Sometimes it feels like I only started this blog yesterday, and sometimes it feels like I’ve been writing articles for The Contrarian Corner my entire life! Regardless, today (to the day and date, isn’t that neat?) marks FOUR YEARS of running this blog! In honor of this anniversary, I figured why not look back on the hundreds of articles I’ve written and look at some of my favorites! And hey, if you’re new here, this is a good place to start if you’re looking for fun articles to check out!
(Note: Some of these placements are more to honor a subtype of article than the article itself, though I did still try to choose individual articles I have fond memories of writing even within subtypes.)
Let’s jump into this little trip down memory lane!
10) Akame Ga Kill ~ Masterful Subversion of Expectations (ARTICLE)
It’s the very first article that I ever wrote. How could I not put it on this list? Sure, in the years since, there are definitely things that I would change about this article. Some details I’d add, some parts I’d rearrange. It’s funny, but I remember that article taking hours to write, despite it’s comparatively minimal length. Nowadays, I’d be able to crank out an article of that length in almost no time at all. Maybe I’ll revisit it one day, do some sort of ‘Redux‘ but for old articles! But that tangent aside, I still like this article, and of course I still love the show it’s about!
9) Contrarian Retrospective ~ Agents of SHIELD: Season Four (ARTICLE)
I’ve only done two of these Contrarian Retrospective article series so far (though I still have plans to do a RWBY one someday), and I loved writing both of them. It took quite a bit of work to craft several paragraphs and find a picture for over twenty episodes for every season of this show…but it was worth it! SHIELD is one of my favorite shows of all time, and I loved being able to go back reminisce about it across all of these articles, then doing the same thing for Korra later on. It’s a structure that I find a lot of fun, so maybe I’ll venture it doing some Contrarian Retrospectives for even more shows than just RWBY one day!
8) UGL ~ Lady Boyle’s Last Party (ARTICLE)
The article subtype of Unforgettable Gaming Levels all kicked off with this article here, and it was a blast to reminisce about this fantastic level (and game) while writing it. It actually takes a bit of skill to do one of these articles, because there’s so much scope to consider when discussing an entire level of a video game. I’ve used RPG Maker for years though, so it is fun to look at things from a game-development-angle sometimes! And obviously I had to start off with Dishonored, perhaps the video game series with the most ‘Best Levels‘ of all time. Hey, speaking of, how come we still don’t have a Dishonored 3 (or 4, if you count Death of the Outsider as a full game)?
7) Remembering The…Genesis (ARTICLE)
This series of articles has reached its conclusion, but I seriously adored getting to write a new one each and every week as I looked back on the gaming consoles that shaped my childhood and early adulthood. It’s almost a little sad to think that an article series like this has a set beginning and end, and that I can’t exactly go back and write more! I mean, I suppose in a few years I could do one on the PS5, but that just doesn’t quite feel the same as dipping into the nostalgia of the Genesis, N64, GBA, and those other retro consoles, does it? Regardless, these articles were so much fun to write, and genuinely did unearth some long-forgotten memories in my brain (like the fact that I forgot that ridiculous Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner game even existed until researching for the Genesis article)!
6) Top 15 Favorite Fairy Tail Fights (ARTICLE)
It’s a little-kept secret that I am an absolute fanatic for a good fight scene, but if there’s one thing I might love more than fight scenes, it’s being able to talk about them! And if there’s something I love even more than talking about a fight scene, it’s talking about 15 of them! Similar to those Contrarian Retrospective articles, this article here (and the “15 fights from RWBY” one) took quite a while to write since there’s just so much going on in them, not to mention finding good pictures. But it really let me indulge in just how much I enjoy consuming great fight scenes in media, and praising them through my writing. I know action scenes aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but they certainly are mine! Case in point, did you know I once recorded a short film in the woods with my family, that was basically one big fight scene? Good times!
