On one hand I absolutely understand how and why folks would get pissy about Shadow being "weak". But on the other.... that's the point? It's a paradigm shift that makes the horror elements shine the brightest--Shadow is basically Canon Shadow in power and accomplishment, so 1. If SHADOW is afraid of this situation, you know it's something that has to be taken seriously, and 2. Knowing that SHADOW (verified by the narrative) is completely powerless to an unknown force turning him into a mindless killer is very scary for the other characters' safety. If it was canon Stoic Aloof Shadow it would get boring pretty fast.
So yeah, ditto on approving of this writing decision👍
Thanks! Yeah, idk, I saw more than one person huffing and puffing at the idea of Shadow falling and hitting his head on a rock and bleeding from hitting his head on a rock. Like long after that page was released, even.
It got me thinking about the toxic nature of power scalers and how much of it consists of a buncha dudebros getting strangled by their own love of Character, attaching their own identities to said-Character, tying even their MASCULINITY to Character, to the point that if Character is ever defeated by anyone or overcome by anything or, say, hit in the head by a rock, suddenly that's emasculating to them, personally. Suddenly it's some deeply insulting, wounding thing because their Sports Team (character) is LOSING!!! And that means they are losing by association.
Bobby Schroeder of ThanksKenPenders and Super Lesbian Animal RPG fame talks about this briefly in her essay titled "IDW Sonic: On Lanolin the Sheep, and the problem with Sonic Twitter:"
"They treat it like it's not a story with ups and downs, but a sport. You root for your favorite characters, and when bad things happen to them that means you're losing. It gets even worse when powerscaling is involved, which you see all the time in discussions of shonen manga. When a character wins a fight or does something cool, they're proving they're the GOAT and moving up in the power rankings. The second they lose a fight or do something foolish, or even when they simply don't do enough cool shit in a given arc, that means they were always a fraud. Out come the Potential Man memes! And if you're a fan of a fraud, that makes YOU look stupid for rooting for them!"
(I highly recommend reading this full essay, especially if you are a fan of Lanolin or maybe even if you are not)
As a writer, the type of fandom here can be very scary and highly discouraging. They want "hype moments and aura" instead of a rollercoaster of a story with a message driving it. I can only hope this attitude passes someday. At the very least, these folks don't bother me as much as they go on about IDW Sonic -- But I hate that they're pestering poor Ian Flynn and Evan Stanley.
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to this day the Tigger Movie is still one of my favorite underrated Disney films. the Animation and backgrounds are gorgeous, and it's like actually moving? It gets super sad at points? Good film
Gosh yeah I was looking at screen shots last night and I adore the stylized backgrounds so much
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Can I say that I adore the way you write Shadow and Rouge's friendship? The two do not seem like they'd be compatible at all from an outside perspective, but Rouge knows how to be soft with Shadow in ways that he lets almost no one else know he needs. Really shows how much they trust each other.
Hoping that we'll eventually see Omega again for the full Team Dark dynamic.
Thank you very much! I write Shadow and Rouge very much with the relationship between myself and my older sister in mind, and a lot of Rouge's dialogue, specifically, especially so.
