Thank you for the last storyboard. I literally cried because of just how much I relate to Snapdragon and his problems. And that's a good thing, you did an incredible job man, thanks a lot
So the problem with Caraway and the whole 'transgenderism' is that he's not actually talking about Gender Dysphoria. That's a hormonal condition that messes with the human body to various degrees and is INCREDIBLY rare. It's a painful physical issue for some people, others can thankfully ignore it. No, what Rodriguez' mouthpiece is actually talking about is the tumblr/twitter 'affliction' which is purely mental and all about personal choice so to most people who try it out, it IS easy because it's mostly online and has no personal consequences. You mention that most of the dialog feels like it's stuff that people say on twitter, well, you are correct as that's where most of the Ellation Studio's 'creatives' hang out 90% of their time, hence the overly soft touch on Gender Dysphoria.
Here how i find a way to fix the Magic System... Iam gonna alter the whole Mgaic System, the magic would be ranked by the level required to use. Old Magic will be altered to Master, Expert & Advanced Magic, while the New Magic will be changed to Novice & Adept. Master: Hardest to do and Control but it's the Powerfull of All. Expert: It's the Second Hardest to control & use but in the right hands can be a life-saver. Advanced: It's the Third hardest, but it is the must used for Military pourpuse, being from healing to use in combat. Adept: It's essentialy a better version of the Novice Magic, but it's extremely good and once you learned it you don't require anything else to control it. Novice: The Basic of all Basics, simply cast a spell and use it, don't need to expand futher. You can still mix 2 different magic ranks to create more powerfull magic.
@@teoborges3949 Here's what I would have done, to keep it simple for a television show. Old Magic is powerful, versatile but slow, requiring gestures and/or rituals. New Magic is the enchantment of Terra-Spheres, but are limited to a 'type' of magic, so you have the Blaster types, for offensive use, Summoning for when you need to get some back up, Transmutaion for all your trans....forming needs. They're main flaws is the spheres are items that can be taken or lost and run out of power, needing to be recharged with Magic every so often. But they're fast casting and easy to use. The main reason that Guardians (Which STILL need to be defined as to what they do, so I will do so here) prefer New Magic is because they are a rapid response force designed to deal with threats to the people, and you need something quick and easy to use, which New Magic and Terra-Spheres are.
Julian Koster, the guy who voiced slime boy, is a musician. He was a former member of the band Neutral Milk Hotel and he even has a podcast called The Orbiting Human Circus of the Air. That's actually how he talks (if you listen to the podcast, he's pretty decent) and yes, he's got a good mic (TLM 103). The only issue is, he compressed it too much (that and the lack of a voice acting coach to liven up the character a bit). Which really begs the question, who the hell was in charge of quality control and is it really hard for audio engineers to fix that? The whole show has a lot of audio inconsistencies.
I had a feeling it was compression or something, not the mic itself, that was the problem. Amazing sound can come from a mediocre mic, and poor sound editing can ruin recordings made with the best mic. Also, I agree, the voice director is just as responsible for the performance quality as the actor.
You know, I actually wouldn’t mind had Snapdragon stayed a guy who just happens to be feminine, or even simply a crossdresser. However, if the words of his voice actress are true and he will eventually transition… I don’t know, it doesn’t sit right with me for some reason. It’s like that makes the teacher’s words boil down to “if none of what you’ve done is something that guys do, maybe you should be a girl instead”. Perhaps, and it’s an immense perhaps, there will be some more exploration on that topic should hell freeze over and HGS get another season. But with basically all of Snap’s reasons for dysphoria coming from “you can’t/shouldn’t do that because guys don’t do that and you’re abnormal for doing it”, I have little hope for that happening. P.S. How in a world where you have potions that can turn you into other species (like the mermaids) why is genderbending treated as something arduous? Edit: 1. How did this comment become the most liked one under this video and 2. How did I get a person in my comment thread that feels the need to answer everyone in said thread as if there's gonna be an explosion otherwise?
Well no, because its not just about snapdragons preferred way to dress and express themself. They're showing legitimate signs of dysphoria, and to caraway they express how uncomfortable their masculine features make them. Crossdressers don't have this issue the way trans people do, and caraway, BEING a trans person, would absolutely have the basis and experience to be able to infer that snapdragon *could* potentially be trans. And so he shows them that it's an *option.* not THE 100% fix everything way, but he lets snap know that gender transition exists. (Also, he shows other signs of dysphoria aswell aside from his convos with caraway. He gets very sensitive when sage brings up the differences between guy friendships and girl friendships, saying he could never understand. He then has a little meltdown over "guys and girls and girls and guys and-" as a trans guy, ive been here. When i was young and in the closet, i loathed any mention of the difference between guys and girls, or when we were separated at school into groups of guys versus girls, and i didnt know why until i got older and realized it was because i was always lumped in with the *wrong* side. My point: snap has some VALID show of dysphoria, despite it being handled very poorly. )
It really is the connection the show makes between Snap’s dysphoria and their experience with toxic masculinity that bothers me, because it sends the implication that the reason Snap is feeling this way is because they don’t fit into their family’s very narrow definition of manhood and not just because they don’t feel comfortable being a guy in general. It also reinforces the sexist idea that anyone who doesn’t fit the mold of a super macho masculinity can’t be a “real man”. You could have just not have that flashback scene there, and you would have delivered the same message that you wanted to, where Snap is experiencing genuine dysphoria, without muddying the waters so much. You don’t even need to get rid of that part of their backstory, just don’t put it in this scene.
I think instead of cutting the scene all together its really a major missed opportunity to make the distinction between having discomfort with stereotypical brutish masculinity and feeling dysphoric about being male in general. Especially since Carroway is a transman who's masculinity is quite different from Snap's family, instead of a generic "this is what trans is" conversation they could have had a much more thoughtful dialogue about what exactly transition magic is meant to address.
> P.S. How in a world where you have potions that can turn you into other species (like the mermaids) why is genderbending treated as something arduous? Maybe bc those potions don't have a permanent effect? (I haven't watched the show so idk) > It’s like that makes the teacher’s words boil down to “if none of what you’ve done is something that guys do, maybe you should be a girl instead”. Well, Snapdragon has body dysphoria, which they expressed in that same conversation with the teacher, so no, it's not necessarily related to acting feminine/masculine
I'm seeing a lot of people not understanding that Snapdragon's issue wasn't just "enjoying feminine things as a man." They legitimately had gender dysphoria. Wanting softer skin and hating broad shoulders isn't something a man comfortable in his body would say. And it has nothing to do with cross-dressing. Cross-dressing only showed how much euphoria Snapdragon gets dressing as a woman.
The way I see it, both feminine guys and transwomen are abysmally under- or misrepresented, especially their journey - if they're represented at all, it's usually after they already figured out who they are and there's not much character development left. So whether Snapdragon is a transwoman or a feminine guy, they'd provide a much needed representation either way. The problem isn't as much with Snap being trans, but it happening in a show with next to no examples of positive masculinity, leaving an overall "cismasculinity = bad" impression. One thing that irks me is how Snap being trans - with their arc being in otherwise bad-to-mediocre show and having some flaws of its own - would still make for the best representation of transwoman's journey I've seen in animated media (journey being the keyword here). I watched Wandering Son anime (praised for its handling of gender identity issues) to have a proper point of reference, and I still think it doesn't work as well as Snapdragon's arc so far. I'd explain the problems with the anime, but they would be a little spoilery; I also judge the anime on its own without the context of supposedly much better manga. Maybe I wasn't lucky with the shows I watched, or maybe there really is such a dearth in transwoman's journey representation that even High Guardian Spice with all its shortcomings manages to positively stand out. I hope we can at least agree that whether Snapdragon is a feminine boy or a transgirl, they're precious either way.
@@AlphishCreature I personally dont like Snapdragon because he follows the bully character. I just dont find that likable regardless of his character arc and it’s hypocritical to feel sorry for him that he’s being bullied, but has no problem with Amarylis bullying other people just because she’s rich.
Honestly, I liked your simple “I was.” Then moving on, it also sounds more natural. I also saw a story boarded thing where it goes into a LITTLE explanation but doesn’t go into the details, and also uses an illusion to narrate what he was saying, which kind of made the whole thing feel more like a magic thing.
That video you're alluding to was from Jamie De Jonge: Caraway trans reveal: ruclips.net/video/H2eKj4Ju0AA/видео.html Caraway counseling Snapdragon: ruclips.net/video/IImRpygg9p0/видео.html And a Snap/Amaryllis fan animatic: ruclips.net/video/IImRpygg9p0/видео.html If CRUNCHYROLL (w/SONY twisting said company's balls) wants to redeem itself, it will reboot HGS w/better *everything*.
Honestly for some reason the bad voiceacting on slimeboy actually made him more endearing to me than the other characters. It sounds like he is constantly high as a kite, having 0 care of...well, anything. But I do understand it could have been done much better, maybe I just like the amateurish performance of it.
There is an element of so-bad-it's good to the performance. The voice isn't unpleasant to listen to, and the badness gets it to stick out in a way that is pretty amusing.
I still don't like that the FIRST thing Caraway talked about was transition magic, even if he later smoothed it out, it still feels gross that was the 1st thing instead of asking Snapdragon more about how he feels or his opinions and then go into how there are many options for him. Also I don't like how Sage and Snapdragon's relationship started out, mostly cause of Sage and how it started on her end
if anything, i think caraway shouldve mentioned how some guys are just. feminine. as well. like, open up different doors instead of just the one so snapdragon can understand himself and his own wants better - realise that just bc he likes dresses, doesnt mean hes a girl.
I imagine in magical worlds transitions can easily be reversed. . But this should have been brought up in a 4th wall break sorta way. . "transition magic exist but you shouldn't take it lightly, imagine a world where we don't have access to these tools to switch here and there. Take your time, figure yourself out, people come in many colors and variations. Just think it over because transition magic exist but it shouldn't be taken lightly 😏" (thank you thank you, I'll take my gender bent ocscor now")
Well. In universe it's pretty easily reversible meaning that Snapdragon could just try it out see how he/she feels about it and if they feel like it isn't for them they can just.. not take the potion next month. No harm no foul. I also see it as Caraway trying (badly mind you) to explain what worked for him and trying to let Snapdragon know that they have options available to them. If it were real life then yeah it'd be really creepy but in universe when you realize just how few real consequences there would be to jjst try it out for a month it becomes a lot more understandable why Caraway would be confident enough to mention it early on. He still fixed his mistake at the end so I say it's excusable.
@@Yuni-is-Schrodingers-Fox Yea, that still doesn't make it look any better whatsoever. Just cause the transformation is easy, how people act will obviously not be. That point was drilled in by Snap himself when he mentioned questioning how his family would act and Cal's entire reason for existing. So clearly it's a decision with more weight to it and should STILL be treated with even a bit of care when talking to a distressed person. So even in universe, it's an awful speech regardlessof if he walked it back AFTER explaining transitioning, because even then he didn't give Snap any alternatives but went into detail about transitioning, which would of course have someone look more at that as a solution than anything else because of how it was sold to them. That still is neglecting that regardless Caraway didn't even ask Snap anything to actually get to know more about his thoughts to be justified in making the 1ST thing transitioning. Even if you can change back easily, dynamics and perceptions between people wouldn't simply go back to how they were, so it's not actually no harm no foul. And how the writers had him conduct himself is still not excusable, especially because they related this to real life(so it is especially gross) despite new magic just being able to do whatever with no cost so there shouldn't be a limit or consequence if we are going by their world(if there is a reason, they never gave it)
@@SpectreBagels it makes it significantly better, what are you even talking about? If in a fictional universe humans grow back their lost limbs 1 day after they become severed then having your arm cut off in this fictional universe would not be considered nearly as terrible an experience as it would be in real life and the same applies here. I'm not saying I liked it or that it was handled perfectly but I think most people are twisting his words and their meanings for the sake of creating a strawman. Caraway *immediately* went back on his suggestion as if it was just what I said, an ill-timed suggestion, a Freudian Slip at the absolute worst. It probably shouldn't have been the first thing he brought up but he was clearly just trying to relate what helped him (albeit badly) so I think it's permissible if not what it should be. Personally I prefer this version: ruclips.net/video/IImRpygg9p0/видео.html
As much as I want to praise Snapdragon, does it come off as a bit.... tone-deaf... for Snapdragon to WANT to be a warrior, WANT to fight... but also resent being raised by a "fight back already!" father. Because... What? What about being a girl means you aren't going to shove your brother's face in the mud for stealing your toy? Am I the only one a little confused as how "wanting to be a girl" is being synonymously connected to being incompetent as a warrior in the face of a bully? "Oh, they are a girl, but they are a feminine girl! A girly girl!" What is the feminine way of stabbing someone with a sword? What is the feminine way of killing someone? The writers are subconsciously writing that Snapdragon doesn't think a real woman defends herself from attacks. You don't want a beard. Okay. But what the hell does that have to do with fighting and you not living up to your father's expectations? These are the times when I wish that people would stop tossing stereotypes and clichés around in order for their sad, pitiful woobie character to be "relatable" and actually focus on what they are writing. Gender queer people sometimes put too much emphasis on reinforcing the worldview of the people they hate specifically to rebel against it--- actually justifying ignorant behavior for the sake making their character seem different, instead of actually pointing out WHY the ignorant character is IGNORANT. 1) YOU, writers, are CHOOSING to make a teenaged (tall, muscular, sweaty, body-hair having, in a time before deodorantconfuse 2) And just to really emphasize that again: MEN WEAR MAKEUP, WIGS, DRESSES AND ROBES, AND STOCKINGS. It is ONLY within the last 100 years did a very specific aesthetic of what a man looked like developed and that's ONLY because of the mass consumption of the idea that the only honest man is a working class man. Wearing PANTS is literally a class issue, not just a gender issue. Men of higher standing didn't wear pants. Princes didn't wear pants. And even working class boys weren't expected to start wearing pants until they were 8-10. And they certainly wore dresses as babies and toddlers, because why would any mother bother cleaning pants by hand when she had to change cloth diapers? You have to REINFORCE sexist stereotypes to "break" them. YOU have to insist that skirts are girly to make them girly, while men dress in skirts for formal occasions all over the world. YOU have to insist that wearing nail polish is some kind of tipping point. Excuse me? Would the trans male teacher be less of a man for wearing nail polish? Is he pretty much wasting his time drinking his transformation potion if he still wanted to wear a dress and paint his nails? See how stupid that sounds?! The only justification to this ridiculousness is by specifically writing Snapdragon as having a macho father, which is, again, obsessing over "proving them wrong" to the point of justifying their behavior. You are rationalizing it. A boy wearing a wig?! At a fair?! He MUST be queer! Nail polish!? He MUST want to be a girl! Why? Because no straight cis boy in a hundred mile radius of this festival would DARE wear a wig. Cat girls, giants, swinger bisexual teachers, dragons, demon women, elves and dwarves, transforming into a mermaid, cats that transform into cat-people, all these things... normal. A boy in a wig? SCANDALOUS! 3) Let's be clear that even though the teacher DID tell Snapdragon that there are plenty of options, the show intentionally wrote this character to be a trans girl. Not to be a feminine boy. So, although the dialogue of "there are so many paths" is nice brownie points, the show isn't actually doing anything to create a diversity of characters. The boy who wears a wig on Halloween MUST be a trans girl, because why else would they do it? So, even though this is a show made by LGBT members, they sidelined the most interesting storyline to a secondary character and had four cis girls as the main cast. I'd be interested to see if Snapdragon growing into her true self ended up causing her to be added to this magic girl squad, but if the show's writers didn't realize that that was the ONLY interesting subplot in its whole story, I don't care about sticking around to find out. This is like when they made Finn the Stormtrooper a main character and didn't think to make a Stormtrooper Rebellion until the last movie. So, here are a few other things that just make it so difficult for me to care: Snapdragon and Sage. The show is obviously hinting Sage and Rose, but is using the tried and true "they are so young and innocent" route. Fine. But Snapdragon knows she has a crush on Sage. And the show does such a disservice to male-female relationships, with no healthy boy relationships at all and then Snapdragon going crazy over being treated differently for her sex than how she wants to be seen and treated. The only boy with a close relationship to the cast is actually a girl. Excellent. I would give the show more credit if it put effort on how SAGE feels about Snapdragon instead of the other way around. Is she even attracted to boys? Does she have a sparkely moment she sees Snapdragon dressed up as a mermaid? The show puts all its eggs in the basket of showing how pitiful Snapdragon is that it doesn't explore any positivity. At all. Let me tell you, if someone thought writing a black character meant every scene they were featured in HAD to be about racism, I wouldn't watch the show. I don't care if every single scene was Based on a True Story, ripped from the headlines real. No one's life as a non-heternormative cis white male is suffering 100% of the time.
@@SuperCosmicMutantSquid They revolutionized the magical girl genre by making the most basic tropes, clichés, and plots imaginable, but they threw in a joke about the teachers being bisexual swingers, so, if you hate cliché lazy writing ... It must be because you're homophobic.
@@Cityweaver The sadder part is if they actually adhered to just the tropes of the genre and basic structure of conventional storytelling, this product would have been far more tolerable. It would still be lacking in creativity and paint-by-numbers, but still cleaner than this jumbled mess of a story & setting and ocean of inconsistent, mixed messaging. Tropes aren't inherently bad or wrong, they become what they are because they work and and satisfy components needed for good storytelling and many go back to the earliest known forms of literature in human civilization...but this team was so amateurish they couldn't even do that right since even the tropes are incomplete and botched in execution. It still baffles me how I have played eroge with better worlds, characters, and stories than this...
@@gtf234 Definitely. I love a good trope. Tropes give genre stories structure. This isn't The Great Gatsby. This isn't a deep dive into the psychology of a hurt individual whose journey serves as an allegory for the author to criticize his contemporaries. It's a magical girl / magic academy cartoon. And because the writers don't respect the Old Heads, and are just throwing vague notions of MG/MA tropes at a wall and seeing what sticks, they are making the LEAST satisfying version they could possible make. I ranted about Snapdragon. Here is just one other little point: you meet ALL four girls in the same episode, the first. OMG, that is the absolute worst idea imaginable. That just shows these writers don't even watch anime, let alone magical girl anime. FEW things are more satisfying to watch than an anime character's introductory episode! That "hell, yeah, another member joins the party" feeling, learning particulars about that character, seeing their backstory/motivation. Imagine One Piece, but Luffy, Nami, Zoro AND Ussop and Chopper were all just introduced, blandly, as background characters. Imagine Sailor Moon, but you tried to focus on ALL five girls for the first seven episodes, never developing any of them. Imagine TOPH from ATLA not having her intro episode. Imagine MARCALINE THE VAMPIRE QUEEN from Adventure Time not having her intro episode. Imagine Seven Deadly Sins, but let's just shove all seven on the screen at the same time. XD Can't hear you Elizabeth, we've got to explain seven backstories in three episodes. XD
While I agree with many of your points, some things here; Men did wear dresses, makeup, and stockings, etc, but much of that was either reserved for higher class men or men who were actors as back then, women were not accepted to be actors for a large period of time, at least in the Roman era, women were not socially accepted to be actors as they never did have a good image until recently. Many believed them to be great liars so they couldnt be used as witnesses in court. Another thing, while many men did not wear dresses, many wore ROBES. There's a huge difference here. Robes were worn by both genders while dresses were mostly available for women than men as they wore togas, again, something more akin to robes. I dont know how it is in other parts of the historical world, but parts like egypt also wore loin cloths and nothing like dresses, again, robes for men. Idk where you got the idea that men wore dresses and stockings as the norm lmao. It never was the norm.
Snapdragon is definitely the most fleshed out in this series. Just because you're a dude doesn't mean you can't enjoy girly things. I love chocolate, poetry, korean drama. The key is finding balance. I know that sounds cliche, but it's true. If you can balance yourself out finding your own perfect blend of masculinity and femininity. Then you're golden.
Yeah. Plus I wonder if he did snapped at Sage for being the problem and bitchy right after she stereotyped men and women falsely. Cause if I were in Snap's shoes and I hear her bitching about her problems with Rose having a crush on a boy out of her jealousy I would called her out also.
I don't think there needs to be balance. A man can just be feminine. He doesn't need to balance it with his masculinity. If he wants to, that's fine, but Snapdragon's problem isn't that he can't find balance between his masculine and feminine sides, it's that he's discouraged from acting or being feminine at all. He doesn't need more masculinity to balance himself out, he just needs to be free to like what he wants and be what he wants to be
Yeah and honestly, you don't even need to balance these things. A guy can enjoy all the things that are perceived by others as "feminine" and still be just a guy
I feel like the inconsistent tones that go back and forth between "kid friendly" and "mature" is because the writers wanted to make something that feels like kid shows such as Steven Universe, but didn't want the stigma of actually being a kids show.
I don't think it's the stigma. I think these are just people obsessed with kid shows and lack maturity. The only "adult" part of them is their sexuality and ability to swear so they added that in and everything just comes off like a bad fanfic because if it. I've noticed this problem amongst other millennials in my cohort. One of my friends (32yo) who now heads an entire library department only reads YA fiction and visibly wrinkled her nose at me when I mentioned an autobiography I was reading. She and a lot of people like her are very averse to growing out off their safe, low conflict, emotionally affirming entertainment. If she were for some reason tasked with writing a show it would lack depth, conflict and character growth because she doesn't like that kind of stuff and wouldn't even know what a deep conflict laden story even looks like. We millennials (specifically middle class and western) are a very immature and sheltered group, and not all of us are living in the same reality.
