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heyiwrotesomethings · 2 years

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She’s the Housekeeper Prt2: Anya’s Reward

Yor Briar/ Forger x She/Her Reader

A/N: Prt1 Prt3 Sorry for the wait, but part two is finally here and part three is already in the works! I hope you all like it! I feel a little iffy about this retelling of episode 5, but ep 6 is going well so far! I am curious to know if you guys mind following the original story so closely or if you would prefer some kind of departure from the original plot. Since this was originally just going to be a oneshot, I’m not sure what people would like to see from this fic. Whatever happens, I’m fairly certain I’ll end this story when season one ends or sooner depending on people’s interest. I’d like to get to Yuri’s episode at the very least, but I know there is a big edition to the family coming up that I want to see and write about 👀. Thanks for reading! Word Count: 2,348

With Anya’s enrollment to Eden nearly secure, everyone was eager to relax. Just one more phone call, and everything would be set in stone.

While Anya colored and watched tv, Loid washed the dishes from lunch. Yor dozed on the couch with her head resting on (Y/n)’s thighs while her partner read a book and ran the fingers of her free hand through Yor’s hair, only stopping long enough to turn the pages before continuing on. The atmosphere was peaceful,

And then the phone rang.

Loid picked up on the second ring, his hands still dripping with water and dish soap as he greeted the caller and listened intently to whoever was on the line.

(Y/n) craned her neck to gauge his reactions and felt hope rise within her when he smiled and his eyes took on an excited gleam. Loid thanked the caller and hung up.

Anya leapt to her feet, “Did I do it, papa?” She asked. Though judging by the look on her face she already knew the answer and squealed happily when Loid picked her up high over his head and smiled proudly at her.

“You did it, Anya!” He declared, swinging the little girl around.

“Congratulations!” (Y/n) clapped quietly, but the combined noise and shift in the energy of the room caused Yor to awaken anyway.

“Congratulations…” Yor slowly sat up and peaked over the couch, rubbing the corner of her eye, “what are we congratulating?”

“Miss Anya is going to Eden, honey.” (Y/n) informed the sleepy woman who immediately perked up.

“Congratulations Miss Anya!”

“Anya is going to school!” The little girl proudly proclaimed. All of her dancing had really paid off!

During their mini celebration, a round of knocks sounded from the door that put everything on pause.

“I thought you said no one was coming today!” (Y/n) hissed quietly. She rolled off of the couch and disappeared down the hall to her and Yor’s room. There wouldn’t be enough time to change into her ‘uniform’ so she would have to hide until whoever the person was left.

“No one was supposed to come,” Loid confirmed, but looking through the peep hole he called back, “It’s alright, it’s my friend Franky. You can come back.”

“Hey! Heard the good news so I thought I’d come by and bring a little something to celebrate with!” Franky greeted Loid with a couple bottles of wine as the door swung open to let him in.

“Thank you, Franky. That’s very kind.” Yor took the bottles from his arms and put them on the table, already itching to pop a bottle open.

“How do you know already?” (Y/n) asked. “We literally got the call only a few minutes ago.”

“Ah, I just have a sixth sense for these kind of things, you know?” Franky laughed. He noticed the warning look Loid gave him and was reminded that (Y/n) and Yor weren’t in the loop. It could be troublesome if they thought Loid was shady for having Franky get him the test answers.

(Y/n) gave him a questioning look, but her eyes happened to flick in Yor’s direction and the third glass of wine she was pouring and she didn’t care anymore.

“Yor, slow down. That’s too much!” She scolded, running past the men and Anya to try to cut her partner off.

Yor saw her coming and already being as drunk as she was, she quickly chugged the rest of the glass. It was like trying to get a piece of plastic away from a cat.

“No more of that.” (Y/n) ordered sternly, poking Yor in the chest.

Yor tried to pout, but quickly fell apart into a giggling mess, bumping her head hard into (Y/n)’s chest.

“You are such a light weight.” She griped, helping Yor down into a chair.

“Did she save any for us?” Franky laughed, plopping into a seat opposite the couple and filling a glass for himself.

“Yeah, sorry about that. I don‘t know what got into her.”

“Anya wants fruit juice!”

“Of course, sweetie. Oh,” Before (Y/n) could get up, Yor wrapped around her like a sloth, “Loid can you do it. I have another child to look after at the moment.”

“Poke, poke, poke.” Yor giggled, pressing her finger against (Y/n)’s cheeks and nose. (Y/n) grabbed her hand and forced it down back into Yor’s lap.

“Right.” Loid retrieved the juice for Anya with an amused smile.

“So Anya, have you told your dad what kind of reward you want for getting into Eden? He’ll buy you anything you want you know.” Franky declared with a troublesome grin.

Anya sat quietly for a minute, swaying her dangling feet to and fro.

“I don’t need papa to buy me anything.” She said, looking down modestly, “I would like to do something though.”

“Sure! Just say the word and your papa will do it!” Franky cheered after taking another swig of wine, Loid gave him a tired glare, but turned to Anya with a reassuring smile.

“Anya wants papa to save her from a castle!” Anya spoke resolutely, pointing to the tv as Bondman was zip-lining into a castle.

“A castle, hm?” (Y/n) gave Loid a look that said, ‘good luck with that, buddy’ and Loid rubbed his forehead.

“That is not a very realistic request, Anya. Isn’t there something else you would rather do?”

“C’mon, it’s more doable than you think,” Franky sat back in his chair, “that castle got remodeled as a theme park. It can be rented out.”

Loid closed his eyes, thinking, then he nodded.

“I need to make a phone call.”

***

“So you can just make a phone call and get a private plane a couple hours later? What kind of psychiatrist are you?” (Y/n) asked as she helped both Anya and Yor with their seatbelts. She thought hiring a private plane was a little too bougie for the man to afford. Especially when his profession apparently included beating the snot out of his patients.

“I have my sources. Here,” Loid attempt to divert (Y/n)’s attention with a glass of wine, “you didn’t get to have any at home.”

“Someone has to keep an eye on her.” She gestured to Yor, but she took the glass anyway, holding it out of reach of Yor’s grabby hands, “actually, maybe a little wouldn’t hurt.”

“Fank you berry mush fur alwaysh looking out fur me, lub youuu.”

“Shhh, Yor, I know— hey! Where did you get that wine bottle?”

While (Y/n) wrestled the bottle away with one hand, not an easy feat, Loid started the plane and took off, Franky and Anya cheered as the plane ascended into the air and found its cruising altitude.

Before long, the castle came into sight, glowing against the darkness of the night sky.

“Looks pretty good, don’t you think?” Franky grinned over his shoulder at Anya.

“Anya is excited!” The little girl’s eyes gleamed while she pressed her face against the glass.

“It is a very pretty sight.” (Y/n) said, peeking out of Anya’s window as well.

“Show prettyyy.” Yor agreed, though her eyes hadn’t left her partner’s body for most of the plane ride and now wasn’t much different.

Loid found a place to land and the Forger’s and Company tumbled out of the plane and into the grand, empty castle.

Franky and Anya ran around for a minute or two before Anya stopped, a small frown on her face.

“What’s wrong, Anya?” Her father asked.

“It doesn’t feel right without servants and enemies. It makes me sad.”

“I know, right? Poor little Princess,” Franky shot Loid a disappointed pout of his own, “papa better step up his game.”

Loid’s eye twitched.

“Where are you going?” (Y/n) asked Loid as Yor clumsily spun her around the ballroom.

“I need to make a phone call.”

***

“Seriously, what is your deal? How did you get all these people so fast?” (Y/n) inquired. The ballroom had transformed into a lively party before her very eyes. She didn’t care what unorthodox practices he held, there was no way he was making this kind of money as a psychiatrist.

Loid opened his mouth to craft a flawless lie, but it was unneeded as (Y/n) had to stop Yor from disappearing into the crowd of spies turned party goers. Loid was actually thankful for the distractions a drunk Yor provided. (Y/n) was too observant and curious for her own good.

He took the stage as Franky dictated and sent out his message to the crowd before handing the reins back to the informant who began a flawless theatrical performance and set the scene.

“Here is our star, Princess Anya!”

“And here is the spy who is going to save me, Loidman!” Anya beamed, directing the spotlight onto Loid.

“And our villain Count Scruffy!” She continued, the light fell back on Franky who rubbed his hands together dastardly.

“And mahh, ah, Ms. (Y/n) will be mama’s keeper!”

“Seems a little on the nose, but okay.” (Y/n) mumbled with a mirthful smile and gave a little wave to the crowd as the light fell on her and Yor.

“And mama will be… whatever.” Anya finished, causing Yor’s mouth to fall open in shock.

“I’ll need your help to keep Loidman out of my way subordinates, keep him away as long as you can!” Franky called out with a evil laugh.

He ushered Anya, (Y/n) and Yor into pod attraction that steadily began to raise higher.

“If you want Princess Anya back, come get her! Scruffy scruff scruff!” Franky laughed watching Loid grow smaller and smaller the further away they got from the floor.

“Good luck!” (Y/n) chuckled at Loid’s face. He looked a little out of his depth.

Before long, a breeze wafted around them and they were outside. (Y/n) and Yor watched on with varied degrees of amusement as a short quiz ensued, leading to Loid having to put on a Bondman costume. It was nothing extreme, but watching Loid blush before putting that cheap mask over his eyes made (Y/n) laugh.

Then the action really kicked off.

“This is like, the production value of a blockbuster movie.” (Y/n) commented, watching Loid fight henchman and dodge the giant balls being shot at him. “Wow, he can really move.”

“And so can we!” Franky said with another evil laugh, making the balloon pod rise above the tower.

“Save me, Loidman!” Anya called out as the balloon ascended.

Loid scaled the steps of the tower with impressive form and dexterity, but when before he reached the top, Franky was off again. Loid leapt from the castle tower and zip-lined to the end of the line of Count Scruffy and his crew.

“I’m surprised you made it this far Loidman, but I won’t give you the Princess!”

“Save me, Loidman!” Anya called out again. She was having the time of her life.

“Hand over the Princess.” Loid gave the command with a lackluster delivery.

(Y/n) snickered again, covering her face in her hands and for but a moment, let go of Yor’s arm. That would prove to be a grave error on her part. A whoosh of air, and when (Y/n) looked up, Yor was up out of her seat and wobbling down the steps towards Loid.

“The most powerful witch in the world! Free from her keeper’s shackles,” Franky rolled with the change easily, “Go, Yorticia!”

“Oh no.” (Y/n) groaned. Wherever this was going it couldn’t possibly be good. She got to her feet and followed after Yor, but even drunk Yor was faster than her.

“Shit!” She hissed under her breath, quickening her pace as Yor threw a deadly kick at Loid’s head that he barely managed to escape with little more than a scratch. “Yor, that’s enough!”

If Yor heard her lover, she gave no indication, instead charging Loid again.

“Anyone who triiies t’ kinnnap Miss Anya, will not geh away alive!”

Yor then proceeded to beat the absolute stuffing out of Loid. All the while (Y/n) ran to catch up and tried to catch Yor’s attention. If she accidentally killed Loid that would be bad on so many levels!

Then by the grace of god, Yor pivoted harshly on the heel of her shoe, snapping it. The sudden detriment to her balance worked with her drunken state to send her crashing to the ground. (Y/n) only made it just in time to catch her head before it hit against the cobble stone.

“Is she alright?” Loid asked, sounding every bit as winded as he looked.

“Fell asleep. Finally.” (Y/n) breathed a sigh of relief. No one would have to die tonight.

“Scruffy scruffy scruff! And so the witch is back in the hands of the keeper! Good work getting this far, Loidman! But you won’t defeat me s—“

Loid smacked Franky none too gently in the face, sending the informant hurdling to the ground. He walked passed without a second glance and stopped in front of Anya and offered his hand, flushed with embarrassment at having to keep playing along.

“I’m here to rescue you, Princess Anya.” He mumbled.

“Papa!” Anya yelled excitedly, running up to hug him.

There was not a dry eye among his fellow spies as the fireworks were set off, signaling the end of the glorious chase.

(Y/n) watched the father-daughter duo talk from a distance, smiling warmly. They were so sweet! She looked down at Yor, snoring peacefully in her lap and brushed the sleeping woman’s bangs from her eyes before turning her attention back to the fireworks lighting up the sky.

(Y/n) sighed, she sure hoped Loid was strong, because she would need help carrying Yor into the plane. She was almost pure muscle. She heard Yor whine after a particularly loud boom, no doubt her head was already starting to ache. (Y/n) pressed her hands over Yor’s ears, doing her best to muffle the fireworks.

