Two Wars (A Poem)

Two Wars

There's a war going on

In this vast space of nothing

Of fires and kettles

And chasms and you

Not long on your walk

You come by lots of fires, hot

You stay by one

And your kettle begins to boil

But it's boiling over something that doesn't exist

But doesn't it exist?

Isn't it real?

It is

Someplace

Somewhere

But not here

3rd person

Outside view

A present moment

You realize they're not with you

Now don't misunderstand

The fire is real

This I won't argue

But the heat we feel?

That's more our purview

For although they are potent by intent

We need not treat the heat like cement

Lest it pave our way straight to 

The Chasm of Contempt

Where it's hard to fathom

Any bridge could connect

They say, "It's us or them, it's this or that."

Reinforcing this false concept

Of a stark contrast

Now, some heat is good

I feel it's worthwhile

But if frozen or scorching

Please turn the dial

And not all fires are bad, mind you

For some can warm and shine light

But others do just burn and misguide

So take a pail for one

and a torch for the other

But before you throw

Check it's water, not petrol

And before you light

Confirm that its shine isn't not quite right

With these things in mind

I hope we can be pushed

But not shoved

That we can protect our kettle

But not let it settle

-----------------------

All that being said

I can't help but think 

Of a second war going on

This one, in the vast space of something

We're living through a bombardment

That comes from feeding a false need that's constant

We feel we are utilizing

But we are being used

We feel we are consuming

But we are being consumed

The more we feed it

The more it hungers

Becoming a constant buzzing

As loud as thunder

But our minds so use

No noise it seems

Until a quiet moment

And then it screams

We're drowning ourselves

We need time to breathe

We need to disconnect

Time to charge and reset

But the food we feed it

Can't simply be removed

But rather it's the it

That needs to be improved

So don't just stop

Replace

The war can be won this way

Take control.

Be intentional.

Although difficult

The rewards are manifold

I plead we will all try

At the very least, I

My Top 10 Favorite Anime v2

July two years ago, I composed a list of my top 10 favorite anime, which you can find here: https://whateveriwant7.blogspot.com/2024/07/my-top-10-favorite-anime.html. I wanted to do some brushing up on it, so here I am.

NOTE: Most of the notes are just copied over from the previous post. The main purpose of this post is to update the rankings. I'll write "NEW:" or "EDIT:" by something if it's new.

HMs: Erased, Haikyuu!!, Hunter x Hunter, Kaijuu No. 8

        Previously Haikyuu!! was #9 and Hunter x Hunter was #10. They've been shifted out by Spy x Family and Toradora. Erased was previously an HM. Feel free to visit the old list to get my thoughts on them. Side Note: I'd put Hunter x Hunter above Haikyuu!!.

        Kaijuu No 8. is fantastic and could definitely make my top 10 as new seasons come out.

10. Spy x Family

        I remember when I first watched the first season of Spy x Family, I wasn't overly enjoying myself, but when I went to watch season 2 or season 3, I was just having a blast with it. Just this perfect blend of action and comedy and slice of life, had a fantastic time. I doubt they were actually that much stronger than season 1, but rather I was different. Regardless of the reason, quite enjoy some Spy x Family now, and it has earned a spot in my personal top 10 for now.

9. My Hero Academia

        NEW: My Hero was previously #6 but I said that 3-7 were all very tough to rank. I stated "Another reason I lowkey feel it's not high is its high episode count which continues to grow." This is indeed the case. I just felt like the series really dragged out for me and I just wanted it to be done. But, as I stated last time, "But its peaks are impeccable, and it's just a show I enjoy." Idk. Spot 9 or 10 feel like a perfectly fine spot for it to sit for now. I'm giving it the edge over Spy x Family for legacy's sake. 

8. Toradora

        NEW: Toradora making its appearance in my top 10, woot woot. The first time I saw Toradora was many moons ago, and I loved it then. I rewatched this in January this year, and, man, it grips my heart. 

7. Mob Psycho 100

        I've cooled quite a bit on Mob Psycho. In the past, I would consistently say it was in my top 3 favorite animes. Now, let me say: It is REALLY good. I think what's really holding me back from ranking it higher is the third season. The third season just wasn't my favorite :/ Which is an absolute shame. 

        The first two seasons are some of my favorite stuff, but I'm ranking the show as a whole, so the third season drags it down a few spots for me. If I ignored the 3rd season, I think this would most likely be top 3 or 4. And perhaps I'm over hating on the 3rd season; it wasn't bad per se, just not very good, imo. Idk.

6. Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

        Wonderful wonderful show. I've also seen the original, but I rewatched Brotherhood recently, and I'm fairly confident I prefer Brotherhood, so I'm only ranking it. This show is, like, actually so good. Characters are incredible, fights are superb, world is fascinating, storyline is awesome. So good. Love and agree with the fact that it's generally regarded as one of the best animes of all time.

5. Your Lie in April

        NEW: Reminder that this text comes from 2024

        So Your Lie in April has been my favorite anime ever since I originally watched it, but I rewatched it this year and decided it no longer was. Major plotline I just didn't like this time around is the main thing. Do I absolutely adore it still? Of course. Incredibly emotional; I cried this watch through for sure for sure. 

        It would not surprise me if it slips a couple-few spots more, but for now its legacy of it being my absolute favorite for years is keeping it in the top 3. My heart is still full of love when I think of this show, and that love is simply stronger than other shows right now. But for the first time in a long while, it is not my number 1.

4. Frieren: Beyond Journey's End

        This is my most recent new anime I've seen and it is simply wonderful/incredible/amazing. I've fallen in love with the world and the characters, and everything is extremely well done. It could very easily climb the ranks of this list in the future. (EDIT: It did) Thinking about it, frankly, it should probably be higher. Currently just waiting on more episodes to eventually release. In its current state, it feels like just the beginning, which makes it a little more awkward to rank super highly, imo. But I am very excited for more, and, like I said, I think once more does come out it could easily go up.

NEW: Loved Season 2 as well

3. Ping Pong the Animation

        Let me tell you, this anime is a masterpiece. It is beautiful and wonderful and poignant and I wrote all whole blog post about it a while back which you can read here.

EDIT: Deleted last sentence as it referenced it being my favorite anime, which is no longer true. I also removed one other sentence to decrease the glaze a smidgen.

2. Steins;Gate

        There's a thrill in the back of my mind when thinking about this anime. It is so tense, so interesting, so cool. So so good. Does time travel extremely well, imo. Goated anime.

1. Odd Taxi

        Holy, I love this anime. The characters are endlessly fascinating and fun. The storyline wraps up so incredibly. It's mix of serious and light-hearted moments is wonderful. Absolute banger. Thanks for the recommendation old roommate Joe.

I've Officially Returned to the Competitive Scene (In This Case: Lorcana)

Yes, indeedily do, I have begun competing in Lorcana events. Last time I competed in a tournament was March of last year where I got 2nd at a $2k event (which you can read about here if you want).

I played in four Set Championships and one local this past month. I played Amber Steel the whole set. Here is the final version of my deck list: https://dreamborn.ink/decks/y4rEwNip6Lq6GdahwAl9 I'd continue to tweak it if I had more tournaments, but I feel really good about that form.

Quick Report of Each Set Champs and Lessons I Learned:

Set Champs 1: 

Summary:

        I, uh, didn't have 8 of the best cards in my deck at the tournament as they hadn't arrived in the mail. Still did surprisingly well for having my hand tied behind my back. When 3-2. Got 11th missing the Top 8 cut.

Lessons:

        In my round one, I was fully taken up by tournament jitters and was playing much much faster than was required, which caused me to make some severe misplays. It was pretty frustrating. But I learned the lesson to calm myself down and take deep breaths. And just because my opponent is playing at a fast clip doesn't mean I need to. Slow down, think through the play, execute.

        Also having a good deck is important lolol.

MVP:

        Bambi did SO much work for me and instantly became a staple in my deck moving forward. She wasn't in my first iteration of the deck and was only put in because I was missing so many other cards, and she killed it.

LVP:

        Eilonwy was never meant to be in the deck either and boy oh boy did she never see the light of day again. She died to various instances of ping damage and was just a waste of a card over and over again. I'm pretty sure it would've been better for me to ink her in every game than play her (except maybe one).

Set Champs 2:

Summary:

        I did so well! I got 2nd and it was awesome and it was a blast. In the five rounds of Swiss, I won my first four rounds and lost my fifth to Izzy getting me the 2nd Seed going into the Top 8 cut. I won two rounds in top cut to make it into the finals where I ultimately lost to Izzy again. 

        One of the players I beat in Swiss and again in Top 8 was Prince, a player who had just recently won a 128-Player CCQ to qualify for Nationals. Awesome win to get (and I beat him 2-0 both times!).

        I do feel like I was getting lucky throughout the day with some huge top decks (ex. topdecking item removal literally both times Prince played down a key item). But I also feel like I was playing extremely smart and sharp the whole day. I was thinking through lines clearly, thinking about my opponent's outs etc. I feel great about how I preformed.