@@lorblauh I'm Gen Z and have noticed that about a lot of Millennials too. Sure, there's no age limit on hobbies/interests/fandoms, and there's nothing wrong with being young at heart or nostalgic for the things you enjoyed as a kid, (hell, I like "kid" things like stuffed animals, crayons, kids' cartoons, Lunchables, etc. too) but at the same time, so many Millennials do seem to make kids' media a huge chunk of their personality. It even seems like a lot of 90's/00's nostalgia trend comebacks are things Millennials enjoyed as children, (such as toys, cartoon reboots, etc.) while I get the impression that previous generation nostalgia comeback trends were more based on things that you would had to have been a teen or young adult to enjoy. (ex. Classic cars, hippie culture, etc.) It seems like an odd phenomenon.
Tbh SU is kid's show not because it is stigmated as one, but because it does not take itself serious. >Establish basically alien Nazis as main antagonists. >Just forgive them because it is a nice thing to do and there is no difference between high school bullies and genocidal war criminal.
@@3ds_fellgod-myhopewillneve617 eh, in the early volumes she was...there. playing more into the "ooh so mysterious" than what she is now...which is basically what Thyme is.
Snapdragon seems like one of the better parts, but I'm really not sure that's saying much. If you took every single one of those writers and had them write out what they thought his story should be separately, you'd probably get the exact same story beats from all of them. They re-hash this sort of story over and over and over - there's basically one life transpeople live to them. (And being trans and someone who works with students, it feels REALLY awkward for me for the teacher to bringing it up to students, especially multiple students, unnecessarily. But I'll put that aside because this is a magical fantasy setting and the relationships aren't necessarily going to be what you would find in reality. It's just awkwardly pushed in the same way the douche is awkwardly douchey because they need a strawman.) The main thing is that they actually allow him to be a bully when usually they would have him do no wrong ever or do wrong but have it portrayed as justified. But I wonder if they continue to allow him to be a bully after they reveal that? Or is he suddenly only a victim?
And apparently the plan was eventually for Snap to go trans outright, which sorta flies in the face of the whole "there are many different paths to self-discovery" idea mentioned in this video
It's funny, but I kind of noticed the same thing. The very first thing that I said to myself when seeing people review Snapdragon in specific was... Wait, I've heard this story before. Three times actually. Mind you, there are some mild differences, but Snapdragon's arch follows the same basic (and I do hate to call it this) "Stereotypical "how I realized I am trans" Story". The only thing missing is the "that moment somebody calls me by my preferred pronouns" smile of pure bliss scene. However, I'm sure it was because they were planning on it for after he actually transitioned.
I agree with just about everything except Amaryllis. I found her to be delightful and refreshing in her egotistical and crazed enthusiasm. Snapdragon was definitely the stand out character though. But then most of the cast were nothing nuggets, so that's not saying much. They could have easily ditch Parsley and Thyme and replaced them with Snap and Amaryllis and it wouldn't really have changed much. Just give Sage the rot plotline with her mother and father trying to fix it and them sending her with Rosemary thinking she'd be safer at the school. Thyme and Parsley are so underdeveloped that they come off as meaningless filler characters. Speaking of filler, this show really needed someone to keep them on track. They wasted a lot of time on slice of politics that it seemingly forgot about its own plot. They don't even get around to establishing the plot until episode three which is way too late, then drop it for several episodes until the festival. Overall, it's very amateur, more like some preteen's DnD fanfiction than a competent show. (I still don't understand the obsession with the song Scarborough Fair. It's just an overused and empty reference with no bearing on the plot, character development or themes. What does any of this show have to do with a song about two exes being petty at one another?) This could have been an okay show, if they had just worked a little harder on it and had someone who knew what they were doing guiding them. Your rewrite of the Snapdragon/Carroway scene was great, by the way. Much more impactful and with a good message about taking the time to figure things out before committing to something that might not be right for you. It's fine and healthy to explore your options before making permanent decisions. It also lacked the condescending undertones of the "I'm transgender" scene, which is much appreciated.
Amaryllis is the best girl. Yes, she's a bit of a bitch, but she will fucking kill anyone who's messing with her friend (Snapdragon) and I can really appreciate this. Plus, majority of her lines were actually entertaining.
I guess it’s just personal preference, everyone will find different things appealing and not appealing. I personally was not the biggest fan of her but as I said that’s just my opinion x
@@chiyokme8159 Eh, I can understand why some people wouldn't like her much. It's not that big a deal which is why I moved on to other points quickly. As long as everyone is respectful to each other, it's all good to disagree on minor things like preferred fictional character types.
@@chiyokme8159 After watvhing some clips of the show the only reazon I give (and seems like a lotof people did) this show a chance was seeing the murder axe girl and at the end of the day she didn't dissapoint and to me was the most entertaining (not best written not really good) part of the show. They could have done her better like showing her how she cares about people inside her circle or things like showing why she was an ass.
I agree that Caraway's transition should have involved a permanent spell as opposed to a monthly one, for the reason you gave plus another I don't see anyone mention. If there exists in this world a spell that allows you to change genders for a month, you canNOT convince me that people wouldn't be experimenting with it and switching back and forth at will, even just for curiosity's sake. And there's no way that doing so wouldn't change people's outlook on gender completely - which would be an intriguing concept to explore. But, the writers wanted to depict gender issues as they stand in the real world, so that can't and isn't going to be explored here. If Caraway's transition were permanent, it would be understandable that others don't use the spell without being absolutely certain that they want to change gender. But, as it stands, it feels strange that, in a universe where you can change genders monthly at will, no one is doing that very thing for a multitude of reasons and changing the universal perception of gender in universe.
i would actually pose a middle ground between the two that mimics real life hrt more. like a spell that you do monthly that makes you closer to your real gender, but that is permanent. if done more than once every month it causes a dangerous hormone imbalance.
You would also have people doing it for more pragmatic reasons. For example, a person might use such a spell to help hide their identity. When you add an ability or power into your world, you must think, "What could people use this for?" as if there is a potential use for something someone is eventually going to use it that way.
@@javonyounger5107 almost any spell can have a way to use it for evil. this would just be another one of those spells. edit: misunderstood your response i agree
I did not even think about that. That would have been a really interesting thing. I am not trans but if i had a potio that would just change me to a girl for 30 days and then i could just not take it again to change back i qould 100% try it. If for no other reason than just wanting to see what that is like. In that world as you say the idea of gender should be so open that it hardly maters with this kind of potion available. Literally just swaping on monthly basis if one wants. Heck i would not be surprised to hear potions being made that lasts shorter or longer if people wants imagine the potion but it only lasts 1 day.
@@maligulant4396 this would have been a really interesting aspect of transformation magic in general. There was that pink haired antagonist who has the ability to turn into different people regardless of gender. Having some sort of drawback to that ability would have been cool.
My problem with the Dnapdragon arc is that it seems his "journey" is largely a result of zero positive masculinity in his life. His father is so over the top to the point negativity while at the same time he is repeatedly told that boys can't understand deep friendship BECAUSE hes a boy. It feels more like hes being shamed and bullied out of being male rather than actually wanting to be a girl. Like, the the show seems to go out of it's way to reinforce only negative stereotypes about men UNLESS they're trans
Yea. I haven’t watch this show because I don’t have Crunchyroll but from clips and summaries alone, I utterly despise the idea of snapdragon being trans for the reasons you said. If it happens it’s very clear to me that his story is 100% just to push the all men are bad agenda and I wouldn’t be able to enjoy what is the only good writing in this self-indulgent pandering propaganda.
Yeah. It ends up feeling like men in the show are all terrible, but instead of using Snapdragon to demonstrate that not every guy is a jerk, instead Snap is is the exception because it turns out she wasn’t *actually* a guy. It’s a very juvenile way to depict being trans. Perhaps it would have been more enriching if Snapdragon’s decision came from within, like they COULD do the things guys can do, but they don’t like it very much, and they came to the decision of wanting to identify as female on their own. I feel like it would have been more empowering if Snapdragon’s transition journey had more agency.
@@gregjayonnaise8314 I think it would have been better if Snap became just a feminine dude rather then Trans. But yeah; the only decent dudes on the show is Trans, feminine or dark skinned.
Honestly it's kinda fucked up how Snap dislikes acting manly because of his family and being exposed to pure masculine negativity to the point he believes they're synonyms, the worst part is, some people might have gone through exactly that, heck, isn't that how elitist feminists are born?
Is he, though? Snapdragon's dad, I mean. How much of him did we really see? Other than him allowing his sons to engage in some bullying between themselves and expecting Snapdragon to fight back and defend himself in some capacity... what did he do? I mean, that's just average parent shit. That's why you send you kid to the playground and public school to get those kinds of skill and life experience. Did he tell Snap that women suck and cant fight? Did he force him to become a guardian? Did he tell Snap that he was worthless or a coward? Like, what did he do that was so terrible? I honestly don't remember because the show was so bland that remembering details is like trying to recall a pain medication induced delusion. All I remember from him is cliche tough love stuff. Iirc he looked like a red headed lumberjack; the kind of stereotype male character who eats a whole stack of pancakes, a plate of eggs, a plate of bacon, and a frothy beer for breakfast.
59:18 - I think that kid in the background being crushed to death in that training simulator thing was the most brutal and violent thing that could possibly ever happen in this show. That one half-second moment must be where their disclaimer/warning comes from every episode.
"artist vs creation" is so true, like truly we should all hate Disney productions by the same logical process but we can separate our feelings from Disney with the content they make.
Look at j.k Rowling she isn’t that well liked but her franchise is awesome seriously a world full of magic and lore and the limit is your imagination I don’t even think the world if fully fleshed out even if it is more stuff can be added like it was always there
@@levievil9220 "but her franchise is awesome seriously" ehhhhhh bad take bro, she weaved white supremacy and antisemetic ideals into the narrative, themes, and characters, it's unfortunate in a case like that. I wouldn't describe her work as awesome or even good if I'm being real with you, but I'll give you the right to be blind to the quiet dogwhistling in her books to enjoy the narrative from a purely white fictional perspective because you seem to try to separate the art from the artist. You're still allowed to like fictional work even if it has uncritically problematic perspectives, just be mindful with touting it in public least you want to be surrounded by increasingly radicalized people.
@@levievil9220 if you're incapable of understanding nuance, that's on you. This comment was about Disney productions like Lion King, separating the corporation from the artwork-- not Disney productions like Song of the South, which you can like the art in theory as an individual but you 100% must be mindful and open with the direct harm of the content. You're out here trying to defend JKR's work and it's in the same category of "uncritical, blatantly racist" work towards semites and other groups of people. Uncritical being important here because that's the difference between this topic and stuff like Huckleberry Finn which is openly critical of the racism on display in the work. I would also argue Attack of Titan is critical of the genre it is presenting within, enough to give it nuance. Please, please read some other books besides HP. There are lots of works around wizardary magic that came well before HP series and none of them have hallmarks of segregation and hate speech othering certain kinds of people.
As a masculine girl, I've heard alot about people telling me that I'm trans. Which does not feel right. I am a girl, but I like some guy things. That should be normal. It shouldn't be this or that. The way you described snapdragon hit hard and I hope that the character doesnt turn out to be trans.
Unfortunately, that's the direction they were going to go if High Guardian Spice had gotten a second season, but thankfully a lot of hatefix writers in the community discard that and do other things with his character.
"We are 50% female in all the creative roles. And our writers room is 100% female. This is what my whole career has been about - is trying to get those voices in there that are not being heard." Well, there's your problem. I too am 'almighty female', but basing the staff entirely upon their sex in some self-indulgent bid of feminist elitism? That's like voting for a political figure based entirely on their sex or race, and not on their political agenda and merits. What an unbelievably shortsighted worldview. There's a way to represent powerful female, gay, and trans characters/roles. This ain't it.
Also with the fact that they were all female being mentioned in the trailer. To me it just comes off as "This is the best that only women can do, this is our limit, we can't do any better." And if I'm being honest, I wouldn't have thought of it nor cared if they never brought it up. It's because they felt the need to bring up the 100% female staff that my mind made me think "okay, let's see what all the women made" which isn't fair at all. Especially when there are women in the field who have made spectacular things for much better shows. I mean I'm probably the only one who thinks that, so if I came off as sexist then I do apologise, but that is how the marketing of HGS came off as to me
@@Sergeantmajormario Exactly. Sex and gender should have no seriously defining role in creativity of this nature. It's insignificant information - unless you have an ulterior motive or agenda, of course. And no, you're not abnormal or sexist at all for thinking that. In fact, the only ones sexist here are the people behind this show, and I can tell you women behaving the way they have is a goddamn embarrassment to the majority of women in the world. If you hire me on a job based on my sex and not my credentials, that's a straight up insult. And similarly, to exclude men merely to fit a 100% female demographic? Awful setup doomed for failure right out the gate. But it's clear creating a good show wasn't the intention here anyway - rather, it was to pander to a very specific group of people that barely even exist.
@@user-zs9ux1ru8u Exactly. As a woman whose been writing for around 12 years now I'm actually offended a bit by how short sighted that statement was from the staff. All those series you mentioned are amazing and several of them are near and dear to my heart. I think the HGS staff could have done better. By
@@oddeyes9413 Hell, we don't even have to stop there at manga. Vizipop made a compelling series, Helluva Boss, and there's a creative animation ARG (Pink Bitch Club) from a different creator VIVINOS that can make a compelling story with either a few episodes or videos. These creators have a lot of passion, love, and effort put into their series, and they didn't need to advertise themselves as being women in order to achieve that.
I see so much potential in Aster, he could be like Sylvain from FE3H, a cocky guy who actually has a lot going on inside. I dont watch the show, but the clips make it seem like he has a lot of achivements? Why not make him have like a gifted kid issue? Like he thinks he has to constantly achive things and be proud of it, and Rose's brash personality knocks him down a peg and he starts to open up?? And if they went that route, a romance with a fun chemistry could be done between them too.... Dude cocky guys softening up is one of my fav things and it could totally work here
True...also personally it looked like he was bragging due to having a little crush on rose. The trying to show off how capable she was at the end, the "look you may never have heard this but youre kinda adorable" kinda sounds like a kid trying to say "hey even if no one thinks youre cute, i think youre cute..but just a bit, im not admitting it lol" So i dont get why he was being played as a bad guy (well...i get why but WHY WHY)
@@yuki97kira i know its been a month but i just saw this. AND YESSS. Like. It was kinda cute actually?? I guess the writers were too focused on making "CiS MeN BaDD!!!" On their show rather than... ya know making lovable characters with fun interaction??? I think no matter how weak a media's plot is, if it has nice lovable charas people would still love it
You should take that re-written scene and animatic and make it into a separate video. I only saw it because I like long reviews, but think about all the people who won’t see it because of the length of the review! So please, put it out there! I do so enjoy fix-it fanworks, and this scene really needed some. I completely agree that the reveal should’ve been moved to where you placed it.
the two scenes you redid were absolutely amazing. as a trans person, you illustrated the experience so well that i actually questioned if you were cis (cis = not trans) when i watched it. my only criticism is that it's not "a transgender", its "a trans person" or simply "transgender". a very simple slip up that could happen to anyone. you're the only cis person i trust writing trans characters.
That's so fucking sweet, thank you! I had some trans people look over my scene (because this actually wasn't my first draft) and they gave me some pointers about what to do so you can thank them for making it more authentic. Also fair on the correction, just know that I didn't mean anything by it, it was just an innocent error lol. I'm glad you think I'm able to write characters outside my identity, that means a lot :)
@@mangawriter that's really good! sensitivity writers were obviously not hired for hgs, and it's very good that you got some for your scene. and your mistake was a very simple one, i could tell by everything else that you didnt mean it in a derogatory manner.
Frankly it’s more about if it’s written well rather than who wrote it. Of course it is quite sad to see someone of that community to not write good representation of their community.
from the way you explained Snapdragon and his design. I would of love to see more of him. but as it stands, he alone isnt enough to make me want to watch this show. its a shame cause i do genuinely like him and his potential as a character. Also your revision of Caraway's reveal and his convo with Snapdragon were leagues better then what they did.
Yeah from how he talked about snap I can see why he is well developed while rest are poorly written plus on the sage part if that scene where she went on bitching and take out all of her jealousy on Snap to the point where she stereotyped men in general I would say Snap calling out that Sage is the one who is the problem is very justified. Cause Sage should never ever treated like as if Rose is hers and hers only and should be supportive about her.
That was what bothered me: why make Caraway give a lesson about being transgender to a girl who really doesn`t care at all about the issue when they have Snapdragon to actually speak about it on a personal level. Also the "Hey kid, you want transgender magic" vibe coming like a slap in the face for a kid who is having an existential crisis was terrible. The remake of the scene was wonderful btw.
Yeah, I saw another RUclips say that if the series removed the earlier scene with Rosemary the whole story with Snapdragon would have flowed much better.
I think the Rosemary scène is fine but I think episode 3 is too early, I think it would've flowed better if Rosemary and Professional Caraway got closer with each other after a couple of bonding on Rosemary mother. Perhaps maybe it would work if season 2 happened and like the late episodes
It would have made more unique of a show if snapd. and purple goblin energy girl were the main characters. The best way to tell a story is to tell it from your own perspective.
The magic system in this show reminds me a little too much of the one in Fairy Tail. Way too many rule bending and rule breaking contrivances to be anywhere close to consistent. Natsu saying he can't recharge his powers by eating his own fire, but then recharges himself by melting metal using his fire and eating it. Even though later on the show explains that him eating metal conflicts with the elemental chart. And then the Runes... The Runes made no sense.
One runic system i really like is the runic system in Witch Hat Atelier. Everything makes sense and is really creative in the ways that they explore it :D
That’s pretty much I stopped watching Fairy Tail lol it had a very “omg villain is front but friends are power so I get some bs upgrade” cycle that it became boring and confusing pretty early.
I feel that HGS look like season 4 of SVTFOE: have great ideas, but the execution is a big mess. The difference is that SVTFOE have executed well characters, plot and worldbuilding in first 2 seasons (Season 3 was good, for me), when HGS have 1 season. Seeing Jamie's animatics and your animatics that make me care about Snapdragon and Caraway, show how much be good the series could be if the crew have a direction. Even modern shows like SU, OK KO, GF, SVTFOE, Amphibia, The Owl House, The Ghost and Molly McGee, Infinity Train and Onyx Equinox (That is also a Crunchroll Original) have well executed characters and stories than HGS. Especially SU, OK KO, Amphibia and The Owl House, that have organic representation, but always focus to tell a entertainment story with believable characters.
Not sure about SU, do not get me wrong, I still love Peridot and even Garnet and what she represents (that couple was so adorable in that show), but too bad the story turned out to be so...just bad...from the direction to the conclusion of everything...the whole "Its from Steven's perspective only" becomes so annoying as the story tried to move foward not mention "Your actions don't have consecuences unless you are Pink"...and Future was just the last nail in the coffin (even with the flaws, there are things I still like of SU before Future, I actually liked the movie, but there is nothing from Future I can rescue...)
See, personally, the divide between Old Magic and New Magic SHOULD have been closer to the different DnD caster types. Spells known and Spells learned. Most Charisma based casters are 'spells known' they know all their spells for that particular level and can switch out which ones they can cast over a long rest, meanwhile Spells Learned is Intelligence based and the realm of Wizard. They pick spells from a list upon level up AND can learn spells outside of those they've picked as long as they're A) of the Right level and B) spend the gold and time to copy it into their spellbook, so they can cast all their spells at any time limited only by the number of spell slots they have available. So Old Magic would be the traditional 'int' based magic, it allowed its caster to be more versatile BUT it required hard study. Meanwhile New Magic was more limited in scope but much easier to cast. Look at Eberron setting, which is a high magitech setting, where magic has replaced things like fossil fuels and pretty much everyone in the populace can cast cantrips BUT anything more than that requires putting in a lot of effort or being lucky enough to have had a celestial/dragon/etc. being somewhere in your bloodline OR you make a deal with a greater power. Meanwhile Artificers are the 'magic as science' type deal where they produce magical effects through inventions, they aren't as powerful as full wizards but they can use devices to replicate magical effects. Both Artificers and Wizards are the 'study the books' kind of caster.
not gonna lie the way you changed the scene with snapdragon and caraway gave me chills, the thought of doing something that will change who you are on the outside is a huge step in someone's life, I'm not gonna go into too much detail but I recently lost a leg (by choice) and I was pondering for a week if I wanted the doctors to save my leg. Now I'm not saying that transitioning is the same as losing a leg but it's the closest I can think of from my perspective and I think you should take more time than a week to think over if you really wanna change your gender forever but I was in a time sensitive situation
@@seekingabsolution1907 They're not though. I have been in several trans groups and they literally push any newcomer to immediately seek HRT. Especially those with obvious underlying issues. I have seen peoppe getting HRT from their first PP appointment without blood tests. It's actually pretty common in Americy, Sweden, Canada and Australia, whereas Holland (where the Dutch Model originates) and Finland are starting to reverse affirmative approaches because of a high rise in negative outcomes.
Ok but listen Cal is voiced by SungWon Cho, so I automatically like him. He could eat puppies and steal from blind orphans and he'd still be enjoyable.