Yor snuggled closer and her hand came up to rest against one of (Y/n)’s, a peaceful smile appeared on her flushed face and (Y/n)’s eyes softened in return.

What a night it had been.

#spy family x reader #spy x family x reader #yor x reader #yor briar x reader #yor forger x reader #yor briar #yor forger

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eyeopeningarchivist · 8 months

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Statement of Phoebe Morris

Concerning: The disappearance of her wedding planner.

Statement Taken: August 20th, 2013

Statement Recorded by Martin Blackwood, archival assistant at the Magnus Institute, London.

Statement Begins:

This happened just a little over a week ago and I'm... still struggling to comprehend it. Michelle and I had wanted to get married for quite some time. We just couldn't decide on when and where. She wanted to go somewhere expensive, extravagant, and grandiose but I wanted something more low-key. Something intimate and quiet. The only thing we could agree on was that we wanted to do it in another country. It was her idea to find a wedding planner and that led us to Philo Newcomb.

I... had mixed feelings about Newcomb from the beginning, honestly. He always seemed... I dunno, preppy? Eager? Overly friendly somehow. And I just wasn't quite sure he knew what he was talking about. I wasn't sure how you could make beige look garish and loud but his suit managed it and the ideas he had for how our wedding should look didn't sound much better but Michelle seemed to like him and he at least seemed friendly. It helped that the location he was trying to sell us seemed gorgeous. It was a massive estate in Mendoza, Argentina with a beautiful sunset view over the balcony. It was apparently owned by some local big shot lawyer in the area or something and Newcomb had been nice enough to pay for our tickets himself. So, I was split.

But then... he showed up. Philo was leading us down to the vineyard when a man in a security uniform stopped me. He was a rather large, bald man with a stoic expression on his face. His whole head seemed completely clean-shaven, not even a spec of stubble anywhere. And I remember his badge said "Tobias Rieper." He said "I think you should look at this" in an even tone and shoved a scrapbook into my hands. It contained... locks of hair... and pictures of corpses and... newspaper clippings of mourning brides and grooms over the course of decades. And on the very last page was a picture of Michelle and I on a date, with Philo's face crudely taped over mine. By the time I looked up, Tobias Rieper had already left.

I got Michelle out of there as fast as I could. I made some excuse about getting the flight bookings wrong and all but dragged her out of there. I-I didn't even explain anything until we got back to the hotel. I didn't even think to call anyone at first. Not until a few hours after we got back to our rooms. When I did pick up the phone, Michelle turned my attention to the tv. Philo Newcomb had been found dead at the estate. Having fallen over the railing from the top floor. With no suspects, police ruled his death an accident.

Michelle and I haven't discussed getting married since. We... need time. But, I thought that was it. That this was just a horrifying situation that we just barely got out of thanks to some help from a stranger. I didn't think there was anything supernatural about it. Until I tried to thank Tobias Rieper for his help.

From what I could find, there is no record of anyone by the name of "Tobias Rieper" working at that estate. Not as security, as wait staff, nothing. So I looked him up online. I got a ton of results online. A corporate liquidator from New York. An all star chef from France. But nothing about our mysterious security guard. But as I kept digging, I saw a pattern. There were never any photographs of him, but sometimes there were... stories attached. Stories about people meeting a mysterious stone faced, completely bald man named Tobias Rieper on the same day as a mysterious disappearance and never finding him again. Meeting a talented rock drummer the same day a famous rock star gets shot. Meeting a stone faced mechanic the same day as the grand prix accident. The name and face is always the same. The only thing that changes is the clothes. Like a mannequin trying on a new suit.

Statement ends.

Notes:

We tried to look up this Tobias Rieper as well and, well, we found just as much as is mentioned in the statement. Tim did, however, manage to dig up the lowest possible quality photograph of someone who matches the description of Mr. Rieper, only this man is labeled as “Lutte Faucheur,” an ex accountant from around the Bordeaux region who was let go from his firm after claiming to have “Visions From God...” Something about his eyes in the photo... He looks tired...

As for the mentioned events, we looked into them just to make sure they all lined up and they do, the only detail missing being that Philo Newcomb’s death was ruled by the Argentinian... Argentine? Er, the police in Argentina said they figured he was drunk when he fell. No autopsy report was filed but given the nature of his death and the fact that it happened where it did, well, I guess they just put two and two together...

For what it’s worth, both "Lutte" and "Faucheur" are words in french... Lutte meaning "Struggle” and Faucheur meaning "Reaper..."

End recording.

#the magnus archives #martin blackwood #@autisticsupervillain

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adultswim2021 · 2 months

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The Venture Bros. #42: "Blood of the Father, Heart of Steel" | October 19, 2009 - 12:00AM | S04E01

Hey! It’s a TV Show I actually like! But it’s also a show I like enough that I feel compelled to watch the blu-ray extras for. Hell, this episode had me watching a fan-edit. What can I say? I’m in love!!!!

I can’t really get into the story of this episode without first talking about it’s unorthodox structure. Basically, the episode jumps around through time in a particular way. We cut back and forth between Brock’s story, which covers what he did immediately after walking off the job as the Venture’s bodyguard. The other story-line is what happens back at the Venture compound. Brock’s story occurs forward in time, like most stories in most episodes of most shows do. BUT: the stuff taking place at the Venture compound is shown to us in reverse order.

There’s also complimentary motifs for each subplot: Brock’s scenes all have a title card that correlates to the original stories found in Marvel Comics #1 from 1939. The Venture’s scenes begin with a CGC rating for a comic book being flashed on screen, which correlates to an actual copy of Marvel Comics #1 which is in the Venture’s possession. As the story moves backwards we find out that the comic has suffered a lot of careless abuse, going from a 9.6 NM grading to a 0.0 (or from 0.0 to 9.6 the way we see it).

Slightly confusing is Brock’s story occasionally finds him at the Venture compound, so there’s some crossover. There’s also visual transitions from one scene to the next, even if it involves a significant time jump. Brock’s story primarily takes place early in the timeline, while the Venture compound stuff takes place later in the timeline.

The episode’s cold open starts off with a scene that takes place right at the end of the season three finale, with the Monarch’s car exploding. It takes Brock out, who gets scooped up by the O.S.I. They take him aboard their S.H.I.E.L.D. ship and fix his heart by using robot HELPeR.’s head, sorta like an Iron Man heart (a character in the episode later mentions that robot hearts became all the rage since the Iron Man movie came out). Brock visits the surgeon that gave Hunter his sex change and gets a replacement put in, freeing HELPeR from his imprisonment in Brock’s chest. Brock mails HELPeR’s head to the Ventures wrapped in his jacket, which Hank takes and treats like a sacred object (we also see him wearing it defiantly in the face of Hatred's insistence that he and the Ventures wear uniforms).

Brock hides out for a bit with Steve Summers, the Bionic Man, whom he memorably gifts a bad painting to as part of his art therapy (I remember this painting being an avatar on a message board I posted on. This information is incredibly important to me, so I’m putting it here, parenthetically). Brock goes to spy on the Blackhearts and Hunter, who you may or may not recall doublecrossed Brock at the end of season three. Basically he was working with the Blackhearts in sending various assassins Brock’s way, lying to him about the OSI being behind it, for the sole purpose of just having Brock kill the Blackhearts’ competition. So that’s why Brock is seeking retribution.

Brock’s confrontation goes poorly, and Brock gets blasted out the Blackheart’s highrise headquarters. It’s here where he gets scooped up by Sphinx, and we find out Hunter was actually working with Sphinx as a mole in the Blackhearts. He also has his dick back (or he’s stuffing; but it's strongly implied he has, or has had, a pecker). It’s truly a banner day for those who like it when people have penises (the default genital).

Meanwhile, the Ventures plot involves them taking on Hatred as their new bodyguard. We see him in the OSI airship, undergoing some kind of chemical castration (or perhaps something more super-sciency), so I guess we don’t have to worry about him molesting the boys. Sorta fucked up, but the idea of “this is just a cartoon and also it’s meant for adults” used to cover a lot more ground in 2009 than it does now. The scene which introduces the fact that Hatred is now their bodyguard just jumps right into it: showing him already established and in the early stages of whipping the boys into shape. We’re also introduced to the HELPeR head being fused with the Venture walking eye.

This scene, which has Hatred trying to make a breakthrough with Hank by having Hank shoot him, is maybe my favorite scene in the episode. It’s especially funny, and it introduces this new dynamic really beautifully. Noted in the commentary; Doc was charged with writing this scene and Jackson thought it would be a little more spelled-out with Hatred formally introducing himself as the new bodyguard. The just-jumping in approach yielded a wonderful scene. It's especially good to start an in-universe shake-up on the right foot, and that's what they goddamn did, gosh darn it.

Also going on at the homestead: Venture is approached by both 21 and a group of Nazis (separately) to do some cloning work. 21 wants to bring back 24, and gives Venture his NM copy of Marvel Comics #1 as payment. Venture is incredulous that a dusty old comic book could be worth anything, and immediately lets Hank have it. We already know that he fucks it up all nasty-like, thanks to the reverse-story telling. 21 is dismayed to learn that the clone of 24 will be a baby on account of the clone slugs’ destruction.

The Nazis are looking to clone Hitler, whose brain seems to be in the body of a bulldog that takes a liking to Dean, which causes friction when it’s decided that the moral thing to do would be to murder it. This resolves with a parody of the ending of Raiders of the Lost Ark, where Orpheus melts the Nazis into goo as well as destroying all of the clone pods (this was a very deliberate way of putting the whole clone thing to rest). This is one of the first scenes of the episode, so it’s not really a spoiler. A scene taking place immediately after these events plays after the credits, where Brock shows up, kills Hitler with the Hitler-killing Golden dagger (how’d he get that?) has some words with Hank, and then takes off.

I had historically considered this episode to be a bit of a failed experiment, at least in the way that it’s very confusing to the first-time viewer. Now that I’ve been through the series a few times (and have even deigned to watch a fan-edit that reorganizes the scenes in chronological order) this episode’s confusing structure gets less jarring with every viewing. Noted in the commentary: the intended effect was for the initial watch-through to confuse the viewer, and have it make sense by the end and especially on repeat viewings. Mission accomplished, I guess.

Anyway, I always approach this episode with low expectations, but this time I found a lot to love about it. I was dramatically composing grandiose sentences in my head about how season three managed to find the show going up it’s own ass, and that this episode starts the season on a similar footing. It takes a few viewings, but I more-or-less think this episode is great, and I admire the experiment.

I will point out that after watching the chronology cut of the episode, that the Ventures story does seem like it’s missing some important pieces of the puzzle. Like, the story jumps past important beats, and having the episode show this story backwards does distract from these story holes. The Go Team Venture book does cop to the idea that this is roughly the reason for showing the one subplot in reverse order as a "fix".

This episode also kicks off Brock not being in the show for a while; he bids adieu to Hank and wouldn’t be seen for a little while. This decision, along with the playing of the timeline of the episode’s story, are characterized as being part of some larger mental collapse felt in particular by Jackson Publick, who asked Adult Swim to change the order from a single 13 episode season to a two-part season with 8 episodes in each part. He just wasn’t up to the task of writing more episodes, and was afraid of crashing and burning and fucking up with their money. Quitting smoking seemed to have a lot to do with it. He was also working on Superjail around this time, as well.

One last thing! The confusion of the episode’s scrambled order was exacerbated on the west coast by an error: Adult Swim aired the first act of the episode twice. So, after the commercial break, the first half started over. Given the nature of the episode, it probably seemed intentional at first. I don't remember seeing it live. More likely is I was recording it and was planning to watch it when it was over (or close to over), so I could fast forward through the commercials. I probably found out what happened online first. I have a vague recollection of feeling grateful that I knew where to find a torrent of the episode, recorded on the east coast.

Okay, one last LAST thing, actually: One tidbit I liked from the "Art of" book: the original idea for Brock's bad painting was to show him staying up all night passionately painting said painting and having that be the reveal. Funny!

#adult swim #adultswim2021 #the venture bros.

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fancysasquatch · 5 months

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Just saw the new Hunger Games movie after obsessively consuming the book over the course of the past few days. 900+ word review below the cut. Spoiler warning for Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, obviously, but spoiler warning for William Friedkin's Bug (2006) too.

The short version of this is going to be that the movie works fine enough on it's own, but is very disappointing as an adaptation to a book I really enjoyed.

