new start but we dream in the dark for the most part ❜

❛ I wish I could tell you what was happening in his brain ❜

❛ I imagine death so much it feels more like a memory ❜

❛ If I throw away my shot, is this how you’ll remember me? ❜

❛ What is a legacy? ❜

❛ What is a legacy? It’s planting seeds in a garden you never get to see

❛ I’m running out of time. ❜

❛ Teach me how to say goodbye ❜

❛ Death doesn’t discriminate between the sinners and the saints ❜

❛ History obliterates in every picture it paints it paints me and all my mistakes ❜

❛ Now I’m the villain in your history ❜

❛ I made every mistake and felt the shame rise in me ❜

❛ History has its eyes on me ❜

❛ I know that greatness lies in you ❜

❛ No one has more resilience or matches my practical tactical brilliance ❜

❛ There are moments that the words don’t reach ❜

❛ There is suffering too terrible to name ❜

❛ The moments when you’re in so deep. It feels easier to just swim down ❜

❛ You built me palaces out of paragraphs ❜

❛ The world has no right to my heart ❜

❛ I’m burning the memories ❜

"It's true that food will fill an empty stomach. But what is there to fill an empty heart I wonder?"

-Magilou, Tales of Berseria.

Ang Huling El Bimbo the Music: thoughts and feelings

[SPOILER ALERT]

Can I just say I love the subtleness of the musical and how it just tells its message through the storytelling???

It touches a whole lot on the Drug War that the current administration is waging against the poor Filipinos who are more victims than the main perpetrators themselves. The end of AHEB which only shows Joy's death and the subsequent lamentation of her family and old friends as the perpetrator who now holds a political position as a councilor goes scot-free is saddening but feels true with what happens in the Philippines. The people who are at the bottom chain are caught or killed while the ones running things get to sit in their high chair.

I also love how the other three main characters Eman, AJ and Hector represent the three divisions of the Filipino middle class and their actions towards the injustices and aggression Joy, who represents the poor and oppressed, faces tell a lot about their positions and views. When none of them could save Joy from being raped, their actions tell a lot about their position. Their positions in the future also dictates where they came from.

Emman who seems to be part of the lower middle class and is also an activist shouts the hospital, focusing more on comfort although might not do much is the kindest of the choices. Going to the hospital would be a direct action to help Joy who is in distraught atm cope. It's also important to see that although Eman got a government post like he dreamed (to change the system), it's the system that changed him instead. With someone from a poor background and no backing, he works hard everyday and is rarely home because he has to "prove" his worth. His career is banking on how hard he works and he forgets that the reason he dreamed of this in the first place was to help advocate for better change in the Philippines and take care of his family with his wife/sweetheart.

AJ who is at the very middle of the middle class chooses the police instead, relying more on the legal system that probably would seem like a fair judge ( probably to imply his trust on the system who perhaps would be fair to him but unjust to others) and his focus on the social aspect of it, aka how other people would perceive what happened. The middlest middle class whose position on the pyramid is dependent on how others perceive you hits too hard for AJ who becomes a successful businessman. He gets a wife, knowing full well that she would simply be a decoration for him to keep appearances, as he is in fact gay. AJ might know some people here and there but to primarily keep his connections, he has to look the part and in exchange for that, he hurts his wife and continues to hide who he truly is.

And God, Hector, this fucking bastard, I hate him but he represents the Upper Middle Class rhetoric so well. Hector tells everyone to keep quiet, to not do anything, overglorifying Joy's trauma and hardship as her being strong. And that speaks so much about how the upper middle class operates, how it's the upper middle class who rarely if ever listens, because although they might not be as powerful as the Filipino Oligarchs, they are pretty much the people living the "Fiipino Dream" and to keep their position, the upper middle class turns a blind eye to the suffering of the Filipino poor. Hector who had always lived comfortably chose to protect his own comfort even in the face of grave injustice. Hector makes it in life too. He's got the resources and the connections, just enough to get him a famous name as a tv director but being in the upper middle class means you still have to bow your head to those with power, to the great oligarchs who control how things go. You see Hector who is "a famous director", under the orders 'from above' has to make his series about ratings than the story itself. He has to accept people with connections into the movie because despite his position that many Filipinos dream about, he isn't exactly the omnipotent hand that can control everything.

God this musical feels so real. The characters too also just represent so much of the struggles of Filipinos, of the lapses in our society and how it continues to harm us and those around us. Please watch The Huling El Bimbo.