Lessons:

        I got to talk to Izzy about our games, and he brought up was how he looked at my hand a couple turns ago and how that helped him. I had completely forgotten about it. It's important to remember what tricks you have up your sleeve vs. what tricks your opponent already knows.

MVP:

        Prince Charming single-handedly won me 3-4 games against Yurple. Benja also came in clutch in key moments.

Set Champs 3:

Summary:

        18 people dropped from the tournament. The day before 30 people had signed up. Turned into a 12-person bracket. Was rather disappointing.

        Round 1, I fought Izzy again. I managed to take a game this time, but still lost.

        Round 2, I fought against a Aggro Amber/Emerald deck. They had some unfortunate draws and petered out both games. I won 2-0.

        Round 3, I fought Mouse House. Game 1, I was ahead and then threw the game away. Was really unfortunate. More on this in my lessons.

        Round 4, I fought Crystal who was playing Yurple. I won 2-0. In one game, I made a poor mistake that luckily didn't get punished hard enough to make a difference.

        Still managed to squeak into 8th place to get a Promo. I had the same tiebreakers as Derek who was in 9th; we're not sure exactly how it was determined I should be above him.

Lessons:

        Don't get comfortable. Think about your opponent's outs. You're winning, but what options do they have to turn the game around? What are their win-cons? Play around them. When you're ahead, it's still important to take a deep breath and think.

LVP:

        Benja did so well the previous week, I over-teched into him by adding another copy. He ended up being useless the entire day and was a big liability. 

Set Champs 4:

Summary:

        Fun competitive tournament, but didn't quite make the cut.

        Lost Round 1 to Wakeen who was playing Mouse House. Man, I don't like fighting that deck. 1-2.

        Won Round 2 to a player playing an off meta Sapphire/Amber deck. 2-0.

        Won Round 3 to a player playing Mouse House. He made some critical misplays; there was nothing I could do if he had just quested, but alas: I won 2-0. Still don't like fighting Mouse House.

        Lost Round 4 to Ruben who was playing Yurple. First Yurple I've lost any games to -- I was 8-0 in games against Yurple before I lost 2-0 to Ruben. We had a great conversation about our games after. More on that in Lessons.

        Won Round 4 to an off-meta Purple Steel deck. 2-0.

Lessons:

        Don't get tunnel vision. Sure, if Meilin gets you Strength of a Raging Fire, you're in a good spot, but what if she doesn't? What other options do you have available to you? If she gets you Thunderbolt instead, would that change how you play?

        If they have it, they have it, so sometimes, you just have to make a play. If he has a Gaston, you probably just lose on the spot no matter what you do. So just play like he doesn't -- do what you can do to stop his good lines that you do have control over (in this case, stopping the Luisa shift).

Lilo & Stitch Songs Basic Deck Guide | Set 13

Made this Lorcana deck guide video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rml042XkzXg

        I think it turned out well, although I'm definitely kind of insecure on how helpful it actually is. I'm afraid some people will watch it and then just respond "This is just barebones info that I could've discerned for myself by just looking at the decklist". 

        Buuuuut, maybe I'm just wrong about that, and even if it's true, I gotta create to get better. It was a fun process and I could see myself doing it again for other decks in the future, so bare minimum this was fun, good practice. But hopefully it's more than just that and somebody actually finds what I have to say insightful/helpful.

My Ranking of Every Live-Action Spider-Man Movie

        NOTE: There are no spoilers for Brand New Day here, although I will be ranking it and giving some non-spoiler thoughts on it. There are spoilers for most of the other Spider-Man films, though.

        Another Note: I published a post "Who is my Favorite Spider-Man?". Although many things I talked about over there could fit in in several spots in here, I left them out since I already wrote about them.

        Okay, just finished watching Spider-Man: No Way Home, which concludes my watchings of the (core) Spider-Man films in preparation(/because I wanted to) for Spider-Man: Brand New Day. I'll come back to this draft and rank Brand New Day once I've seen it.

        This was notably my first time seeing the Tobey Maguire trilogy. It was also my first time watching Spider-Man: No Way Home after seeing both the Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield films. The first, (and only other) time I had watched No Way Home was in theaters before I had seen any other spider-man film. (Although, I think I should note, I did know how Gwen Stacy died before watching No Way Home for the first time.)

        I wanted to rank them and give a couple thoughts about them. NOTE THIS IS MY PERSONAL ENJOYMENT/FEELINGS; IT IS NOT INTENDED TO BE AN OBJECTIVE RATING. 