Before I start getting into negatives, I'll start with what I liked. The acting was overall fine. Jason Schwartzman was no Stanley Tucci as the tv host but he was still pretty good. Viola Davis knocked it out of the park as the mad scientist Dr. Gaul. Peter Dinklage didn't have much to do outside of one monologue at the end which was ruined by poor direction.

I also really liked the art design of the movie. The brutalist architecture was reminiscent of post-war Europe, particularly the Soviet Union. The military uniforms were sufficiently Nazi-esque without being tasteless. I saw a social realist-style poster in the background in District 12. The technology in the Capitol had a postwar Mid-century Modern aesthetic while in the poorer districts it looked like older technology from the 30s and 40s (including a video chatting device that looked like a candlestick telephone). Altogether it conveyed the idea that this happened decades ago, in relation to the original trilogy, and took place not too long after a major war. Very well done.

Now to get into the parts I didn't like too much. I'm still too much of a philistine to pay much attention to the directing/editing/cinematography side of things during my first viewing of a movie, but there were a few things that stood out to me. As I mentioned, Peter Dinklage has a monologue at the end which could have been very good it it wasn't filmed in flat shot-reverse shot with uninteresting framing, blocking, set design, and lighting. There was also a moment in the middle of the film which where the main characters have their last conversation the night before one will be fighting and possibly dying in the Hunger Games, but most of it is filmed in a profile shot of their faces leaning into towards the bars of her cage. The visual metaphor was a bit too on-the-nose, and the shot itself was framed in an awkwardly claustrophobic way.

That was all preamble though, and the bulk of this review is about the writing, specifically how they condensed a 500 page book into a 150 page screenplay. Obviously a lot had to be cut or shortened, and sometimes they did it well. For instance, the first minute or two covers several different page-long flashbacks which tell you all you really need to know. But some changes really hurt the pacing and even quality of the story.

The first part of the book covers the month leading up to the Hunger Games, but the movie condenses that down into a few days, so everything seems rushed because you have a week's worth of plot development happening in a single busy afternoon. The two main characters fall in love after meeting 5(?) times for a total of about 30 minutes. There was also a scene rewritten for no reason which was completely ruined, where a girl willingly sticks her hand into a cage of snakes she nows will attack her rather than admit to lying about helping on an essay (in the book she's tricked into it as part of a cruel test).

Almost the entirety of the Hunger Games itself was rewritten, although that's something I was fine with because it was different but not worse. The games as written would have been boring, and the version they had was a solid ~30 minute substitute.

The last section of the movie might have been butchered even worse than the beginning. A lot of that section of the book is Snow experiencing a simpler life in District 12, so when he gets a chance to go back to the capital there's a question of whether he chooses that life or his new life, which plays into the books themes of control and freedom. The movie barely shows his new life, so it's more of a question of whether he gets everything he wants in life or some girl he met two weeks ago he sorta likes.

The climax is also heavily bungled. Instead of his paranoia getting the better of him during one of his downward spirals, causing him to turn on Lucy Gray when he thinks she turns on him, she actually just turns on him. It's possible for a movie to capture losing your grip on reality like that, like the climax of Bug where the main duo feed into one another's mania until they burn themselves alive (that movie rules btw), but this movie didn't use any of the moviemaking techniques that . She also pretty unambiguously survives which is worse than the book, where her fate is left up to interpretation like the Wordsworth poem she's named after.

Just in general this movie suffers because it lacks the insight that came from the book being from Snow's point of view. We lose all of his internality, good and bad, so he's much flatter and less consistent. That theme of control vs freedom I mentioned runs throughout the book, but mostly in his internal dialogue, so in the movie we just get a few disjointed "this is what I believe" monologues from various characters that don't work as well.

To end on a positive note, I'll say there was one more change I liked. At the end of the movie, Snow's cousin Tigris very visibly sees Snow for what he is and is reasonably scared of him, which is better than in the book where they're all one big happy family.

#Hunger Games #ballad of songbirds and snakes #movie review

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aeonianarchives · 1 year

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Far Beyond the Stars

Prologue | A Broken dream

AU: Space Age Word count: 1.6K Summery: Lindir loses his job as a sci fy writer so he decides to moves back to his hometown where chaos is sure to ensure TW: slight Homophobia

Taglist: @eunoiaastralwings | @aetherofthepen | @antares0606 (you seemed intrested in this AU so I hope you don't mind I tagged you)

╔═══*.·:·.☽✧ ✦ ✧☾.·:·.*═══╗

Ever since Lindir was a small boy he had always been interesting in space from nights stargazing with his father on the roof which in hindsight was very dangerous and something Lindir would never do again, to books he read, he dreamed of the stars, he dreamed of life out there, exploring the stars was all Lindir ever dreamed off, he truly did wonder what was up there, but alas he could only turn his love for the stars into music and writing he could never get up there himself, for many reasons, he was too nervous to even sign up to a space course, and he much preferred fantasy so making space fantasy in song and writing was right up his alley.

Lindir dodged through two parked cars and ran across the street in between the cars to get to the otherside a small stall that was selling newspapers and magazines, it was painted green and made of metal, a man sat with his legs up on a table inside it, it had a rainshield going around it and above it, it read Newsstand, the papers where set on the table and held on the front of it the stall even had a copy of the rival publishers of Lindir’s he picked up the small book and flipped through the pages.

“Does anyone actually like this crap, I know people are calling this the space age but men on mars are barely realistic” the man said behind the counter his voice was husky and unpleasant, Lindir reached into his pocket and gave the man the money for the book.

“It has a certain charm to it I believe, some imagination to it, some people prefer stuff which is less realistic or has almost no chance of being true and leaves it to the imagination” Lindir said as his friend who was in the city at this time wrapped an arm around him.

“They are dreamers, let there dreams go to far and are even more broken when the caves in on top of them, I prefer the good old detective books” The man said

“This is the city where dreams are supposed to come true” Lindir said

“That's a child’s dream, I thought that too when I first came here all it brought me was bankruptcy and ruin that's how I ended up running a stall like this” The man said

Was this just a dream which would blow up in his face, he hadn’t been published on his publishers book since last august and that was 3 months ago, this work maybe his publishers final straw and the stallman was right his dream would cave in on him but he had come so far.

“Hey songbird did you catch the news, of the new mission, apparently it was a success even if we reached space after the soviets we could probably get to the moon before them” Elladan said pulling Lindir away from the stand and into a conversation, he was in his uniform unlike the last time Lindir saw him

“I did it was rather exciting to watch it on master Erestor’s tv set, I would of loved to see the launch in person next time” Lindir said as Elladan walked the elder to the office

“Well see you later, I have a meeting to get to there is a reason I’m in the big city wanna meet up at the old dinner we went to the first night we first got to the big city” Elladan questioned

“I would love to, but the dinner changed ownership last year, still the same place but different dinner” Lindir said Elladan nodded and ran off as Lindir walked in and up to his office.

“There he is the man of the hour what did you do with the drawing did your magic hands to there work”

“Galaxy has printed it’s new issue” Lindir said placing it down but the papers in the envelope which sat under his arm where stolen

“Hey give that back” Lindir said snatching at the paper

“Oh a Sherlock Holmes esque style of story on a collany within the moon’s surface, I didn’t know you could read anything but Sci Fi you live for it nor did I know you like British writers” The man Halor said as the women took it

“Lindir the main character of this is a women now you can write women well, you are a very well feminine man but the public wouldn’t like it, nor would they like the homosexual detective”

“Society has stepped back in time pirates and Vikings cared little of who anyone else liked so what if a man likes a man” Lindir snapped

“Lindir are you, there is nothing wrong with you if you are but this seems rather personal to you” halor questioned almost knowing or suspecting the answer

“So what if i am” Lindir said

“So if you are you don’t like me right” he asked just to make sure

“You lot are insufferable and no Halor I don’t even like you, your far from my type in men anyway if I was gay, which I am not but it would be totally fine if I was '' Lindir muttered to himself while sitting down, Lindir and the rest of them managed to convince the editor to send Lindir’s novel off, the hours ticked slowly for Lindir waiting to see if the publisher accepted to publish his work it was doubtful.

Lindir covered his ears with his hands, the clock ticking was way louder than normal it seemed, and time seemed to slow. It was painfully slow for Lindir, the editor got back and hung his hat and coat on the coat hanger.

“We are not publishing this months volume” The editor said

“It’s because of what I wrote isn’t it, because of the main character being a woman and homosexuals isn’t it” Lindir said

“No it’s not, there is nothing wrong with what you wrote but the worry is the public will not like the woman protagonist or the detective he has decided to play it safe and not publish it Mr Tyelkormo is also under a lot of stress as Galaxy is getting more reads than us, so we need to start on next month where we will release two books, but for the bad news which I have to be the unfortunate bearer of Mr Tyelkormo also said to let you know you have been let go Lindir, I’m sorry I really am but with the amount of times your story hasn’t been published in a row he has to let you go, don’t you have that job in the book store or the house your father owned in the suburbs” The Editor said

“No you know what he can’t fire me because I quit” Lindir said, getting his coat and hat and walking out. He sighed as he pulled his coat on as he walked out the building he made his way to the bookstore and opened the door.

“You don’t have a shift today Lindir” Erestor said as Lindir entered

“I know but I have free time, afterall Tyelkormo fired me” Lindir said making Erestor make an unsure noise

“You’re going to fire me as well I may as well move back to my fathers old house he hasn’t sold it” Lindir said

“No I’m not but I can’t bump up your pay or hire you for more days the shop is struggling I doubt it will stay open for much longer with that bigger book store just around the corner” Erestor said

“So what will you do when this place closes” Lindir said

“I won’t let it close, for as long as I can pay rent, but I will have to let you go at some point” Erestor said Lindir grumbled and left he would just find a job in the suburbs maybe he could become a self publishing author; that could work couldn’t it, or he could get hired in the old dive bar and sing instead of that one song on repeat from the broken Jukebox in the corner, that would be if Thranduil would hire him, dropping out to become an author didn’t work like dropping out worked for Elladan and Arwen they were semi successful, Arwen had an agent which was getting her hired he had seen her in commercials and Elladan as much as he was hyper to his credit Elladan knew what he was doing, he should of listen to Elrohir and Haldir and stayed in university with that part time job instead of finding a way out of university and moving to the big city just because he got the chance to he was so stupid to actually follow the chance he should of thought it through logically but he was to blinded by excitement to care back then.

He must of been to blinded by excitement to actually plan what to do if he got fired he should of done that he can’t afford rent for much longer given he had zero income now which meant he had to move back to his hometown, he could move into the house his dad had before he got the ranch get a part time at Thranduil’s bar and then help his father on the ranch, he didn’t really want to do that but it was what he had to do for now at least until a miracle happened which starts off his writing career or music one but he doubted that would happen any time soon, given his role of luck at the moment.

╚═══*.·:·.☽✧ ✦ ✧☾.·:·.*═══╝

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wuxiaphoenix · 1 year

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On Writing: History and the Fantastic

I love fantasy and SF worlds, where weirdness abounds and there’s a new monster or alien around every labyrinth corner. But I favor grounding the fantastic in as much history, science, and biology as you can handle. It adds depth and backstory to your world, and there are plenty of readers out there hungry not just for entertainment, but for information. When they read a story, they want to learn something.

For me, learning the history of Northeast Asia started with Blockbuster and Samurai X.

Note, prior to that I’d seen some anime; Sailor Moon, Monster Rancher, a few others. But they were all dubs on TV, and I had no idea they were anything beyond “new cartoons”.

(The internet was not something I could get easy access to at the time. Or I’d have found out otherwise.)

Samurai X, though - that was something completely different. The animation was beautiful, the swordfights like nothing I had seen before, and the apparent historical details (samurai and people in late 19th century uniforms, really?) were intriguing enough that I wanted to see if they were anything close to real. And so started my poking into manga (Rurouni Kenshin first, others later) and early modern Japan.

(Blockbuster is also how I got to see Gundam Wing, Princess Mononoke, Howl’s Moving Castle, and Spirited Away. I miss that store.)

Finding out that the Bakumatsu was real, not an invention of the writer, and samurai had indeed been running around killing each other with swords (and guns) about the same time as the American Civl War was... well. World-shaking isn’t exactly accurate. But it certainly shook up my view of history.

I also admit to a deep sympathy with anyone who wants to tell the rest of the world, “get off my lawn and stop bothering me”. In the long term it doesn’t work, other humans being first-class botherers, especially if they think you might be weaker than they are. But the impulse is real, and relatable.

This led to a lot of digging. A lot, and probably pulling out every book in nearby libraries related to that place and time.

