firefletch

[firefletch]

Derik, a veteran soldier of the Children's War who's worked his way up to Captain of the Royal Guard.

#inchresting 👀 #definitely seems like a pleasant guy/j #derik #songs of the fallen #cool art #sharing embers

[firefletch]

About Greta Gerwig, Little Women, and Narnia

Greta Gerwig should not be in the Narnia realm at all. As anything.

The Narnia stories are inseparable from Christianity. Greta Gerwig is a Unitarian Universalist. This means she, in her own personal life, doesn’t believe in the saving work of Jesus Christ, which is a core belief of Christianity, and a core theme in Narnia. Everything in the Narnia books hinges on this, from the character motivations to the structure of the fantasy world to the way the magic in Narnia works.

Additionally, the women in Narnia do not adhere to post-modern or even antique feministic values. They are celebrated for their love and tender-heartedness and faith, all of which require self-sacrifice. Aravis of The Horse and His Boy starts out a proud warrior escaping an arranged marriage and ends up a humbled lady of Archenland court marrying the Prince. Susan Pevensie is at her best when she’s tender-hearted and at her worst when she doubts and becomes more concerned about her own identity than others. The school that Eustace and Jill go to in The Silver Chair is derided for it’s feministic views. By contrast, modern feminism is opposed to self-sacrifice, and that is the kind of thing Greta Gerwig demonstrates belief in throughout all of her works.

Am I saying that no person who isn’t a Christian or some type of conservative when it comes to feminism can ever work on Narnia? Absolutely not. I’m not saying that. Lots of people on the Walden Media Narnia movie (the first one), which was great, were not Christians and did not believe in the saving work of Christ. But they stayed faithful to the source material, even if they didn’t believe in the source material themselves. So the story retained it’s autonomy and power.

Greta Gerwig can’t do that. She has already demonstrated that she does not know how to make a story that hangs on to it’s integral source material if she, herself, doesn’t agree with that source material. She can’t be objective, and therefore, she can’t be faithful to what Narnia is.

How do I know that? Little Women.

I don’t care if you liked the Little Women movie by Greta Gerwig. I don’t care if the acting was “amazing” and I don’t care if Timothee Chalamet and Florence Pugh are great in it. I said exactly what I said. Greta Gerwig made a great movie—but she made a terrible adaptation of Little Women.

It was not Little Women. She made changes to Little Women. What changes, you ask? Changes to the specific pieces of the source material that did not reflect Greta Gerwig’s personal views.

That’s the cardinal sin for directors of adaptive stories or remakes—to make changes to the core themes of a classic tale, because you don’t agree with those core themes. That’s called mutilation, not “updates.”

Here’s how she did it in two major ways in Little Women:

She cut out Jo’s humble response to Friedrich’s gentle rebuke of sensation stories, and replaced it with a feministic self-pitying outburst from Joe and s borderline apathetic, cool piece of feminist advice from Friedrich. That takes all the continuity out of it and warps the characters. That scene is so pivotal in the book. It’s Jo, respecting a man who is much older and excellent in character than any other she’s ever known, and feeling immediately humbled by him calling her out. She’d never have responded that way if Laurie called her out. They would have argued. But this scene was supposed to show what Jo needed from a future romantic partner. She needed someone she respected, someone who could be wise and gentle—two things Laurie is not. She needed someone who would help her take her eyes off of worldly success and herself, and onto eternal benefits to mankind, specifically, the effect her stories might have on children. His gentle, respectful, wise love (and the love of characters like Beth) turns Jo from a self-absorbed writer into a selfless mother, like her own Marmee.

But Greta Gerwig never wanted Jo to be a selfless mother. She wanted, and I quote, “Jo’s love to be her work, and her romance with Friedrich secondary.” You know why?

Because that’s what Greta Gerwig believes in. Greta Gerwig’s life is her work. Watch any of her movies, you’ll see the smudge marks of that wholehearted belief all over them. She can’t even be objective when the whole point of a character is to make work secondary, as was certainly the case with the character of Jo March. No. She has to twist up one of the best American heroines ever into an automaton of herself.

The second way she mutilated source material is with Amy and Laurie. In the books, Amy and Laurie grow to love each other out of the character deficiencies that they make up for in one another. At the start of their courtship, Amy is ambitious and Laurie is lazy. Amy wants to marry for advantage, and Laurie wants to make much of his spurned love for Jo by giving up on life. And that’s it.