So I watched the first episode of Disney’s docuseries on the filming of The Mandalorian, and the first episode focuses on the directors behind it and just. You guys. I had no idea just how much of a relatable NERD Dave Filoni was.

Seriously, he tells the story of how he met George Lucas and started working on TCW (sorry if this is a common knowledge story and I just never heard it) and oh my gosh it is absolutely adorable and also the biggest nerd mood???

He:

Was openly snarky and dismissive with the person who first called to offer him the LF job while he was working for Nickelodeon because he thought it was a prank call from the guys on the Spongebob crew making fun of him for being a massive Star Wars nerd

Flailed excitedly about the Jedi costume he was making at home

Spent his entire first meeting with George believing he wasn’t gonna get the job and was just thinking about how much this was gonna boost his future nerd cred, so the next time he got into a debate with another Star Wars fan he could back his opinions up with, “well I met George Lucas.”

The rest of his story was super sweet and all the other directors were lovely too and agh, we’re so lucky to have him!

tiny soap simply groovin out here

My favorite part of Prospect (2018) is when Cee basically explains why we write fanfiction, and Ezra is being adorably supportive.

MWIII Campaign Thoughts and Reviews

(Played in the recruit difficulty because I suck at FPS games, and I want to explore and spent time in the campaign without dying too much). Leave some thoughts!

⚠️SPOILER ALERT⚠️

So… that was devastating. 

(+) To start things off, Makarov - Boy, holy shit. Yes. YESSS. They didn’t hold back with the new Makarov. He’s a mastermind, he’s a charming fella, he’s a psychopath lol. And the fact that he smiles a lot in this campaign just adds to the creepiness. I might get some side-eye here, but this Mak can go head-to-head with the OG!Mak. He’s always onto something, he’s proven destructive, had the 141 hauling ASS to chase him. I know just one game with rushed development won’t be enough for an iconic character like him, so I’m glad they didn’t kill him.

(-) I absolutely ABHOR, DETEST, LOATH the Open Combat Missions (OCM). It is so very not Call of Duty campaignesque. it doesn’t help anything with the narrative, and if anything, it even took away the narrative for us. The former missions in former games are iconic in their own way because the mission designer put a lot of thought into how the game will be played, the situations we found ourselves in.

But OCM's, we're like... Left to our own devices without any story-driven dialogues.

I think one of the reasons why MWII was so close to everyone's heart was because of the banters between the characters, especially in Alone. Here, because it's literally our choice and our time, it left us with no actual given time to know and love the characters more than we already did. Yes we love the characters, MW19 and MWII did that for us. But in this one? They said "character development is done, mate. Now go to war.”

Then again, is OCM a product and evidence of MWIII’s rushed development? 100% yes. I don’t give a shit if they cover it with “oowh we make OCM so you can play the missions differently each time without repeating the same mission over and over again!”. Let me ask you this, Activision - Have ‘repeating the mission over and over again’ been a problem with us campaign-enjoyers? No! I played the MWII campaign like 5 times, in all difficulty (except realism I still love my life), and I enjoyed it, because the mission designers took a lot of time and thought to it instead of just creating a map, putting a bunch of loadouts scattered around the area and throw us in it. So yes, it’s clear that OCM is a product of rushed development. It sucks the life out of the campaign missions.

(+) Look, I said it before that I will go to the campaign with the lowest expectation possible. I expected Mak to be sub-par, I expected them to play safe with the characters, and BOY WAS I WRONG. Settings aside from the point above where the character feels stuck on the character development (which is a huge minus btw), all the characters have time to shine in their own missions, especially Price because I feel like we play him the most. However, I do also love the fact that the girls get shit done here. Farah and Laswell did their work so beautifully and apparently it was revealed that Laswell will be a MP operator, so that’s cool. 

(+) Ghost being a menacing presence, can stood his ground. Price being level-headed though at the same time unhinged as usual. Gaz being the voice of reason throughout the entire fucking game LMAO. Soap being the brave man he is, the passion and fury is evident throughout the campaign. Farah being badass and dependable as usual. Alex being the main supportive guy to Farah (Faralex is canon at this point argue with a wall). Nikolai being our most reliable get-away guy. And of course, Graves and Shepherd being the fucking goofy ahh duo I actually find interesting. The trial cutscene was such a goofy scene LMAO the fact that they backstabbed each other in the ass is real funny. I side with Graves though. However wrong and unhinged he may be, Graves is just a guy doing his job and did what he’s told to do.