Eventually this led to the MDZS animation, and then various c-dramas and k-dramas. Unfortunately library books on Ming, Yuan, Qing, Goryeo and Joseon are... locally nonexistent. But between internet niche articles and JSTOR, I can keep digging and filling in the gaps as I get one book at a time. Because this part of the past is a foreign world, and makes everything you thought familiar take on a new light. With that you reconsider your own history, how place makes a difference, and how the past leaves ghosts of customs, foods, attitudes, and fears in its wake.

The past was different. But often it’s presented as “more of the same, people just didn’t know as much”... unless you look at the past in a foreign land, where historians are more willing to focus on “this is how it was, wasn’t it weird?”

But humans are humans. If you can see how weird that past over there was, you know your own must be equally weird. And then you can start finding the cracks and oddities that were glossed over in the history “everyone knows”.

Here’s a tame example. Cattle drives and cowboys, the quintessential image of the Old West. Except prior to the Civil War, cattle drives were a major thing in the Southeast, stock being driven to the railheads for points north. Meaning after the war a lot of Southern drovers headed west away from Reconstruction and picked up their old job in a new place. Sometimes bringing their old grudges and a fair amount of PTSD with them

(Yes, the Civil War had PTSD. They called it “heatstroke”. It was considered serious and sufficient explanation for rare lethal shooting sprees years or decades later.)

Knowing all this, you can see that while the character of Nathan Algren in The Last Samurai may not be a historical person, he is a very historically plausible character. And that makes the story so much better.

Steal from the best. Give your worlds reality. Your stories will last with the reader, long after they close the book.

#creative writing #worldbuilding #history

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ledenews · 3 months

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Novotney: Snow Days Once Were Rare and Treasured

Uphill, both ways, without snow shoes but instead, something called galoshes over Pic Way shoes. That’s right, that’s what it was like to be a kid in the 1970s, and our story will not change. We didn’t have backpacks and our books were ridiculously gigantic and filled with mostly words and few photos. The boys, by the way, wore white shirts and long, polyester, blue pants and we had our NFL letterman jackets with matching toboggans, but the girls? Thin white blouses, and skirts. With no real options. It was cruel, really. And the snow seemed deeper and the temperatures lower, and our classrooms inside that old brick building were see-our-breath chilled with radiators waiting to scorch our bitterly brisk hands. Our recesses were moved from the church parking lots to inside the gymnasium, and at any second we were allowed outside, snowball flew with ill intent. But every once in a while, there was the “Snow Day.” The “Snow Day” seemed like another Sacrament from The Lord to a Catholic kid praying for a break from the day-ins and day-outs of a grade school education, but that’s because they were very rare. We had to watch some weird WACO station on Channel 3, or we had to see it on WTRF TV-7 or hear it from the DJs on WKWK. That’s what made it real. There were early mornings, too, when the school doors would be locked even if the news didn’t report the call-off, and those days were extra blessed because we were up and ready for the thrill a sleigh ride offered. In and out of the cellar doors we went all day long, and our mothers – who were able to be home back in those days – would yell about our soaking wet clothing one moment and offer us hot cocoa the next. Those inches of snow allowed us to ride our sleds and tubes, and we skied, played make-shift Olympics games, punished public buses, ate the white-colored snow when thirsty, and we were free from the chalkboards, the sour milk, the uniforms, and the wicked rulers of an angry nun. “Snow Days” were truly glorious and never taken for granted since they were hard to come by “back in the day” because once upon a time ago a cold school and a slick and slippery bus ride were OK. Until they weren’t anymore, that is. Until Little Sally caught a bad cold and Little Jimmy’s busted and bloody nose – an injury sustained by smacking one’s face against the bus window during one of those adventurous rides – wasn’t funny anymore. And that’s when something called “liability” started meaning more than a day’s worth of education. It’s when the “Snow Day” became so common state governments had to approve and implement regulatory laws for minimum hours of classroom time because people would sue, and they would win because Little Sally’s bad cold and Little Jimmy’s nose were caused by bad judgment. And now, a few flurries and temperatures below freezing are worthy of consideration, and now, the “Snow Day” just isn’t the same. Read the full article

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glutton-for-content · 1 year

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I decided to post about the character that is in my profile picture as well as give a story of a character I made for this demonic show.

The information can be found Under "Read More" but keep in mind that stuff might be changed in the future.

Spek is a half-imp demon currently residing in the lust ring, Having had contact with the porn industry for a while but not in a direct way, working in adult movie retail and sex shops spread around the ring, but his true passion shined true during a gymnastics class, even managing to get into try outs to work at a circus as a acrobat, one of the places they applied and performed at was at Loo Loo Land where a Robofizz gave him the contact to his flesh and bone self, thinking this would be a opportunity to get into a less vulgar kind of entertaiment, Spek ran to his apartment and called the number, but the person on the other end of the line wasn't Fizzarolli or another Robofizz, it was the Prince of the lust ring.

Asmodeus said that Robofizz was recording each performance at Loo Loo so that he and Fizz could select new dancers for a new show that was going to be a permanent weekly thing on Thursdays and Fridays, a Fizzarolli show full of backup dancers and clown-themed beverages that were going to be served by said dancers, Spek asked if there were anything else the dancers were to do afterward, after All, Ozzie's might be a restaurant with performances but that doesn't stop patrons for wanting to sleep with anyone that works there, but Fizz said that they had a strict rule about the patron and worker relationship, they can stare all they want but no touching the dancers, if they wish to get handsy, they will have to pay extra to be bedded by some of the performers that have given explicit content, any lack of something that could be a confirmation, even silence, will be read as no and if the patron continues the act, they'll be cut from any membership and kicked out of the establishment, it would be unfair to Fizz if Asmodeus did not allow such a rule given what he has gone through, Spek agress on the interview and the next day, a box with various uniforms and a key to a 3 month free apartment was dropped at his apartment's door.

Despite having a pretty decent life tho, Spek wished he could apply his skills in gymnastics in other places outside of performing in the Lust ring, he already had sex and vulgarity shoved into his face most of his life, and a second job would not hurt, as they work mostly 3 days a week, 2 performing with Fizz and 1 as a waiter.

Thankfully, while listening to the TV while doing the dishes, Spek caught a song of a freelance murdering business, Immediate Mudering Professionals, with one of the options available on their website being one for someone that was athletic but in a speed kind of way, Spek booked a time for an interview and after managing to get a day off as a waiter, Spek got the extra job and was now saving up to move to a different place, in Impcity to be exact.

#my art #Impsona #helluvaboss #helluvabossOC #helluvabossImp

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nomorerww · 1 year

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This is another diatribe by an egotistical, condescending male but whenever a new fantasy series is released and BREAKS RECORDS like Hogwarts legacy did It always make me wonder. Why are peoples so drawn to these stories where one person is tasked with "saving" the entire world, where the stakes are unrealistically high. The premise seems more than a little narcissistic. And of course, It is typically a boy that we are focusing on here. One of the writer's arguments is that it is ego that underpins people's eagerness to consume fantasy fiction or to become fervent supporters of a sports team or something -- almost as if they have something to do with a successes of these things, is if they're living vicariously through a random player or the main character in a game.

But is there no ego/lack of impulse control involved in lifestyle choices like constant partying and heavy drinking like one of the author's friends did, supposedly in an attempt to mimic the rock and roll musicians he idolized? It too involves self-indulgence and an immediate dopamine hit.

Those recently entering college will end up partying and drinking to an excess because they want to feel like they belong/they want to feel that high, one wonders what happens when that mindset persiats for decades...

[...]According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average American spends a little more than five hours each day watching television.

Moreover, the average American will spend the equivalent of nine years of his or her life watching television. (This figure, of course, does not include the untold hours we spend watching movies -- either at the cinema or online -- or the inordinate amount of time spent surfing the Web.)

It is, thus, reasonable to assume that the public expends an enormous amount of time engaged with mass media instead of with real-life interactions and experiences.

But at what cost?

Given that the overwhelming majority of Hollywood movies, television shows (and pop songs) are basically garbage designed to appeal to the broadest swath of society in order to maximize corporate profits -- the impact of such exposure is extremely corrosive and perhaps incalculable. We are addicted to our TVs, iPads, iTunes, Blackberries, iPhones and the Internet the same way we cannot shed our embrace of drugs, tobacco, alcohol, gambling and other forms of instant gratification.

Almost 30 years ago, a brilliant educator and author named Neil Postman wrote an engrossing book called “Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business.” Covering a broad array of subjects, Postman proposed the idea that addiction to mass media is essentially tantamount to oppression and slavery, as was once predicted decades before by George Orwell’s “1984” and Aldous Huxley's “Brave New World.”

Thus, mass media serves as a kind of voluntary medication for the masses -- people who are either bored or dissatisfied by their real lives seek to escape into the unreal universe of images on a screen or sounds on a music player, which, in turn, often dictate what they think, how they talk, how they dress and even what they say.

Fantasy and science fiction have become a cold, hard, stark reality.

I am reminded of two former friends of mine who epitomize how mass media has usurped our personal lives and consciousness. One fellow, whom I will call Matt, is obsessed with rock 'n' roll. Now approaching middle age, Matt still wears what’s left of his hair long and frequently dons T-shirts and blue jeans (the standard rock 'n' roll uniform).

Born to a wealthy but broken home to two unloving parents, Matt was a homely and awkward child who grew into a desperately unhappy and lonely adolescent. He sought solace in the world of rock music -- he bought hundreds of records (his collection now runs into the thousands), attended innumerable concerts, devoured all the music magazines and (like too many of his peers who sought to imitate their idols) took drugs, smoked and drank excessively.

This same depressing narrative has been replicated millions of times around the planet by similarly bored and alienated teenagers. But Matt took his obsession several steps beyond.

Despite a definite lack of musical talent, Matt dove so deep into the realm of rock 'n' roll that he has deluded himself into thinking that he, too, is part of the rock music industry. He speaks of famous musicians by the first names (Mick, Jimi, Bob, Bruce, etc.) and acts like they are personal friends of his. When he would attend a concert, he did not simply go as a fan -- rather, he pretended he was actually part of the show (as if he participated in its very production).

And these delusions have only deepened over the past 30-plus years.

Clearly, Matt desperately needed to fill the emptiness in his soul and heart with the accouterments of the pop music industry -- a universe he has no real connection to whatsoever.

For another old friend of mine, whom I will call Dan, the attachment to mass media has taken even more bizarre and pathetic turns.

Dan, who, like Matt, grew up in an affluent, suburban family and developed into a lonely, awkward, sullen teenager, dove headlong into the spheres of television and movies. Nothing unusual about that, but to Dan, the nonexistent lives and worlds of fictitious TV and film characters became real to him -- more real, in fact, than the flesh-and-blood creatures around him.

Unable to formulate his own jokes or monologs, Dan repeatedly plagiarized the words he heard uttered by people on the screen -- he even pretended that they were real people that he knew personally (much like how Matt adopted rock stars as his own friends and peers).

Thus, the plot lines of TV shows became an inseparable part of Dan’s otherwise humdrum real life.

Matt and Dan may serve as extreme cases, but I believe tens of millions of people share this same terrible affliction -- the total immersion and subjugation of one’s ego and individuality into the fantasy lives of people they do not know, have never met, are unlikely to ever meet and may not really even exist.

Ironically, Western democracies purport to celebrate individuality -- yet mass media has completely undermined that noble concept by turning the masses into a mindless herd who blindly follow the activities of an exalted few, who themselves are manufactured by a tiny elite of media lords.

Is this freedom? Is this democracy? Is this healthy?

George Orwell was indeed prescient.

Living vicariously through media-created images also expands to sports. Whenever I see men and women wearing memorabilia of their favorite sports clubs -- whether it be the New York Yankees or Dallas Cowboys or Notre Dame football or Manchester United -- I wonder: Are they honoring the team and its players? Or are they vainly glorifying themselves -- that is, deluding themselves into believing they are part of the roster? A combination of both, I suspect.

This phenomenon is particularly acute in the field of science fiction/horror/fantasy films. It seems as though every other year, a new sensation arrives (manufactured and heavily marketed by movie studios) that suddenly attracts millions of movie-goers, turning an otherwise mediocre piece of celluloid into an instant classic while concurrently creating a battalion of fans who dress up like characters in the film.

When I was a boy, a little movie by the name of “Star Wars” was released. I went to see it, liked it and thought it was a reasonably enjoyable adventure story. But I was completely taken aback by the fanaticism it inspired -- indeed, I was puzzled as to why so many fans returned to the theater repeatedly to watch it. (I knew one fellow who watched the film more than 100 times and knew the entire dialog by heart, this being years before the availability of home videos).

