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tiffanys-aus-and-headcanons · 13 days

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Appendix D: Some Pig/One More Final

The first three posts in this series are here.

Undertale was a slightly postmodern children's fantasy movie produced by Jim Henson's Creature Shop in the '80s. Noah Hathaway played the protagonist, Frisk, who went on a long quest to escape from a magical prison inside Mt. Ebott; Frisk's father had thrown them into the mountain, known to be full of monsters, in an attempt to kill them. However, it's suggested that as a human, Frisk is inherently more of a protagonist than a monster can be, and has a vague sort of magical power over them. Toriel's death, which Frisk accidentally causes early in the movie, is commonly listed as a Peak Sad Childhood Moment.

George Orwell wrote The Writing In The Web, a political fable about a cult started by a well-meaning spider. E. B. White wrote Snowball's Farm, a whimsical children's tale about a farm whose animals decide to take over.

Infamously, Emmanuel Goldstein's monologue fills dozens of pages, takes at least three hours to read aloud, and brings the plot of Ayn Rand's 1984 to a screeching halt.

Short story collections and anthologies often keep the same title, author, and spirit, it's just the stories that are swapped out. For example, classic episodes of Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone include A Wonderful Life, The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty, Miracle On 34th Street, and The Sixth Sense. 1983's The Twilight Zone Movie includes segments based on classic episodes Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (directed by John Landis and given anti-war themes), Cocoon, The Poltergeist, and In Search of the Twelve Monkeys (the original starred a young William Shatner). Candle Cove is an episode of Black Mirror.

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was a 1999 Ben Stiller comedy about a team of low-rent superheroes who theme themselves after public domain characters because they cannot afford licensing fees. The film was well-reviewed, but a box office bomb. It was actually the first film to use Smash Mouth's One Week - the One Week music video is actually cross promotion with League of Extraordinary Gentlemen - and it would remain the film most associated with the song until Dreamworks' Happily N'Ever After hit theaters two years later.

The Amazing Digital Circus was a virtual pet game and toy line that struck when the iron was hot on that niche, before being bought out by Hasbro and rebooted a few times in different forms and mediums. Lauren Faust created a long-running television cartoon of it that was a huge smash hit with fandom culture despite the show's clearly very young target audience. The property's canon is all very light kiddie fare; the scariest thing about The Amazing Digital Circus is that for a brief and touchy stretch of time in the early 2000s, it was owned by the Peoples Temple, which was seriously considering turning it into a recruiting platform.

Your cringe unpublished works that you gave up on were almost certainly swapped around with other people's cringe unpublished works that they gave up on. There's lots of upwards and downwards mobility to the scramble, but not usually that much. Exceptions are very rare - like a beggar suddenly being made king, or a god being reincarnated into an ant - but they do occasionally happen. For example, what you know as the land of Oz exists only in the head of a young Milwaukee stoner, who suddenly came up with the idea for an epic graphic novel one day in the 2010s while sitting on the bus, and spent a couple of years absolutely convinced she would eventually make it. (She cannot draw.) Conversely, L. Frank Baum's children's fantasy series, Enormia, which has been adapted and reimagined many times, most notably as audiences' introduction to color film, exists in your world only as a different Milwaukee stoner's overly elaborate backstory for his jerkoff sessions. This kind of thing is much more the exception than the rule, and even such exceptions are almost always much smaller in scope - an obscure stillborn project getting swapped around with an obscure out-of-print novel, or an obscure direct-to-video z-movie.

The True Detectives forum and its many schismatic spinoffs, all of which are devoted to discussing mystery fiction, host literally thousands of Wind fanfics. Many of the writers - perhaps most of them - have never actually read Wind, just other fanfiction of it; next to none of the fics are worth reading. Most Wind fics reuse the original protagonist, Rorschach, but treat him as a generically relatable blank slate. The most common fic format by far is the "altdunnit", a form of what-if scenario in which the mystery that sets off Wind's plot is different in some way.

Rorschach is held by a substantial portion of the fandom to be an egg (a trans woman who has not realized it yet). Wildbow has never endorsed this interpretation, and it doesn't seem to be much on his radar. In recent years, the trans Rorschach portion of the fandom has grown; they don't tend to look especially kindly on Warn, much of which Wildbow wrote as a response to fans (like those on the True Detectives forum) he felt had been too inclined to take Rorschach's side in Wind. Flame wars over Warn's content were constant throughout its serial publication, and made it easily the rockiest experience of Wildbow's writing career.

Some noteworthy and relevant podcasts include Jonathan Sims' The Dresden Files, the Ranged Touch Network's Scott Pilgrim Made The World, Doof Media's Winding Down (later Warning Down), and the McElroy family's The Adventure Zone (an actual play podcast which has currently had three major campaigns, two anthology series, and various one-shots). Film Reroll is still an actual play podcast that runs the basic setups of movies (and occasionally other media) as short tabletop campaigns; occasionally, their version of a movie will be much closer to ours than it is to the version of the movie in their own universe.

Xenobuddy was an early childhood public access show, originally created for the BBC in the late 1990s but later aired internationally. The title character is a small alien puppet who lives on a futuristic spaceship staffed by children (who speak a vague conlang akin to a dollar store Esperanto). At the end of every episode, it gets lost and is found, usually by (harmlessly) bursting out of one of the children. It was very popular with its target audience and much loathed by parents. Edgy ironic fanart depicting the titular Xenobuddy as some kind of dangerous parasite abounds.

