User blog:Corbierr/The Touchstone Of Ra (Another analyzing rant)

Ah, TOR. The movie that inspires many, err... emotions. And not all of them good. In fact, I'm going to cut to the chase this time and deliver my hypothesis- TOR can show you all the problems of HOA ever by simply examining all it's major points. That's right. Every problem the show had can be summed up or, at the very least, results in a problem found in this freaking movie.

So if that intro got you as excited as it got me to tear this thing apart and discuss it's flaws in detail, then you are probably my wife, my BT, or really, really bored. BUT LET'S DO THIS ANYWAYS SHALL WE?

Sophia and the Newbie Trio
So of course I have to begin at the beginning of this epic story where we meet Cassie, Erin, Dexter and Sophia who all spawned out of thin air in order to create a villian, and, um... pad the story I guess. Now, not only are the newbie characters infamous for being annoying, (except Dexter) they also expose one problem the show has that is...rather overlooked.

That is, new characters? They are brought into existence out of literally nowhere, and, in the worst cases, don't warrant life at all. (For that second point, think back to every rant I've had about Benji and you know what I mean.) Sure, this doesn't make them poor characters, because characters like Willow, KT and Eddie were all created this way. And they, well, they have reason to be there. So do characters like Poppy,who rounded out Jerome. But others? Outside of padding the story, stirring drama and...umm... existing... some characters do not need to be in the story at all. Okay, you can make the case for teachers like Miss Valentine that if the characters didn't have, well, teachers, it'll shatter the suspension of disbelief. That's perfectly fine. But...um... Robbie? Created for the sake of Mickra drama. Piper? As much as I love her, she was just there for Nikita to be featured and to add more drama for a span of three episodes. Mother-effing BENJI? HE ONLY EXISTS TO JUSTIFY THE EXTREMELY IMPORTANT PLOT POINT OF A DODGEBALL GAME.

... Now onto the characters of TOR. Sophia, I've already said, was there to be a villain, so yeah, she kind of had to exist (but that doesn't make her in-story justification from being a bit out of nowhere. I mean The Alchemist? They totally just made that up to justify the plot with her). Dexter, okay, he was likable but I can't see any purpose for him other than having a reason for Sibuna (except for Patricia of course) to side with Sophia. Cassie and Erin? I'm willing to bet they were just there to justify Dexter and Sophia being included, otherwise their characters would be very, very random.

So yeah, the newbies of TOR really didn't need to exist because they could have easily done something like, IDK... Make one of the HOA characters, like Joy or Willow, possessed by the spirit of the Alchemist who wants to finish building the pyramid. Of course nobody sees any problem with them because they're already friends, until Eddie sees them with the touchstone. The thing with the sacrifice would stay the same... but then instead of the possessed character being turned to stone, they are freed from their possession and The Alchemist's spirit is banished.

I just made a better plot for Touchstone Of Ra without including the newbies at all. See writers? It's not hard! (I'm sure this won't help the newbie's become popular any time soon)

There is another smaller problem with the newbies of TOR that doesn't actually happen in the other seasons but I still want to discuss it. Basically, the character's attributes are taken from pre-existing characters. Sophia has those loose simiarities to Nina. Cassie seems like a slightly-craftier Amber. Erin is basically season 1 Mara. Dexter is awesome, sure, but he's also that way only because he was a mix of all the dudes, because apparently the only way to make an interesting new guy character we are meant to like is to recycle traits from characters we're already attached to in an attempt to trick us into liking him as well. *deep breath*  Maybe I'm just tricking myself into feeling smarter than I am about this, because I doubt this was intentional, but it's still aggrivating to me the way I see it...

But that's just one small flaw in terms of character that this movie carried on from the seasons, as you will see when we examine...

Patricia's plot
Patricia is my favorite character. Everyone on this wiki should know that by now. And before I rant about her "arc", I want to say that no, I'm not only ranting because she's my favorite. I'm doing this because she deserved more as a character than she got in TOR... and it's time to show you all what I mean.

I see Patricia as almost the opposite as I saw characters like Mara or Season 2 Joy- you know, the Plot-centered ones? Instead, she's not there to cause drama or create pointless plots, but more like to just react to whatever the story says should be important to her. Her lazer focus on one topic at a time is a nice character trait, but also a sign of laziness on the writers, who just decide that she will only ever be focused on one thing and one thing alone and whatever that thing is, it's always a result of something someone else does or has happen to them. '''In short, everything she does is a reaction to something else. They never made her proactive enough to cause things, unless those things are very indirect (i.e, Sibuna being created because of the initiation). '''

Now that I got that out of the way, Touchstone Of Ra is possibly the worst offender of this problem, period. Season 2 is a close second. Thing is, her entire role in TOR is to be jealous of Sophia because... she exists and talked to Eddie so there's your justification. And that's it. Anything she did of note in this movie is because of that one thing. AND THAT'S SO STUPID! I MEAN SERIOUSLY! But it gets worse, because in the second half, she just ran around in a dress and let Eddie deal with the stuff alone. Because... that's totally what Patricia of all people, one of the most impulsive people in the show, would have done, right? Go to the graduation and let Eddie, KT and the newbies handle the mystery? Well, that pisses me off, maybe just because she's my favorite character, but that is NOT how she should have been handled this time!

