the hand | #TBHX edit
this is gonna flop but this song has been plaguing me for the past 2 weeks it just fits so many characters
aren't you afraid of becoming a demon?
TBHX Rewatch - Dragon Boy
Episode 21
- Something about the camera POV we start off with makes it seem so predatory, even without the mocking tone they take with posting about Liang Long on FOMO
- Mr Groomer, you return. Wait— I should clarify: Mr Rock Groomer, you return.
- Ghostblade quit MG, good on him
- Guessing this is also around the time Little Johnny went from FOMO to DOS, though I don't think we're explicitly told?
- Rock is giving Liang Long Smile's locket, I think? (Future interjection from later in the ep: Yep, pretty sure that must be it)
- Nice legitimately still looking up to Smile despite being waaaay past the point of good choices already is very bittersweet
- Nice freaking out even before Shang De says anything is something I hadn't caught on first watch. His mere presence is enough to have him panicking
- I prefer X's Japanese voice actor. Huh, didn't expect that. I think maybe his cn one is too strong a presence in his civilian form whilst his jp one can pull off the Some Guyness pretty well. Despite being. Well. Mamoru Miyano.
- Smile: No I'm fr life sucks. X: I refuse to take anything seriously. Smile: 🙃. (X will regret this.)
- omg baby Nice in the crowd in that Smile flashback??
- Just thinking, when we saw undercooked Smile a few episodes back, it was still possible for him to frown 😔. Although... he was going for X then, right? In his prime as opposed to barely scraping the top ten as now? Are Trust Values... can we apply inflation to Trust Values? Was a number one hero back then equivalent to a number ten now? (I suppose this would tally with why Commission&Co are so worried about X, given the threshold of godness and all that. Lowkey wanna link it in with increased parasocialism in the social media age but I'm already side-tracking too much)
- Also, thinking of how Smile is really the last of the old guard in the top ten to remain standing. And how it makes sense that his arc is placed near the end of season one chronologically and in episode order. Because throughout the season, the new has replaced the old. And he's the last of the old gen both chronologically and from the audience's perspective
Episode 22
- Wonder if Rock actually knows more about Zero than we do or if this is standard apologism. As in, I’m sure there’s more we don’t know, but given Rock’s methods, we haven’t exactly got reason to believe he’s out for world peace so much as defending his poor little meow meow, yk?
- “Nice, you came at the perfect time.” The music would disagree
- Shang De knew Smile was Rock’s next target for sure then. I really need to know what’s going on with these info leaks. How does DOS always know what’s up with Shang De and how does Shang De know what’s up with Rock. And where does Zac fit into any of this.
- Nice there like: I’ve made my choice. I’ll take down Dragon Boy. But actually the choice made him. Rest in pieces, Nice
- Cyan can shoot arrows to purify Fear (or at least do something to the Fear zombies), Dragon Boy can process it through his body after some pain, Lin Ling was able to shake off a small amount (that looks similar to the amount that took out Smile), Loli’s armour is immune. There are quite a few potential routes through which Trust can “overcome” Fear, but it’s still not easy
- No thoughts, just Nice suffering. But also… in trying to actually do something after his freak out, he forgot about the optics for once in his life and appeared to attack a fellow hero who’d just taken down a villain
- 3D!!