Personally, I liked how Amaryllis respected Snapdragon's boundaries during the festival episode. If you were to rewrite the entire series, would you still include the 'toxic' characters? I'd think it would be interesting to have a group featuring the toxic three: Aster, Cal, and Amaryllis. The loveable side characters: Snapdragon and Slime Boy, and one of the main cast, Parsley. Team CASPSA, if you may.
Your fixes literally would've solved SO many of HGS's worst problems! It amazes me how a team of (supposedly) professional creators fail at such a basic level, especially regarding things like the transgender stuff, since their original selling point in the first place was "good representation"
That one scene with his father telling it to defend himself, how is that hyper-masculinity? His father's literally telling him to not be a pushover and let people take advantage of him. There's nothing masculine about that at all whatsoever. That is something my mother, my grandmother, and my auntie used to teach me when I was growing up. I didn't have a father but I had three mother figures. When I was getting bullied in school you know what they told me, to stop being a little bitch and stop letting them punk me. Guess what would happen when the same thing happened to my sisters, they would tell them the same damn thing. Stop letting them punk you and fight back. Learn to defend yourself when nobody else is going to help you. And I want anybody reading this to pay attention to the last part of that paragraph. Learn to defend yourself when nobody's going to help you. What about that is hyper-masculinity? My mother, auntie, and grandmother we're trying to teach me not to be a little bitch and let people take advantage of me when nobody's going to help me at all,when people are just going to stand there and watch and watch you get your ass be, the only one who's going to defend you and stick up for you is yourself. This has nothing to do with masculinity and everything to do with not letting somebody take advantage of you and punk you. And the one mil / Father figure in my life, my grandfather, was a pacifist and didn't want me to fight. He didn't want me to get in trouble. But it was my mother figure is telling me, that doesn't count with self-defense. If they're fucking with you, hit him right back! And when I did get in trouble for trying to fight back, they were the first ones to be complaining at the principal's office. There's the first one to say, you've been around my child before because I have been to the principal's office many many times, not for being in trouble but just being a special needs child. I would say the principal and vice principal understood me and knew me more than most of the teachers I had from kindergarten all the way up until 8th grade. When I needed help, we might parents and grandparents needed help, they did not hesitate to help.I can definitely see my principal and vice principal with some of the best people I had within my middle and elementary school years.. by the way, the school I went to the kindergarten all the way up to 8th grade. So they would always tell them, you know him and you know how he is. The only time he is going to start hitting somebody back, as if they fuck with him first. Cuz I never wanted to put my hands on anybody. I didn't want a reason to swing on nobody. I very much wanted to go the past this route. But it was getting to the point where I'm like you know what fucking, I ain't just going to punch him, I'm going to drag their ass in a basement and fucking hang them! No it only had been punches and kicks here and there the few times I did get in fights in school. But let's just say once I was out of school, I can't really get much context to this because it's just personal family business. But it did eventually get to the point where I strangled the motherfucker. I wanted him to stop his shit but he wouldn't fucking listen. So I fucking choked him till he was fucking begging for a breath. Now tell me, do you think this has anything to do with my masculinity, or everything to do with me wanting to be left the fuck alone but nobody would leave me the fuck alone? Cuz I can tell you first hand, the times I did have to push back it was because they wouldn't leave me the fuck alone so I made sure to hit where it hurt. And it had nothing to do with gender roles. The females were telling me to fight back, my mother figures were telling me to fight back. My father figure said to me the pacifist. And yes I know some people do kind of look at being a bitch being less masculine. But I'm from a very ghetto family. Being a bitch has nothing to do with femininity or masculinity. Being a bitch has everything to do with being a bitch. Being a coward. Not defending yourself and letting those who are bothering you do so. Especially when again, ain't nobody else going to help you. So you can either sit there and cry, or you could turn around and hit right back. I'm seeing it how my mother and my grandmother and my aunts would say. Three women. And very feminine women at that. They aren't masculine women or lesbians or anything. But as they say, they ain't no bitch either. You can take the family out of the hood but you ain't going to take the hood out of the family. The whole being a bitch having to do with masculinity thing, that seems to only come from those from the suburbs who got it good like that.
I fully agree, my father used to tell me to fight back instead of taking it all which got me into trouble when they twisted it into me making fights when they're the ones who tried to push first. It's obvious that a parent would want you to stand up for yourself especially in a world/environment that can be dangerous to you growing up. So I don't understand why the writers tried framing it as another example of toxic masculinity, even if some facets of it is true with putting expectations on a child, there's more nuance than just that.
Of course the idiots who write stuff like this think standing up for yourself is bad if you're a dude. They want men under their feet, and it's a lot easier to do that to a coward than it is to do it to a fighter.
@@BwooHuraca not in that story. More inter-planet-echange students. Think our world split into differents planets and galaxies and the characters naviguate into all of that, and their emotions and struggles etc. You get the picture. Here the plot : This dude is from a rather forgetable planet, in a dangerous street, living a boring life. He have no bonds here and secretly want to become a fashion designer and leave his planet. When a famous celebrity that inspire him annonce she cast new models for her brand/ Vogue like magazine, he took his chances. He's gonna meet people, get inspired, and face some obstacle... It's only the start, I still have to set the environnement and the characters more, but one day, its gonna be a webtoon, AND a physical format. Cuz I love bragging about my books in my library. (Also, its gonna be in french first, cuz well im french) One thing I love, is that I have to do ~research~ about differents styles, designers, movies, ethnicities, dolls... I just love it.
Thank you for mentioning dead eye syndrom. It may be a small thing compared to the rest of the problems this show has, but it seriously bothers me a lot.
Better question for the trans themes in this cartoon is why to have them. If you can transform INTO anything.......Then why even bring it in. Trans people exist only because in the real world you cannot fully transition from one form to another....while in the show......It is possible due to the lack of any limiters of magic.
Right...thats my problem too. Its not really something unattainable fully, heck isnt one of the students transfer into another creature (a frog) in the purple dress teachers class. If turning into another creature is THAT easy...then changing genders from an already existing body, into the same species, just a bit of tweaking, shouldve been easier. On another note, why arent there people in town taking potions to look like tiefling, fishpeople (not mermaid, but fins ears, webbed feet), i mean if its not permanent, wouldnt that potion be ideal when its halloween
I like the concept of having the transition magic be permanent, but I also like the current concept of having to make the choice, every month, to be true to yourself + who you are. Depending on how they intend(ed) to handle transphobia/trans issues later on in the narrative (if/when they do), having caraway + snapdragon's convo including something along the lines of; SD: "How did you know....who you are? Or, were?" C: "honestly? I didnt know until I knew. I had to make a choice between the person I was born as and the person I wanted to be. And I made it. And I keep making it, every month." SD: ".....are you happier now, as the person you are, instead of who you were?" C: "I've been the same person inside the whole time, but, yes. I am happier. Happier than I've ever been. And I'm happy for them too *gestures to photo album* - without them making that choice, I wouldn't be here, now, with you." It would be nice to have a trans character make a commitment to their transition, for both political and personal reasons, but I'm also not opposed to snapdragon + caraway having a conversation later on about a new, more permanent transition spell, and maybe one of them gets it while the other doesn't, or they get it together, or they make it themselves, together. There are multiple options/perspectives to trans representation + trans narratives within real life, and I'd love to see more of it depicted, because that way, there won't be The Trans Narrative, because there isn't one in real life either.
I almost feel like Professor Caraway's explanation of Trans Magic would have made a lot more sense in the episode where he confronts Snapdragon. It would have made a lot more sense in that context and felt more natural Edit: 1:09:19 Nevermind, you already realized that 😂
I think there's already a manga/anime that deals with the old magic vs new magic topic (sort of) It's Akashic Records of B@stard Magic Instructor (have to google it because can't remember the name, and it has fanservice if u interested) In that manga/anime world, magic users cast spells by speaking the enchantment, similar with Harry Potter but wand not necessary. The modern way of casting is shortening the enchantment and only say a few key words while the old way is just say the full line of enchantment. In modern combat, hardly anyone use the old way since it can get u killed if your spell cast slower. Which leads to an interesting episode where Glenn, the "b@stard" magic instructor (using the old way) lost to his student in a duel (using the new way). He then proceeds to explain why he uses the old way is that it can be adjusted and more flexible. Adding, replacing some words can amplify its power, change the spell behavior, make it change direction, etc... (I forgot the rest but that's pretty much it)
That's also basically Fate's plot. Magecraft (new) allows mages to do things that normal humans are capable of through technology. For example, we fly with planes, mages just needs to do a spell. Magic on the other hand is beyond the capability of even mages, it's ancient power that only people of those times were able to do, as well as select few present time mages. Things time travel, reality alteration, immortality, heck the Holy Grail in the original series was intended to be used by one of the factions to obtain the Third Magic for immortality.
@@Tamaki742 Not really. Fate's plot basically 7 mages each summon their own servants (heroes from the past, present or future in both real history and ancient myth and beliefs) within 7 classes to fight to the death for the Holy Grail that can grant any wish. Therefore, people who join that war are already mages, because u need mana to summon and sustain a servant. Their magic ability is affected by their birth talents or lineage. Besides that they are regular human, still can be injured and killed. There's no "new" magecraft in Fate, usually in a Holy Grail War, the mages chosen are on the same time period so the difference isn't that huge Normal mages don't have time travel capability, Kiritsugu in Fate Zero can only speed up or slow down time for himself and he can only do it for a short while, he can't undo it and travel to the past or capable of speeding to days or months later. They did make a magical device to travel through time in Fate Grand Order but that requires lots of magical energy, advance technology and pretty much impossible to perform by any individual mage. In fact, it's only made possible because of a Holy Grail wish The only mage known to be immortal and capable to observe and travel among parallel worlds and timelines is Zelretch and the explanation for that is rather vague. But he isn't involved directly in the Holy Grail War battles
@@lazycat836 I think you're misunderstanding me. But maybe I shouldn't have said that it's Fate's plot, but more of it's basic magic system, sorry about that. I'm saying that Magecraft _is_ the new "magic" in Fate, or rather Type Moon franchise. They draw very clear distinction between that and Magic itself. Again, Magic in Type Moon is what they defined as ancient powers that only people of those era (this is mainly just represented in ancient or mythological servants like Medea) and select few mages are able to do it, it's also what they call miracles because of the very near impossibility to achieve it. I didn't mention anything about mages coming from different era. Kiritsugu's Time Accel is what they categorize as Magecraft. Zeltretch on the other hand, is one of the very few mages capable of utilizing Magic, the Second Magic, which like you said, allowed him to explore parallel worlds and timelines. Aozaki Aoko from Tsukihime and Mahotsukai no Yoru is another one who can utilize Magic, which is the Fifth Magic, that actually allows her to travel through her individual time. The Einzberns wanting to achieve Heavens Feel is because that's the Third Magic, that is capable of granting immortality. Also they didn't exactly do time travel in FGO, what they did was more of a projecting the spirit and have it travel through space, so no they didn't even use the grails for it. This is mainly done to trick the Counter Force too, so it doesn't just basically destroy the person being sent to the Singularities. It's also travelling through space because the Singularities created by Solomon became something separate from the time and space Chaldea exists in, which will eventually be locked into place with the mainstream history so they still have to fix it.
@@Tamaki742 so True magic is hard to achieve but magecraft is easier? Fifth magic not really allow travel through time since 2nd magic already did that, it basically more like exchange time(?), like cut and paste it into another point in time Also I didn't mean they use the Holy Grail to power the ray shift device in FGO specifically, but that Marisbury used the Grail to wish for money for research and build the facilities
@@lazycat836 Yeah but that's the extend of what the Grail did, providing the money just to kickstart the creation of Chaldea. It's more like Magic is something that mages past the Age of Gods can no longer reproduce. Magic and Magecraft were considered just the same before that but with technology, things that were seen as miracles when done through magic slowly decreased. So magic spells that allows people to fly or create light for example is just reduced to be just a craft, normal people can just use tech for it. Then Magic becomes something very rare and involves doing things that not even tech could achieve. It's pretty much why they stated that the main goal of modern magi is to reach the Root, because that's how you gain Magic in the first place. And not everyone can just do it because if someone already took a specific theory and path to reach it, no one else can do the same thing, you have to go through another way. But it _can_ be inherited, like Aoko's case. Reaching the Root in concept is actually also something the planet and Alaya deemed as a crime and threatening to existence itself. It's why magi who possess Magic are very few. When they activate it, a Counter Guardian will get summoned to kill them. The time travel in Second Magic is considered just to be the side effect of it, not its domain. That should still belong to Fifth Magic, BUT it _is_ still a pretty unclear concept. Considering you can also rewrite events in time with the Second, it makes the Fifth pretty unclear, but either way, Aoko still uses it to travel through her individual time. It doesn't exactly rewrite the world, but the effect is still pretty terrifying. Like it's not even causing time paradox when she borrowed time and moved it around, she effectively caused the heat death of the universe to be more certain. No wonder Counter Guardians get sent to people using Magic.
this show is... like a fantasy made by a developing child and made into reality by a team of women and managed to void it of all emotions and life... like bruh my 6 year old nephew makes better albeit convoluded stories edit: 54:06 bruh i just realized that her sword magically cleaved its way into the ground without rosemary putting force on it as she drags it to use it to stand
About the rating I'm not sure if not mabye either of three things that I personally suspect happened: The rating was decided by some bigots, and the show creators then decided to at least use a tiny bit more leeway, while still sticking to their original idea of making it pretty childish, or The show, as it stands, was made for kids but the show creators didn't take care that there weren't any swears or blood, so the show was then rated for adults because of incompetence on the writers' part, or They made the show for a niché tumblr audience (they would most likely have belonged to) and hoped that audience would champion them no matter what, and so they wrote it in a tone that tumblr users typically write in. Regardless though, thing that is a strong pointer to the fact they wrote it for tumblr is the fact that they put in specific references. For example, years ago there was a meme about rabies pride and wanting rabies, and Sage says that "Do.. you.. want.. rabies?" so weird because it's basically the reaction the first person coming up with it got.
I can kind of see how the *option* of temporary transition magic would make sense. There are trans people who don't want to have a complete transition yet, for whatever reason (physical health, wanting to have biological children, not having body dysphoria in the same places as other trans people, and a lot more that I don't know/comprehend as a cis woman). The option is there, and if Caraway is taking monthly potions to keep the transition spell active, he has his own reasons for why he hasn't done anything permanant yet (or even if he wants to) Maybe the potion just tastes good...
41:49 The show has been done since 2019. The backlash was that bad, so they hid it during promoting the originals. The only reason it's seen in the light of day is because of the Crunchyroll purchase.
WOAH HOL UP, your telling me this guy that just made a SUPER high quality 1 HOUR AND 20 MINUTE VIDEO only has 3.3k subs??? Man you deserve wayy more, very underrated.
34:53 I’ll be honest, Amaryllis grew on me more than I expected to in the second half of the season. Something about her particular brand of Asshole™ was just kind of enjoyable, especially since I wasn’t really all that invested in (most of) the character drama in the show. Her friendship with Snapdragon was also kind of wholesome. Although to be fair I might have a different opinion on her if I watched the entire show in one entire 4 hour sitting like you did
Your rewrites and storyboard voice acting was really good. Really completed your analysis by actually showing you could actually write a more compelling story.
Snap and Amaryllis are legit the best characters in the show but if anything, Snap and his characterization shows a lot of the crux and biases of the crew when it comes to writing guys. They make it painfully clear they think feminine guys are the 'right' way for men to behave as any guy who isn't apart of that trope are depicted as 'toxic'. If the crew behind this are going to bitch at everything else on the merit of how female characters are portrayed they ain't got room to play the same card with male characters, and I'm a woman saying this. Their problem lies in believing what they hold are the thoughts and feelings of everyone 'like them' and this is the only way to be 'diverse'. Granted, I've had the misfortune of interacting with the person in charge of this shit and she is indeed one of those types who believes diversity is a virtue but only when it benefits her and she and who she picks are the only people who should be allowed to make what she deems as diverse stories. I think this show was the nail in the coffin for me when it comes to this vapid style of writing because of how poorly the male characters are treated and how minority character are treated like displays. If you really want to deliver this message of unity and diversity, treat everyone like a hod damn human. Diverse writing doesn't mean singling out a group and treating them like shit, except the ones that 'obey' you. It means respecting people and NOT writing them as the derogatory images often attached to them but here comes this show stating guys who are comfortable with being masculine ARE all bad and feminine guys are just a jibbering mess. Holy shit, I know i went off but the only thing toxic on this show are the attitudes that allowed it to even exist. Edit: to answer your question on old vs new, that's just it. It's just the writers harping on anything old as bring worthless because it's, to them, 'not progressive' and is 'problematic'. You know that thing you mentioned about separating the art from the artist? They can't do that and apply it to everything from art, history, writing and as such are obsessed with replacing and rewriting things to their new, progressive image because the old must die to them. That's why new magic is 'better' but ironically old magic requires sharing skills which they are trying to imply is a bad thing. They essentially want access to everything without realizing what dedication is and that natural development of skills is rewarding. New magic is basically a freaking participation trophy; everyone gets it but then what's the point?
- Yeah, Snapdragon is probably my favorite of the bunch, if I had to pick someone. And although it feels like him becoming a trans girl is the most likely route, I probably wouldn't mind him continuing the femboy approach. - Anise's and Aloe's spiel about Sage's mom using New Magic once upon a time...ugh, I REALLY hate it. It only exists for the couple to claim Sage's mom is a hypocrite for discouraging New Magic usage nowadays just because she used it _in a phase._ That...that's not hypocrisy. And since no reason is given on WHY she quit New Magic, I just care more about that "WHY". Maybe she saw that she was harming the earth (if overuse really is causing the Rot), maybe something happened back in Witch Country (which we now know is home to the bad guys) - but the couple only focuses on "she did it once, so it's cool if you do it". Imagine if that same excuse was used to mess around with drugs or guns! (I'm sure the writers had a different kind of experimentation in mind, but still.) But, whatever - their message ends up being "Your mom used to be cool, but now she's lame, don't ask why." - Who the hell thought _Redbud_ was a sound pick as an HGA teacher?? She's a legit psychopath! - As much as I'd like to separate art from artist here, Sage's rant about guy-friendships being "less special than girl-friendships" is just making Kate Leth's (or some other misandrist's) fingerprints all the more visible. - ...Aaaaand Aster and Call project those fingerprints to SPACE. But if I had to decide which one was worse, I'd probably lean toward Call - both are womanizing, but Aster's issue is being an idiot, while Call's are being transphobic AND spiteful. Like, Call INTENTIONALLY got under Snap's skin about his mermaid costume, while Aster was just clueless that he was slowing Rosemary down. Kind of ironic, though, that the more despicable guy ISN'T the white blond one. (And...tossing that heavy hammer onto his foot? Even for him, that feels like a disproportionate penalty.) - As for villains, can we talk about Mandrake? I swear, this guy's the funniest part of the series I've seen - not by supplying good comedy, mind you, but by being so cartoonishly edgy. "What a cute kitty. Can I break its neck?" That line...{snrk} I know it's to establish him as a homicidal freak, but it just sounds so stupidly unnatural and tryhard-y, it makes me laugh instead! This isn't Shadow edge, folks - this is _Coldsteel_ edge! {sigh} Too bad we likely won't see him anymore, thanks to {SPOILER}'s suggestion. - My main issues with Caraway's "I'm transgender" monologue are all in pacing and timing. First, his textbook-y description doesn't seem like it should it told to the mature audience that the opening disclaimer suggests. Second, it completely derails from the main conversation subject that is Lavender - it's the tea story in YIIK, basically. Thirdly, why would Rosemary, meathead she is, care about transitioning or potions? As you demonstrated, he could've shortened his talk to Rose to a subtle hint, and then saved the direct reveal for his chat with Snap. And as a bonus, as you said, his method of transitioning is relatively convenient compared to real transitioning - it's not quite as relatable as it probably wanted to be. - BTW, the main four are named after herbs, not spices. Title makes no sense.
Honestly, I cried a little during your animatic and felt for the characters and the stress they are going through. That was a really impactful scene that I feel should have taken more time to develop and allow the characters to be actual characters. I feel that this show's issue is mostly that it wanted to hit all of the "anime beats" but not really sit and think what made anime what is it. Or good storytelling for that matter. But that if you want to tell a story that people will want to sit and listen to, writers have to give the characters meaning outside of generic character flaws and issues. Snapdragon did have the most depth, but the rest of the crew felt like it was handled with the delicacy of a hammer to glass. But still amazing animatic and voice acting!
22:33 I agree. Instead of them sending them on quests it could've been them going on quests on their own and therefore getting punished for it. Which could also lead to some great character development! Learning not to make such impulsive decisions and to consider things before jumping into them.
From all these reviews, I thought for the longest time Thyme was the towering, stoic type with a bit of sass like Garnet but less nurturing(I havent watched much of SU so this is my reudementary understanding of her), but thanks to the clips you showed, I now see every word she says is pointed like a sewing needle.
I love analysis videos so much and I resonated so hard with the "give it the fairest shot it deserves" I am an aspiring creator and seeing people bash HGS really scared me at first, but videos like these motivate me to work harder and be a better story teller. The story boards felt emotionally impactful and beautiful and the criticisms felt fair and not like you were just shitting on it for content. This was definitely the highlight of my day
The way snapdragon’s hair flips from side to side is driving me crazy. This is what happens when you don’t make turnarounds for an asymmetrical character.
