Mar 24, 2026
HMMM idk how to feel. I think it's easy one of the best entries quality wise and it's technically really solid to great, but the thematic aspects fell so flat to me that they ruined the experience. I kept waiting for the moment where my earlier impressions would be proven wrong, but they really weren't. Putting "the blame" on one person isn't satisfying, and I know the director is just a cog in the machine and yadda yadda, but in the end... has he been proven wrong? Objectively speaking, the existence of the x-men diclonii have caused a lot of harm directly because of what they are, which is where the allegory falls flat. Yeah, systemic neglect and ostracizing leads to hatred, but in real life gays and browns don't control gravity or are spider people you get me. It just didn't work for me at all, and it doesn't help that it kind of feels like it could've, perhaps should've, led somewhere really interesting, but it was cut short because contest. I don't know, I get WHY it was set up this way, but it just wasn't satisfying to me as a reader.
Ordinarily I wouldn't put that much thought into perceived themes, especially since most entries don't seem to care about it that much, but in this case it felt as though you went out of your way to deliver something beyond anime girl go powow. I don't know, maybe I'm just not radicalized enough, or maybe it's a bad faith reading or I just don't have enough context yet. For what it was trying to say, I just felt like it's kind of simplistic? Yeah, discrimination bad. So? Discrimination IRL has no real basis but oppressed anime classes that cause mass murders... well, cause mass murders. I don't know, it's just something I see semi-regularly and it's literally never done well. I'm not even sure how it would be since it's basically giving a reason to what is fundamentally unreasonable. But I digress.
Characters good, writing good, plot good. It's not necessarily groundbreaking but it was done well enough to stand out despite familiar tropes and scenarios. I like the characters a lot, especially Bats who is a sharkboi (this is canon) and I think the director has a lot of potential which is totally not being someone who'd use slurs because free speech,,, ngl I was crashing out about Bats or Anma dying a couple of chapters ago. I was dreading the possibility of the villain doing nothing wrong and Pisha joining them (against her consent probably) but this works as a semi return to the status quo. I still feel like everyone has a death flag except the protagonist (against her consent).
Weirdly though, I feel like I was the least attached to Pisha. She was fun and all but she was also just kinda there compared to the rest of the cast. I think that you did a good job with making everyone stand out despite their familiar molds, but Pisha just kind of was a familiar mold all around? I don't know, it's not like it's an uncommon thing in the genre, but it would've been nice to see her more fleshed out, pun intended. Also,,,, ngl, Pisha and Bats have great bromance chemistry. Which is why I was relatively sure he'd die but thank fuck that wasn't the case. gg C.B. you'll be reborn in an inflation fic elsewhere
I also like Tarantino.
I thought yuna would eventually get assimilated into xiaolian's system or smth