- And yeah, more confirmation that others can’t see what’s going on when X snaps. Also, I agree with whichever post it was that said that when X snaps and the cans appear around him that’s him sobering up
- Continuing the optics thought: Nice full-on crying in public. It’s amazing what one public breakdown did to his hero standing. It’s probably particularly bad for him as his persona is supposed to be “perfect” but either way, it’s like you can’t drop the mask at any point or you lose out. I guess we see something similarish with Firm Man, in that one moment can tank a career
- X now genuinely invested for the first time in who knows how long and Rock has a solid lead on his identity, albeit one that takes some months to pay off in full
- Into the endgame now…
also i do love lin ling but i think what compelled me the most about the nice arc was how OG nice haunted the narrative and how it set up the worldbuilding (ie the absolute horrors of the hero-idol-influencer-entertainment industry) for me the e-soul arc scratches the itch in my brain because yang cheng is a less straightforwardly heroic protagonist. like what they do w him is so compelling to me the show does a really good job of making you want root for him bc he went through so much and was very much framed as the up-and-coming underdog compared to the old e-soul who doesn't really give a fuck about saving people anymore. but then the rug is pulled and we find out his whole journey was bc the establishment was backing him the whole time, they just wanted a younger more popular e-soul replacement. like idk it is so interesting to me. anyway yang cheng please get out of there
TBHX Rewatch - The Johnnies
Episode 17
- why is little johnny's mum's design so todoroki....
- Second spouse in a row telling their hero partner to Escape. This could mean nothing.
- Between Dragon Boy and Little Johnny, I lowkey wonder if kids born from heroes have different traits prior to getting any Trust of their own. Little Johnny has his cheek dashes and Dragon Boy his tattoo thingies. Then again, I don't know that Wang Nuonuo showed any... different traits? Eh, something to keep an eye out for ig
- Ah okay, Ah Sheng -> Vortex as X around twenty years prior to the current day. Filling in my gaps in the known Xs
- "She deceived us all with a smile" oh, I like that line
- I know that Little Johnny is beholden to Trust Value as a human but I'm curious if Big Johnny gets to basically bypass that or if it's boosted in some way? The fact the Trust/Fear-immune material is from the alien ship means there has to be some link there (edit: 'human' was bad wording, sorry ahu)
- And we're back to where we left off with Ghostblade's prologue
Episode 18
- Get Aliened, Vortex. Actually, no, I hate that wording, let's not do that
- Ghostblade meanwhile like "none of my business" (which, fair.)
- Something about Vortex being so beaten up and none of those injuries would be a thing if Ah Sheng were there to heal him. Lie in your own grave <- okay so tbf it was Ghostblade ordered to kill Ah Sheng but Vortex still tried to rope Ah Sheng back in not long before his death so I'm assigning some (unfair) blame
- Okay, so, Ah Sheng was under Shang De (when he was in MG) and Little Johnny under Zac (FOMO) iseeisee
- The plane crash returns. Vortex dies and Cyan receives her Luck and the chain reaction continues
- Little Johnny thinking he's a Ghostblade whisperer will never not be funny. Dw about the Ah Sheng thing <3
- The implications here being that DOS explicitly sanctions the Fear experimentation. Which tbf we knew from Cyan's arc, but that was more about information regarding Fear whereas this is stating it outright. Anyway, seems like they're aware of Shang De's own experimentation and want to keep an eye on it?
- "I couldn't carry my teammate as support" heh, I hope that's a game metaphor carried over from the cn, because very fitting tbh given we're introduced to present day Johnny playing a video game
- what is the micky liu zhen deal frfr
- I feel like I'm possibly missing a layer here in terms of how Micky baited Queen, but it's still so telling that both Micky and Liu Zhen know that's exactly what's happening here. Also, Micky clearly not wanting Queen involved mirroring Luo Tong trying to keep Luo Li from the Ruins. The circumstances are pretty different otherwise but Micky just... kinda... lets it happen rather than interfere with his plans vs. Luo Tong lowkey sabotaging the mission for the sake of Luo Li by trying to stop her from getting involved at first
Episode 19
- Little Johnny: “Do you think DJ Shindig was also at the dad murder scene?”