What I'm seeing with all these reviews is that Snap is the only good thing about this show. And I agree with what you said! It was worrisome when they tried to tackle the dangerous nuance of gender identity but you're right. They nailed it with Snap. Not everyone needs to transition. Someone can just be gender nonconforming. We need stories that aren't just stories to fill a quota or mark a checkbox. This is why most forced representation falls flat on its face. Audiences like to be told stories, not given lectures. If you're going to do a coming out story, it shouldn't be done just for representation's sake. I like your corrections. Caraway being trans didn't feel like it was there just to be there as opposed as to how it was done in canon.
52:04 Why would anyone make a show about "Coming of age" young schoolgirls, and aim it at a mature audience of mature people who like watching young girls? Why not make them college age? Did they make it too mature by mistake? "She Ra and the Princesses of Power" has a swordfight with a catgirl, where one of the girls gets cut. Maybe they tried to copy that, but didn't notice that She Ra did it without showing any blood or even any contact between the sharp point and the flesh. Did they aim it at children but then put in the disclaimer to stop people from complaining about the violence? Maybe it's not intended for mature viewers, it's intended for children who ignore disclaimers?
Dude! I honestly wanna know where High Guardian Spice was going with their plot, the development of the characters, and just the overall show if you were one of the story writers, the scene you recreated with Snapdragon and Professor Caraway was such a remarkable and beautiful way of showcasing what the show failed to do. You did an awesome job my guy, keep it up
I will say, as a trans person living with other trans people, all of us having to take monthly dosages of HRT (I think you meant HRT instead of puberty blockers, since puberty blockers is more common for minors around the age of puberty), I don't mind the idea of the monthly potions, unless we're using it to also compare to surgeries. I'd never say that anyone who is gender questioning and contemplating transition should immediately jump into HRT, but I do think that should they want to explore that option after having time to think on it (I thought on it for nearly 5 years), that it's important to know that a month or so on HRT will not make any permanent and "irreversible" changes, though it's a good way to start and really realize that HRT was not for you before it's too late. I was on HRT for two years, it changed all my fat distribution, even making my face look different, my permanent changes didn't really kick in until a half year in. I've been off HRT for over a year (I plan to go back on it soon), and it didn't take long for my fat distribution and face to go back to how it used to be. I'm not denying that there are some irreversible medical transition choices that can happen, but there are also ways to dip your toes in the water with medical transition, such as HRT, without making a full 100% commitment, since it really isn't an easy choice to make, and it can really help to use as an argument against hesitant friends and family that they don't have to worry that you're going to ruin your life and body should you start your first step in medical transition. That being said, I'm also not against the idea that Caraway could have done a permanent form of transition magic (though perhaps that's still something in development for new magic, just like how modern science is working on new ways to transition, such as uterus implants for trans women), and the potions were a way to test the water for him before making that full committment. Honestly, we need to de-stigmatize de-transitioning so that people realize it's alright to quit early and that choosing to start transitioning isn't the end all decision. Also, I appreciate how you handled the transgender and LGBT+ content, I will warn that saying "transgenderism" tends to be a conservative dogwhistle used to invalidate transgender people as purely a sort of ideology, and also warn against saying "a transgender," since that is just grammatically incorrect. Other than that, I super appreciate how you were with discussing the topic.
It feels like "new magic" was meant to be an allegory for both modern technology _and_ modern values, which only muddies the issue even further - not to mention having implications that I doubt the writers meant.
Just rework the festival to be the finale instead of the 8th and 9th episodes and the plot structure's already way better. Episode 12 rushes through resolving Sage's arc and Olive's that could be more naturally built up over time, so throw it out. Cal as a character really doesn't need to exist when we could rather focus on Snap's relationship with Amaryllis affecting each other more naturally. Sage's and Rosemary's conflicts are forced regardless and could be more naturally written with a better order of events because Sage SHOULD probably be significantly effected by nearly killing Rosemary just because Rosemary asked for it and Rosemary should probably be more concerned about literally almost dying. And Thyme's demon summoning can easily be changed from "Tell my dad about the water" to "Give my dad the water".
Ngl. Snap Dragon was awesome, though. A+ femboy. Looks great as a dude, looks great as a girl. He should have been the main character. He also wasn't annoying or boring. The guy felt real.
I really enjoyed this review because it was comprehensive and above all things, fair. My only real commentary thereon is that fantasy stories that have something like transition magic and are trying to be representative is that it requires very fancy footwork to create a wall around sex and make it so that it is literally the only thing you can't fully transform from one thing to the other without actually revealing that you're doing so. They can't make it permanent because then the transition is not between assigned gender and actual gender, but between trans and cis. Another reason that it can't be permanent is that if you can transform someone from A to B, you can transform them from B to A... or come up with a really good reason why. Because even in the real world, the therapeutic plastic surgery can be undone (although the disruption that the HRT component inflects can be permanent) so an explanation is needed for why the capabilities of mundane chemicals and surgery are greater than those of magic--especially after establishing that new magic is easy, unlimited, and all-powerful. Me, personally, I would rig up the world such that new magic is fantastic and everything--nearly as powerful as it is in canon--but that if you need to do something extremely complex and powerful, you need the old magic. Basically, that transition is only possible by use of a method of magic that is old, out of fashion, mostly forgotten, and whose experienced practitioners are dying in droves from old age. I feel like that could go in very interesting directions.
I like the idea of it being permanent but i also think that the professor's way of transitioning should have been old magic. The show keeps telling us it's an harder way to use magic and that you need to be good at it and to ACTUALLY put effort in it. And like has been said it would have been more interesting if old magic was theorically stronger but new magic was easier to use. it could have been more interesting to have this magical transition be something you REALLY need to work for, in real life it can be a long process and in this magical world i think it could be too because it would be realistic while still keeping magical elements and telling us more about his character.
Unfortunately, about Snapdragon, the plan was to make him trans in the second season (that they will never get), confirmed by the voice actor. It's very disappointing. They had such a good potential and arc for him, about how guys don't have to be hyper-masculine, and can be feminine too, and still as much of a man. But instead, the message was twisted into "if you are not hyper masculine, you are a trans girl". Caraway was such a hottie too, what a wasted character and character design smh. That last "alternative" version was super emotional. Really got me. It felt so real and personal, not like him explaining the concept to the viewer as though we are 5 years old. And also, more importantly, it showed him as such a kind character, because unlike in the real show, he didn't just randomly jump on an opportunity to talk about himself and his identity, which came off as kind of self-centered when the girl came to ask about her mom, who's MISSING (if you meet someone in real life who always wants to talk about themselves, you'd usually not get a good impression of them), he only brought it up to comfort another person. So we, the audience, got to hear a much more intimate detail of his character, while he got to tell it for a selfless reason, not "I talk about myself at every opportunity I get" kind of way, which paint him as a very good character. Like that cool teacher you feel like you can talk about things you don't even dare to talk to your parents about. Which many people could relate to, or wish they had, if they grew up in families that didn't accept them.
@@AuroraExhale Because, as I already explained (though it was kind of crammed in with everything else), it paints the narrative as "if you are not hyper-masculine, and you have trouble with your identity cause you couldn't live up to the hyper-masculine environment you were raised in, you are trans. Men can't be feminine or like feminine things, if they do, they are trans." It makes it look like he became trans because of trauma from his past making him uncomfortable with masculinity, not because he legit was born that way. It's gives off a similar vibe as "you only think you are gay because you were SAed when young". "You *turned* gay due to trauma, you weren't born that way." Meanwhile, Caraway explains that he transitioned simply because... He was always that way. He always felt like his body was not fit for him.
Um... yeah... about that... The show is getting a second season. All right folks grab your kindling because this dumpster fire of a show is about to get wild!
Something I think would have been cool about the "Transition Magic" is if they had both types of potions. In Minecraft, you can make potions and, by adding an extra ingredient, you can make the potion last longer. I think if Caraway explained, "I first used a temporary potion to see if transition was right for me and then, when I realized it was, I used a permanent potion." I think it would've been better because it shows the baby steps trans people will take. When a trans person is, well, trans, they don't just automatically get top surgery. They (usually, this obviously isn't the case for all people) will start with just wearing the opposite gender's clothes. They slowly work up to eventually getting hormones, top surgery, and bottom surgery, depending on what they want and their dysphoria. (Again, this isn't the case for all people, just a basic understanding but one that is still accurate.) By making Caraway use a temporary potion before using the permanent one, it would have explained not only did he think about this A LOT, but that he was actively taking baby steps and it would've been a good point to his character. Not to mention, him talking to Snapdragon, it would have made his argument better. "While using the permanent potion for me was the best, you should use the temporary one, if that's what you want to do. The temporary one will allow you to go back before you do anything drastic, but still let you figure out yourself. Again, I wouldn't recommend starting with the potions, I encourage you to do baby steps. The potions should be the last thing on your list." THIS could've been a great discussion Caraway had with Snapdragon!!! Also, forgive me if I messed up the magic system. I've never seen High Guardian Spice, but with the way you talked about it, I can just feel the frustration, lol.
This was a good video. Your analysis was thorough and I liked how you took scenes and showed how to improve them. The only criticism I have is the use of “transgenderism,” “being a trans,” “transgendered.” That section about revealing Caraway being trans was good, it’s just the use of those phrases isn’t great. It’s better to say for example, “Caraway’s experience being a trans man” instead of “Caraway being a trans” and “trans people deserve better” instead of “transgenderism deserves better” at 1:16:43. Overall, this was a good video, and I think breaks down the show and it’s flaws well.
I was thinking the exact same thing throughout, coincidentally terfs have co-opted that language to use to imply it’s like an ideology or something that is done to you rather than who you are
@@princess_sarina_elysia Yep, that’s one of the main reasons why. The phrasing implies it’s an ideology (unintentionally or not depending on the person saying it) when being trans just means being true to yourself and who you are regardless of what your sex is. It’s just a part of someone’s identity and not a belief system or ideology.
i just wanted to give a few comments as a trans man after watching your whole essay please..........please keep reading into trans issues and talk to actual trans people if you're going to go into it in such depth. it will lend more credibility to your criticism. T shots/hormone replacement are not puberty blockers once youre an adult. also, there are a LOT of things about transition that ARE reversible. and seeing things like HRT done realistically even in magic gives HRT some weight in real life. as a trans man, it was a really good way of explaining it on a side character. it IS pretty good representation. things about HRT ARE temporary and reversible unless you keep up HRT. it was refreshing to see it be so realistic and easy for him. because trans people dont have to struggle with their identity. a lot of things trans people go through are because of cis people dictating what we can and should do and the failures of the medical system. transition is NOT about sacrifice or struggle, its about joy and feeling GOOD about yourself. the reason im focusing on this part of your video is because even as a casual watcher having seen this character and the clips him being trans is relevant, it was very refreshing to see someone NOT have to struggle top transition! and framing a gender struggle as coming to terms with your identity (snapdragon, even if it turns out hes a cis feminine guy) vs the struggle to transition because of a transphobic society is great!! it SHOULD be made. there are enough stories framing the lives of trans people as shitty because of a transphobic society, let a trans person be trans and have an easy time. btw. "a transgender" and "transgenderism" aren't real terms. its "a transgender person" and " being transgender is..." or just "his gender", "gender issues" etc. you even said it once "his transness" thats prefect!! not "transgenderism". i understand where you're coming from, but again your criticism and changes to the story would be better, more credible and genuine with the input from trans people.
As someone who is questioning their gender, the scene with caraway and snapdragon was absolutely phenomenal!!! I’ve never felt so seen, and the art, characters, and explanation was so on point it’s chilling! You did an amazing job, and I’m going to go binge some of your other videos now! 💚
Very much appreciate this review. Something about this cartoon gives one the feeling of just wanting correct things that were almost there but fell flat. Cuz dang do i wish i couldve rewritten the trans scenes lol. I liked the rework to them! Very nice review dude c:
Did some research and It seemed I was wrong on that. Being honest, I was thinking of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves when I wrote that part, which I don't even think is technically fantasy so... shit, my bad lol ah well, 1 out of 2 ain't bad lmao
Im gonna argue with the snapdragon thing - that's still grooming. The professor could have opened with literally anything else, and their response? "Hey have you heard of this thing, I a trans person am doing?" Then when they get excited you try to "Cool them down" with a coy "But mayyybeeee other stuff"? This is incrementalism. It's a tactic used by calculating abusers who realize their abuse might be construed as abuse if they put too much on at once, so they pretend to be somewhat neutral. Carroway doesn't offer other solutions, they offer transitioning and then vague other "maybe kinda solutions" That makes the scene - and yes the *creator* even more insidious and gross.
Lol somehow I don’t think someone mentioning transitioning as an option is grooming, especially in a world where transitioning seems to be entirely reversible. Even if it did work like it did in the real world, that’s still not grooming. He’s a trans person trying to be helpful, and I agree that he could have presented it better, but I really doubt he’s purposefully trying to lead Snapdragon towards being transgender.
Thank you, my thoughts exactly! And as for the reason why it is grooming: Most people aren't trans, the tens of thousands of Detransitioners who were offered Transition because of the Dutch Model would support that argument. The issue lies with Carroway immediately offering the most radical solution in detail, while being ambiguous and somewhat dismissive of other options. Plus, he is doing so in an emotionally vulnerable situtation without listening properly or asking questions. He is directly assuming and it seems to me that it reflects an issue Raye Rodriguez or Snapdragon's VA had in the past. What this is referring to btw is "cracking the egg" which is honestly nothing but disgusting grooming behavior. I have seen it live in action done to emotionally and mentally unstable people who were clearly in need of help and whose condition visibly worsened after they pursued transition as they were advised. Do not EVER suggest transition to anyone. That is something a person should come to terms with themselves or with the help of a therapist. All you're doing is giving someone who has issues an "easy solution" which isn't easy at all. Offer other methods or ask them how they feel. Brings me back to the time a friend of mine (a Transwoman) talked to someone who was groomed in that way and that person realized half a year into HRT with already irreversible effects that they were groomed into it. I know it sounds fake, but it was very scary and the truth.
I really do respect your willingness to separate the art from the artist. I may not like HGS even on its own or its creators and some of the crossover stuff like propaganda elements, but as a whole I do like the separation moral. HGS would make a decent kids show if you tone down the blood a little and get rid of the swearing and propaganda. It has potential in that regard but that was completely missed.
In the snapdragon a Calloway arc, I would go with the route of Calloway explaining transgenderism, but snap explaining that he doesn’t know if he’s a trans girl, or how he truly feels about his identity in general. Calloway would then say “of course. Transition magic isn’t for everyone, and is a long process. Everyone has their own needs, and you should take that time to explore yourself. I know that, when using transition magic for being a transgender male, I made peace with that internal conflict. But what works for me will not work for everyone. Explore your interests. Try out something, and if it doesn’t feel right, you can always try something new.” Basically being like transition magic helped me, but isn’t for everyone and shouldn’t be your only option…. …if that made any sense Edit; wrote this before seeing the 4 min story board oh lordy Also, crossdressing Snapdragon is perfect and should be protected at all costs
wow imagine as a guy being told 'if you don't enjoy guy things, you are a girl.' while telling girls 'if you don't enjoy girl things, you do you, you are still a badass girl'
The last animation you did was just pure perfect. I got goosebumps and I think this should be implemented in the series. This show has so much potential and yet they didn't go all out. I like this show and would love to see a season 2 just to see what happens but it does need a lot of ironing and it feels like it was made for the writers to watch and not for the audience, like it wasn't supposed to be released.
This is why it failed, it focused in diversity instead of quality. Only those with self respect would understand that diversity is supposed to be accidental instead of deliberate. You don’t immediately become competent by being diverse.
I personally like slime boy. Not because he’s a very good character, or his voice acting is very good. In fact there’s a lot of time I can’t understand what he’s saying at all. But that kinda makes it feel more human. Rather than someone in a show mumbling, so cartoonishly, that it’s basically just sound effects. I feel like his voice could stay as it is, and then reactions from other characters or his mumbling, could enhance that. Make it feel more “real” But that’s just my opinion I’m positive plenty of people would disagree with me.
I feel what is the biggest drawback is that they put political correctness first story telling next when it should be the other way around. Like I mean why else Avatar, the original Teen Titans and Justice League successful? And why else anime is gaining lots of popularity in the current year in the first place? Also not only that even I who have some transgender friends online I did at least understand that gender dysphoria is not a joke and the thing is you do raised a good point about transgendering. Cause the risk is really at stake since there is no going back that one wrong move makes that person stuck into the wrong body forever once they found out that they don't actually have one after they fully discovered themselves.
I think the caroway trans dialogue was perfectly fine...for a childrens show. The explanation is obviously very simple but that works for young children who wouldn't necessarily understand the minutiae of what it means to be trans. The way they explain it is quite easy to understand. It also doesn't present it as something strange or to be feared. It's just a part of who he is. It would be a great message for a children's show. Unfortunately for the show, they chose to market it to 'mature' audiences meaning that such a simple explanation comes across as the writers talking down to their audience. Like when someone talks really slowly and uses small words because they think you're too dumb to understand what they're saying. It's heavy handed and demeaning.
It honestly felt like you could find it in sesame street or a Mr Rogers episode, shows ment to teach and entertain children typically have that 'info dump in a soft voice' vibe but it doesn't fit in this anime that was ment to be "mature"
Hey bois. Just wanna say thank you to the people who left comments saying they liked the Storyboards I made.
It means a lot :)
Hi
Thank you for the last storyboard. I literally cried because of just how much I relate to Snapdragon and his problems. And that's a good thing, you did an incredible job man, thanks a lot
So the problem with Caraway and the whole 'transgenderism' is that he's not actually talking about Gender Dysphoria. That's a hormonal condition that messes with the human body to various degrees and is INCREDIBLY rare. It's a painful physical issue for some people, others can thankfully ignore it.
No, what Rodriguez' mouthpiece is actually talking about is the tumblr/twitter 'affliction' which is purely mental and all about personal choice so to most people who try it out, it IS easy because it's mostly online and has no personal consequences. You mention that most of the dialog feels like it's stuff that people say on twitter, well, you are correct as that's where most of the Ellation Studio's 'creatives' hang out 90% of their time, hence the overly soft touch on Gender Dysphoria.
Here how i find a way to fix the Magic System...
Iam gonna alter the whole Mgaic System, the magic would be ranked by the level required to use.
Old Magic will be altered to Master, Expert & Advanced Magic, while the New Magic will be changed to Novice & Adept.
Master: Hardest to do and Control but it's the Powerfull of All.
Expert: It's the Second Hardest to control & use but in the right hands can be a life-saver.
Advanced: It's the Third hardest, but it is the must used for Military pourpuse, being from healing to use in combat.
Adept: It's essentialy a better version of the Novice Magic, but it's extremely good and once you learned it you don't require anything else to control it.
Novice: The Basic of all Basics, simply cast a spell and use it, don't need to expand futher.
You can still mix 2 different magic ranks to create more powerfull magic.
@@teoborges3949 Here's what I would have done, to keep it simple for a television show. Old Magic is powerful, versatile but slow, requiring gestures and/or rituals. New Magic is the enchantment of Terra-Spheres, but are limited to a 'type' of magic, so you have the Blaster types, for offensive use, Summoning for when you need to get some back up, Transmutaion for all your trans....forming needs. They're main flaws is the spheres are items that can be taken or lost and run out of power, needing to be recharged with Magic every so often. But they're fast casting and easy to use.
The main reason that Guardians (Which STILL need to be defined as to what they do, so I will do so here) prefer New Magic is because they are a rapid response force designed to deal with threats to the people, and you need something quick and easy to use, which New Magic and Terra-Spheres are.
Julian Koster, the guy who voiced slime boy, is a musician. He was a former member of the band Neutral Milk Hotel and he even has a podcast called The Orbiting Human Circus of the Air. That's actually how he talks (if you listen to the podcast, he's pretty decent) and yes, he's got a good mic (TLM 103). The only issue is, he compressed it too much (that and the lack of a voice acting coach to liven up the character a bit). Which really begs the question, who the hell was in charge of quality control and is it really hard for audio engineers to fix that? The whole show has a lot of audio inconsistencies.
Seriously, this show had 3 years to figure this out, this and the most basic of the worldbuilding elements.
And yet I like slime boy much more than any of the other characters
I had a feeling it was compression or something, not the mic itself, that was the problem. Amazing sound can come from a mediocre mic, and poor sound editing can ruin recordings made with the best mic.
Also, I agree, the voice director is just as responsible for the performance quality as the actor.
... Somehow that makes it a bit worse... Or rather confusing... He might not be a VA. But you'd think he'd know a bit better o. O
That's actually pretty based. One of my favorite moments in this show was Slime Boy playing the hand saw
You know, I actually wouldn’t mind had Snapdragon stayed a guy who just happens to be feminine, or even simply a crossdresser. However, if the words of his voice actress are true and he will eventually transition… I don’t know, it doesn’t sit right with me for some reason. It’s like that makes the teacher’s words boil down to “if none of what you’ve done is something that guys do, maybe you should be a girl instead”.
Perhaps, and it’s an immense perhaps, there will be some more exploration on that topic should hell freeze over and HGS get another season. But with basically all of Snap’s reasons for dysphoria coming from “you can’t/shouldn’t do that because guys don’t do that and you’re abnormal for doing it”, I have little hope for that happening.
P.S. How in a world where you have potions that can turn you into other species (like the mermaids) why is genderbending treated as something arduous?