George Lucas not only built an enormous empire out of "Star Wars" (and several subsequent sequels and prequels of varying quality), but also a religion of sorts. The film became a kind of Bible to legions of followers -- people of all ages recited bits of dialog like scripture and dressed up like Luke Skywalker or Han Solo or Darth Vader (with, of course, light sabers that didn’t really do anything).

The obsession with "Star Wars" has only intensified after 35 years -- grown adults dress up like characters from the film at various functions. Lucas, who has made more money than he could spend in a millennium, is likely appalled by what he has inadvertently wrought.

Indeed, more than any other film, the huge success of "Star Wars" permanently damaged the integrity and artistry of filmmaking.

[...]

"Star Wars" and "Star Trek" have each become billion-dollar corporate empires that apparently will never disappear (new converts are recruited each year to keep the franchise going).

And they have a lot of company -- in recent decades, "Harry Potter," "Game of Thrones," "Batman" and various others have seized the souls of untold millions of obsessives who spend ungodly amounts of time (and money) on these pointless entertainments.

I have never read a "Harry Potter" book, nor have I ever seen any of the films, but I realize they’re massively popular, particularly with children. While I admire J.K. Rowling for inspiring millions of kids around the world to read books -- I would rather they read "Treasure Island," "Jane Eyre" or "Sherlock Holmes" (rather than a book whose popularity depends upon films, massive marketing/promotion and huge merchandising).

[...]At the root of all of this virtual reality is real greed. ‘The Hobbit’ is a great example of how Hollywood has franchised fantasy and encouraged its fans to run away from real life. ... The goal is to get the audience hooked on the studio’s product -- and some literally become addicted. ... But what is worrying is the cult-like following that the Tolkien films have encouraged. Many of the acolytes seem victims of arrested development -- detaching themselves from the real world with its real people and its real challenges. In the same way that superhero movies actually emasculate the audience by convincing them that their problems are so big that only a man in a cape can solve them, so the fantasy racket returns us to the emotional paralysis of early childhood. ... The true horror comes when someone can no longer tell the difference between what’s real and what’s not and they end up living their lives as dwarves or wizards.”

Amen, Mr. Stanley!

One must also wonder what Tolkien himself would have thought of this monstrous corporate machine he unwittingly created from beyond the grave.

Tolkien’s tales of elves and wizards were largely inspired by the ancient Celtic and Norse legends he was immersed in as a child -- he celebrated the simple, rustic values of a pastoral lifestyle. Indeed, Tolkien was appalled by the modern mechanized world of unrelenting commerce and sought to retreat from such corrosive vulgarities in his own private shire.

Yes, Tolkien sought escape as well, but he created his own dazzling, highly detailed fantasy world; he did not appropriate someone else’s dreams and move into them.

All these 24-7 diversions cannot be good for our society or our souls. To combat this paralyzing disease, we must declare: “May the force be with you.”

#long reads #harry potter #escapism #fantasy film #sociology

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niannianyabao · 1 year

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Recent Comics: Why Don't You Love Me? by Paul B. Rainey

I've written before about the "it's really good" problem—how to review, and direct audiences towards, a work that is simply gangbusters on every level, and seems to offer no access point for the reviewer wishing to praise it. The ecstatic reviews that persuaded me to pick up a copy of Paul B. Rainey's graphic novel Why Don't You Love Me?—the first great 2023 publication I've read this year, and already very likely to make my list of the year's best books—seemed to uniformly suffer from a subset of this problem: how to praise something exceptional without saying too much about it? Guardian reviewer Rachel Cooke wondered: "Will readers stick with [Why Don't You Love Me?] long enough to reach the twist that makes the effort of reading its first half worthwhile? I can't be sure that everyone will – and yet, I must not spoil this twist, even in the cause of encouragement."

I demur a little from Cooke's concern. Why Don't You Love Me? has a tremendous—in both senses of the word—twist around its midpoint, which lands the book firmly in the realm of science fiction, and which I will do my best to avoid spoiling. But to me what makes the book remarkable is what comes both before and after this moment. It's clear almost from the first page that something more is going on here than initially appears. The pleasure of reading comes not only from figuring out what that something is, but, once you've done so, from gaining a new understanding of the path that led to that realization.

Right from the start, Why Don't You Love Me? sends mixed signals to readers about the kind of comic, and story, it is. The book is presented as a compilation of newspaper strips, originally published on Rainey's website, but hewing very closely to the rigid format of the mainstream funny pages. Each page has three rows of panels, with the top row made up of a large title panel followed by two potential throwaways, and two additional rows with an almost uniform box format. Each page describes a single vignette in the protagonists' lives, and culminates in a punchline. But the style of the art puts one more in mind of subversive, indie comics—thick black lines depicting simplified interior scenes, deliberately unpretty characters, and a lot of emphasis on the accouterments of vice like cigarettes, empty alcohol bottles, or distracting TV and computer screens. The punchlines are more often bleak or gross rather than funny.

Even this gesturing at a familiar style, however, obscures something entirely different. To begin with, Why Don't You Love Me? feels like yet another entry in the very well-populated subgenre of indie comics about how awful middle class suburban life is, and how the people who live that life are constantly seeking to fill the void in their souls with TV, substance abuse, and inappropriate sex. Our heroes are Mark and Claire, a suburban couple with two small children who seem to hate their lives and each other. Claire is barely functional, regularly drinking herself into a stupor and flying into a rage when asked to participate in the running of the household. Mark puts on a more normal front, but inwardly he's flailing, utterly at sea both at home and at work. Neither one seems particularly committed to their marriage vows—Mark flirts with a woman he meets on the long dog walks he takes to get away from his family, and Claire briefly emerges from her drunken haze and starts playing the role of a devoted parent when she meets the attractive father of one of her daughter's friends. Otherwise, the two are wildly neglectful parents, constantly shocked to realize that they're expected to keep their children fed, clean, and in school.

There's a similar move here to the one deployed so successfully in the first season of The Good Place, where behavior that would normally be horrifying and even criminal, such as Mark repeatedly forgetting his son's name or Claire sending her grade-school-aged children to the shop to buy alcohol and cigarettes, is normalized because it's assumed to fall within the tropes of a comedic format. But right from the start, Rainey establishes that this isn't entirely what's going on. "Christ! Do you mean all this might be real?" Claire asks Mark in the book's first page, and very quickly it becomes clear that the two aren't simply forgetful or neglectful, but genuinely ignorant. Mark has no idea how to do his job as a website designer and keeps complaining that he's actually a barber. Claire doesn't remember her friends' names and remarks to her mother that she'd hoped her deceased father would be alive. It very quickly becomes obvious that the reason the two are so incapable of functioning as a couple isn't that they're estranged, but actual strangers.

Beyond this general impression, there aren't a lot of hints in this part of the book as to what might actually be happening. Which, we eventually realize, puts us in a similar headspace to Mark and Claire, who have experienced some sort of rupture that they are at a loss to even define, much less explain. Even the major twist at the book's midpoint doesn't really answer our questions. It is, however, a jumping-off point to a careful working out of the book's premise that takes up much of its latter half. Eventually, Rainey reveals a thought-out, shocking SFnal McGuffin which is both enormously satisfying when you finally understand it, and gobsmacking when you realize what it spells out for our heroes. (It also makes Why Don't You Love Me? a pleasure to reread, as certain implications that are never spelled out become clearer on a second pass.)

Still, what's most interesting about this part of the book is the way it makes you reevaluate what came before, seeing it not as a gag about marital dissatisfaction, but as an extreme trauma response. In the second half of the book, the circumstances of Mark and Claire's lives change dramatically, giving them space to not only understand what has happened to them, but to grapple with how they behaved in the initial shock of their lives being so thoroughly disrupted. Not all of these stories are particularly dramatic. Claire gets a rather satisfying storyline about learning to stand up to an abusive boss, while Mark debates between the old dreams of his teenage years, and new dreams triggered by his recent experiences. Eventually, they reconnect and are able to forge a new, more honest relationship—one that is completely unromantic, but also the most meaningful bond they have in their lives.

One possible reading of Why Don't You Love Me? is as a metaphor for how depression and mental illness can render us strangers in our own lives, and how in their aftermath we may find ourselves struggling to make amends to the people we failed while in their grip. I think there's a lot of truth to this reading, which gets at at least some of what Rainey is trying to do. But to me, the SFnal component of the book is not merely an allegory, but fundamental to its story, which is about how people cope with having been roped into a science fiction narrative, and how they respond to their own response.

Mark and Claire have both experienced something otherworldly, and this causes them to reevaluate not just their lives, but how they want to live in the future, even under the threat of more SFnal shenanigans. Much of the couple's emotional grappling in the book's second half is about understanding why they treated each other so badly in its first, and in particular, acknowledging how they mistreated their children. It's impossible to say more without really venturing into spoiler territory, but what Why Don't You Love Me? becomes by its end is a deeply compassionate story about ordinary people learning to cope with the unimaginable, finding solace in the most unexpected of places, and figuring out how, even in the face of complete upheaval, to keep going.

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cyarskj1899 · 1 year

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Documentary

Boys in Blue: a high school football team grapples with race, police and violence

Andrew Lawrence

@by_drewSat 7 Jan 2023 02.11 EST

When George Floyd was unlawfully killed by a Minneapolis police officer in May 2020, the moment hit home with Peter Berg. Before the 58-year-old New Yorker turned Angeleno was a distinguished film-maker, Berg was a theater major at Macalester College in St Paul, Minnesota. He had long had fond memories of that late-80s heyday – back when the Twin Cities were famous for compassion, low crime rates and artistic revolution.

It was a special time. “Purple Rain had just come out,” Berg recalls. “There was a famous nightclub in Minneapolis called First Avenue. We would go there twice a week and see Prince, the Time or Alexander O’Neal. There was this diverse musical phenomenon happening when I was there, and my memories are of people getting along really well – Black, white, Hispanic, Vietnamese. It was very disorienting to see George Floyd brutally killed in a place I remember so differently.”

Keen to understand why and how the Twin Cities community changed, Berg found himself looking for answers in sports, a comfort zone he’s made his own like few in Hollywood – turning high school football bestseller Friday Night Lights into a mammoth on-screen franchise, producing and acting in the HBO dramedy Ballers and launching ESPN’s 30 for 30 docuseries with a look back on the NHL trade that sent hockey great Wayne Gretzky to Los Angeles. When Berg read a New York Times article about a Minneapolis high school set in the shadow where Floyd was killed that had a football team coached by cops, he knew that was where he had to be. “I sensed that there was something unique and special going on in the community.”

Under his Film 45 production company label, he marshaled a film crew to spend the 2021 season embedding at Minneapolis North. Unsurprisingly, the school community – with its hard scars from neighborhood and police violence – was suspicious of the cameras at first. Bit by bit, Berg & crew had to win them over. “We spoke to Black and white police officers coaching at the high school, spoke to the families, spoke to the kids and said, ‘Look, our goal was to go in there and observe what is happening and try and create a little bit of separation from the binary opinions that are surrounding these issues.’ We have no idea how it’s going to end.’”

The result is Boys in Blue, a four-part series that debuts this week on Showtime in the US. And at first glance, it’s tough not to miss the visual and tonal echoes to Netflix’s Last Chance U. But where that docuseries homes in on the fallen football stars seeking redemption in junior college and the week-to-week prospects of their team, Boys in Blue’s focus is much broader. It not only places those personal stories within the context of a crime-addled city at the center of the defund movement, the individual characters are vastly more textured.

The players are virtually babies, the core contributors just high school sophomores – forced to grow up too fast; the most tender moments are the ones when they can just be kids. The coaches wear two uniforms, and the professional one makes some kids fundamentally uncomfortable. While the Twin Cities’ liberal white protesters grapple with police in the streets and call for their abolition, Minneapolis North players fret for their coaches’ safety and job security on the sideline. If a ballot measure that proposes to replace the police with a more nuanced public safety department passes, Minneapolis North’s coaches would be forced to find new jobs that might not offer the same flexibility for football.

Anchoring the series is the relationship between offensive coordinator Rick Plunkett and quarterback Deshaun Hill Jr – one, a Minneapolis beat cop; the other, an incredibly police-dubious 15-year-old who’s lost loved ones to violence of all stripes. It’s a layer of complexity beyond the typical play designer-triggerman dynamic, and it makes their journey to develop trust in each other that much more compelling. But once Hill discovers that Adams isn’t that much different from him, a neighborhood kid who went into policing to actually serve and protect, Hill comes around. And once they’re on the same page, Minneapolis North rounds into a scoring juggernaut with a real chance at playing in a state championship in the home stadium of the NFL’s Minnesota Vikings before college scouts.

