I’ve been looking back and forth between Reinhardt’s and Hana’s animated shorts. Both of them include the main character carrying a burden on their shoulders but what I want to know is why the D.Va “Shooting Star” cinematic barely put any meat on the bones in understanding what Hana has actually seen herself, with her own eyes? This has been boggling my mind ever since the short released because I do not like D.Va (sorry). However, I do want to like Hana Song. I watched PlayOverwatch’s Behind the Scenes making of the short and in the first 20 to 30 seconds of the video, Ben Dai quotes from Jeff Kaplan about how they should tell the story of D.Va that “only a few people know”. And I thought this was a great idea, but at the 1:20 minute mark where they talked about the flashback scene is what really confused me. Why is there no actual emphasis on the flashback?
I want to follow this up with what editor Jake Patton says when mentioning the flashback scene in which he says, “…for me, it really works as a peek at what D.Va is carrying on her shoulders as the hero of Busan, and as the main character for our piece.” I respect that the opinion of someone’s artistic design but if that flashback scene is what supposedly made Hana who she is today, why is the topic being in a thrown around like a hot potato in this conversation between Hana and this Dae-hyun guy who apparently is supposed to be D.Va’s childhood friend? Is he the next Overwatch hero to be released for the game like Brigitte in Reinhardt’s short? (Nah I’m kidding).
I started researching all that I could find about D.Va so far, from possible comics I missed about her (none), that one 2 second footage I saw of her flying under some robot’s foot (can’t find it under all the people reuploading the D.Va short). All I can find is stuff on the wiki which is doesn’t provide any emotional backbone to the short besides her E-Sports teammates and that’s what setting me off. There was so much potential to recreate the emotional impact like Reinhardt’s short. It MADE me want to care about these nameless soldiers who Reinhardt was supposed to protect, and ultimately his brother-in-arms, Balderich. Why couldn’t there be a story of D.Va fighting alongside her E-sports teammates against the giant omnic? Is it going to be saved for a limited time story event like the Archives?
It’s very situational and maybe even unagreeable to compare the trauma of an old veteran to that of a simple 19 year old girl but there’s one thing I want to point out, referring again to the flashback scene. There was an expression that gave me a few goosebumps and it was on the 1:23 minute mark in the short. Hana had this genuinely frightened / shocked / scared expression on her face during that moment and that stood out to me more than the action scene with all the tentacle omnic things. The current D.Va that I know is bubbly but that 1 second of her with that expression could’ve easily overthrown nearly all of the 8 minutes from the short trying to tell that same expression.
The rest of the Behind the Scenes after the talk about the flashback scene had me honestly annoyed. It was 4 minutes describing the action scene with the squid droids and the aftermath scene and how there was “a lot of work going into making [D.Va] look natural”. And in my head, I felt like she’s only half natural. She does talk like a normal person as they wanted her to be in the short, that much is very true, but it’s only a shell. A taco shell, more precise, because the meat, lettuce, tomatoes, and whatever else people put on their tacos, is what help makes a taco taste good. And this animated short is only the taco shell with lettuce in it. I can only hope that what Michael Chu said in this forum post I saw can improve on Hana Song’s background. MEKA SQUAD LORE (MICHAEL CHU INTERVIEW)