Edit: 1. How did this comment become the most liked one under this video and 2. How did I get a person in my comment thread that feels the need to answer everyone in said thread as if there's gonna be an explosion otherwise?
Well no, because its not just about snapdragons preferred way to dress and express themself. They're showing legitimate signs of dysphoria, and to caraway they express how uncomfortable their masculine features make them. Crossdressers don't have this issue the way trans people do, and caraway, BEING a trans person, would absolutely have the basis and experience to be able to infer that snapdragon *could* potentially be trans. And so he shows them that it's an *option.* not THE 100% fix everything way, but he lets snap know that gender transition exists. (Also, he shows other signs of dysphoria aswell aside from his convos with caraway. He gets very sensitive when sage brings up the differences between guy friendships and girl friendships, saying he could never understand. He then has a little meltdown over "guys and girls and girls and guys and-" as a trans guy, ive been here. When i was young and in the closet, i loathed any mention of the difference between guys and girls, or when we were separated at school into groups of guys versus girls, and i didnt know why until i got older and realized it was because i was always lumped in with the *wrong* side. My point: snap has some VALID show of dysphoria, despite it being handled very poorly. )
It really is the connection the show makes between Snap’s dysphoria and their experience with toxic masculinity that bothers me, because it sends the implication that the reason Snap is feeling this way is because they don’t fit into their family’s very narrow definition of manhood and not just because they don’t feel comfortable being a guy in general. It also reinforces the sexist idea that anyone who doesn’t fit the mold of a super macho masculinity can’t be a “real man”.
You could have just not have that flashback scene there, and you would have delivered the same message that you wanted to, where Snap is experiencing genuine dysphoria, without muddying the waters so much. You don’t even need to get rid of that part of their backstory, just don’t put it in this scene.
I think instead of cutting the scene all together its really a major missed opportunity to make the distinction between having discomfort with stereotypical brutish masculinity and feeling dysphoric about being male in general. Especially since Carroway is a transman who's masculinity is quite different from Snap's family, instead of a generic "this is what trans is" conversation they could have had a much more thoughtful dialogue about what exactly transition magic is meant to address.
> P.S. How in a world where you have potions that can turn you into other species (like the mermaids) why is genderbending treated as something arduous?
Maybe bc those potions don't have a permanent effect? (I haven't watched the show so idk)
> It’s like that makes the teacher’s words boil down to “if none of what you’ve done is something that guys do, maybe you should be a girl instead”.
Well, Snapdragon has body dysphoria, which they expressed in that same conversation with the teacher, so no, it's not necessarily related to acting feminine/masculine
@@BAVy11037 in the show the genderbent potion is not permanent, stating to drink it once a month
Problem with Snapdragon...the writer goes on twitter and calls Snap trans. That whole "guys can be feminine too" is completely dropped off-show.
I mean they hate men, so of course Snapdragon cant be a guy.
You serieus. The only thing I liked about the show
I'm seeing a lot of people not understanding that Snapdragon's issue wasn't just "enjoying feminine things as a man." They legitimately had gender dysphoria.
Wanting softer skin and hating broad shoulders isn't something a man comfortable in his body would say. And it has nothing to do with cross-dressing. Cross-dressing only showed how much euphoria Snapdragon gets dressing as a woman.
The way I see it, both feminine guys and transwomen are abysmally under- or misrepresented, especially their journey - if they're represented at all, it's usually after they already figured out who they are and there's not much character development left. So whether Snapdragon is a transwoman or a feminine guy, they'd provide a much needed representation either way. The problem isn't as much with Snap being trans, but it happening in a show with next to no examples of positive masculinity, leaving an overall "cismasculinity = bad" impression.
One thing that irks me is how Snap being trans - with their arc being in otherwise bad-to-mediocre show and having some flaws of its own - would still make for the best representation of transwoman's journey I've seen in animated media (journey being the keyword here).
I watched Wandering Son anime (praised for its handling of gender identity issues) to have a proper point of reference, and I still think it doesn't work as well as Snapdragon's arc so far. I'd explain the problems with the anime, but they would be a little spoilery; I also judge the anime on its own without the context of supposedly much better manga.
Maybe I wasn't lucky with the shows I watched, or maybe there really is such a dearth in transwoman's journey representation that even High Guardian Spice with all its shortcomings manages to positively stand out.
I hope we can at least agree that whether Snapdragon is a feminine boy or a transgirl, they're precious either way.
@@AlphishCreature I personally dont like Snapdragon because he follows the bully character. I just dont find that likable regardless of his character arc and it’s hypocritical to feel sorry for him that he’s being bullied, but has no problem with Amarylis bullying other people just because she’s rich.
Honestly, I liked your simple “I was.” Then moving on, it also sounds more natural. I also saw a story boarded thing where it goes into a LITTLE explanation but doesn’t go into the details, and also uses an illusion to narrate what he was saying, which kind of made the whole thing feel more like a magic thing.
That video you're alluding to was from Jamie De Jonge:
Caraway trans reveal: ruclips.net/video/H2eKj4Ju0AA/видео.html
Caraway counseling Snapdragon: ruclips.net/video/IImRpygg9p0/видео.html
And a Snap/Amaryllis fan animatic: ruclips.net/video/IImRpygg9p0/видео.html
If CRUNCHYROLL (w/SONY twisting said company's balls) wants to redeem itself, it will reboot HGS w/better *everything*.
@@acsound Much as I WOULD like to see that happen, I don't see that happening. XD
@@battybuddy Maybe those resources could be used by a team who knows what they're doing, instead? For a more thought-out project
If he said "i was" and it left it at that, it would give her a reason to have snapdragon talk to him later, and build off of it so much easier
Sure, 'Show don't tell', ...to an extent, but shouldn't someone say the word "Transgender" at some point? or it's a bit of erasure.
Honestly for some reason the bad voiceacting on slimeboy actually made him more endearing to me than the other characters.
It sounds like he is constantly high as a kite, having 0 care of...well, anything.
But I do understand it could have been done much better, maybe I just like the amateurish performance of it.
There is an element of so-bad-it's good to the performance. The voice isn't unpleasant to listen to, and the badness gets it to stick out in a way that is pretty amusing.
Unrelated but your profile pic is so cute 🥺
Honestly, I thought I was alone thinking that. It’s not good, but it sure does give him quite the personality
I still don't like that the FIRST thing Caraway talked about was transition magic, even if he later smoothed it out, it still feels gross that was the 1st thing instead of asking Snapdragon more about how he feels or his opinions and then go into how there are many options for him. Also I don't like how Sage and Snapdragon's relationship started out, mostly cause of Sage and how it started on her end
if anything, i think caraway shouldve mentioned how some guys are just. feminine. as well. like, open up different doors instead of just the one so snapdragon can understand himself and his own wants better - realise that just bc he likes dresses, doesnt mean hes a girl.
I imagine in magical worlds transitions can easily be reversed.
.
But this should have been brought up in a 4th wall break sorta way.
.
"transition magic exist but you shouldn't take it lightly, imagine a world where we don't have access to these tools to switch here and there.
Take your time, figure yourself out, people come in many colors and variations. Just think it over because transition magic exist but it shouldn't be taken lightly 😏"
(thank you thank you, I'll take my gender bent ocscor now")
Well. In universe it's pretty easily reversible meaning that Snapdragon could just try it out see how he/she feels about it and if they feel like it isn't for them they can just.. not take the potion next month. No harm no foul. I also see it as Caraway trying (badly mind you) to explain what worked for him and trying to let Snapdragon know that they have options available to them. If it were real life then yeah it'd be really creepy but in universe when you realize just how few real consequences there would be to jjst try it out for a month it becomes a lot more understandable why Caraway would be confident enough to mention it early on. He still fixed his mistake at the end so I say it's excusable.
@@Yuni-is-Schrodingers-Fox Yea, that still doesn't make it look any better whatsoever. Just cause the transformation is easy, how people act will obviously not be. That point was drilled in by Snap himself when he mentioned questioning how his family would act and Cal's entire reason for existing. So clearly it's a decision with more weight to it and should STILL be treated with even a bit of care when talking to a distressed person. So even in universe, it's an awful speech regardlessof if he walked it back AFTER explaining transitioning, because even then he didn't give Snap any alternatives but went into detail about transitioning, which would of course have someone look more at that as a solution than anything else because of how it was sold to them. That still is neglecting that regardless Caraway didn't even ask Snap anything to actually get to know more about his thoughts to be justified in making the 1ST thing transitioning. Even if you can change back easily, dynamics and perceptions between people wouldn't simply go back to how they were, so it's not actually no harm no foul. And how the writers had him conduct himself is still not excusable, especially because they related this to real life(so it is especially gross) despite new magic just being able to do whatever with no cost so there shouldn't be a limit or consequence if we are going by their world(if there is a reason, they never gave it)
@@SpectreBagels it makes it significantly better, what are you even talking about? If in a fictional universe humans grow back their lost limbs 1 day after they become severed then having your arm cut off in this fictional universe would not be considered nearly as terrible an experience as it would be in real life and the same applies here. I'm not saying I liked it or that it was handled perfectly but I think most people are twisting his words and their meanings for the sake of creating a strawman. Caraway *immediately* went back on his suggestion as if it was just what I said, an ill-timed suggestion, a Freudian Slip at the absolute worst. It probably shouldn't have been the first thing he brought up but he was clearly just trying to relate what helped him (albeit badly) so I think it's permissible if not what it should be.
Personally I prefer this version: ruclips.net/video/IImRpygg9p0/видео.html
As much as I want to praise Snapdragon, does it come off as a bit.... tone-deaf... for Snapdragon to WANT to be a warrior, WANT to fight... but also resent being raised by a "fight back already!" father. Because... What? What about being a girl means you aren't going to shove your brother's face in the mud for stealing your toy? Am I the only one a little confused as how "wanting to be a girl" is being synonymously connected to being incompetent as a warrior in the face of a bully?
"Oh, they are a girl, but they are a feminine girl! A girly girl!" What is the feminine way of stabbing someone with a sword? What is the feminine way of killing someone? The writers are subconsciously writing that Snapdragon doesn't think a real woman defends herself from attacks. You don't want a beard. Okay. But what the hell does that have to do with fighting and you not living up to your father's expectations?
These are the times when I wish that people would stop tossing stereotypes and clichés around in order for their sad, pitiful woobie character to be "relatable" and actually focus on what they are writing. Gender queer people sometimes put too much emphasis on reinforcing the worldview of the people they hate specifically to rebel against it--- actually justifying ignorant behavior for the sake making their character seem different, instead of actually pointing out WHY the ignorant character is IGNORANT.
1) YOU, writers, are CHOOSING to make a teenaged (tall, muscular, sweaty, body-hair having, in a time before deodorantconfuse
2) And just to really emphasize that again: MEN WEAR MAKEUP, WIGS, DRESSES AND ROBES, AND STOCKINGS. It is ONLY within the last 100 years did a very specific aesthetic of what a man looked like developed and that's ONLY because of the mass consumption of the idea that the only honest man is a working class man. Wearing PANTS is literally a class issue, not just a gender issue. Men of higher standing didn't wear pants. Princes didn't wear pants. And even working class boys weren't expected to start wearing pants until they were 8-10. And they certainly wore dresses as babies and toddlers, because why would any mother bother cleaning pants by hand when she had to change cloth diapers? You have to REINFORCE sexist stereotypes to "break" them. YOU have to insist that skirts are girly to make them girly, while men dress in skirts for formal occasions all over the world. YOU have to insist that wearing nail polish is some kind of tipping point. Excuse me? Would the trans male teacher be less of a man for wearing nail polish? Is he pretty much wasting his time drinking his transformation potion if he still wanted to wear a dress and paint his nails? See how stupid that sounds?! The only justification to this ridiculousness is by specifically writing Snapdragon as having a macho father, which is, again, obsessing over "proving them wrong" to the point of justifying their behavior. You are rationalizing it. A boy wearing a wig?! At a fair?! He MUST be queer! Nail polish!? He MUST want to be a girl! Why? Because no straight cis boy in a hundred mile radius of this festival would DARE wear a wig. Cat girls, giants, swinger bisexual teachers, dragons, demon women, elves and dwarves, transforming into a mermaid, cats that transform into cat-people, all these things... normal. A boy in a wig? SCANDALOUS!
3) Let's be clear that even though the teacher DID tell Snapdragon that there are plenty of options, the show intentionally wrote this character to be a trans girl. Not to be a feminine boy. So, although the dialogue of "there are so many paths" is nice brownie points, the show isn't actually doing anything to create a diversity of characters. The boy who wears a wig on Halloween MUST be a trans girl, because why else would they do it? So, even though this is a show made by LGBT members, they sidelined the most interesting storyline to a secondary character and had four cis girls as the main cast. I'd be interested to see if Snapdragon growing into her true self ended up causing her to be added to this magic girl squad, but if the show's writers didn't realize that that was the ONLY interesting subplot in its whole story, I don't care about sticking around to find out. This is like when they made Finn the Stormtrooper a main character and didn't think to make a Stormtrooper Rebellion until the last movie. So, here are a few other things that just make it so difficult for me to care: Snapdragon and Sage. The show is obviously hinting Sage and Rose, but is using the tried and true "they are so young and innocent" route. Fine. But Snapdragon knows she has a crush on Sage. And the show does such a disservice to male-female relationships, with no healthy boy relationships at all and then Snapdragon going crazy over being treated differently for her sex than how she wants to be seen and treated. The only boy with a close relationship to the cast is actually a girl. Excellent. I would give the show more credit if it put effort on how SAGE feels about Snapdragon instead of the other way around. Is she even attracted to boys? Does she have a sparkely moment she sees Snapdragon dressed up as a mermaid? The show puts all its eggs in the basket of showing how pitiful Snapdragon is that it doesn't explore any positivity. At all. Let me tell you, if someone thought writing a black character meant every scene they were featured in HAD to be about racism, I wouldn't watch the show. I don't care if every single scene was Based on a True Story, ripped from the headlines real. No one's life as a non-heternormative cis white male is suffering 100% of the time.
This show was made by man hating White Coastal women with savior syndrome who believe they just invented....everything.
@@SuperCosmicMutantSquid They revolutionized the magical girl genre by making the most basic tropes, clichés, and plots imaginable, but they threw in a joke about the teachers being bisexual swingers, so, if you hate cliché lazy writing ... It must be because you're homophobic.
@@Cityweaver The sadder part is if they actually adhered to just the tropes of the genre and basic structure of conventional storytelling, this product would have been far more tolerable. It would still be lacking in creativity and paint-by-numbers, but still cleaner than this jumbled mess of a story & setting and ocean of inconsistent, mixed messaging. Tropes aren't inherently bad or wrong, they become what they are because they work and and satisfy components needed for good storytelling and many go back to the earliest known forms of literature in human civilization...but this team was so amateurish they couldn't even do that right since even the tropes are incomplete and botched in execution.
It still baffles me how I have played eroge with better worlds, characters, and stories than this...
@@gtf234 Definitely. I love a good trope. Tropes give genre stories structure. This isn't The Great Gatsby. This isn't a deep dive into the psychology of a hurt individual whose journey serves as an allegory for the author to criticize his contemporaries.
It's a magical girl / magic academy cartoon.
And because the writers don't respect the Old Heads, and are just throwing vague notions of MG/MA tropes at a wall and seeing what sticks, they are making the LEAST satisfying version they could possible make.
I ranted about Snapdragon. Here is just one other little point: you meet ALL four girls in the same episode, the first. OMG, that is the absolute worst idea imaginable. That just shows these writers don't even watch anime, let alone magical girl anime. FEW things are more satisfying to watch than an anime character's introductory episode! That "hell, yeah, another member joins the party" feeling, learning particulars about that character, seeing their backstory/motivation.
Imagine One Piece, but Luffy, Nami, Zoro AND Ussop and Chopper were all just introduced, blandly, as background characters. Imagine Sailor Moon, but you tried to focus on ALL five girls for the first seven episodes, never developing any of them. Imagine TOPH from ATLA not having her intro episode. Imagine MARCALINE THE VAMPIRE QUEEN from Adventure Time not having her intro episode. Imagine Seven Deadly Sins, but let's just shove all seven on the screen at the same time. XD Can't hear you Elizabeth, we've got to explain seven backstories in three episodes. XD
While I agree with many of your points, some things here;
Men did wear dresses, makeup, and stockings, etc, but much of that was either reserved for higher class men or men who were actors as back then, women were not accepted to be actors for a large period of time, at least in the Roman era, women were not socially accepted to be actors as they never did have a good image until recently. Many believed them to be great liars so they couldnt be used as witnesses in court.
Another thing, while many men did not wear dresses, many wore ROBES. There's a huge difference here. Robes were worn by both genders while dresses were mostly available for women than men as they wore togas, again, something more akin to robes.
I dont know how it is in other parts of the historical world, but parts like egypt also wore loin cloths and nothing like dresses, again, robes for men.
Idk where you got the idea that men wore dresses and stockings as the norm lmao. It never was the norm.
to be clear the "im sorry is there a better time to get mugged?" line is gold, shame it had to be in a show with really bland and shitty dialogue
I did actually like that line too lmao
I really liked that line too.
I was the only person in my friend group who liked that line cuz all of my friends hated it ;-;
That one actually got a smile out of me, lol.
It is a good one
Snapdragon is definitely the most fleshed out in this series. Just because you're a dude doesn't mean you can't enjoy girly things.
I love chocolate, poetry, korean drama. The key is finding balance.
I know that sounds cliche, but it's true. If you can balance yourself out finding your own perfect blend of masculinity and femininity. Then you're golden.
Yeah. Plus I wonder if he did snapped at Sage for being the problem and bitchy right after she stereotyped men and women falsely. Cause if I were in Snap's shoes and I hear her bitching about her problems with Rose having a crush on a boy out of her jealousy I would called her out also.
Wait since when is liking chocolate is a girl's thing.And even k dramas?
I don't think there needs to be balance. A man can just be feminine. He doesn't need to balance it with his masculinity. If he wants to, that's fine, but Snapdragon's problem isn't that he can't find balance between his masculine and feminine sides, it's that he's discouraged from acting or being feminine at all. He doesn't need more masculinity to balance himself out, he just needs to be free to like what he wants and be what he wants to be
chocolate, poetry and korean drama aren't feminine things but ok
Yeah and honestly, you don't even need to balance these things. A guy can enjoy all the things that are perceived by others as "feminine" and still be just a guy
I feel like the inconsistent tones that go back and forth between "kid friendly" and "mature" is because the writers wanted to make something that feels like kid shows such as Steven Universe, but didn't want the stigma of actually being a kids show.
I don't think it's the stigma. I think these are just people obsessed with kid shows and lack maturity. The only "adult" part of them is their sexuality and ability to swear so they added that in and everything just comes off like a bad fanfic because if it.
I've noticed this problem amongst other millennials in my cohort. One of my friends (32yo) who now heads an entire library department only reads YA fiction and visibly wrinkled her nose at me when I mentioned an autobiography I was reading. She and a lot of people like her are very averse to growing out off their safe, low conflict, emotionally affirming entertainment. If she were for some reason tasked with writing a show it would lack depth, conflict and character growth because she doesn't like that kind of stuff and wouldn't even know what a deep conflict laden story even looks like.
We millennials (specifically middle class and western) are a very immature and sheltered group, and not all of us are living in the same reality.
One Piece was for kids yet it has way too much mature content not meant for kids to see. This is what the creators are going for.
@@lorblauh I'm Gen Z and have noticed that about a lot of Millennials too.
Sure, there's no age limit on hobbies/interests/fandoms, and there's nothing wrong with being young at heart or nostalgic for the things you enjoyed as a kid, (hell, I like "kid" things like stuffed animals, crayons, kids' cartoons, Lunchables, etc. too) but at the same time, so many Millennials do seem to make kids' media a huge chunk of their personality. It even seems like a lot of 90's/00's nostalgia trend comebacks are things Millennials enjoyed as children, (such as toys, cartoon reboots, etc.) while I get the impression that previous generation nostalgia comeback trends were more based on things that you would had to have been a teen or young adult to enjoy. (ex. Classic cars, hippie culture, etc.) It seems like an odd phenomenon.
Tbh SU is kid's show not because it is stigmated as one, but because it does not take itself serious.
>Establish basically alien Nazis as main antagonists.
>Just forgive them because it is a nice thing to do and there is no difference between high school bullies and genocidal war criminal.
@@TheSameYellowToy I second that.
When it got to the part about Thyme, the first thing that came to my mind was "So like Blake from RWBY, but if she were needlessly bitchy/angsty."
But wasn't Blake always bitchy/angsty in the first six volumes. I say the first six because she's flat out not a character in Volumes 7 and 8.
So exactly like Blake in RWBY
So current blake?
Blake was actually interesting with her background as a terrorist trying to make up for what she’s done in the past. Thyme seems to just be a bitch.
@@3ds_fellgod-myhopewillneve617 eh, in the early volumes she was...there. playing more into the "ooh so mysterious" than what she is now...which is basically what Thyme is.
Snapdragon seems like one of the better parts, but I'm really not sure that's saying much. If you took every single one of those writers and had them write out what they thought his story should be separately, you'd probably get the exact same story beats from all of them. They re-hash this sort of story over and over and over - there's basically one life transpeople live to them.