But it's not the fault of TOR. Remember? The other seasons did it first. Her jealousy was always a thing, but at least in the first season her jealousy didn't consume her! It merely made her angrier than she would have been. Come season 2, Peddie took control and the writers probably assumed that, since it was popular, that's all we'd want in the third season. But not from Eddie, that'd just be silly. No, only from Patricia. SHE was the one designated to be consumed by the Peddie relationship, her jealousy towards others suddenly making her completely irrational and inable to do anything but be angry, and she was only shown to have some of her old badass-ness left whenever Eddie was involved in some way. Eddie maybe have something to do with Nina being gone? Well now she has a reason to be proactive and help Fabian. Eddie, KT and Fabian in the crypt? Better be competent long enough to get them out of there.... and Okay I may be overeaggerating because there were times like during the descendants thing where she was pefectly capable and badass while Eddie had nothing to do with it... '''so I guess the real qualifier is, she showed her competent side whenever Eddie wasn't around at the time. Because when he was, she was focused on Peddie. And that's just fucking sad. '''

But wait, there is more to discuss in terms of characters!

Jerome and Joy
...*incoherent, angry babbling*. DAMN YOU WRITERS, GOD DAMN... UGH. NO. HOW DARE YOU?! DO YOU WANT ME TO BASH MY HEAD AGAINST A TABLE WHENEVER I SEE TOR? WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY?

-cough-

I do not particularly find enjoyment in their plot during this movie.

In fact, it gets me shouting at the television whenever their scenes come on, only stopping for the sake of my family and sanity.

In other words, screw TOR and season three for this whole effing problem! OH MY GOD.



That was a clip from The Room, a god-awful movie that is also completely hilarious, unlike this subplot of TOR, which makes me completely angry at everything.

Now, you guys all know the problem. But because this wouldn't be a good blog without me getting rid of my sanity and explaining these things in detail, I must do it for you. My readers.

SO BASICALLY JEROY GAINED AMNESIA HALF WAY THROUGH THE THIRD SEASON AND FORGOT ABOUT THE MYSTERY EXCEPT NOT BECAUSE JOY HAD FLASHBACKS SO DAMN IT EVEN IN THE THIRD SEASON THE WRITING WAS BETTER FOR THIS PROBLEM BUT HERE? THEY JUST SEE SIBUNA ACTING LIKE THERE IS DANGER AND DESPITE BEING A DUO OF REALLY SMART PEOPLE THEY CANNOT PUT TWO AND TWO TOGETHER AND FIGURE OUT THAT SOMETHING IS GOING ON! ARE YOU KIDDING ME? I MEAN SERIOUSLY THERE'S SEASON-RESET AND THEN THERE IS JUST NOT CARING ABOUT THE FANS AND THE CHARACTERS MORE THAN SLAPPING TOGETHER A DECENT MOVIE! AUGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

...So does that cover it? I don't need to go into deep, analytical detail, right? I mean...I think that rant says it all.

The ending
Ugh. So no, this is not me talking about the very, very end with Victor leaving and that jazz because for the most part I enjoyed that. No, I mean the cop-out ending. To summerize:

SOMEONE IS GOING TO DIE AND OH MY GOD IT'S EDDIE except not because only the Osirian died and ughhhhhh.

I don't recall anyone having issues with this ending before, but I just realized how stupid and lazy it is! We've got the build up. We've got Eddie TELLING US he'll die along with that prophecy (at least I think that was a think) and we've got the whole sacrifice thing. So okay of course we all knew that they'd never have the guts to really kill Eddie- but the whole ending just feels like a cop-out! A twist ending and nothing more. So after all that foreshadowing and anticipation, what we learned is that the Osirian apparently counts as a person and is now dead but Eddie himself isn't and we all know that if anyone else played sacrifice, then that person would have been DEAD for real. Which means that this is just the universe being lazy and giving the writers an excuse to give us a surprising ending, while it could have been avoided by just not telling us the Orisian will die, and instead just keeping it vague, and IDK maybe making Sophia be the sacrifice or something I mean that's a little silly but still it's better than tricking us for no real reason!

This reminds me of the other lazy endings this series has. Season One, while my favorite in terms of finales, it still feels a little lazy because A) Fabian switching the elixirs was just brought up out of nowhere and it makes sense but still, just kind of a copout and B) Nina could not have hid the cup under the stage in any possible situation so uh...yeah. Season two was better, but rushed and most of Sibuna just sort of stood around and watched as stuff happened. Season three... THEY JUST HAD TO PUT A KEY IN A HOLE AND THAT WAS THE CLIMAX.

So it only makes sense that TOR should feel like the laziest ending in terms of what actually happens. Not the amount of drama, not how emotional it may have been, but how the problem was actually solved and the lazy way the "twist" happened.

Conclusion
So I think I've talked about just about everything worth ranting about for this movie. Basically, this movie exposed not only how sloppy the writers were about characters and subplots, but also about endings as well (and thus the story over all).

Now, yes, I did once make a blog about how TOR was not horrible based on the theme of "endings" and "goodbyes", which does make it easier to bear, however, it's still a very frustrating movie and, looked at objectively, even the good parts have flaws, and what I was here to discuss.

Thanks for reading everyone. I'll see you next time...which will be a very special occasion! Because Haley is a genius and gave me the idea of posting a video where I rant and discuss all sorts of HOA related topics. Which means I need material! Haley and Alaisia already gave me good ones: Tor, Mara / Joy personality switch, Mara not being a sinner, Nina leaving out of the blue when they could have just replaced her, The damned Keddie/Peddie war, Jerome cheating on Mara when he was in love with her for two years, Mabian's random kiss, Joy not being the chosen one, Eddie losing his Osirian powers, and Nina being a Osirian-less Chosen One. But I would still like more! That's where you, my dear friends, come in. If you have anything you'd like me to talk/rant about in the video, maybe something I haven't covered or you want more detail on, or maybe something you just want to see me get angry about, let me know and I'll be sure to try and include all your topics. <3