It’s Amy who first wakes up to feeling something romantic toward Laurie, not Laurie, and Laurie is not the first to make a move on her. Laurie does not know he is in love with Amy until well after she knows she loves him. Then, he does not make the first outward advance on Amy. They both come to the same conclusion together; when they do, she does not resist. In Greta Gerwig’s version, he’s back to falling in love with a girl who’s resisting, because that’s where Timothee Chalamet’s emotional acting shines or whatever.

But that’s not the worst part. The worst part is that she adds a feminism speech from Amy, as a reason for her resistance, and she subtracts the scene where Laurie actually proposes. The scene where Laurie proposes, in the book, is so beautiful.

The two characters are in love, they know they’re in love, and neither of them is insecure about it. Amy has learned that she needs a life-partner who knows her and will protect her, like her old home-values did, and not some rich aristocrat or prince. Laurie has learned that he needs a life-partner who can stir him toward change, not through big explosive arguments and hope of conquered affection like Jo, but with gentle love and sheer inspiration, found in Amy.

So, in the most beautiful analogy for courtship that ends in marriage ever, he proposes to her while they’re rowing on a lake. She’s sitting next to him in the middle of the boat, she’s got one oar, he’s got the other, and she says, “How well we pull together, don’t we?” And he says, “so well that I wish we might always be in the same boat. Will you, Amy?” And she says “yes.”

That’s it. No argument. No big, passionate, sentimental explosion like he had with Jo. No wrenched and broken heart-strings. He didn’t have to convince her. She didn’t have to resist. Because entirely without force, and entirely without insecurity, they protected each other’s hearts and came to a conclusion that was based on something so much deeper and more eternal than fleeting passion.

Greta Gerwig cut that out and listened to Meryl Streep and put in another stormy lover’s-quarrel speech from Amy about why she couldn’t be with Laurie because she was in Jo’s shadow, and feminism and marrying for advantage, blah blah blah. It’s terrible. It’s mutilation. It ruins everything the original Little Women had.

it doesn’t matter if she got some of the characters right. It doesn’t matter if she got a lot of the quotes right. It doesn’t matter if all of Act 1 of the movie is mostly-book-accurate. If you change load-bearing themes or character motivations, you show that you can’t be objective and faithful to the source material.

It is fine if Greta Gerwig wants to make a movie about a woman who loves her work more than anything else. It is fine if she wants to make a movie about how women are under-appreciated for their minds and souls, and have characters that go on a journey to prove it. But it is not fine to use someone else’s story to say it. Make your own story, Greta Gerwig.

Oh, you already did? See: Lady Bird? See: Frances Ha? Then come up with something new. Don’t shoehorn your same beliefs into every franchise that is offered to you, like vomiting, then eating the vomit and regurgitating it over and over in new colors. Figure out how to tell someone else’s story in a faithful way, objectively, or else keep your stained hands off until you can clean them up. Especially, keep them off Narnia.

Greta Gerwig makes movies for Greta Gerwig, by Greta Gerwig. She can’t be objective, and for that, she can’t do Narnia. She can’t do it justice, she can’t do it faithfully, because she makes movies for herself, by herself.

#analysis #long post #narnia #oof #I am not super optimistic for the future of the movies atm #sharing embers

[firefletch]

hi friend!! what does Aurora look like?

Aurora is four foot eleven and three quarters (which she’d insist is TECHNICALLY five feet, by rounding up), and has a petite build (initially she was unhealthily skinny, but in time eating Corli’s hearty meals has remedied that). She has dark auburn hair, orange-yellow eyes, and freckles smattered across her nose and cheeks.

At the beginning of “Treasure of Wyrmvale,” her hair is in a plaited bun, and she wears a baggy black robe. As she’s gotten settled into Wyrmvale, she’s switched to her hair being in a braid, with some wisps being left free in a way that nicely frames her face, and she now wears a hair kerchief and an apron dress. The hair kerchief is off-white with half-suns embroidered on the edges, and she changes the dress colors often, as she’s started to experiment with wearing color again. She’s found that she really likes greens and blues.

Thanks for the ask!