5) U.I.C.S. ~ Shania Reid (ARTICLE)
Look, I tried to keep this list from just being every single U.I.C.S. article that I’ve ever written, but I definitely had to slip a few onto the list! And how could I skimp out on including the U.I.C.S. article all about my favorite character from the Xenoblade franchise! I loved two things in particular when it came to writing this article. The first thing was being able to put into words my love for this character who so frequently went either overlooked, misunderstood, or overhated by the fanbase when Xenoblade Chronicles 3 came out (thankfully, opinions have shifted more positively towards her later). Secondly, I had to spend several hours rewatching Shania’s cutscenes using the in-game cutscene viewer so I could get screenshots to use for the article, because there literally weren’t any high-quality pictures on Google Images to pull from!
4) A.F.S.A. ~ Blake and Yang vs Adam (ARTICLE)
In the same vein as that article on fights in Fairy Tail, the Awesome Fight Scene Analysis subtype of article is one that is always a pleasure to write (even if I haven’t done very many of them…so far). And yes, a few paragraphs up I mentioned loving being able to talk about so many fights, whereas the A.F.S.A. articles are only one at a time. But I’m able to go so much more in-depth because of that low count, and that extra freedom really allows me to go nitty-gritty on the details in my breakdown and praise of these fights (like spending paragraphs upon paragraphs for what ends up being twenty seconds of hyper-fluid fight animation). One of the best things about running your own blog is being able to get as detailed and pedantic as you want while writing, after all! And what better fight to do that with than the best clash in all of RWBY?
3) Writing Talk ~ Character Consistency and First Impressions (ARTICLE)
This entire blog’s existence makes it clear that I love writing, but I also love to write about writing! I’ve got a lot of thoughts crammed up into my noggin that are just begging to be unleashed, after all! I certainly don’t think of myself as some sort of undefeatable professional expert on writing (in fact, I’ve never really liked people who profess to have irrefutable writing advice that must be taken as gospel). But I do find it a lot of fun to break down tropes, clichés, common writing techniques, and certain patterns and styles I’ve noticed in the books I’ve read, games I’ve played, shows I’ve watched, and stories I myself have written. It’s a real joy to just be able to passionately talk about how much I love writing!
2) U.I.C.S. ~ Tory Nichols (ARTICLE)
The only U.I.C.S. to take two parts (and spoilers, but part three will be coming soon now that Cobra Kai has ended), and at one point the first Tory article was the longest on my entire blog. While it doesn’t hold that crown anymore (gee, I wonder which article DOES have that honor now?), I still fondly remember writing that first Tory article. It took quite a few hours, many of which took place during a quiet Saturday at the library back when I still worked there. I put so much love and care into the article, leveraging a lot of WordPress techniques I admittedly don’t’ use as much as I should (like subheadings and pull quotes). And I care immensely about Tory as a character, so I really wanted the article to come out perfectly, and I think it did. And I have hopes that the conclusion of this U.I.C.S. Tory Nichols journey sticks the landing too whenever I’m finally able to show it to you all!
1) U.I.C.S. ~ Kuvira (ARTICLE)
It couldn’t be anything else, really. There isn’t a single other article on this blog that took me this much time to write, this much brainpower to craft, this much effort to bring together into one amazing final product (if I do say so myself). And, I mean, it is the single longest article on this blog by a mile!
Which, in-and-of itself is really funny to me. Obviously, I love Kuvira. I knew I loved Kuvira before I started writing. But I kinda surprised myself by not realizing just how much I apparently loved Kuvira! I went so in-depth with the detail of covering every single possible thing about her character across Seasons 3 and 4 of Korra, and then the Ruins of the Empire comic that it’s a wonder my fingers even still work! And I suppose I did take multiple weeks to write this article (having to throw together backup articles just so I could maintain my weekly Saturday output until this behemoth article could finally debut)!
I’m pretty proud of my usage of subheadings and pull quotes in this article to really flesh everything out, and I’m also proud of the images I found. There’s not much in the way of high-quality images for the whole of Korra, so I had to do a lot of screenshotting and cropping to actually have usable images!
But hey, that’s just my opinion! And here’s to four more years!
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