Season 3 Retrospective

 

Hi, I'm back.

Nate is here.

This time with a new character design...again. 

Let's hope it lasts this time lol. 

Happy New Year everyone. Another year has passed, and I hope you are all doing well. This year has been a big one for me, with multiple huge examinations and life changes. There's only 7 blogs to go through this year, so it's a little redundant to rank all of them…but I'm still going to do it. I'm too lazy to configure a creative way to look back on these blogs; plus I don't have time. I'll do that for Season 4 don't @ me. 

Let's get started. 

7: 

Kenny Mccormick VS Mr Immortal 

(South Park VS Marvel Comics) 

Released: April 1st 

I don't think this blog was bad, not by any stretch. I loved working on this. It's better than a good majority of the blogs I did in 2023, but I would say it was a little undeveloped.

I think the biggest issues are in some part due to the matchup itself. I covered Kenny VS Mr Immortal because:

1. It was April Fools and I wanted to do something silly. 

2. I was really into South Park at the time (and still am).

3. The matchup had been on my radar for a while and it was a good way to introduce a new series. 

That last point fell apart due to how little content Mr Immortal actually brings to the table. Mr Immortal's utter obsolescence combined with the second point means that Kenny hogged most of the spotlight. The execution was inevitably going to be tricky, and combined that with my lackluster google document skills 6 months ago, it was bound to be at least partially doomed. Mr Immortal, despite being canonically extremely important, appears in like 10 Comics total. He is so obscure and does practically nothing. His most impressive showing is kicking Hawkeye into a pool, where Hawkeye gets right back up. Like dude, become plot relevant just once please. 

There is the research aspect, which is arguably the most important part of these blogs. Mr Immortal's research was relatively easy —just read like the 10 or so comic issues he is featured in. However, Kenny's side was a lot more tricky. Unlike Megamind or Despicable Me, I didn't have time to watch through a show with 26 seasons, a movie and four games (including the mobile game). Due to such, Kenny has so much material that I simply neglected to cover. I barely talked about his multitude of gear or abilities, and there's a whole section talking about Imaginationland and Cthulhu that I swept away with an ‘idk’. That's definitely an error I'll have to rectify in future installments because an ‘idk’ in a blog where I'm supposed to have done my homework and give the answers where I can isn't exactly the best impression to give off. 

It also suffers from me still finding my groove and improving my craft in making these blogs. Some sections are extremely short and the verdict doesn't touch on any of the nuances of the battle. I wish I could go back and discuss more about Kenny's character and more content that is unique to him. It would have been nice to discuss more about his strange limbo between life and death, his weaknesses such as his insecurities about his friendships, and his dynamics with other characters —especially Butters. I didn't do him justice I feel.

This all leads to a comparatively clunky blog compared to the rest of the year's lineup. I could definitely do better, but I still enjoyed making it, and I suppose that is the most important part. I don't have any matchups for South Park lined up for the upcoming year (at least currently), but it would be fun to cover them again in more detail.

I definitely want to cover Stan and Kyle as they are my favourites. Butters is a character that is begging me to cover, and with his Professor Chaos persona and Imaginationland; there is certainly a lot to talk about with him. Cartman is also a character I want to cover, and probably should cover; if I don't, he'll probably throw a tantrum and then feed me my family as chilli. The New Kid is also a character oozing with potential who is definitely deserving of coverage eventually. I will definitely be using Marvel again in the future, and definitely not using Mr Immortal again. Overall, not bad. Solid B-tier. I had a lot to say about this one. Don't get used to it. 

6: 

Winter Soldier VS Red Hood

( Marvel Comics VS DC )

Released: February 14th

First blog of the year. I really wanted to cover a Marvel and DC street tier fight and this was the one my friends voted on. As an earlier blog, it suffers from lacking the same development that the later blogs in the year would have, and I definitely have new stuff to cover when I come back to Street Tier Marvel and DC. 

Red Hood and Winter Soldier are both really cool, and I'm excited for the new Thunderbolts movie coming out. Bucky is a character that requires a certain level of nuance and finesse to pull off well, similar to Wolverine or Black Widow. I hope the film turns out good.

5:

Stitch VS Rocket Raccoon 

( Lilo & Stitch VS Marvel Comics )

Released: June 8th

I don't have any lot to say about Stitch VS Rocket. It was a fun blog, but it suffers from some of the issues from earlier this year —like me using inconsistent formats for my calculations. Still, really fun.

Rocket is probably the trickiest character to power scale this year, outside of maybe Percy Jackson. I talked about it in the blog, but he is in a sort of limbo state between being a street tier character and a heavy hitter, which is pretty uncommon in Marvel Comics. Even for those in-between characters, they still usually have a rough tier of power that they can squeeze into. I.e. Spiderman can squeeze into the top of the Street Tier, Ironman can squeeze into the bottom of the Herald Tier. Rocket is annoying since he's in the middle. Rocket Raccoon is one of my favourite Marvel characters as of recent, especially after Guardians of the Galaxy 3. I'm really happy I got to cover him. Stitch is also great. He's simple, and there isn't too much to say about him, but that's the point.

4:

Harry Potter VS Percy Jackson

( The Wizarding World VS Riordanverse )

Released: December 31st 

Probably the most difficult blog this year. Prior to 2024, I hadn't even touched a Percy Jackson or Harry Potter book. To study and research their entire series, and then analyse their power scaling, took another absurd amount of time and head scratching.  Percy was also tricky to scale. There are very little online material for Percy's power scaling, and few of them actually discern between Percy with the Achilles's curse and Percy without.