Boys in Blue could easily have tipped into Dick Wolf-grade copaganda. But by maintaining focus on the complete story and withholding judgment all the while, Berg paints the fullest picture of the defund debate yet‚ one that makes it nearly impossible not to have empathy for all sides – even the white assistant coach who grudgingly winds up at the center of his viral video moment with a Black bus rider. “It’s certainly not our goal to tell people what to think,” Berg says. “I don’t believe there are sides in this particular story. There is just what there is.”

But the biggest gut punch comes in episode 4, when Hill is killed by random gunfire while leaving school on an icy February day. The documentary was in the midst of its final shooting week. The night before Berg’s crew had filmed him out on a date with his girlfriend, dreaming about their futures, debating whether to kiss on camera. His teammates and coaches knew it was Hill the moment they saw a shot of the walking boot on his left foot, the byproduct of late-season injury.

The man charged with Hill’s killing – ruled second-degree murder – is expected to go on trial this month. “It obviously traumatized us involved in making the show and re-traumatized people in the community,” says Berg, choking up. “George Floyd was the inciting incident for us coming down there. And then here we are, nine months later, having a memorial for Deshaun in the same auditorium where George Floyd’s memorial was.

“I’ve made scripted films about Navy Seals, police officers and rig workers who have died. I’ve met with their families and gone through the process of trying to respectfully tell their stories. But I’ve never been through anything like this.”

Hill was such a loss – a reticently sweet soul, an honor roll student and NFL aspirant who was just starting to draw recruiting attention from major colleges. Without him, Berg wrestled with how to complete the series. Ultimately, he wound up screening rough cuts for members of the Minnesota North community before delivering a final product to Showtime. It’s an ending Berg never could have imagined – harsh and yet deeply poignant. “There’s no playbook for processing the grief that comes when a 15-year-old boy who hasn’t even begun to hit the prime of his life is just brutally murdered in a nonsensical manner,” Berg says. “I told the crew, ‘It’s gonna take a lot of time, it’s gonna hurt and those emotions had to be honored.’

“But for anyone who’s open to taking a look at the doc, it’s also beautiful to see Deshaun Hill in all of his glory – laughing, scoring touchdowns, kissing his girlfriend, loving his sisters. It’s one of the odd, unpredictable opportunities that documentary film-making gives you to touch something special.”

Boys in Blue is airing on Showtime in the US with a UK release to be announced

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rinkrats · 3 years

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🥺 that mike lange story. But also those tags #sid loooves christmas #he loves giving presents #looks good in red #piles on the pounds fast #post hockey career as santa 😂😂👌🏽👌🏽

he loves his mementos and presents and is COMMITTED to them. scrapbooking. matching jackets. little pills with hidden motivational messages~*~ his love language is gifts and neck smooches and stalking geno. relevant right now are some anecdotes i sent a friend earlier this year for dorky sid gifts fic fodder:

1. Crosby's constant thoughtfulness would be impressive from anyone, much less someone of his stature.

"Sid always texts me happy birthday, he's always asking me like, how's Russia?" Evgeni Malkin said. "We talk and message all summer. He asks me how my skates are. He knows, like, everything. He follows my Instagram, I think (laughs)."

In addition to having a handle on those little details, Crosby is constantly providing those around him with memories and mementos. If the team is on the road and goes, say, sightseeing or to a sporting event and takes a group photo, Crosby will later send a framed copy to everyone.

When Ron Hextall and Brian Burke watched their first Penguins game in person, Crosby is the one who approached head equipment manager Dana Heinze and asked for two used game pucks to give to the new GM and president of hockey ops.

After the Penguins won in 2009, Crosby had jackets made for the three players on the team who had scored a Cup-clinching goal in Game 7: Talbot (Pittsburgh), Ruslan Fedotenko (Tampa Bay) and Mike Rupp (New Jersey).

"They were blue jackets with gold buttons, and each one had a patch on it that said 'GWG Game 7,'" Talbot said. "At one of our first team meals the next season, he presented us with the jackets and did a big ceremony with the music and stuff. We had a private room in the restaurant. I still have the jacket."

-The Consummate Teammate, Captain and Ambassador, Feb 2021

2. Merz: My first interaction with Sid was when we were on the bench, guys were talking about a teammate, and the first thing this 15-year-old says is, “Hey, guys. Let’s keep everything positive. Don’t talk about your teammates that way.”

Salcido: When we were getting ready for nationals, he found these little pills that you could put a hidden message inside. They unscrewed, and inside was a tiny scroll. He gave one to every teammate. … He had everyone fill one out. He didn’t tell anyone what to write, but he made it known that we all knew what the goal was: winning nationals. So we wrote on our scrolls, rolled them up and put them in the pill thing. We kept them with us everywhere we went.

-‘Is this real?’: Stories of Sidney Crosby’s year at a Minnesota prep school, May 2020

3. On “Butterfly Boy” Jonathan Pitre:

Though the Senators are his team, Sidney Crosby has always been Jonny’s favourite player. After the TSN documentary airs, Tina gets a call from the Penguins. Sid needs Jonny’s measurements. He wants to have a suit made for him by his personal tailor, Domenico Vacca.

“It’s the kindest, sweetest gesture,” Tina says. “Sid heard that Jonny went to a lot of games, so he wants him to look like he’s one of the guys.”

“I want him to feel like a pro,” Crosby says. “Here’s a guy who is going through something so painful, and his first thought is always, ‘How can I help others?’ When I was young, I’d watch on TV the players coming to the rink in their suits. That was a cool part of being an NHL player. I want him to feel that, to make it as real as possible for him.”

Tina tries to discreetly measure Jonny while she’s changing his dressings. But he’s way too smart for that.

“Um, Mom, why are you measuring me? Am I going for surgery again?” he asks.

“No, no!” Tina replies, trying to reassure him and come up with a good lie, all in the same breath. “The doctor needs them just to make sure they have proper dressings next time you are in.”

A few weeks later, the sharp navy blue suit shows up at their front door, along with a couple of ties, an autographed stick and a handwritten letter from Sid.

“His eyes just light up,” Tina says. “Jonny always liked to be well-dressed, and he just loves having his own suit. It fits perfectly. He looks so good in it.”

-Beauties by James Duthie (2020)

4. Pascal Dupuis inspired his Pittsburgh Penguins teammates on their run to the Stanley Cup, and Sidney Crosby found a special way of driving that message home.

Dupuis retired in December with lingering health concerns because of blood clots. Despite his NHL playing days coming to an end, the veteran forward remained an integral part of the Penguins and was in uniform to hoist the Cup after Pittsburgh's six-game win against the San Jose Sharks in the Stanley Cup Final.

On Sunday, Dupuis brought the Cup home one last time as a player to share a special day with his family, friends and hometown fans.

"Yes, it does feel bittersweet a little bit," Dupuis said. "You get the Cup, you want to celebrate. But at the same time I got a gift by the mail [Saturday]. Basically, it's a book of all the pictures of all the good stuff we went through. It came from Nova Scotia, so you guys can figure out who it came from (Crosby), but he couldn't give it to me during the season, he saw me skating a little bit.

"And he sent it [Saturday], before my day with the Cup, so he knew what he was doing to get me right here," Dupuis said, putting his fist over his heart.

-Pascal Dupuis shares Stanley Cup with family, friends, Aug 2016

5. In 2011, Crosby was out of the lineup with a concussion, and the Penguins made their annual visit to Children’s Hospital.

Crosby got along so well with one boy there and was so touched that he later asked Bullano to go back... just the two of them, no cameras, no attention.

When Bullano and Crosby met for the follow-up visit, Crosby appeared clutching a pair of Toys “R” Us bags, filled with a Transformer toy the two had discussed.

“He literally bought every type of this toy they make,” Bullano said. “[Crosby] had never seen it before and thought it was so cool.

“There are no pictures of this. There’s no video. He was laying in the bed with the kid. They were just playing. We were there for over two hours. I got to know the mom really well because we were just sitting there.

“The kid had no idea. Didn’t expect it. They had no idea he was coming. We got there and he said, ‘Hey buddy. hope you don’t mind that I came back.’ The kid couldn’t believe it.

“[Crosby’s] crazy cool about stuff like that.”

What’s crazy is trying to recount the many times stuff like this has happened with Crosby:

• The Little Penguins Learn to Play program has been around for nine seasons, outfitting now 1,200 kids with free head-to-toe hockey equipment. Not only does Crosby serve as the face of the program — which the NHL has now adopted — but he helps fund it, too.

“There’s an awareness of what a person in his position can bring,” Penguins vice president of communications Tom McMillan said. “I think he activates that as much as anybody I’ve seen during his playing career.”

• After a recent practice, Crosby noticed a local family in the Penguins dressing room, approached them, introduced himself, learned their story and wound up giving them a signed stick.

Nobody asked Crosby to do that, and he wanted zero credit when discussing it a couple days later.

“For people who have the opportunity to come in here, people dealing with certain things, if you can brighten their day a bit or spend some time with them, it’s something that’s special for all of us,” Crosby said.

• A few years ago, through a team charity event, Crosby befriended a 4-year-old Amish boy with cancer. Crosby remarked to Bullano how much he loved talking to the boy because of how engaging the boy was and how he wasn’t consumed with technology. Crosby even tried to visit the boy but learned he had passed away.

• He learns the first and last names of the kids who attend his hockey school in Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia.

“Two kids came from Japan its first year,” Bullano recalled. “He was so blown away by that. He couldn’t wait to meet them.”

• Earlier this season, the Penguins welcomed Grant Chupinka, 24-year-old cancer patient, into the dressing room. Crosby chatted up Grant and his parents, Steve and Kim.

He spent his usual time — about two or three times the requirement. Gave the tour. Then found out the Chupinkas didn’t have tickets for that night’s game and decided he would pay for them to go.

“I’m sure he could just give them an autographed puck or something, but he takes his time to go out and see them and talk to them and get to know them,” Brian Dumoulin said. “It speaks volumes for him and who he is as a person.”

Spend any length of time with Crosby during his visits with those less fortunate, and a few things become obvious.

One, Crosby is really good at these. Smooth but not in a slimy way. Sweet. You know how when you’re around someone talking and they go out of their way to make eye contact with everyone around? That’s Crosby.

He’s also humble, always introducing himself like those he’s meeting don’t already know. Holding a hand is no issue. And Crosby is the rare 20-something pro athlete without kids who acts every bit like he does.

“It is not an easy situation to talk to someone with terminal cancer,” McMillan said. “A lot of people couldn’t do that. He has an amazing ability to do that and make that person feel good.”

Crosby has welcomed several Make-a-Wish kids and tries, if at all possible, to schedule such events for practice days — to maximize the time he’s able to spend.

He’s developed a special friendship with Patrick McIlvain, a soldier who nearly died when he took a bullet to the head in Afghanistan. McIlvain actually does physical therapy with one of Crosby’s sticks.

A former club hockey player at Cal U, McIlvain comes by every year, and the Penguins don’t even bother to tell Crosby. Either he already knows or immediately stops what he’s doing to come say hello.

“He’s not doing it to leave a legacy,” said Terry Kalna, Penguins vice president of sales and broadcasting. “His numbers leave the legacy. He’s just a down-to-Earth, good guy.”

Before a visit, Crosby has Bullano email him what is essentially a scouting report on who he’s going to meet. He likes to learn about them, their situation and what they’ve been through. As much information as he can ingest. Crosby never just swoops in, shake a hand and leave.

“As much as anyone has ever seen, he accepts the responsibilities of being not just a professional athlete but a star professional athlete,” McMillan said. “He views it as part of the job. Like coming to the morning skate. That’s just what you do.”

Put another way, “he owns those moments,” says Kalna.

Said Bullano, “He’s just a good human being.”

-When it comes to giving, Sidney Crosby does as much as he can, Feb 2017

6. When Crosby received a generous signing bonus on his Reebok deal, he wanted to share it with everyone.

“He gave everyone on the bus gifts,” says Oceanic radio commentator Michel Germain. “Him sharing his bonus with all the people he’d been travelling with for two years, that impresses me greatly. I think the most important thing about Sidney Crosby is his personality and the kind of human being he is. What he exuded. The inner richness he’d already developed.”