        IN REGARDS TO SPIDER-VERSE: Although I'm not officially ranking them here, I'm fairly confident both Spider-Verse films would make it into my top four. Maybe even taking both the top spots.

1. Spider-Man: No Way Home

        This movie is a freaking triumph. I love this movie. I think it was really cool that it still landed with me before I had even seen the other Spider-Man films and now is even better. 
        As referenced, I knew how Gwen Stacy died before my first viewing, so Andrew catching MJ landed the first time, but the moment landed soo much harder after seeing Andrew's films. Additionally, knowing additional small references was great ("Sun in the palm of my hand", "You were never a nobody Max", "Trying to do better" etc.).
        A cool thing that I didn't even realize was a cool thing the first time I watched No Way Home was Tobey Maguire being the one to stop Tom Holland from killing the Green Goblin. A moment which is so much more meaningful now after watching Spider-Man 3 where one of the major themes was forgiving/letting go of revenge.
        Does the first chunk of the movie have weird pacing, and is not nearly as great? For sure, for sure. But it's peak beyond that.

2. Spider-Man: Brand New Day

        I was so high on life after watching this film and frankly should maybe be number one, but No Way Home made me more emotional to the point of shedding some amount of tears and Brand New Day didn't, so that's the major reason No Way Home is still my favorite. 
        I thought the dialogue felt very natural and good. The MCU presence felt incredibly natural and not forced at all -- was done incredibly imo. Thought the pacing was really good. Action was incredible. Great emotional moments, although some of them only landed, like, 75% for me. Humor was funny and natural. Man, I love this movie.

3. Spider-Man

        This movie blew all my expectations out of the water. The plot kept thickening. Even up to the very end, the plot kept thickening and making the story better and richer.
        Ex. Final scene. At the funeral when it set Harry Osborn up as a villian/enemy and a piece of heart-wrenching conflict as Harry expresses his love for Peter but his anger toward Spider-Man. At that point I was like, "Oh snap, what a good way to end the movie", but then it thickened again with Mary Jane telling Peter how she feels, but Peter saying a friend is all he has room for right now. Freaking heart-wrenching beauty. So good.

4. Spider-Man 2

        So good. I knew going into this one that it was generally regarded as the best Spider-Man film. I was thrown off by some directorial stuff (ex. randomly becoming a horror movie when the arms took control). Also felt like some decisions characters made felt a tad less realistic than the first one + Harry hearing voices and finding the Goblin stuff just felt unrealistic/weird too. Which is why I put Spider-Man 1 above. But the story and the emotional-wrenching stuff is top notch and, in those categories, are stronger than Spider-Man, imo.

5. Spider-Man: Far From Home

        The Mysterio fights are still some of the coolest Spider-Man scenes we've gotten, which is why I prefer this movie over Homecoming. The moments with Happy in the plane were powerful and awesome. I think the pacing is kind of wonky though.
        Peter's identity getting revealed in the end credits scene gutted me when I watched it in theaters.

        The first two Tom Holland movies feel very different than the Tobey and Andrew movies, which makes it harder to rank. The MCU presence just shifts a lot of things.

6. Spider-Man: Homecoming

        First time personally using this slang word, but I feel it fits perfectly here: I felt like RDJ's performance mogged Tom Holland's in this movie, which is a little awkward since it's, you know, a Tom Holland Spider-Man film and not an Iron Man film. But what can you do, it's RDJ. Still really like the film, though. Vulture's identity reveal was really good.

7. The Amazing Spider-Man 2

        Man, the emotional scenes in this movie hit for me. I think many other parts are much rougher than The Amazing Spider-Man, but the emotional scenes were strong enough for me to like it more than The Amazing Spider-Man even though on paper I recognize that The Amazing Spider-Man is better.

8. The Amazing Spider-Man

        I really liked how this movie dove into why Peter was an orphan. It's a question I've had and am surprised it's never brought up in the other adaptations. But I like how this one does it, tying in with the cross-species plot and having it be the root of some good emotional moments.

9. Spider-Man 3

        This movie started off so rough, but I think it stuck the landing. Peter letting Gwen kiss him was soooo hard to watch, I took several breaks because I was cringing so hard over how stupid Peter was. I liked Harry's redemption at the end. Bully Maguire will forever be iconic. The last scene made my heart happy; I'm glad Peter and Mary Jane figured it out. It was a good scene to end a great trilogy.

SPIDER-MAN. I LOVE SPIDER-MAN. Easily my favorite superhero.

Btw, the 9 Spider-Man Movies >> the 9 Star Wars Movies