knit

If you were Carey, how would you have drawn that? What features would you have changed or removed or added to indicate to the reader that Taako is no longer beautiful?

Because whatever your answer is, you're basically saying that that trait is inherently not beautiful. And people who have that trait are not beautiful.

So if you would add, say, dark circles under his eyes, you're saying that people with dark circles aren't beautiful. Scars on his face? People with scars aren't beautiful. Smaller eyes, maybe? Wrinkles? Acne? Shorter hair? Asymmetrical features? The stand you're taking is that those features negate someone's beauty.

And yeah, I get it. It would be about Taako's insecurities. Its not that those things are inherently unattractive, it's that Taako worries about them being unattractive. But it would still suck to be reading a book you've been looking forward to and see them call out something you yourself are insecure about as an indication of "losing beauty."

And that's not the McElroys brand. At all. They very deliberately didn't describe Taako's appearance when this happened, just the emotional impact it had. You can't really convey that the same way in graphic novel form. How could they have done it in a way that wouldn't make any of their readers feel shitty?

so

this book had some. major pacing issues in regards to wonderland itself. aka the Main Content of the arc

they got rid of so much content that meant a lot to the story and the characters and it ended up feeling . fairly Empty in some ways. like i was constantly wishing for more

but this leads into my concern:

what the fuck is going to happen to stolen century.

bc if they had made suffering game just a little bigger to fit more of the wonderland stuff in it i think it wouldve been so much better.

but they Didnt

and . stolen century is a major arc that has so much important stuff in it

and story and song i feel like has enough content for its own book!!

i dont understand why theyre being combined

youre taking space away from both of them to exist as their full and true selves!

i knew going into suffering game that there would be stuff missing, especially since i predicted that reunion tour would be included in it!!

but i just. i dont think you can do that with stolen century.

you have to have that time and dedication for all of the characters to grow and learn to be close, especially with the context that they all remember Everything now, and that their relationships will be exceedingly complicated now, especially with lucretia!!

like, taako and lucretia specifically.

it just frustrates me because i feel like these final arcs that really hammer home the themes of the series and the characters is just. gonna fall short.

i dont think that either arc is going to get the true adequate time they each need to fully portray our finale