#ooooooo inchresting #she seems fun #other's ocs #other's art #cool art #dear wormwood #(I think that's the correct tag asdf) #sharing embers

[firefletch]

hi thanks for starting a server so I could write for ten minutes which proceeded to alter the course of our lives, im so glad that I met you!!

Aasdfas

I mean thanks for being such a good friend that you altered the course of my life adfsas

I'm glad I met you too!! Ily fren!!

Also happy (late) birthday I hope your next year is a good one

#ask #answer #granny-griffin #this is a bit late whoopsies

[firefletch]

What's everyone's favourite flowers that aren't like. The normal ones. Like everyone's a fan of roses and sunflowers what's a more niche one. One you don't get in gift sets. Mine's sweet peas

#Alstromeria!!!

[firefletch]

May 3 is two weeks away

#Me too bestie

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Thinking of naming her AmberLee

#ooooooo #love the textures #other's ocs #other's art #cool art #sharing embers

[firefletch]

Here's how I DUNKED on Cain's CRINGE descendent AND HIS MOM with my BASED ALPHA MALE WORKOUT ROUTINE two hours NO clickbait!!!

#AGSJDHSKSHAKSJ #beowulf #part of me is tempted to send this to my lit professor from college but also I haven't talked to him in like a year (I've graduated) #so that would be a wild out-of-context message #humor #sharing embers

[firefletch]

#asdafsdasdf amazing #iconic really #kids really do be like that #sharing embers #humor

[firefletch]

steps into a big pot of bubbling oil and sits there like its a hot tub and i snile at you so nicely that you step in after me and youre immediately boiled til theres nothing left

#that is SUCH an expression asdfasd #cats #humor #sharing embers

[firefletch]

By Harajuku Shrimp on Instagram 🍤

#adsfasdasd #she tried her best I guess #spy x family #loid forger #anya forger #comic #humor #sharing embers

[firefletch]

They are seven and six btw.

Let the chaos begin.

Part 1 of 5

#the backstory lore (tm) #they are very cute kittens #alexander #trevin #other's ocs #comics #cool art #sharing embers

[firefletch]

Another shapeshifter transformation attempt.

#yes yes #very cool #love the vibes of it #making shifting almost into a kind of dance #animation #art #cool art #sharing embers

[firefletch]

Red what are you thoughts about AI art ?

a toy I personally find profoundly uninteresting that is regrettably being used for evil by deeply tiresome people

#well said #I too am deeply tired of the evil it's being used for etc #sharing embers

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#asdfasdf the accuracy tho #beautiful #humor #star wars #text memes #sharing embers

[firefletch]

Topics of conversation among the elven party come to visit Minas Tirith for Aragorn and Arwen's wedding:

Whether the paintings and tapestries of legendary events made by the city's denizens are accurate

Whether Glorfindel should be shown tapestries depicting his fall

Balrogs don't look like that

Whether Osgiliath really was as pretty as they say

Whether Osgiliath or Annuminas was prettier

Whether the Rohirrim resemble the house of Hador much

Whether Aredhel would have gotten on well with Eowyn (difficult question because on the one hand - gestures at everything - and on the other: Aredhel was a difficult person at times, had never met one of the secondborn and would likely have mortally offended the other within ten minutes)

Another Gondorian woman looking a bit like Lúthien

Why do Lúthien look-alikes turn up generations upon generations after Elros

Does Minas Tirith feature too many stone walls and too little greenery

Is there something wrong with the Noldor for not minding being cooped up within stone walls

There having still been far more greenery in Tirion last time the exiles had been there (7000 years ago)

Whether Tirion was much changed when Glorfindel last saw it (3000 years ago)

Whether Gondorians naming their children after Túrin of all people is taking things a bit too far

Whether an inkeeper should be informed his prized family heirloom is an elvish dinner knife

Whether a courtier should be informed his prized family heirloom had been made by Curufin because on the one hand he might consider it cool, and on the other hand - Curufin

Whether a certain type of cake should best be eaten hot or cold

Can you use osanwë accidentally and is it cheating if it happens while you're playing bridge

#asdfasdfad #these are all great #rip the bridge game really #elves #middle earth #lord of the rings #humor #sharing embers

[firefletch]

He’s zoomin

#he's a comin' #as fast as he can #lil guy #doggos #dachshund #video #sharing embers