(+) I love the fact that Mak tried to frame Urzikstan to pin the blame on them. It's exactly what the OG!Makarov did but in HD. The Passenger mission is phenomenal and more damn traumatizing if only it was a bit longer and more stretched. There are many more reference to the OG games and I absolutely love it.

Now…

Soap’s Death

Remembering all the MWII missions with Soap... It hits differently now, man. 

(-) I've read a lot of people's arguments about it that the fact that it happened is just for shock value and kind of disappointing. Because let’s be real here, Soap is an SAS who got the name Soap because of how much of a slippery bastard he is. Granted, Mak is an ex-Spetsnaz and can fight with Soap. But how he went down in a goddamn takedown without any chance of fighting is just… it’s not it.

To add to that, the reaction from the boys is just... Underwhelming? Like I get it they're battle-hardened SAS soldiers, but let them show some damn emotions for fuck’s sake. One of the main reason why the OG!Soap’s death is really painful is because of Price’s reaction to it. How he said “NO. NO NO NO SOAP!!” While he shook Soap’s lifeless body in the table. At least let Price kneel to him, straighten his body, touch his vest. Close his eyes, gather Soap’s hand and PUT HIS GUN ON his chest all the while Ghost and Gaz knelt beside them. I do love the fact that they literally went to Scotland to let go of his ashes with Ghost holding the urn though. I cried in this scene. 

And the fact that it happened with the shortest campaign out of all the reboot MW games, it just felt rushed. Yes. It’s completely rushed, there’s no doubt about it. Again, the result of rushed developments.

(+) Now, with that said, I kind of want to shed light on how Soap is literally the youngest guy in the group. He had so much to live for. He's a sunshine in the middle of this gruff emotionally hardened man. He's such a joy to be around. He's brave. He's fresh. The fact that he's got so much to live for adds to the sadness and bitterness, which I actually like.

Sometimes I do kind of like those kinds of deaths, where the character is too soon to die,  because it hit so much harder and in a different way than the OG! one. We got to see the OG!Soap went from when he was an FNG, turn to a captain, to a man of fortitude that  earned Price's honor and sacrificed himself to protect Price. We saw how he developed and changed. We saw his entire career with us throughout all the OG!MW trilogy.

Reboot!Soap's story barely even started, and the fact that he's still so young, imagining how he'd be one hell of an officer, how he'd lead his team in the future. 

OG!Soap’s death is sad because all the times and memories we’ve been through with him, but Reboot!Soap’s death is equally sad for the times we could’ve gone through with him.

I want to say this though, some people said that Soap's death is sudden, but I wouldn't agree with that. I think the telltales are all there.

In the helicopter scene after Price and Soap caught him in Verdansk, Mak literally SAID HIS FULL NAME. That is a literal pinpoint death sentence from Makarov. And how emotional Soap’s reaction is compared to the other boys when the airport blew up. The signs are literally all there! I saw it coming actually. 

So is Soap’s death rushed? Yes. Could it have been executed better? Is it for shock value? Yes. But is it as sad? Yes. Honestly, I blame the rushed development and due dates for this. Activision is a cash grabber who wanted a yearly release so they can catch more money. I fucking bet my ass that initially they didn’t want to kill Soap, but it’s like a last-minute decision to make this game actually look like it’s worth 70 dollars. 

WHAT'S NEXT?

Now. Shepherd is positively fucken dead. Price is now an actual criminal and a fugitive. He just killed a 4-star US Marines general in his own office. Price is entering his insane and unhinged era. I do wonder if he'll go even more unhinged than this.

The story will undoubtedly continue in the MP seasons (although probably only 2 seasons that mattered because it'll also undoubtedly be filled with skins and collabs and shit). I think it will also focus more on transitioning to the next CoD games, which will be Black Ops (It is confirmed that for the 2024 and 2025 CoD, it will be Black Ops games).

We're talking future here, so if there's going to be a CoD MWIV, It might be possible that this is the game where we'll finally defeat Makarov while the 141 copes with losing Soap. I do wonder if Price will become too unhinged and will get rid of everything on his way to kill Mak. will become too much for Gaz, and Gaz would do something against Price's command or wish - and Ghost will have to choose a side. Now that's the kind of drama I want to see.

What do I score this campaign, what do I score this campaign... The story is actually good, but because the development is evidently rushed, the packaging feels a bit hollow. It's a 7.5/10 for me!

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Wait you know what

We get to pet a dog named Riley. 10/10, Game of The Fucking Year.

Reboot!Logan/Hesh (?) 👀

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So there it goes! If you've read this far I love you and Activision will pay for my therapy (ʘ ͜ʖ ʘ)