(And being trans and someone who works with students, it feels REALLY awkward for me for the teacher to bringing it up to students, especially multiple students, unnecessarily. But I'll put that aside because this is a magical fantasy setting and the relationships aren't necessarily going to be what you would find in reality. It's just awkwardly pushed in the same way the douche is awkwardly douchey because they need a strawman.)
The main thing is that they actually allow him to be a bully when usually they would have him do no wrong ever or do wrong but have it portrayed as justified. But I wonder if they continue to allow him to be a bully after they reveal that? Or is he suddenly only a victim?
And apparently the plan was eventually for Snap to go trans outright, which sorta flies in the face of the whole "there are many different paths to self-discovery" idea mentioned in this video
@@BroudbrunMusicMerge Sometimes bad writers create something really good... and if you let them continue they'll manage to ruin it.
It's funny, but I kind of noticed the same thing. The very first thing that I said to myself when seeing people review Snapdragon in specific was... Wait, I've heard this story before. Three times actually. Mind you, there are some mild differences, but Snapdragon's arch follows the same basic (and I do hate to call it this) "Stereotypical "how I realized I am trans" Story".
The only thing missing is the "that moment somebody calls me by my preferred pronouns" smile of pure bliss scene. However, I'm sure it was because they were planning on it for after he actually transitioned.
In my opinion, Snapdragon landed in the wrong show
@@Snowmon89 i am curious on the other two story with those trans character, if you don't mind
I wish more media reviews were like this, excellent job
Oh hey its brightgoat! :D
Omg, hi!!
Thank you!
I agree with just about everything except Amaryllis. I found her to be delightful and refreshing in her egotistical and crazed enthusiasm. Snapdragon was definitely the stand out character though. But then most of the cast were nothing nuggets, so that's not saying much. They could have easily ditch Parsley and Thyme and replaced them with Snap and Amaryllis and it wouldn't really have changed much. Just give Sage the rot plotline with her mother and father trying to fix it and them sending her with Rosemary thinking she'd be safer at the school. Thyme and Parsley are so underdeveloped that they come off as meaningless filler characters.
Speaking of filler, this show really needed someone to keep them on track. They wasted a lot of time on slice of politics that it seemingly forgot about its own plot. They don't even get around to establishing the plot until episode three which is way too late, then drop it for several episodes until the festival.
Overall, it's very amateur, more like some preteen's DnD fanfiction than a competent show. (I still don't understand the obsession with the song Scarborough Fair. It's just an overused and empty reference with no bearing on the plot, character development or themes. What does any of this show have to do with a song about two exes being petty at one another?)
This could have been an okay show, if they had just worked a little harder on it and had someone who knew what they were doing guiding them. Your rewrite of the Snapdragon/Carroway scene was great, by the way. Much more impactful and with a good message about taking the time to figure things out before committing to something that might not be right for you. It's fine and healthy to explore your options before making permanent decisions. It also lacked the condescending undertones of the "I'm transgender" scene, which is much appreciated.
Amaryllis is the best girl. Yes, she's a bit of a bitch, but she will fucking kill anyone who's messing with her friend (Snapdragon) and I can really appreciate this. Plus, majority of her lines were actually entertaining.
I guess it’s just personal preference, everyone will find different things appealing and not appealing. I personally was not the biggest fan of her but as I said that’s just my opinion x
@@chiyokme8159 Eh, I can understand why some people wouldn't like her much. It's not that big a deal which is why I moved on to other points quickly. As long as everyone is respectful to each other, it's all good to disagree on minor things like preferred fictional character types.
@@aprilvaiarella435 totally x
@@chiyokme8159
After watvhing some clips of the show the only reazon I give (and seems like a lotof people did) this show a chance was seeing the murder axe girl and at the end of the day she didn't dissapoint and to me was the most entertaining (not best written not really good) part of the show.
They could have done her better like showing her how she cares about people inside her circle or things like showing why she was an ass.
I agree that Caraway's transition should have involved a permanent spell as opposed to a monthly one, for the reason you gave plus another I don't see anyone mention. If there exists in this world a spell that allows you to change genders for a month, you canNOT convince me that people wouldn't be experimenting with it and switching back and forth at will, even just for curiosity's sake. And there's no way that doing so wouldn't change people's outlook on gender completely - which would be an intriguing concept to explore. But, the writers wanted to depict gender issues as they stand in the real world, so that can't and isn't going to be explored here. If Caraway's transition were permanent, it would be understandable that others don't use the spell without being absolutely certain that they want to change gender. But, as it stands, it feels strange that, in a universe where you can change genders monthly at will, no one is doing that very thing for a multitude of reasons and changing the universal perception of gender in universe.
i would actually pose a middle ground between the two that mimics real life hrt more. like a spell that you do monthly that makes you closer to your real gender, but that is permanent. if done more than once every month it causes a dangerous hormone imbalance.
You would also have people doing it for more pragmatic reasons. For example, a person might use such a spell to help hide their identity. When you add an ability or power into your world, you must think, "What could people use this for?" as if there is a potential use for something someone is eventually going to use it that way.
@@javonyounger5107 almost any spell can have a way to use it for evil. this would just be another one of those spells.
edit: misunderstood your response i agree
I did not even think about that. That would have been a really interesting thing. I am not trans but if i had a potio that would just change me to a girl for 30 days and then i could just not take it again to change back i qould 100% try it. If for no other reason than just wanting to see what that is like. In that world as you say the idea of gender should be so open that it hardly maters with this kind of potion available. Literally just swaping on monthly basis if one wants. Heck i would not be surprised to hear potions being made that lasts shorter or longer if people wants imagine the potion but it only lasts 1 day.
@@maligulant4396 this would have been a really interesting aspect of transformation magic in general. There was that pink haired antagonist who has the ability to turn into different people regardless of gender. Having some sort of drawback to that ability would have been cool.
My problem with the Dnapdragon arc is that it seems his "journey" is largely a result of zero positive masculinity in his life. His father is so over the top to the point negativity while at the same time he is repeatedly told that boys can't understand deep friendship BECAUSE hes a boy. It feels more like hes being shamed and bullied out of being male rather than actually wanting to be a girl.
Like, the the show seems to go out of it's way to reinforce only negative stereotypes about men UNLESS they're trans
Yea. I haven’t watch this show because I don’t have Crunchyroll but from clips and summaries alone, I utterly despise the idea of snapdragon being trans for the reasons you said. If it happens it’s very clear to me that his story is 100% just to push the all men are bad agenda and I wouldn’t be able to enjoy what is the only good writing in this self-indulgent pandering propaganda.
Yeah. It ends up feeling like men in the show are all terrible, but instead of using Snapdragon to demonstrate that not every guy is a jerk, instead Snap is is the exception because it turns out she wasn’t *actually* a guy. It’s a very juvenile way to depict being trans.
Perhaps it would have been more enriching if Snapdragon’s decision came from within, like they COULD do the things guys can do, but they don’t like it very much, and they came to the decision of wanting to identify as female on their own. I feel like it would have been more empowering if Snapdragon’s transition journey had more agency.
@@gregjayonnaise8314 I think it would have been better if Snap became just a feminine dude rather then Trans.
But yeah; the only decent dudes on the show is Trans, feminine or dark skinned.
Honestly it's kinda fucked up how Snap dislikes acting manly because of his family and being exposed to pure masculine negativity to the point he believes they're synonyms, the worst part is, some people might have gone through exactly that, heck, isn't that how elitist feminists are born?
Is he, though? Snapdragon's dad, I mean. How much of him did we really see? Other than him allowing his sons to engage in some bullying between themselves and expecting Snapdragon to fight back and defend himself in some capacity... what did he do? I mean, that's just average parent shit. That's why you send you kid to the playground and public school to get those kinds of skill and life experience.
Did he tell Snap that women suck and cant fight? Did he force him to become a guardian? Did he tell Snap that he was worthless or a coward?
Like, what did he do that was so terrible? I honestly don't remember because the show was so bland that remembering details is like trying to recall a pain medication induced delusion. All I remember from him is cliche tough love stuff.
Iirc he looked like a red headed lumberjack; the kind of stereotype male character who eats a whole stack of pancakes, a plate of eggs, a plate of bacon, and a frothy beer for breakfast.
59:18 - I think that kid in the background being crushed to death in that training simulator thing was the most brutal and violent thing that could possibly ever happen in this show. That one half-second moment must be where their disclaimer/warning comes from every episode.
Omfg the way how they looked in the background and smush like an orange in a juicer made me laugh
Omg i didnt even realize a kid got crushed to death, im sure most people dont realized it either. Its actually hilarious and ironic.
I don’t think he got crushed? In the show Parsely I think goes through that rolling thing and don’t die, I haven’t watched the full episode though
@@GippyHappy well Parsley is tiny so
@@morgaena3313 no but they like fully stand up in it
"artist vs creation" is so true, like truly we should all hate Disney productions by the same logical process but we can separate our feelings from Disney with the content they make.
Look at j.k Rowling she isn’t that well liked but her franchise is awesome seriously a world full of magic and lore and the limit is your imagination I don’t even think the world if fully fleshed out even if it is more stuff can be added like it was always there
@@levievil9220 "but her franchise is awesome seriously" ehhhhhh bad take bro, she weaved white supremacy and antisemetic ideals into the narrative, themes, and characters, it's unfortunate in a case like that. I wouldn't describe her work as awesome or even good if I'm being real with you, but I'll give you the right to be blind to the quiet dogwhistling in her books to enjoy the narrative from a purely white fictional perspective because you seem to try to separate the art from the artist. You're still allowed to like fictional work even if it has uncritically problematic perspectives, just be mindful with touting it in public least you want to be surrounded by increasingly radicalized people.
@@RWAsur hello hypocrite
@@levievil9220 if you're incapable of understanding nuance, that's on you. This comment was about Disney productions like Lion King, separating the corporation from the artwork-- not Disney productions like Song of the South, which you can like the art in theory as an individual but you 100% must be mindful and open with the direct harm of the content.
You're out here trying to defend JKR's work and it's in the same category of "uncritical, blatantly racist" work towards semites and other groups of people. Uncritical being important here because that's the difference between this topic and stuff like Huckleberry Finn which is openly critical of the racism on display in the work. I would also argue Attack of Titan is critical of the genre it is presenting within, enough to give it nuance.
Please, please read some other books besides HP. There are lots of works around wizardary magic that came well before HP series and none of them have hallmarks of segregation and hate speech othering certain kinds of people.
As a masculine girl, I've heard alot about people telling me that I'm trans. Which does not feel right. I am a girl, but I like some guy things. That should be normal. It shouldn't be this or that. The way you described snapdragon hit hard and I hope that the character doesnt turn out to be trans.
Unfortunately, that's the direction they were going to go if High Guardian Spice had gotten a second season, but thankfully a lot of hatefix writers in the community discard that and do other things with his character.
I regret to inform you that they made him trans. They confirmed it on Twitter.
Nothing wrong with a girl liking guy stuff. Always liked a tomgirl myself. Now days though, they turned the word tomgirl in a dirty word.
Isn't doing that kind of thing sexist?
@LWolf12
That's because the word is "tomboy." "Tomgirl" is some cursed Twitter construction.
"We are 50% female in all the creative roles. And our writers room is 100% female. This is what my whole career has been about - is trying to get those voices in there that are not being heard."
Well, there's your problem. I too am 'almighty female', but basing the staff entirely upon their sex in some self-indulgent bid of feminist elitism? That's like voting for a political figure based entirely on their sex or race, and not on their political agenda and merits. What an unbelievably shortsighted worldview. There's a way to represent powerful female, gay, and trans characters/roles. This ain't it.
Also with the fact that they were all female being mentioned in the trailer. To me it just comes off as "This is the best that only women can do, this is our limit, we can't do any better."
And if I'm being honest, I wouldn't have thought of it nor cared if they never brought it up. It's because they felt the need to bring up the 100% female staff that my mind made me think "okay, let's see what all the women made" which isn't fair at all. Especially when there are women in the field who have made spectacular things for much better shows.
I mean I'm probably the only one who thinks that, so if I came off as sexist then I do apologise, but that is how the marketing of HGS came off as to me
@@Sergeantmajormario Exactly. Sex and gender should have no seriously defining role in creativity of this nature. It's insignificant information - unless you have an ulterior motive or agenda, of course. And no, you're not abnormal or sexist at all for thinking that. In fact, the only ones sexist here are the people behind this show, and I can tell you women behaving the way they have is a goddamn embarrassment to the majority of women in the world. If you hire me on a job based on my sex and not my credentials, that's a straight up insult. And similarly, to exclude men merely to fit a 100% female demographic? Awful setup doomed for failure right out the gate. But it's clear creating a good show wasn't the intention here anyway - rather, it was to pander to a very specific group of people that barely even exist.
The creators of Sailor Moon, Fullmetal Alchemist, Utena, Demon Slayer, Gray man, and a lot of other great anime/Manga: Are we a joke to you???
@@user-zs9ux1ru8u Exactly. As a woman whose been writing for around 12 years now I'm actually offended a bit by how short sighted that statement was from the staff. All those series you mentioned are amazing and several of them are near and dear to my heart. I think the HGS staff could have done better. By
@@oddeyes9413 Hell, we don't even have to stop there at manga. Vizipop made a compelling series, Helluva Boss, and there's a creative animation ARG (Pink Bitch Club) from a different creator VIVINOS that can make a compelling story with either a few episodes or videos. These creators have a lot of passion, love, and effort put into their series, and they didn't need to advertise themselves as being women in order to achieve that.
I see so much potential in Aster, he could be like Sylvain from FE3H, a cocky guy who actually has a lot going on inside. I dont watch the show, but the clips make it seem like he has a lot of achivements? Why not make him have like a gifted kid issue? Like he thinks he has to constantly achive things and be proud of it, and Rose's brash personality knocks him down a peg and he starts to open up?? And if they went that route, a romance with a fun chemistry could be done between them too....
Dude cocky guys softening up is one of my fav things and it could totally work here
Dont mind me just taking this prompt for my story lmao
True...also personally it looked like he was bragging due to having a little crush on rose. The trying to show off how capable she was at the end, the "look you may never have heard this but youre kinda adorable" kinda sounds like a kid trying to say "hey even if no one thinks youre cute, i think youre cute..but just a bit, im not admitting it lol"
So i dont get why he was being played as a bad guy (well...i get why but WHY WHY)
@@yuki97kira i know its been a month but i just saw this. AND YESSS. Like. It was kinda cute actually?? I guess the writers were too focused on making "CiS MeN BaDD!!!" On their show rather than... ya know making lovable characters with fun interaction??? I think no matter how weak a media's plot is, if it has nice lovable charas people would still love it
You should take that re-written scene and animatic and make it into a separate video. I only saw it because I like long reviews, but think about all the people who won’t see it because of the length of the review! So please, put it out there!
I do so enjoy fix-it fanworks, and this scene really needed some. I completely agree that the reveal should’ve been moved to where you placed it.
the two scenes you redid were absolutely amazing. as a trans person, you illustrated the experience so well that i actually questioned if you were cis (cis = not trans) when i watched it. my only criticism is that it's not "a transgender", its "a trans person" or simply "transgender". a very simple slip up that could happen to anyone. you're the only cis person i trust writing trans characters.
That's so fucking sweet, thank you! I had some trans people look over my scene (because this actually wasn't my first draft) and they gave me some pointers about what to do so you can thank them for making it more authentic.
Also fair on the correction, just know that I didn't mean anything by it, it was just an innocent error lol.
I'm glad you think I'm able to write characters outside my identity, that means a lot :)
@@mangawriter that's really good! sensitivity writers were obviously not hired for hgs, and it's very good that you got some for your scene.
and your mistake was a very simple one, i could tell by everything else that you didnt mean it in a derogatory manner.
Cis doesn’t mean anything. You can just say straight
@@InnerAtanih cis... means not trans. someone can be cis and not straight, or not cis and straight. theyre (generally) unrelated terms.
Frankly it’s more about if it’s written well rather than who wrote it. Of course it is quite sad to see someone of that community to not write good representation of their community.
from the way you explained Snapdragon and his design. I would of love to see more of him. but as it stands, he alone isnt enough to make me want to watch this show. its a shame cause i do genuinely like him and his potential as a character. Also your revision of Caraway's reveal and his convo with Snapdragon were leagues better then what they did.
Yeah from how he talked about snap I can see why he is well developed while rest are poorly written plus on the sage part if that scene where she went on bitching and take out all of her jealousy on Snap to the point where she stereotyped men in general I would say Snap calling out that Sage is the one who is the problem is very justified. Cause Sage should never ever treated like as if Rose is hers and hers only and should be supportive about her.
That was what bothered me: why make Caraway give a lesson about being transgender to a girl who really doesn`t care at all about the issue when they have Snapdragon to actually speak about it on a personal level. Also the "Hey kid, you want transgender magic" vibe coming like a slap in the face for a kid who is having an existential crisis was terrible. The remake of the scene was wonderful btw.
Yeah, I saw another RUclips say that if the series removed the earlier scene with Rosemary the whole story with Snapdragon would have flowed much better.
I think the Rosemary scène is fine but I think episode 3 is too early, I think it would've flowed better if Rosemary and Professional Caraway got closer with each other after a couple of bonding on Rosemary mother. Perhaps maybe it would work if season 2 happened and like the late episodes
It would have made more unique of a show if snapd. and purple goblin energy girl were the main characters. The best way to tell a story is to tell it from your own perspective.
The magic system in this show reminds me a little too much of the one in Fairy Tail. Way too many rule bending and rule breaking contrivances to be anywhere close to consistent. Natsu saying he can't recharge his powers by eating his own fire, but then recharges himself by melting metal using his fire and eating it. Even though later on the show explains that him eating metal conflicts with the elemental chart. And then the Runes... The Runes made no sense.
Friendship is magic that's what keeps him going ✨🦄
One runic system i really like is the runic system in Witch Hat Atelier. Everything makes sense and is really creative in the ways that they explore it :D
That’s pretty much I stopped watching Fairy Tail lol it had a very “omg villain is front but friends are power so I get some bs upgrade” cycle that it became boring and confusing pretty early.
@@匚尺丂乇-k3v yep...anime rules, as long as you got friends, you can do OP shits
Fairy Tail was good and still made sense though, don't even try to compare it to HGS.
I feel that HGS look like season 4 of SVTFOE: have great ideas, but the execution is a big mess. The difference is that SVTFOE have executed well characters, plot and worldbuilding in first 2 seasons (Season 3 was good, for me), when HGS have 1 season. Seeing Jamie's animatics and your animatics that make me care about Snapdragon and Caraway, show how much be good the series could be if the crew have a direction. Even modern shows like SU, OK KO, GF, SVTFOE, Amphibia, The Owl House, The Ghost and Molly McGee, Infinity Train and Onyx Equinox (That is also a Crunchroll Original) have well executed characters and stories than HGS. Especially SU, OK KO, Amphibia and The Owl House, that have organic representation, but always focus to tell a entertainment story with believable characters.
What's SVTFOE?
@@NaviciaAbbot Star vs the Forces of Evil.
Not sure about SU, do not get me wrong, I still love Peridot and even Garnet and what she represents (that couple was so adorable in that show), but too bad the story turned out to be so...just bad...from the direction to the conclusion of everything...the whole "Its from Steven's perspective only" becomes so annoying as the story tried to move foward not mention "Your actions don't have consecuences unless you are Pink"...and Future was just the last nail in the coffin (even with the flaws, there are things I still like of SU before Future, I actually liked the movie, but there is nothing from Future I can rescue...)
@@rachelmariecaberapacheco7942 No problem. These are fair critiques.
@@caiocesarmarques4765 Thanks ☺️
See, personally, the divide between Old Magic and New Magic SHOULD have been closer to the different DnD caster types. Spells known and Spells learned. Most Charisma based casters are 'spells known' they know all their spells for that particular level and can switch out which ones they can cast over a long rest, meanwhile Spells Learned is Intelligence based and the realm of Wizard. They pick spells from a list upon level up AND can learn spells outside of those they've picked as long as they're A) of the Right level and B) spend the gold and time to copy it into their spellbook, so they can cast all their spells at any time limited only by the number of spell slots they have available.
So Old Magic would be the traditional 'int' based magic, it allowed its caster to be more versatile BUT it required hard study. Meanwhile New Magic was more limited in scope but much easier to cast.
Look at Eberron setting, which is a high magitech setting, where magic has replaced things like fossil fuels and pretty much everyone in the populace can cast cantrips BUT anything more than that requires putting in a lot of effort or being lucky enough to have had a celestial/dragon/etc. being somewhere in your bloodline OR you make a deal with a greater power. Meanwhile Artificers are the 'magic as science' type deal where they produce magical effects through inventions, they aren't as powerful as full wizards but they can use devices to replicate magical effects. Both Artificers and Wizards are the 'study the books' kind of caster.
Or they could make old Mages like warlocks and New mages like Artificer/wizards
Snapdragon was high key one of the best characters I've seen in a while!
Snapdragon needs to be in a better show.
@@witecatj6007 #freesnapdragon
@@yamaneru6760 I second that motion!
#freesnapdragon
not gonna lie the way you changed the scene with snapdragon and caraway gave me chills, the thought of doing something that will change who you are on the outside is a huge step in someone's life, I'm not gonna go into too much detail but I recently lost a leg (by choice) and I was pondering for a week if I wanted the doctors to save my leg. Now I'm not saying that transitioning is the same as losing a leg but it's the closest I can think of from my perspective and I think you should take more time than a week to think over if you really wanna change your gender forever but I was in a time sensitive situation
In the real world, people usually do take years and this story would do well to show that.