-Superstitious and generous, Dec 2006

7. also this simply because it makes me ;w;

Even in defeat — no, especially in defeat — Sidney Crosby proved why he wears the "C" for the Penguins.

After the game, with his heart sinking and his season over, the Penguins’ captain bent over, sank to the ice to pick up the puck, took it to linesman Tony Sericolo and then skated to his team’s handshake line.

I immediately thought of a View from Ice Level I’d written on Crosby making sure a retiring official was sent away from PPG Paints Arena properly. I knew picking up the puck wasn’t for the same reason that was, but I also knew, in some way, it was connected to Crosby’s awareness and respect of the game.

“It was for the Islanders,” Crosby told me after the game, his eyes swollen from a first round exit – by way of a sweep to make it worse. He told me how the winning team always wanted the puck, and it was his way of providing it for the Islanders.

Crosby looked me right in the eye as he told me this, just as he did with every other member of the media to come to him after the loss.

I could tell from those swollen eyes and the way he sat at his stall, by himself with his hands folded as he stared blankly, that Sidney Crosby is much more used to being on the receiving end of a puck when a series ends than he is at retrieving it for the winning team.

That scene. His swollen eyes. Staying in the locker room until most had left – talking to anyone who needed him. Most of all, though, picking up the puck that prompted my question in the first place and making sure the right people got their piece of their own history.

It all adds up to one thing: In victory and in defeat, Crosby respects the game above all else – just as he’s always done.

-Even in defeat, Crosby shines, April 2019

#anyway this was a nice walk down memory lane after the disastrous game rip #sidney crosby #pittsburgh penguins #hockey #text

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beyondspaceandstars · 3 years

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While You Sleep

Chapter 1

Relationship: Bucky Barnes x Reader Warnings: angst, mention of violence Summary: Soulmate!AU - Throughout life, you're given glimpses of your soulmate through dreams. As you sleep, memories flash in your mind showing you the life your soulmate has lived. Everyone around you raves about how their soulmate reads great books or volunteers in their spare time. But you can't relate as your dreams end up being more like nightmares. Through initial images of death and violence, you come to learn your soulmate is the Winter Soldier. A/N: I had this idea one day and initially it was just gonna be a one shot but then i said screw it. i’ve never really done a full chapter story/series so...? Here I go? I’ve written most in advanced so I know I actually have some sense of where this is going and tbh i think it’s gonna be interesting but i love soulmate!au anyways :)

masterlist | taglist | read on ao3

The nightmares always felt the same.

In your mind, clear glimpses revealed him - the brooding, long-haired man. He typically wore a mask and that same unforgiving yet disconnected look in his eyes. A metal arm would glimmer every now and then and you’d quickly find him wielding guns or twirling knives. The most uncomfortable acts were those of when he’d use just his hands.

You didn’t really know the people he was affecting. Some looked important, some seemed like casualties to whatever bigger fight was being played at, but they all came in quick glimpses. Part of you felt that he didn’t care enough to remember them. He had no connection, just a goal. There was always more of a focus on what he was doing and making sure it was done. You could tell that was what he was feeling, what he was seeing, and frankly, it was of the disturbing kind.

You had grown up hearing friends and family gush about all the wonderful, fascinating soulmate dreams -- because that was what they were supposed to be: dreams. Lovely, lullaby dreams showing one the life their soulmate was living. Giving the other a glimpse at their feelings, their adventures. Hopefully making you want your person.

Your parents loved reminiscing about how they saw each other playing with friends as kids or volunteering at shelters in college. Your friends had been equally fascinated, constantly gossiping about what books their soulmates had read or how their eyes would light up when they played with their dogs.

But you weren’t getting that. Instead of seeing your soulmate read their favorite book, you watched him take down what felt like an army of people. You saw him marching on command as if just a machine.

Part of you thought you were broken. Why were you only getting to see the bad things? Was there nothing good about your person? Had they lived for nothing other than these missions?

It was a weird combination, what you felt towards him. To say you weren’t at least intrigued would be a lie because, at the end of the day, this man was your soulmate. No matter how unnerving or confusing it was, you two were paired. While you didn’t know if he actually knew it, you felt it. You felt the pull in every knife flip. In every stab. In every mission. In every accomplishment.

Even time he was forced to go dormant -- because, yes, you could see the ice. You could see the shocks.

Your soulmate dreams were nightmares. And they ached and pulled at you.

***

You were already awake when sunlight began seeping into your room. This wasn’t a new occurrence -- the sun and you seemed to like to play a game to see who would rise first... You, it was always you lately.

The dreams were distorted memories last night. You didn’t see it all like it was interrupted, but you could tell it appeared to be a past memory. There was just something about the intensity visually this time that was weaker. It was less fresh than previous ones but still held feelings, strength. It was a confusing phenomenon, an old thought transmitting between the soulmate lines, but wasn’t unusual for you by any means.

Sometimes you received memories from your soulmate that dated back to the 70s, sometimes 60s. Things he had seen that weren't even from your decade which raised so many more alarms. It prevented you from getting any sort of age range. Sometimes people received memories their soulmates had learned of, like hearing a story of a wedding and depicting it, but they never lasted. Usually they were one-off casualties but these you had persisted. They had to be from him.

While confusing beyond all means, something you never could think about discussing with others, it gave you a little hope that maybe, just maybe, things had…stopped. Whatever rampage or mission your soulmate was on (had been put on?) was finished. Especially being a memory that came from just a few years ago. For once, maybe there weren't new nightmares for your soulmate to produce.

But you couldn’t get your hopes up. They could be right back at it tonight so you couldn’t allow yourself to ponder it no matter how much it all bugged you. You force yourself to get up and on with the day. Rising as you had watched the sun do so.

You pulled yourself out of bed choosing to ignore the sleep-deprived headache threatening to creep up. Shuffling around your bedroom, you collected your work uniform wherever you had really tossed it throughout the space.

Once dressed for the day, you moved on to making yourself presentable to actually get on with work. While you only just worked in a coffee shop -- not exactly the epitome of luxury -- tips were key and people liked their barista to actually look alive.

You finally got out of the door just moments later, homemade bagel sandwich in tow, all complemented by the fakest, brightest smile you could muster as you made your way down the city sidewalk.

You quite enjoyed the work commute, being able to weave in and out of the people, your mind instinctively wondering if he was here. Was he milling around? Hiding in the shadows? Planning something here or there? What to do next?

You figured most likely not, but you still looked even if the idea of him was enough to make you shake in your boots. Besides, you didn’t even totally know what you were looking for. The eyes and hair only revealed so much. The glimmer of his hand, though, that sure was unique. You could still see it in flashes throughout your mind.

So, you harmlessly let your eyes wander on the street. Checking over the faces, the posture, the appearances of them all but none of them could tug on that part of your heart. Granted, it was sort of ridiculous. Your soulmate had been proven to maybe not be the kindest person in the universe but something had to happen if the two of you were paired. And you were just the right amount of daring to see it through.

You finally made it to the coffee shop after your leisure browsing of the city people all bustling, brain set on getting one place or another. They were just exhausting to even look at.

The bell above the door jingled as you entered. The shop was mere minutes from opening and your coworker was already setting up, nearly ready to bring in the morning rush. She greeted you with a weak, tired smile. You responded with one of your own. Seamlessly, you two fell into it all, moving in silence. Prepping, brewing, cleaning.

Work was going much smoother than normal for the day. You seemed to fall into your tasks with ease as you served the morning crowd. You had your normals’ orders memorized and the new customers wooed at your speediness. Tips were coming in nicely as well, you noted. You and your coworker worked together, as if in a tango behind the counter.

The day seemed that it would continue on just as smoothly as the morning had. Things started to taper off nicely around the afternoon. The shop was mostly filled with college students in between their lectures. They nursed their coffees as they typed away so determined with their homework.

You and your coworker took the brief moment to lull around. She was aimlessly sweeping by the sugars while you cleaned the same spot over and over again on the counter as you watched the television in the corner.

The owner had put in the TV a while ago citing it drummed up service but you never actually found proof of that. Instead, it sat high up on the wall, above the windows, muted at all hours. He at least allowed the closed captioning to be on which was what you were reading as you pretended to clean.

Some midday news program was on. A graphic flashed signaling that they were going into one of their “investigative reports.” You stopped your movements with the rag as you watched the news graphic transition to a portrait picture of a man from the waist up. He...

Something made your stomach drop. Your heart twisted in familiarity while your brain sounded the alarm. Those eyes. That arm. You could feel all of it practically radiating from the television. Letting go of the towel, you let out a gasp at the true shock when it suddenly clicked in your head.

Everything slowed down around you. Customers began staring, concerned. Your coworker was calling your name, asking what was wrong. But you couldn’t do anything. Your eyes were glued to the television. Something crushed in you as it began adding up.

Eyes. Arm. Feelings. Emotions. Eyes. Arm. Feelings. Missions. Scene after scene, you went over everything that had been stored -- forced -- unconventionally in your head.

You read the name on the closed captioning followed by his title. Who he was, what he was.

It fell into place. All of it. It was him, yes. The dreams -- no, no. The nightmares. Your word repeated it over and over again. Him. All him. James Buchanan Barnes. The Winter Soldier.

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wrenhyperfixates · 3 years

Text

The Raven Haired Rebel

Chapter 1

Pairing: Loki x reader Series Summary: After invading New York, it was decided that, as a punishment, Loki would work for SHIELD. Yeah, right. After escaping from their custody and stranded on Midgard, the God of Mischief decides to prove he’s the one thing no one ever thought he was: the good guy. Now a vigilante, Loki attempts to make amends for his past wrongdoings while also evading the Avengers, including their newest member. You. Brought in specially for the case, you notice more and more details about the prince’s story don’t add up. When you get the chance to turn him in, will you listen to your employers or your heart that believes Loki’s done nothing wrong? Chapter Summary: In which you plead Loki’s case. Chapter Warnings: none A/N: Besides this being a miniseries, all the chapters are pretty short too! Hope you enjoy all the same :)

Permanent Tag List: @lucywrites02 @frostedgiant @lunarmoon8 @twhiddlestonsstuff @lokistan @lowkeyorlokificrecs @gaitwae @whatafuckingdumbass @castiels-majestic-wings @kozkaboi @cozy-the-overlord @birdgirl90 @myraiswack @mythicalgarlicknot @what-a-flammable-heart @marvelouslovely @laurenandloki @fallinallinmendes @sophlubbwriting @mooncat163

RHR Tag List: @happygalaxymilkshake @electroma89 @stardust-walker @i-would-kneel-for-loki

Masterlist

Disclaimer: Gif not mine

Swiping into Avengers Tower made you feel important, more so than swiping into a SHIELD base. You weren’t exactly sure why, though. Perhaps it was because SHIELD was a secret, and no one knew. Here, the passerby on the street looked on in awe. Or maybe it was because the Tower was so elite. Because so select few got to enter. But really, it probably wasn’t that you got to enter so much as why you got to enter.

True, since your first day on the job, word got around that you were the best in your field. Fast as lightning, you’d risen through the ranks to be Fury’s top tracker, a position all but secured when he brought you on for this case. A case, you knew, that intrigued you far more than it should have.

Just like everyone else had on that day a little over three months ago, you watched the TV with rapt attention as gods and superheroes made themselves known to the world. And, you supposed, supervillains too. Not that you’d told anyone, but something didn’t quite sit right with you in the weeks after when news anchors and colleagues alike were referring to the raven haired god as such.

For the next three days, you’d pored over books of Norse Mythology and a number of studies. Most of the latter coming from one Dr. Jane Foster, who you soon came to link with Thor. But even there you found a disconnect between the god of legends and the bloodied man on your screen. He never really did have malicious intent before. He was a trickster, yes, but he’d not even come close to doing something this drastic before! Ok, yes, there was his involvement in Ragnarök in the myths, but even for that you’d found multiple sources that could debunk it. Besides, it certainly didn’t seem like Asgard had even faced the end times yet.

Alas, you figured Thor knew his brother, and you had your own case to work on, so you let be the mystery that was Loki.

And then you were called into Fury’s office a week ago and asked to begin tracking the god. A bit too eagerly, you’d agreed to take the case. You’d dealt with villains before, truly evil people, and your search only further proved what deep down you already knew; Loki was not one. Everywhere you followed his trail, a mysterious savior was stopping bank robberies and saving people from burning buildings and runaway trains. Not to mention there were multiple descriptions of said savior using green magic. It seemed a wonder that the tracker in the case before you hadn’t noticed. Then again, people tend to only see what they want to.

