u/TheWor1dsFinest

Kiki’s Delivery Service for me.

We watched Ghibli movies in my house a lot when I was a kid. I always thought Kiki’s was so boring and slow compared to the more adventurous and fantastical stuff like Spirited Away or Castle in The Sky. Just groaned whenever my sister would put it on.

Wasn’t until my 30s that I watched it again with an ex-gf. I had moved to L.A. immediately after college in my 20s and had a REALLY rough go of it for a few years out there trying to break into the entertainment industry. Took a lot to finally settle into an ok life out there. Watching Kiki’s again after having lived that experience totally changed my view on the movie and its message. It was just so true what it had to say about needing to have a more mature attitude towards work and learn how to roll with punches and use the strengths you’ve got. Now it’s my favorite comfort film.

Its always tough when it seems like there is some fundamental incompatibility that keeps the relationship from really working the way it needs to despite the many other positive things that are there. It’s even tougher when partners aren‘t on the same page about it.

One partner feels like it’s just an awful and unfortunate situation where both parties have done all that can be done but it’s time to make the call and face facts that the relationship simply doesn’t work; someone else is still desperately trying to make the relationship work and may feel that the situation may still be salvageable with more time and effort. It’s impossible to say who is right.

For those in the former camp who initiated their divorce and dealt with a resentful partner who felt like you gave up on them and the marriage, how did it turn out in the long run?

It’s definitely a lot easier to appreciate it for what it is and its slower more reflective pace the 2nd time. I think S1 just ends with such frenetic action and major implications for the world that it can just leave you still running on that high going into the 2nd season. It‘s easy to be in “what’s next??!!” mode as an eager viewer wanting more and forget that, for the characters, they sort of need less after what happened; room to breathe and process.

I went through a divorce and my job being downsized since I last watched it. Now it just feels like such an accurate depiction of the grieving process with all its anger, sadness, confusion, loss, steps forward and setbacks. I absolutely loved it and cried so many times for what they were all going thru.

Mark: Seance Dog isn’t real! He’s a comic book character!

Seance Dog: In your dimension, yes. But there exist myriad other worlds where dogs and magic are as real as the air you breath.

Mark: We have dogs! Dogs ARE real!

Seance Dog: Well then you’re halfway to understanding!

This trend of giving the A-side the W with a stoppage at the first opportunity to claim their opponent wasn’t gonna win or was “in danger” has gotten WAY out of hand.

It feels like the larger boxing establishment has gotten flagrant and unashamed about it at this point. We see it way more often than we used to. Recent ones that come to mind for me are Rolly/Barroso, Emiliano Vargas/Quintana, obviously Usyk/Verhoeven this past week, even Amanda Serrano/Hanson was a shitty stoppage.

There’s nothing controversial about them, they’re just bad. And it’s crazy the way they’ve gaslit a lot of fans into making it a matter of opinion by perpetuating the narrative of “controversy” like there’s two sides to it. There isn’t in these kind of cases. Theyre just the boxing establishment protecting/boosting someone’s record to keep things on script. Plain and simple.

The ref shouldn‘t be stopping fights for any reason other than a fighter is unequivocally no longer fighting back or able to defend themselves and is clearly already taking the kind of damage that may be life-altering. It’s the corner’s call to take the more preemptive “we‘re outmatched and not gonna win this one…“ or “you’re okay right now, but anymore than this and we think you’re gonna get hurt so we wanna protect you” decision if they wanna throw in the towel before it gets to that point. The outcome of a fight is never certain until it’s certain, and that’s the only reason it should be stopped by the ref. Not because a star briefly has momentum and is momentarily laying into an opponent who has their guard up while their back is against the ropes or manages to land a good shot or two amidst a eye catching but ultimately fruitless flurry of punches.

In 30+ years of watching boxing, I gotta go with the Nakatani/Moloney KO as the one that most scared me for a fighter.

Watched that whole fight live and I was SURE Nakatani had killed him when he landed that punch at the end of the 12th. Highlights of that KO are ubiquitous on social media now and everyone’s seen it, but a lot fewer people watched the whole fight.

What they forget is just how viciously Nakatani had been beating up Moloney leading up to the KO. He had already taken so much damage that I was saying “they need to stop this…” somewhere around the 10th. I was already concerned about Moloney having long term damage from how many shots he was eating. And the KO punch was just like overkill x5. I suspected some “died a week later after being in a coma” kinda thing was gonna be the story when I saw that punch.

I’m playing for the 2nd time and just got to the scene where Maelle repaints Lune and Sciel after they were gommage’d.

So are Lune and Sciel truly “brought back to life?” Or are they now essentially clones sort of like the painted Verso?

Verso tells her that painting isn’t about verisimilitude, but rather essence and that she needs to remember them. It comes across like she’s having to paint Lune and Sciel from scratch based on memory, which is quite different than “reviving” them per se. It would imply that we’re technically playing as Lune and Sciel v2.0 for the rest of the game.

And I’m noticing that in spite of helping Maelle do this, Verso does not share in her enthusiasm for their return. It makes me think he recognizes the sort of trivialization of their lives when they can just be casually brought back with the stroke of a brush. Almost like life has no meaning if death has no meaning.

And that notion REALLY throws a damper on the whole “this painted world and these painted beings are just as real as the outside one.” Which is really Maelle’s whole stance, but it’s sort of hypocritical coming from her when she’s basically a demi-god in that world and knows all too well that she enjoys no such privileges/power in the outside world she claims is no different. There is no “we could repaint Verso” (or anyone else who dies) in Paris.

I’m finding myself leaning way harder into the Verso ending this 2nd time around…

I’m an older millennial and I’ve dated a couple women over the years that swore Lena Dunham’s “Girls” was the best show ever and “basically [their] life.” Each of them proved to be really unstable, toxic people. I’ve only just come around to finally watching some of it and now it all makes sense why it would resonate with them.

It’s become a red flag show for me when someone REALLY identifies with it.