@@seekingabsolution1907 They're not though. I have been in several trans groups and they literally push any newcomer to immediately seek HRT. Especially those with obvious underlying issues. I have seen peoppe getting HRT from their first PP appointment without blood tests.
It's actually pretty common in Americy, Sweden, Canada and Australia, whereas Holland (where the Dutch Model originates) and Finland are starting to reverse affirmative approaches because of a high rise in negative outcomes.
Ok but listen
Cal is voiced by SungWon Cho, so I automatically like him. He could eat puppies and steal from blind orphans and he'd still be enjoyable.
yes omg i agree he is an amazing va
ProZD?
@@MasonGreenWeed Yep!
38:19
I think a student just got crushed through a grinder? Dang this school has a body count
Oh wow I just saw that!
Personally, I liked how Amaryllis respected Snapdragon's boundaries during the festival episode.
If you were to rewrite the entire series, would you still include the 'toxic' characters?
I'd think it would be interesting to have a group featuring the toxic three: Aster, Cal, and Amaryllis. The loveable side characters: Snapdragon and Slime Boy, and one of the main cast, Parsley.
Team CASPSA, if you may.
I think the toxic ones are the most interesting because they have actual clear flaws to overcome. The main four are kinda boring.
I definitely would, I would just rewrite them to be more than just stereotypes lol
51:18 the creators live on twitter. This is how they think people talk to eachother.
One of the writers, Kate Leth, admits to being "tumblrpilled" back in the day, so I can see where you'd be correct in your assessment.
Underrated. All of your points are amazing, and the effort you put in the trans scene can be seen.
Your fixes literally would've solved SO many of HGS's worst problems! It amazes me how a team of (supposedly) professional creators fail at such a basic level, especially regarding things like the transgender stuff, since their original selling point in the first place was "good representation"
That one scene with his father telling it to defend himself, how is that hyper-masculinity? His father's literally telling him to not be a pushover and let people take advantage of him. There's nothing masculine about that at all whatsoever. That is something my mother, my grandmother, and my auntie used to teach me when I was growing up.
I didn't have a father but I had three mother figures. When I was getting bullied in school you know what they told me, to stop being a little bitch and stop letting them punk me.
Guess what would happen when the same thing happened to my sisters, they would tell them the same damn thing. Stop letting them punk you and fight back. Learn to defend yourself when nobody else is going to help you.
And I want anybody reading this to pay attention to the last part of that paragraph. Learn to defend yourself when nobody's going to help you. What about that is hyper-masculinity? My mother, auntie, and grandmother we're trying to teach me not to be a little bitch and let people take advantage of me when nobody's going to help me at all,when people are just going to stand there and watch and watch you get your ass be, the only one who's going to defend you and stick up for you is yourself.
This has nothing to do with masculinity and everything to do with not letting somebody take advantage of you and punk you.
And the one mil / Father figure in my life, my grandfather, was a pacifist and didn't want me to fight. He didn't want me to get in trouble. But it was my mother figure is telling me, that doesn't count with self-defense. If they're fucking with you, hit him right back!
And when I did get in trouble for trying to fight back, they were the first ones to be complaining at the principal's office.
There's the first one to say, you've been around my child before because I have been to the principal's office many many times, not for being in trouble but just being a special needs child.
I would say the principal and vice principal understood me and knew me more than most of the teachers I had from kindergarten all the way up until 8th grade.
When I needed help, we might parents and grandparents needed help, they did not hesitate to help.I can definitely see my principal and vice principal with some of the best people I had within my middle and elementary school years.. by the way, the school I went to the kindergarten all the way up to 8th grade.
So they would always tell them, you know him and you know how he is. The only time he is going to start hitting somebody back, as if they fuck with him first.
Cuz I never wanted to put my hands on anybody. I didn't want a reason to swing on nobody. I very much wanted to go the past this route.
But it was getting to the point where I'm like you know what fucking, I ain't just going to punch him, I'm going to drag their ass in a basement and fucking hang them!
No it only had been punches and kicks here and there the few times I did get in fights in school. But let's just say once I was out of school, I can't really get much context to this because it's just personal family business. But it did eventually get to the point where I strangled the motherfucker. I wanted him to stop his shit but he wouldn't fucking listen. So I fucking choked him till he was fucking begging for a breath.
Now tell me, do you think this has anything to do with my masculinity, or everything to do with me wanting to be left the fuck alone but nobody would leave me the fuck alone?
Cuz I can tell you first hand, the times I did have to push back it was because they wouldn't leave me the fuck alone so I made sure to hit where it hurt.
And it had nothing to do with gender roles. The females were telling me to fight back, my mother figures were telling me to fight back. My father figure said to me the pacifist.
And yes I know some people do kind of look at being a bitch being less masculine. But I'm from a very ghetto family. Being a bitch has nothing to do with femininity or masculinity. Being a bitch has everything to do with being a bitch. Being a coward. Not defending yourself and letting those who are bothering you do so.
Especially when again, ain't nobody else going to help you. So you can either sit there and cry, or you could turn around and hit right back. I'm seeing it how my mother and my grandmother and my aunts would say. Three women. And very feminine women at that. They aren't masculine women or lesbians or anything. But as they say, they ain't no bitch either.
You can take the family out of the hood but you ain't going to take the hood out of the family.
The whole being a bitch having to do with masculinity thing, that seems to only come from those from the suburbs who got it good like that.
I wholeheartedly agree. My father _and_ my mother taught me the importance of standing up to for myself and my principles.
I fully agree, my father used to tell me to fight back instead of taking it all which got me into trouble when they twisted it into me making fights when they're the ones who tried to push first. It's obvious that a parent would want you to stand up for yourself especially in a world/environment that can be dangerous to you growing up. So I don't understand why the writers tried framing it as another example of toxic masculinity, even if some facets of it is true with putting expectations on a child, there's more nuance than just that.
Of course the idiots who write stuff like this think standing up for yourself is bad if you're a dude. They want men under their feet, and it's a lot easier to do that to a coward than it is to do it to a fighter.
I mean this in the most sincere way possible: reading about your life felt more engaging than watching this show
B-but femboy uwu
I'm going to be honest and say your videos gives me motivated to continue to write my own stories.
YES!! CONTINUE TO WRITE!!! *YOU GOT IIIIIIIIT!!*
@@synkieagda7620 Awww thank you!
@@Supermariorpg6 What are you writing ? I'm doing a comic about fashion that take place in space (with way too many characters...)
@@synkieagda7620 Fashion in space? Like avant garde spacesuits that functionally deflect gamma radiation?
@@BwooHuraca not in that story.
More inter-planet-echange students. Think our world split into differents planets and galaxies and the characters naviguate into all of that, and their emotions and struggles etc. You get the picture.
Here the plot : This dude is from a rather forgetable planet, in a dangerous street, living a boring life. He have no bonds here and secretly want to become a fashion designer and leave his planet. When a famous celebrity that inspire him annonce she cast new models for her brand/ Vogue like magazine, he took his chances. He's gonna meet people, get inspired, and face some obstacle...
It's only the start, I still have to set the environnement and the characters more, but one day, its gonna be a webtoon, AND a physical format. Cuz I love bragging about my books in my library.
(Also, its gonna be in french first, cuz well im french)
One thing I love, is that I have to do ~research~ about differents styles, designers, movies, ethnicities, dolls...
I just love it.
Thank you for mentioning dead eye syndrom. It may be a small thing compared to the rest of the problems this show has, but it seriously bothers me a lot.
30:14 no wonder she was decent compare to the other characters, i never realized she had the least development over everyone lmao
Better question for the trans themes in this cartoon is why to have them. If you can transform INTO anything.......Then why even bring it in. Trans people exist only because in the real world you cannot fully transition from one form to another....while in the show......It is possible due to the lack of any limiters of magic.
Right...thats my problem too. Its not really something unattainable fully, heck isnt one of the students transfer into another creature (a frog) in the purple dress teachers class. If turning into another creature is THAT easy...then changing genders from an already existing body, into the same species, just a bit of tweaking, shouldve been easier.
On another note, why arent there people in town taking potions to look like tiefling, fishpeople (not mermaid, but fins ears, webbed feet), i mean if its not permanent, wouldnt that potion be ideal when its halloween
I like the concept of having the transition magic be permanent, but I also like the current concept of having to make the choice, every month, to be true to yourself + who you are.
Depending on how they intend(ed) to handle transphobia/trans issues later on in the narrative (if/when they do), having caraway + snapdragon's convo including something along the lines of;
SD: "How did you know....who you are? Or, were?"
C: "honestly? I didnt know until I knew.
I had to make a choice between the person I was born as and the person I wanted to be. And I made it. And I keep making it, every month."
SD: ".....are you happier now, as the person you are, instead of who you were?"
C: "I've been the same person inside the whole time, but, yes. I am happier. Happier than I've ever been. And I'm happy for them too *gestures to photo album* - without them making that choice, I wouldn't be here, now, with you."
It would be nice to have a trans character make a commitment to their transition, for both political and personal reasons, but I'm also not opposed to snapdragon + caraway having a conversation later on about a new, more permanent transition spell, and maybe one of them gets it while the other doesn't, or they get it together, or they make it themselves, together.
There are multiple options/perspectives to trans representation + trans narratives within real life, and I'd love to see more of it depicted, because that way, there won't be The Trans Narrative, because there isn't one in real life either.
I almost feel like Professor Caraway's explanation of Trans Magic would have made a lot more sense in the episode where he confronts Snapdragon. It would have made a lot more sense in that context and felt more natural
Edit: 1:09:19
Nevermind, you already realized that 😂
I think there's already a manga/anime that deals with the old magic vs new magic topic (sort of)
It's Akashic Records of B@stard Magic Instructor (have to google it because can't remember the name, and it has fanservice if u interested)
In that manga/anime world, magic users cast spells by speaking the enchantment, similar with Harry Potter but wand not necessary.
The modern way of casting is shortening the enchantment and only say a few key words while the old way is just say the full line of enchantment. In modern combat, hardly anyone use the old way since it can get u killed if your spell cast slower.
Which leads to an interesting episode where Glenn, the "b@stard" magic instructor (using the old way) lost to his student in a duel (using the new way). He then proceeds to explain why he uses the old way is that it can be adjusted and more flexible. Adding, replacing some words can amplify its power, change the spell behavior, make it change direction, etc...
(I forgot the rest but that's pretty much it)
That's also basically Fate's plot. Magecraft (new) allows mages to do things that normal humans are capable of through technology. For example, we fly with planes, mages just needs to do a spell. Magic on the other hand is beyond the capability of even mages, it's ancient power that only people of those times were able to do, as well as select few present time mages. Things time travel, reality alteration, immortality, heck the Holy Grail in the original series was intended to be used by one of the factions to obtain the Third Magic for immortality.
@@Tamaki742 Not really.
Fate's plot basically 7 mages each summon their own servants (heroes from the past, present or future in both real history and ancient myth and beliefs) within 7 classes to fight to the death for the Holy Grail that can grant any wish.
Therefore, people who join that war are already mages, because u need mana to summon and sustain a servant.
Their magic ability is affected by their birth talents or lineage. Besides that they are regular human, still can be injured and killed.
There's no "new" magecraft in Fate, usually in a Holy Grail War, the mages chosen are on the same time period so the difference isn't that huge
Normal mages don't have time travel capability, Kiritsugu in Fate Zero can only speed up or slow down time for himself and he can only do it for a short while, he can't undo it and travel to the past or capable of speeding to days or months later.
They did make a magical device to travel through time in Fate Grand Order but that requires lots of magical energy, advance technology and pretty much impossible to perform by any individual mage. In fact, it's only made possible because of a Holy Grail wish
The only mage known to be immortal and capable to observe and travel among parallel worlds and timelines is Zelretch and the explanation for that is rather vague. But he isn't involved directly in the Holy Grail War battles
@@lazycat836 I think you're misunderstanding me. But maybe I shouldn't have said that it's Fate's plot, but more of it's basic magic system, sorry about that.
I'm saying that Magecraft _is_ the new "magic" in Fate, or rather Type Moon franchise. They draw very clear distinction between that and Magic itself. Again, Magic in Type Moon is what they defined as ancient powers that only people of those era (this is mainly just represented in ancient or mythological servants like Medea) and select few mages are able to do it, it's also what they call miracles because of the very near impossibility to achieve it. I didn't mention anything about mages coming from different era.
Kiritsugu's Time Accel is what they categorize as Magecraft. Zeltretch on the other hand, is one of the very few mages capable of utilizing Magic, the Second Magic, which like you said, allowed him to explore parallel worlds and timelines. Aozaki Aoko from Tsukihime and Mahotsukai no Yoru is another one who can utilize Magic, which is the Fifth Magic, that actually allows her to travel through her individual time. The Einzberns wanting to achieve Heavens Feel is because that's the Third Magic, that is capable of granting immortality.
Also they didn't exactly do time travel in FGO, what they did was more of a projecting the spirit and have it travel through space, so no they didn't even use the grails for it. This is mainly done to trick the Counter Force too, so it doesn't just basically destroy the person being sent to the Singularities. It's also travelling through space because the Singularities created by Solomon became something separate from the time and space Chaldea exists in, which will eventually be locked into place with the mainstream history so they still have to fix it.
@@Tamaki742 so True magic is hard to achieve but magecraft is easier?
Fifth magic not really allow travel through time since 2nd magic already did that, it basically more like exchange time(?), like cut and paste it into another point in time
Also I didn't mean they use the Holy Grail to power the ray shift device in FGO specifically, but that Marisbury used the Grail to wish for money for research and build the facilities
@@lazycat836 Yeah but that's the extend of what the Grail did, providing the money just to kickstart the creation of Chaldea.
It's more like Magic is something that mages past the Age of Gods can no longer reproduce. Magic and Magecraft were considered just the same before that but with technology, things that were seen as miracles when done through magic slowly decreased. So magic spells that allows people to fly or create light for example is just reduced to be just a craft, normal people can just use tech for it. Then Magic becomes something very rare and involves doing things that not even tech could achieve. It's pretty much why they stated that the main goal of modern magi is to reach the Root, because that's how you gain Magic in the first place. And not everyone can just do it because if someone already took a specific theory and path to reach it, no one else can do the same thing, you have to go through another way. But it _can_ be inherited, like Aoko's case. Reaching the Root in concept is actually also something the planet and Alaya deemed as a crime and threatening to existence itself. It's why magi who possess Magic are very few. When they activate it, a Counter Guardian will get summoned to kill them.
The time travel in Second Magic is considered just to be the side effect of it, not its domain. That should still belong to Fifth Magic, BUT it _is_ still a pretty unclear concept. Considering you can also rewrite events in time with the Second, it makes the Fifth pretty unclear, but either way, Aoko still uses it to travel through her individual time. It doesn't exactly rewrite the world, but the effect is still pretty terrifying. Like it's not even causing time paradox when she borrowed time and moved it around, she effectively caused the heat death of the universe to be more certain. No wonder Counter Guardians get sent to people using Magic.
*14 minutes in:* "Now with the positives done, let's get into the negatives"
*1 hour remaining:* ho boy...
this show is... like a fantasy made by a developing child and made into reality by a team of women and managed to void it of all emotions and life... like bruh my 6 year old nephew makes better albeit convoluded stories
edit: 54:06 bruh i just realized that her sword magically cleaved its way into the ground without rosemary putting force on it as she drags it to use it to stand
About the rating I'm not sure if not mabye either of three things that I personally suspect happened: The rating was decided by some bigots, and the show creators then decided to at least use a tiny bit more leeway, while still sticking to their original idea of making it pretty childish, or
The show, as it stands, was made for kids but the show creators didn't take care that there weren't any swears or blood, so the show was then rated for adults because of incompetence on the writers' part, or
They made the show for a niché tumblr audience (they would most likely have belonged to) and hoped that audience would champion them no matter what, and so they wrote it in a tone that tumblr users typically write in.
Regardless though, thing that is a strong pointer to the fact they wrote it for tumblr is the fact that they put in specific references. For example, years ago there was a meme about rabies pride and wanting rabies, and Sage says that "Do.. you.. want.. rabies?" so weird because it's basically the reaction the first person coming up with it got.
I can kind of see how the *option* of temporary transition magic would make sense. There are trans people who don't want to have a complete transition yet, for whatever reason (physical health, wanting to have biological children, not having body dysphoria in the same places as other trans people, and a lot more that I don't know/comprehend as a cis woman).
The option is there, and if Caraway is taking monthly potions to keep the transition spell active, he has his own reasons for why he hasn't done anything permanant yet (or even if he wants to)
Maybe the potion just tastes good...
41:49 The show has been done since 2019. The backlash was that bad, so they hid it during promoting the originals. The only reason it's seen in the light of day is because of the Crunchyroll purchase.
“We’re so progressive!! Look at our stereotypical world with stereotypical characters! Did I mention we’re PROGRESSIVE?!?!?!!”
WOAH HOL UP, your telling me this guy that just made a SUPER high quality 1 HOUR AND 20 MINUTE VIDEO only has 3.3k subs??? Man you deserve wayy more, very underrated.
34:53 I’ll be honest, Amaryllis grew on me more than I expected to in the second half of the season. Something about her particular brand of Asshole™ was just kind of enjoyable, especially since I wasn’t really all that invested in (most of) the character drama in the show. Her friendship with Snapdragon was also kind of wholesome. Although to be fair I might have a different opinion on her if I watched the entire show in one entire 4 hour sitting like you did
Your rewrites and storyboard voice acting was really good. Really completed your analysis by actually showing you could actually write a more compelling story.
Thank you so much!
Snap and Amaryllis are legit the best characters in the show but if anything, Snap and his characterization shows a lot of the crux and biases of the crew when it comes to writing guys. They make it painfully clear they think feminine guys are the 'right' way for men to behave as any guy who isn't apart of that trope are depicted as 'toxic'.
If the crew behind this are going to bitch at everything else on the merit of how female characters are portrayed they ain't got room to play the same card with male characters, and I'm a woman saying this.
Their problem lies in believing what they hold are the thoughts and feelings of everyone 'like them' and this is the only way to be 'diverse'. Granted, I've had the misfortune of interacting with the person in charge of this shit and she is indeed one of those types who believes diversity is a virtue but only when it benefits her and she and who she picks are the only people who should be allowed to make what she deems as diverse stories.
I think this show was the nail in the coffin for me when it comes to this vapid style of writing because of how poorly the male characters are treated and how minority character are treated like displays. If you really want to deliver this message of unity and diversity, treat everyone like a hod damn human. Diverse writing doesn't mean singling out a group and treating them like shit, except the ones that 'obey' you. It means respecting people and NOT writing them as the derogatory images often attached to them but here comes this show stating guys who are comfortable with being masculine ARE all bad and feminine guys are just a jibbering mess.
Holy shit, I know i went off but the only thing toxic on this show are the attitudes that allowed it to even exist.
Edit: to answer your question on old vs new, that's just it. It's just the writers harping on anything old as bring worthless because it's, to them, 'not progressive' and is 'problematic'. You know that thing you mentioned about separating the art from the artist? They can't do that and apply it to everything from art, history, writing and as such are obsessed with replacing and rewriting things to their new, progressive image because the old must die to them. That's why new magic is 'better' but ironically old magic requires sharing skills which they are trying to imply is a bad thing. They essentially want access to everything without realizing what dedication is and that natural development of skills is rewarding. New magic is basically a freaking participation trophy; everyone gets it but then what's the point?
- Yeah, Snapdragon is probably my favorite of the bunch, if I had to pick someone. And although it feels like him becoming a trans girl is the most likely route, I probably wouldn't mind him continuing the femboy approach.
- Anise's and Aloe's spiel about Sage's mom using New Magic once upon a time...ugh, I REALLY hate it. It only exists for the couple to claim Sage's mom is a hypocrite for discouraging New Magic usage nowadays just because she used it _in a phase._ That...that's not hypocrisy. And since no reason is given on WHY she quit New Magic, I just care more about that "WHY". Maybe she saw that she was harming the earth (if overuse really is causing the Rot), maybe something happened back in Witch Country (which we now know is home to the bad guys) - but the couple only focuses on "she did it once, so it's cool if you do it". Imagine if that same excuse was used to mess around with drugs or guns! (I'm sure the writers had a different kind of experimentation in mind, but still.) But, whatever - their message ends up being "Your mom used to be cool, but now she's lame, don't ask why."
- Who the hell thought _Redbud_ was a sound pick as an HGA teacher?? She's a legit psychopath!
- As much as I'd like to separate art from artist here, Sage's rant about guy-friendships being "less special than girl-friendships" is just making Kate Leth's (or some other misandrist's) fingerprints all the more visible.
- ...Aaaaand Aster and Call project those fingerprints to SPACE. But if I had to decide which one was worse, I'd probably lean toward Call - both are womanizing, but Aster's issue is being an idiot, while Call's are being transphobic AND spiteful. Like, Call INTENTIONALLY got under Snap's skin about his mermaid costume, while Aster was just clueless that he was slowing Rosemary down. Kind of ironic, though, that the more despicable guy ISN'T the white blond one.
(And...tossing that heavy hammer onto his foot? Even for him, that feels like a disproportionate penalty.)