I think it was all worth it though, as the blog itself turned out (in my humble opinion) great. Both series I enjoyed a surprising amount, and it has put more matchups from their series on my radar. Nico specifically is a character I really want to use. 

3:

Korra VS Rey

( The Legend of Korra VS Star Wars )

Released: August 25th

I didn't expect to enjoy this installment as much as I did. Both of these series, despite their questionable reputation, were honestly pretty fun to watch. The Legend of Korra is over-hated and is pretty good. Rey’s trilogy of Star Wars Films aren't the best, but it was pretty fun to dive into Star Wars lore in general. 

I have much more to say about Star Wars in general than I do for Rey; she's just a bad character. Star Wars is a series with a complex and deep lore that rivals series like Dragon Ball with how much content it has. I'll love to cover them again, maybe even covering Star Wars Legends. Avatar is a great series, obviously. The Legend of Korra is surprisingly good, tackling themes of ableism through benders and non-benders. It isn't lazy by any stretch.

I made this for a friend's birthday, I hope you still enjoy it. Sorry your preferred character lost lmao. 

2:

Megamind VS Gru 

( Megamind VS Despicable Me )

Released: December 5th

This was a lot of fun to work on. I would go as far as to say that this was the most fun blog to work on this year. Both series are silly enough to the point that really anything could go, and that gave me a lot of freedom to take a back-seat and have fun. 

The original Megamind is still a fantastic film to this day, and the Peacock Sequels are well...you should know. Funnily enough, Despicable Me is similar, with a good first film and the following films just being okay. Both series are just fun, and it is nice to turn your brain off to research. This blog took forever to make, partially because I was taking my time with it and partially because there's so much to cover.

As a side note, the Megamind Peacock Sequels are incredibly hard to access. I was lucky enough to have a friend who had a Peacock account because the series is nowhere online. It is practically only available in Peacock, which is not even available in my country, which threw a big wrench into my plans for a solid week.

My friends voted on this one out of 20 matchups, and it was a great decision. One of the most fun blogs I've done, and is the new gold standard for the blogs in the future. Go check this one out if you haven't, I would recommend it.

1:

Philza VS Toriel

( Dream SMP VS Undertale )

Released: July 1st

This is probably the most passionate I've been for a blog in a long time. For all the other blogs, I had to research the characters extensively before writing. Megamind, Despicable Me, Avatar and Lilo & Stitch, had me watching hours of content for research. The comic characters, even though I knew them pretty well, I still had to pour through dozens of comics for all of the comic characters. Let's not even start on Harry VS Percy.  This blog was comparatively easier. Undertale and Dream SMP are both series I know in pretty deep detail, and hence I could just start diving deep immediately.

In retrospect, you can really see that I had a lot more fun with this blog than any other blog. I could include little references that I had the privilege of knowing due to having spent years in both of their random. Toriel was also a fun character to unpack, and I found so much more depth to her than I had thought previously. I find myself appreciating her role in the series a lot more; she's less of a pure good character, and more of a bright grey.  Philza was also a joy to cover, with an unsung character journey and being a relatively controversial figure in the Minecraft space. I find his story so fascinating as a good man corrupted by war who slowly finds his way again. That's what I truly loved about the Dream SMP; everyone is so humanly flawed yet lovable and engaging. If all goes according to plan, the next character should also be a more unsung one. 

Both of these series are definitely ones I'll be revisiting. Undertale is definitely coming back eventually. I mean, can I really say I have covered Undertale if I don't have a blog about Sans? I'm not sure how long I should keep doing DSMP blogs for, given the series has a questionable reputation and some very questionable people. Still, at the end of the day, it's a story, and it is one I like. There are still so many characters I want to cover badly, and passion makes a great blog.

These series have impacted my life and have allowed me to develop into who I am today. It hits the closest to home for me. Also, Technoblade. Fly High. <3

 

What's Next?

Oh right, what's next? Usually I give a hint of what series I want to cover, but I don't think I'll do that this year. With my timetable for the year getting more strict, it's getting increasingly difficult to ensure I get all the content I want out there. I don't want to over-promise with series like Sonic or Ben 10 with crazy amounts of lore.

Blog Shorts should come out soon, which has been a mini project I have been working on which can hopefully fill time within projects. You will hear about that soon enough. >;)  Next year, I plan to get about 7 Blogs out there, the same as this year. This schedule is one I really like. It gives me time to go off the deep end with detail, yet have time to live life, focus on other hobbies, or just try to survive.

I won't promise too much just yet. We'll see where life takes us. Quite frankly, it hasn't been the best year. I've lost good friends and struggled with mental problems. Some of my favourite creators turned out to be not great people, and I still miss Techno. 2025 doesn't look too much better, especially being queer and seeing all the politics bullshit going around.

Still, there's things to look forward to, and things to celebrate. I have friends that I would die for, projects that I'm excited to work on, and series that have me eagerly awaiting for more. There's more plot twists to the story, and we'll just have to see where it goes next.

So stay tuned, stay safe, keep finding hope

and I'll see you all soon.

Next time:

 

Granolah VS Magneto 

( Dragon Ball Super VS Marvel Comics )