Regardless, you made your way to the elevators, heading toward the conference room on one of the upper floors. You tapped your foot as it ascended, impatient to share your findings. As the lift stopped and you got out, you tugged on your leather jacket. It was ever so slightly too big, but it was on sale. Plus, you felt like it looked pretty cool, considering your job and all. Subconsciously, you puffed up your chest a bit too. Regardless of actual size, you felt like a petite little thing, stepping into a room of now renowned heroes. Strange, you thought, how so much could change in just three months.

“You know, I got to get me one of those,” said the man suddenly keeping pace next to you. You quickly identified him as Tony Stark.

“I... Pardon?” you replied, slightly startled.

“Your jacket,” he said, pointing at it. “I feel like the leather will match the whole rugged good-guy, vibe. Besides, I think Capsicle’s got one.”

You chuckled at that. “Maybe we should just make it the team uniform then.”

“Team, huh? So you must be that new tracker kid we’re working with.”

“I’d hardly call myself a kid,” you scoffed.

“When you get to be as rich as I am, you get to call everyone a kid,” Tony shrugged.

“I’m not exactly sure that’s how it works, but whatever you say, I guess,” you chuckled again.

“See, now if everyone would just adopt that mindset, we’d get stuff done a lot faster around here.” He quickly signed something that was brought up to him on a clipboard, never stopping. You wondered how long he could keep up like this before collapsing. “Besides, take it as a compliment. That last tracker was some fuddy-duddy old guy.”

“Fuddy-duddy?” you guffawed. “Maybe you’re the old one, after all.”

Tony feigned like he’d been struck in the heart. But before you could keep up the banter, you reached the conference room, and Steve was waving you inside.

“Stark,” he said with a nod. “Are you ready to begin or are you going to keep distracting our new teammate?”

“Aye aye, Captain,” he said with a little salute. “Reporting for duty.”

You mouthed a sorry as you followed Stark into the room. Even if the rest of them turned out to be hard-asses, at least Tony was fun. And having one ally was better than none, you figured. As you took your seat across from your new friend, you flipped through the file that had been left for you. It wasn’t really anything new, so you glanced at your teammates again. Nat and Clint both nodded at you, recognizing you from a couple other missions you’d interacted during. There wasn’t really any time to talk, however, before Captain Rogers was walking to the head of the long table.

“Alright, team. Before we get started, I think it’s worth mentioning we have a new member on the team,” Steve said, before welcoming you by name. “I think we’re all caught up on the situation here, so let’s dive right in. A new trend has shown up in the Tower’s data mining.”

“Data analysis,” Tony butt in. “It sounds more ethical that way.”

“Whatever you want to call it, the program showed that wherever Loki goes, there’s a spike in activity of an organization calling themselves AIM. At first glance they seem innocent, but after some digging, we’ve found they’re anything but. We’ve determined Loki is working with them, perhaps even masterminding some of their more underground projects. Agent? Can we assume you found the same things?”

“Uh, yeah, no. Actually, my data shows the opposite,” you cleared your throat. Standing, you slid the information from your tablet onto the room’s TV screen. “See, it seems that he’s actually doing good deeds. There are multiple accounts of a man fitting Loki’s description performing heroic works.”

“Ok, I’ll bite,” Tony said, leaning forward. “What about AIM then? You think it’s a coincidence.”

You bit your lip. “I’ll admit, I haven’t found anything about them yet. But... maybe, just maybe, Loki’s showing up where they are because he’s trying to stop them.”

“I am so sorry to interrupt, but that does not sound like the Loki I know at all,” Thor laughed. “A wonderful joke, though.”

Now you were getting mad. You shouldn’t be, but you saw something worth defending in Loki. A lot, actually. There was something about that look in his eye that you couldn’t quite read, but it was telling you something was wrong all the same.

“That’s not fair! Maybe you don’t know him as well as you thought. Look at this,” you said, swiping to show a side by side of Loki during and after the fight. “You can see it by the look on his face; something was seriously wrong during the battle. Plus, I’ve seen videos of him when he first came; he was not alright. Afflicted with severe anxiety and what looks like burn marks, I’d say. He needed help.”

“With all due respect,” Clint chimed in, “aren’t your a tracker, not a psychologist?”

“Yes, but as such I’ve been trained to look at all the details. Not just what’s convenient.”

“Listen,” Steve sighed before things got any more heated. “It’s a great theory and all, but you read Thor’s account of everything that happened before this. So, until we get some solid evidence proving otherwise, we’re going to have to stick with what we already know. We’ll put a pin in the AIM thing until you can take a look, though. Ok?”

“Ok,” you agreed, defeatedly taking your seat again.

You looked around the table. Natasha and Bruce, the only two who hadn’t said anything, both looked kind of pensive. Alright, maybe bewildered was the better word for Bruce. He was smart, no doubt about it, but you got the impression he wasn’t very good in social settings. Then there was Clint and Thor, both who seemed a little skeptical of you. At least Thor seemed to be considering his brother’s innocence at least a little. Steve was a bit more unreadable as he continued to prattle on about what you already “knew” for the case. And then there was Tony, who seemed more impressed than anything else. He, at least, had seemed to genuinely consider what you said. Perhaps he still was.

“The best way to solve this,” Steve closed his spiel, “is to bring him in. Agent, have you located him yet?”

You sighed. Deeply. It shouldn’t be this much of a struggle to present your findings. You’d had no trouble speaking on his behalf. Yet a part of you—an alarmingly large part, you realized—didn’t want to turn him in. But who were you to ignore direct orders?

“Yup,” you conceded, pulling up a map with a blinking red dot, marking Loki’s location.

“Well then, team,” Steve said to the group. “Let’s roll out.”

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lesbianlotties · 3 years

Link

five times Deena and Sam met in secret (and one time they didn’t)

Chapters: 1/6 Fandom: Fear Street Trilogy (TV) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Samantha "Sam" Fraser/Deena Johnson Characters: Deena Johnson, Samantha "Sam" Fraser (Fear Street) Additional Tags: Pre-Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Post-Canon, High School, Cheerleaders, Band, Teenagers, Teen Romance, First Meetings, First Love, First Kiss, Fluff and Humor, Fluff, Happy Ending

Secrets.

Deena and Sam met by accident. They fell in love in secret.

But how long can they last together like that?

Chapter 1 - secret places

From one end of the football field, Deena stormed away from band practice. She had trouble accepting the fact that she was required to do an extracurricular activity to get through high school. She had chosen band as a result of pressure from her best friends. Kate was cheerleading captain and Simon was the school’s mascot. It was convenient to join band and at least have their company during the school’s games. Besides, she could get away with a lot because the guy in charge of the band had always had a crush on Kate, and he was aware Deena was her best friend. So, she could sneak away from practice, go sit down under the bleachers, and entertain herself thinking about how there’s hardly a good thing about living in Shadyside. Unbeknownst to Deena, a beacon of light and hope was heading her way at that exact moment.

From the opposite end of the field, cheerleading practice was going on a small break, which Sam was aggressively thankful for. Her mind was a jumbled mess, and the worst part? It was all her fault. In retrospect, she knows she went into cheerleading because she longed to be in those girls’ company. Maybe she should have expected that same thing would be the worst part about it. She was professional, respectful, not a creep, she repeated in her mind again and again. But just one fleeting touch, one particular twist in a girl’s skirt, represented a great distraction. It made her think about things she didn’t feel even close to prepared to think about. Her thoughts got carried away, she felt overwhelmed, she needed to run away. How could she have known she was running straight toward the greatest distraction, the biggest challenge, the momentarily worst but eventually best thing that would happen to her…

One girl resenting the world around her. One girl troubled by her own thoughts and feelings. Both of them holding their heads down, walking fast, searching for a hiding place, and running right into each other.

“Fuck!”

“What the hell?!”

“Hey, watch where you’re going you…”

“I’m sorry, I was just…”

After they looked into each other’s eyes, there was no turning back. Because Deena gazed into crystal clear blue eyes and she didn’t see fear, she saw the light of a blue sky at the end of a dark tunnel. Because at the same time, Sam saw her brown eyes and couldn’t care less about the anger in them, she only felt the warmth of a home she hadn’t even met yet.

Nothing had prepared Deena for the moment she saw Sam for the first time. At her age, she felt almost surprisingly confident about herself, her feelings for other girls, and what that would mean for her life. But one thing was knowing she was interested in girls and a very different thing was being interested in one girl. This immediate attraction, this feeling of shocking delight, and being rendered speechless, that was completely new.

Similarly, Sam felt at a loss. Movies, songs, books, other girls’ stories had prepared her for this moment. However, they all pointed at the fact that it should be a guy standing in front of her, she should bat her eyelashes at him, he should pick up her dropped books, and someday they would get married, simple as that. But instead, she got Deena, wild hair, delicate features, and her band’s hat fallen in the ground in between them. Someone should pick that up. Sam’s eyes quickly looked around. No boys to bat her eyelashes to. No one watching. Just her and this girl and the opportunity to follow her instincts. Be herself.

In a flash, Sam had kneeled down, picked up the ridiculous hat and stood back up to give it to Deena. Miraculously, Deena seemed to get back to herself by the time she was staring at Sam’s face again. Even if “herself” was experiencing contradicting feelings. Defense mechanisms of apathy and toughness threatened to flare up. Hopeless kindness and attraction insisted on peering through. In the end, she accepted her hat and mumbled, “Thanks.”

“I’m sorry,” Sam repeated, “I was, um…”

“Furiously running away from something?” Deena raised a curious eyebrow.

It made Sam laugh. She wasn’t sure if she laughed at the joke, or as a nervous result of hearing Deena’s voice. Either way, she softly shook her head and started smiling as she introduced herself. “I’m Sam.”

“Deena,” the brunette replied. “So, was something chasing you, Sam?”

“No…” Sam answered. Her hand came up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. As if hearing Deena say her name wasn’t overwhelming enough, now she had to come up with a reasonable lie. “Cheerleading,” she blurted out, “can be, uh, overwhelming, sometimes.” Not completely a lie. But the other girl seemed to see straight through her.

“Right,” Deena said.

Her tone was enough to know she didn’t completely buy Sam’s words, but she wouldn’t dare pry for more information. Partially, out of politeness. Mostly because Deena didn’t really want to know more. She wasn’t known for being invested in many other people, her school, or her town. She had more than enough with her own problems. She really didn’t need anything else. But she couldn’t help it. Because on one side was Sam, nervous blue eyes, flushed cheeks, obviously anxious in her cheerleading uniform. Then across from her was Deena. Deena and her unexplainable instinct to offer a hand to this girl she just met and fight for her whatever kind of monster had made her feel like she needed to run and hide.

“Well, Sam. I hate to break it to you but,” Deena paused for dramatic effect and for the newfound pleasure of watching Sam’s eyes stare at her expectantly, “this is kind of my spot, you know?”

“Oh?” Sam stuttered, curious.

“Oh, yeah. Everyone needs a place to hide from Shadyside’s many horrors. And this place right here? It’s taken.”

“I see,” Sam nodded slowly, as a smile started to form on her pink lips. “I suppose you don’t want my company, do you?”

Deena studied her silently for a second, holding back her own smile. It was incredible the way that the more Sam seemed to relax and smile more, Deena did the entire opposite, her heart sped up considerably, feeling like it might burst out of her chest. She did everything she could to maintain her composure though, for the sake of the easy banter they had going on. Then she replied, “I’m not really the type that enjoys company.”

“So, I should go, right?”

Sam even took one step back and turned her body a little, as if she would willingly walk away from the most fascinating encounter of her life. This step she took also brought to both their attention the fact that somehow, during their conversation, they had moved even closer than necessary, closer than they had been at the beginning.

“No, you don’t,” Deena blurted out as soon as she saw Sam’s poor attempt at moving away. “You can stay,” she said, reaching out and just brushing her fingertips to the back of Sam’s hand. She didn’t mean for it to be a life-changing action, but the sparks of electricity that ran through both their bodies at once were undeniable.

“Are you sure?” Sam asked, a little breathlessly after that touch.

“Just don’t make it a habit,” Deena smiled at her. She had no way to foresee the months and months she would spend with Sam in that very spot. “And don’t tell anybody. I have a reputation, you know?” Then, she winked.

While she worked on recovering from that wink, Sam followed Deena to the best spot to hide from the world or, at least, the rest of their school. “Fine,” she replied finally, as the two of them smiled at each other, “It’ll be our secret.”

#this is how we're coping with the end of the trilogy ladies :)#fear street #deena x sam #sameena #fear street fanfiction #fear street trilogy #my fic

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