- As for villains, can we talk about Mandrake? I swear, this guy's the funniest part of the series I've seen - not by supplying good comedy, mind you, but by being so cartoonishly edgy. "What a cute kitty. Can I break its neck?" That line...{snrk} I know it's to establish him as a homicidal freak, but it just sounds so stupidly unnatural and tryhard-y, it makes me laugh instead! This isn't Shadow edge, folks - this is _Coldsteel_ edge! {sigh} Too bad we likely won't see him anymore, thanks to {SPOILER}'s suggestion.
- My main issues with Caraway's "I'm transgender" monologue are all in pacing and timing. First, his textbook-y description doesn't seem like it should it told to the mature audience that the opening disclaimer suggests. Second, it completely derails from the main conversation subject that is Lavender - it's the tea story in YIIK, basically. Thirdly, why would Rosemary, meathead she is, care about transitioning or potions? As you demonstrated, he could've shortened his talk to Rose to a subtle hint, and then saved the direct reveal for his chat with Snap. And as a bonus, as you said, his method of transitioning is relatively convenient compared to real transitioning - it's not quite as relatable as it probably wanted to be.
- BTW, the main four are named after herbs, not spices. Title makes no sense.
Honestly, I cried a little during your animatic and felt for the characters and the stress they are going through. That was a really impactful scene that I feel should have taken more time to develop and allow the characters to be actual characters. I feel that this show's issue is mostly that it wanted to hit all of the "anime beats" but not really sit and think what made anime what is it. Or good storytelling for that matter.
But that if you want to tell a story that people will want to sit and listen to, writers have to give the characters meaning outside of generic character flaws and issues. Snapdragon did have the most depth, but the rest of the crew felt like it was handled with the delicacy of a hammer to glass. But still amazing animatic and voice acting!
"It's a nightmare, go can go insane with the gore!!"
As a person who frequently sees nightmares, I agree!!
22:33 I agree. Instead of them sending them on quests it could've been them going on quests on their own and therefore getting punished for it. Which could also lead to some great character development! Learning not to make such impulsive decisions and to consider things before jumping into them.
From all these reviews, I thought for the longest time Thyme was the towering, stoic type with a bit of sass like Garnet but less nurturing(I havent watched much of SU so this is my reudementary understanding of her), but thanks to the clips you showed, I now see every word she says is pointed like a sewing needle.
gotta appreciate the effort this man put into this video. My guy dropped a four minute animatic just to prove a point like it was nothing
It has potential but the writing completely flopped and i feel bad because i like the animation sometimes
That's what happens when you hire your staff based on sex and not merit.
Hiring them based on luck
And oh gog they were unlucky
What potential? It's ideas has been done better by other media already...
I love analysis videos so much and I resonated so hard with the "give it the fairest shot it deserves"
I am an aspiring creator and seeing people bash HGS really scared me at first, but videos like these motivate me to work harder and be a better story teller. The story boards felt emotionally impactful and beautiful and the criticisms felt fair and not like you were just shitting on it for content.
This was definitely the highlight of my day
Beastars, as an example, does a great job at letting you now the tone at the beginning.
The it starts off with a goddamn murder
The way snapdragon’s hair flips from side to side is driving me crazy. This is what happens when you don’t make turnarounds for an asymmetrical character.
What I'm seeing with all these reviews is that Snap is the only good thing about this show. And I agree with what you said! It was worrisome when they tried to tackle the dangerous nuance of gender identity but you're right. They nailed it with Snap. Not everyone needs to transition. Someone can just be gender nonconforming.
We need stories that aren't just stories to fill a quota or mark a checkbox. This is why most forced representation falls flat on its face. Audiences like to be told stories, not given lectures. If you're going to do a coming out story, it shouldn't be done just for representation's sake. I like your corrections. Caraway being trans didn't feel like it was there just to be there as opposed as to how it was done in canon.
52:04 Why would anyone make a show about "Coming of age" young schoolgirls, and aim it at a mature audience of mature people who like watching young girls? Why not make them college age?
Did they make it too mature by mistake? "She Ra and the Princesses of Power" has a swordfight with a catgirl, where one of the girls gets cut. Maybe they tried to copy that, but didn't notice that She Ra did it without showing any blood or even any contact between the sharp point and the flesh.
Did they aim it at children but then put in the disclaimer to stop people from complaining about the violence?
Maybe it's not intended for mature viewers, it's intended for children who ignore disclaimers?
Dude! I honestly wanna know where High Guardian Spice was going with their plot, the development of the characters, and just the overall show if you were one of the story writers, the scene you recreated with Snapdragon and Professor Caraway was such a remarkable and beautiful way of showcasing what the show failed to do.
You did an awesome job my guy, keep it up
I will say, as a trans person living with other trans people, all of us having to take monthly dosages of HRT (I think you meant HRT instead of puberty blockers, since puberty blockers is more common for minors around the age of puberty), I don't mind the idea of the monthly potions, unless we're using it to also compare to surgeries. I'd never say that anyone who is gender questioning and contemplating transition should immediately jump into HRT, but I do think that should they want to explore that option after having time to think on it (I thought on it for nearly 5 years), that it's important to know that a month or so on HRT will not make any permanent and "irreversible" changes, though it's a good way to start and really realize that HRT was not for you before it's too late.
I was on HRT for two years, it changed all my fat distribution, even making my face look different, my permanent changes didn't really kick in until a half year in. I've been off HRT for over a year (I plan to go back on it soon), and it didn't take long for my fat distribution and face to go back to how it used to be.
I'm not denying that there are some irreversible medical transition choices that can happen, but there are also ways to dip your toes in the water with medical transition, such as HRT, without making a full 100% commitment, since it really isn't an easy choice to make, and it can really help to use as an argument against hesitant friends and family that they don't have to worry that you're going to ruin your life and body should you start your first step in medical transition.
That being said, I'm also not against the idea that Caraway could have done a permanent form of transition magic (though perhaps that's still something in development for new magic, just like how modern science is working on new ways to transition, such as uterus implants for trans women), and the potions were a way to test the water for him before making that full committment. Honestly, we need to de-stigmatize de-transitioning so that people realize it's alright to quit early and that choosing to start transitioning isn't the end all decision.
Also, I appreciate how you handled the transgender and LGBT+ content, I will warn that saying "transgenderism" tends to be a conservative dogwhistle used to invalidate transgender people as purely a sort of ideology, and also warn against saying "a transgender," since that is just grammatically incorrect. Other than that, I super appreciate how you were with discussing the topic.
It feels like "new magic" was meant to be an allegory for both modern technology _and_ modern values, which only muddies the issue even further - not to mention having implications that I doubt the writers meant.
Just rework the festival to be the finale instead of the 8th and 9th episodes and the plot structure's already way better. Episode 12 rushes through resolving Sage's arc and Olive's that could be more naturally built up over time, so throw it out. Cal as a character really doesn't need to exist when we could rather focus on Snap's relationship with Amaryllis affecting each other more naturally. Sage's and Rosemary's conflicts are forced regardless and could be more naturally written with a better order of events because Sage SHOULD probably be significantly effected by nearly killing Rosemary just because Rosemary asked for it and Rosemary should probably be more concerned about literally almost dying. And Thyme's demon summoning can easily be changed from "Tell my dad about the water" to "Give my dad the water".
Ngl. Snap Dragon was awesome, though. A+ femboy. Looks great as a dude, looks great as a girl. He should have been the main character. He also wasn't annoying or boring. The guy felt real.
I think they had him say “I’m trans” just because they knew Twitter would go ape shit. Let’s be real that’s 100% what they did.
I really enjoyed this review because it was comprehensive and above all things, fair. My only real commentary thereon is that fantasy stories that have something like transition magic and are trying to be representative is that it requires very fancy footwork to create a wall around sex and make it so that it is literally the only thing you can't fully transform from one thing to the other without actually revealing that you're doing so. They can't make it permanent because then the transition is not between assigned gender and actual gender, but between trans and cis. Another reason that it can't be permanent is that if you can transform someone from A to B, you can transform them from B to A... or come up with a really good reason why. Because even in the real world, the therapeutic plastic surgery can be undone (although the disruption that the HRT component inflects can be permanent) so an explanation is needed for why the capabilities of mundane chemicals and surgery are greater than those of magic--especially after establishing that new magic is easy, unlimited, and all-powerful.
Me, personally, I would rig up the world such that new magic is fantastic and everything--nearly as powerful as it is in canon--but that if you need to do something extremely complex and powerful, you need the old magic. Basically, that transition is only possible by use of a method of magic that is old, out of fashion, mostly forgotten, and whose experienced practitioners are dying in droves from old age. I feel like that could go in very interesting directions.
I like the idea of it being permanent but i also think that the professor's way of transitioning should have been old magic. The show keeps telling us it's an harder way to use magic and that you need to be good at it and to ACTUALLY put effort in it. And like has been said it would have been more interesting if old magic was theorically stronger but new magic was easier to use.
it could have been more interesting to have this magical transition be something you REALLY need to work for, in real life it can be a long process and in this magical world i think it could be too because it would be realistic while still keeping magical elements and telling us more about his character.
Unfortunately, about Snapdragon, the plan was to make him trans in the second season (that they will never get), confirmed by the voice actor.
It's very disappointing. They had such a good potential and arc for him, about how guys don't have to be hyper-masculine, and can be feminine too, and still as much of a man. But instead, the message was twisted into "if you are not hyper masculine, you are a trans girl".
Caraway was such a hottie too, what a wasted character and character design smh.
That last "alternative" version was super emotional. Really got me. It felt so real and personal, not like him explaining the concept to the viewer as though we are 5 years old. And also, more importantly, it showed him as such a kind character, because unlike in the real show, he didn't just randomly jump on an opportunity to talk about himself and his identity, which came off as kind of self-centered when the girl came to ask about her mom, who's MISSING (if you meet someone in real life who always wants to talk about themselves, you'd usually not get a good impression of them), he only brought it up to comfort another person.
So we, the audience, got to hear a much more intimate detail of his character, while he got to tell it for a selfless reason, not "I talk about myself at every opportunity I get" kind of way, which paint him as a very good character. Like that cool teacher you feel like you can talk about things you don't even dare to talk to your parents about. Which many people could relate to, or wish they had, if they grew up in families that didn't accept them.
@@AuroraExhale Because, as I already explained (though it was kind of crammed in with everything else), it paints the narrative as "if you are not hyper-masculine, and you have trouble with your identity cause you couldn't live up to the hyper-masculine environment you were raised in, you are trans. Men can't be feminine or like feminine things, if they do, they are trans."
It makes it look like he became trans because of trauma from his past making him uncomfortable with masculinity, not because he legit was born that way.
It's gives off a similar vibe as "you only think you are gay because you were SAed when young". "You *turned* gay due to trauma, you weren't born that way."
Meanwhile, Caraway explains that he transitioned simply because... He was always that way. He always felt like his body was not fit for him.
Um... yeah... about that...
The show is getting a second season.
All right folks grab your kindling because this dumpster fire of a show is about to get wild!
Something I think would have been cool about the "Transition Magic" is if they had both types of potions. In Minecraft, you can make potions and, by adding an extra ingredient, you can make the potion last longer. I think if Caraway explained, "I first used a temporary potion to see if transition was right for me and then, when I realized it was, I used a permanent potion."
I think it would've been better because it shows the baby steps trans people will take. When a trans person is, well, trans, they don't just automatically get top surgery. They (usually, this obviously isn't the case for all people) will start with just wearing the opposite gender's clothes. They slowly work up to eventually getting hormones, top surgery, and bottom surgery, depending on what they want and their dysphoria. (Again, this isn't the case for all people, just a basic understanding but one that is still accurate.)
By making Caraway use a temporary potion before using the permanent one, it would have explained not only did he think about this A LOT, but that he was actively taking baby steps and it would've been a good point to his character. Not to mention, him talking to Snapdragon, it would have made his argument better.
"While using the permanent potion for me was the best, you should use the temporary one, if that's what you want to do. The temporary one will allow you to go back before you do anything drastic, but still let you figure out yourself. Again, I wouldn't recommend starting with the potions, I encourage you to do baby steps. The potions should be the last thing on your list." THIS could've been a great discussion Caraway had with Snapdragon!!!
Also, forgive me if I messed up the magic system. I've never seen High Guardian Spice, but with the way you talked about it, I can just feel the frustration, lol.
I actually liked Amaryllis. She is intended to be the bully, and unlikeable. Yet she has the actual character development.
As terrible as Thyme is, I can't help but love the line "I hate it when feelings come out of my face." XD
This was a good video. Your analysis was thorough and I liked how you took scenes and showed how to improve them. The only criticism I have is the use of “transgenderism,” “being a trans,” “transgendered.” That section about revealing Caraway being trans was good, it’s just the use of those phrases isn’t great. It’s better to say for example, “Caraway’s experience being a trans man” instead of “Caraway being a trans” and “trans people deserve better” instead of “transgenderism deserves better” at 1:16:43. Overall, this was a good video, and I think breaks down the show and it’s flaws well.
I was thinking the exact same thing throughout, coincidentally terfs have co-opted that language to use to imply it’s like an ideology or something that is done to you rather than who you are
@@princess_sarina_elysia Yep, that’s one of the main reasons why. The phrasing implies it’s an ideology (unintentionally or not depending on the person saying it) when being trans just means being true to yourself and who you are regardless of what your sex is. It’s just a part of someone’s identity and not a belief system or ideology.
Good comment
@@rk8con Thanks!
i just wanted to give a few comments as a trans man after watching your whole essay
please..........please keep reading into trans issues and talk to actual trans people if you're going to go into it in such depth. it will lend more credibility to your criticism.
T shots/hormone replacement are not puberty blockers once youre an adult. also, there are a LOT of things about transition that ARE reversible. and seeing things like HRT done realistically even in magic gives HRT some weight in real life.
as a trans man, it was a really good way of explaining it on a side character. it IS pretty good representation. things about HRT ARE temporary and reversible unless you keep up HRT. it was refreshing to see it be so realistic and easy for him.
because trans people dont have to struggle with their identity. a lot of things trans people go through are because of cis people dictating what we can and should do and the failures of the medical system. transition is NOT about sacrifice or struggle, its about joy and feeling GOOD about yourself.
the reason im focusing on this part of your video is because even as a casual watcher having seen this character and the clips him being trans is relevant, it was very refreshing to see someone NOT have to struggle top transition! and framing a gender struggle as coming to terms with your identity (snapdragon, even if it turns out hes a cis feminine guy) vs the struggle to transition because of a transphobic society is great!! it SHOULD be made. there are enough stories framing the lives of trans people as shitty because of a transphobic society, let a trans person be trans and have an easy time.
btw. "a transgender" and "transgenderism" aren't real terms. its "a transgender person" and " being transgender is..." or just "his gender", "gender issues" etc. you even said it once "his transness" thats prefect!! not "transgenderism".
i understand where you're coming from, but again your criticism and changes to the story would be better, more credible and genuine with the input from trans people.
Damn, the entire show in one sitting. I could not stand more than 2 episodes.
As someone who is questioning their gender, the scene with caraway and snapdragon was absolutely phenomenal!!! I’ve never felt so seen, and the art, characters, and explanation was so on point it’s chilling! You did an amazing job, and I’m going to go binge some of your other videos now! 💚
I'm glad you liked it dude. That means a lot :)
Very much appreciate this review. Something about this cartoon gives one the feeling of just wanting correct things that were almost there but fell flat. Cuz dang do i wish i couldve rewritten the trans scenes lol. I liked the rework to them! Very nice review dude c:
17:30 wait wait since when is the steorotype of dwarves having many childern?
Did some research and It seemed I was wrong on that.
Being honest, I was thinking of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves when I wrote that part, which I don't even think is technically fantasy so... shit, my bad lol
ah well, 1 out of 2 ain't bad lmao
Im gonna argue with the snapdragon thing -
that's still grooming. The professor could have opened with literally anything else, and their response? "Hey have you heard of this thing, I a trans person am doing?" Then when they get excited you try to "Cool them down" with a coy "But mayyybeeee other stuff"?
This is incrementalism. It's a tactic used by calculating abusers who realize their abuse might be construed as abuse if they put too much on at once, so they pretend to be somewhat neutral. Carroway doesn't offer other solutions, they offer transitioning and then vague other "maybe kinda solutions"
That makes the scene - and yes the *creator* even more insidious and gross.
Lol somehow I don’t think someone mentioning transitioning as an option is grooming, especially in a world where transitioning seems to be entirely reversible.
Even if it did work like it did in the real world, that’s still not grooming. He’s a trans person trying to be helpful, and I agree that he could have presented it better, but I really doubt he’s purposefully trying to lead Snapdragon towards being transgender.
Thank you, my thoughts exactly! And as for the reason why it is grooming: Most people aren't trans, the tens of thousands of Detransitioners who were offered Transition because of the Dutch Model would support that argument.
The issue lies with Carroway immediately offering the most radical solution in detail, while being ambiguous and somewhat dismissive of other options. Plus, he is doing so in an emotionally vulnerable situtation without listening properly or asking questions. He is directly assuming and it seems to me that it reflects an issue Raye Rodriguez or Snapdragon's VA had in the past.
What this is referring to btw is "cracking the egg" which is honestly nothing but disgusting grooming behavior. I have seen it live in action done to emotionally and mentally unstable people who were clearly in need of help and whose condition visibly worsened after they pursued transition as they were advised.
Do not EVER suggest transition to anyone. That is something a person should come to terms with themselves or with the help of a therapist. All you're doing is giving someone who has issues an "easy solution" which isn't easy at all. Offer other methods or ask them how they feel.
Brings me back to the time a friend of mine (a Transwoman) talked to someone who was groomed in that way and that person realized half a year into HRT with already irreversible effects that they were groomed into it. I know it sounds fake, but it was very scary and the truth.
I really do respect your willingness to separate the art from the artist. I may not like HGS even on its own or its creators and some of the crossover stuff like propaganda elements, but as a whole I do like the separation moral.
HGS would make a decent kids show if you tone down the blood a little and get rid of the swearing and propaganda. It has potential in that regard but that was completely missed.
In the snapdragon a Calloway arc, I would go with the route of Calloway explaining transgenderism, but snap explaining that he doesn’t know if he’s a trans girl, or how he truly feels about his identity in general. Calloway would then say “of course. Transition magic isn’t for everyone, and is a long process. Everyone has their own needs, and you should take that time to explore yourself. I know that, when using transition magic for being a transgender male, I made peace with that internal conflict. But what works for me will not work for everyone. Explore your interests. Try out something, and if it doesn’t feel right, you can always try something new.” Basically being like transition magic helped me, but isn’t for everyone and shouldn’t be your only option….
…if that made any sense
Edit; wrote this before seeing the 4 min story board oh lordy
Also, crossdressing Snapdragon is perfect and should be protected at all costs
wow imagine as a guy being told 'if you don't enjoy guy things, you are a girl.' while telling girls 'if you don't enjoy girl things, you do you, you are still a badass girl'
bruh I teared up with your storyboard. You're amazing!
Your rewrite of both trans scenes were fucking amazing
It almost made me tear up smfh
Thank you so much dude :)
Wow, amazing review, critique, and must I say- storyboarding style
The last animation you did was just pure perfect. I got goosebumps and I think this should be implemented in the series. This show has so much potential and yet they didn't go all out. I like this show and would love to see a season 2 just to see what happens but it does need a lot of ironing and it feels like it was made for the writers to watch and not for the audience, like it wasn't supposed to be released.
This is why it failed, it focused in diversity instead of quality. Only those with self respect would understand that diversity is supposed to be accidental instead of deliberate. You don’t immediately become competent by being diverse.
I personally like slime boy. Not because he’s a very good character, or his voice acting is very good. In fact there’s a lot of time I can’t understand what he’s saying at all.
But that kinda makes it feel more human. Rather than someone in a show mumbling, so cartoonishly, that it’s basically just sound effects. I feel like his voice could stay as it is, and then reactions from other characters or his mumbling, could enhance that. Make it feel more “real”
But that’s just my opinion I’m positive plenty of people would disagree with me.
I'm happy this is re-uploaded - I didn't get to finish it.
I feel what is the biggest drawback is that they put political correctness first story telling next when it should be the other way around. Like I mean why else Avatar, the original Teen Titans and Justice League successful? And why else anime is gaining lots of popularity in the current year in the first place? Also not only that even I who have some transgender friends online I did at least understand that gender dysphoria is not a joke and the thing is you do raised a good point about transgendering. Cause the risk is really at stake since there is no going back that one wrong move makes that person stuck into the wrong body forever once they found out that they don't actually have one after they fully discovered themselves.
I think the caroway trans dialogue was perfectly fine...for a childrens show. The explanation is obviously very simple but that works for young children who wouldn't necessarily understand the minutiae of what it means to be trans. The way they explain it is quite easy to understand. It also doesn't present it as something strange or to be feared. It's just a part of who he is. It would be a great message for a children's show.
Unfortunately for the show, they chose to market it to 'mature' audiences meaning that such a simple explanation comes across as the writers talking down to their audience. Like when someone talks really slowly and uses small words because they think you're too dumb to understand what they're saying. It's heavy handed and demeaning.
It honestly felt like you could find it in sesame street or a Mr Rogers episode, shows ment to teach and entertain children typically have that 'info dump in a soft voice' vibe but it doesn't fit in this anime that was ment to be "mature"
Yeah the transgender reveal triggered what I found the first and biggest instance of people re writing a scene iv seen on youtube like ever.