- “[Ghostblade]’s also a cold, emotionless person deep down” wow rood. And also blatantly false but tbf his approach to how he handles his emotions came in handy for once
- Ghostblade leaving his signature knife marks all over the trees whilst Little Johnny’s like “don’t think about it~”
- Luo Tong trying to keep Luo Li out of danger despite her suit giving them all a much stronger chance of survival. Hm. Like, I understand why he makes that choice but given he knows they only escaped last time because of Ghostblade he’s got to have an idea of just how dangerous this is. He’s lowkey putting everyone else in danger by his refusal to let Luo Li engage
- Luo Li giving Wang Nuonuo a gf tracker…
- You know, in retrospect, ep 18 was quite recappy. I’m getting the sense that this arc is as long as it is at least in part because of the choice to retread events. It’s mostly kept fresh but I think this part was maybe designed to give the animators a bit of a break before kicking back into high gear
- Rock saying the Commission would basically issue a cover-up of whatever happens on this mission because they’re already involved takes my mind back to the plane crash. Because yeah they’ve got history with this sort of thing. (And, to some extent, everything to do with Zero is also relevant here)
- Oh to be inside E-Soul’s head during all this
To Be Hero X / Ghost Trick
A story about a man in a suit, with a red/white/black color scheme & sunglasses, teaming up with a dog in an attempt to defy fate, using supernatural time & space defying powers…
Thankfully X here already took care of the whole two nickels/coins thing lol
TBHX Rewatch - The Johnnies
Episode 17
- why is little johnny's mum's design so todoroki....
- Second spouse in a row telling their hero partner to Escape. This could mean nothing.
- Between Dragon Boy and Little Johnny, I lowkey wonder if kids born from heroes have different traits prior to getting any Trust of their own. Little Johnny has his cheek dashes and Dragon Boy his tattoo thingies. Then again, I don't know that Wang Nuonuo showed any... different traits? Eh, something to keep an eye out for ig
- Ah okay, Ah Sheng -> Vortex as X around twenty years prior to the current day. Filling in my gaps in the known Xs
- "She deceived us all with a smile" oh, I like that line
- I know that Little Johnny is beholden to Trust Value as a human but I'm curious if Big Johnny gets to basically bypass that or if it's boosted in some way? The fact the Trust/Fear-immune material is from the alien ship means there has to be some link there (edit: 'human' was bad wording, sorry ahu)
- And we're back to where we left off with Ghostblade's prologue
Episode 18
- Get Aliened, Vortex. Actually, no, I hate that wording, let’s not do that
- Ghostblade meanwhile like “none of my business” (which, fair.)
- Something about Vortex being so beaten up and none of those injuries would be a thing if Ah Sheng were there to heal him. Lie in your own grave <- okay so tbf it was Ghostblade ordered to kill Ah Sheng but Vortex still tried to rope Ah Sheng back in not long before his death so I’m assigning some (unfair) blame
- Okay, so, Ah Sheng was under Shang De (when he was in MG) and Little Johnny under Zac (FOMO) iseeisee
- The plane crash returns. Vortex dies and Cyan receives her Luck and the chain reaction continues
- Little Johnny thinking he’s a Ghostblade whisperer will never not be funny. Dw about the Ah Sheng thing <3
- The implications here being that DOS explicitly sanctions the Fear experimentation. Which tbf we knew from Cyan’s arc, but that was more about information regarding Fear whereas this is stating it outright. Anyway, seems like they’re aware of Shang De’s own experimentation and want to keep an eye on it?
- “I couldn’t carry my teammate as support” heh, I hope that’s a game metaphor carried over from the cn, because very fitting tbh given we’re introduced to present day Johnny playing a video game
- what is the micky liu zhen deal frfr
- I feel like I’m possibly missing a layer here in terms of how Micky baited Queen, but it’s still so telling that both Micky and Liu Zhen know that’s exactly what’s happening here. Also, Micky clearly not wanting Queen involved mirroring Luo Tong trying to keep Luo Li from the Ruins. The circumstances are pretty different otherwise but Micky just… kinda… lets it happen rather than interfere with his plans vs. Luo Tong lowkey sabotaging the mission for the sake of Luo Li by trying to stop her from getting involved at first