Static is a supernatural slasher franchise created by Wes Craven, with the first film, also simply titled Static, released in 1984. The movies concern a group of gibbering neotenous ogre-fae who wake up in the modern day after a long sleep, incorporate televisions into their bodies, and start eating people by sucking them into hellish pocket dimensions. The Screen-Guts collectively are probably in the top five antagonists most people think of when they think of slasher horror.

Toby Fox's ROSEQUARTZ is especially known for its meta take on video game morality systems. The game has a mission-based structure; throughout it, the player is encouraged to take on a pacifist playstyle, championed by the player character's late mother, the title character. However, the Crystal Gems give the player enough autonomy that you are entirely able to take a much more violent tack; doing so has a rippling effect on the game's writing in countless immersively-integrated ways. If the player goes out of their way to be as murderous as possible - the so-called "genocide route" - the differences from the main route grow much more extreme, and rather than gaining allies, you start to lose them, as the Crystal Gems realize what you're doing and one by one turn against you. If you manage to shatter Garnet - it's the hardest and most iconic fight in the game, Megalovania is playing, her Future Vision gets used for all it's worth - then you use your knife to slash at the cosmos, erasing Earth, Homeworld, and everything else. This, Toby Fox is saying, is apparently all you want out of a video game - another toy to break.

Warner Bros still did Space Jam with Michael Jordan and the Looney Tunes, it's just that the Looney Tunes in question were Mickey Mouse and friends. They also still did a second one with LeBron James, which was, by God, somehow worse. They put Ms. Frizzle in it.

Walt Disney made his squeaky clean reputation on the back of adaptations of things like Rudyard Kipling's adventure novel The Call of Cthulhu, P. L. Travers' Thomas the Tank Engine, and Erich Kästner's feel-good coming-of-age kidnapping tale about the power of perseverance, Lolita, originally done with Hayley Mills and later remade with Lindsay Lohan.

Nabokov's extremely controversial literary classic that has defined the idea of the unreliable narrator is Father's Trap, from the perspective of a man who plots to obtain custody of both of his daughters for nefarious purposes. Most publishers ignored Nabokov's instructions not to depict the twins, Lisa and Lottie, on the cover. Stanley Kubrick and Adrian Lyne have directed mediocre film adaptations, and songwriting team Lerner and Loewe did a musical that was a legendary flop.

The Japanese fashion movement is Gothic Pollyanna, after an otherwise-forgotten series of penny dreadfuls about a cute, cheery, rules-minded young girl who is, despite appearances, an insane criminal. Minor character Bonesaw in Alan Moore's Worm Turns also clearly hearkens back to the Pollyanna stock character.

The DEA was a prime-time soap opera about the ongoing "war on drugs"; it ran for eleven seasons from 1982 to 1993. Its plot focused on federal agents working at the Drug Enforcement Administration office in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and especially partners Hank Schrader and Steve Gomez and their families. It is mostly remembered today for its downer ending (in which the treachery of late-show villain Walter White, or "Heisenberg", gets the leads killed, and he escapes from justice), and for its far-more-acclaimed spinoff series Better Call Saul, which also ran for eleven seasons from 1993 to 2004, functioning as a prequel, midquel, and sequel to The DEA.

Between The DEA and Better Call Saul, Kelsey Grammer played crooked lawyer Saul Goodman for twenty consecutive years of primetime TV, first as featured comic relief and later as a leading man. (He also guest-starred on the mostly-forgotten Mall Cop, establishing that it, too, was set in the world of The DEA and Better Call Saul.) Better Call Saul won more than a dozen Primetime Emmys. Peri Gilpin received several of these for her performance as Kim Wexler.

St. Elsewhere was a film written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan in the late 1990s; it was highly acclaimed and successful, and established Shyamalan in the public eye as a skilled auteur with an affinity for twist endings. The film's final scene reveals that its main setting, St. Eligius Hospital, exists entirely within the imagination of an autistic boy, Tommy Westphall, as he gazes into a snowglobe. The so-called "Tommy Westphall Universe Hypothesis", which posits that this same twist applies to most of fiction due to a network of crossovers, was invented by a Saturday Night Live sketch shortly postdating the film's release, in which an amnesiac Charles McGill (from Better Call Saul) wakes up in St. Eligius, attended to by a cast of characters who are more concerned with their own nonexistence.

After rising to prominence as a writer, storyboarder, and composer for Pendleton Ward's Science Time (where she established the Summer/Jessica relationship that would come to define later seasons), Rebecca Sugar got to make her own cartoon, Henry Ichor. Set in a recently post-apocalyptic but strangely cheerful world, Henry Ichor concerns a young teenage boy who is conscripted as a mech pilot due to his rare and innate ability to link to the powerful Evangelion mecha. (His preferred Evangelion is eventually revealed to be a form of his late mother, the reason he can do this in the first place.) Henry turns out to be a vital asset in protecting humanity from the monstrous "Angels" that frequently threaten it, and is surprisingly emotionally mature for his age. However, the adults around him (especially his father, Gennady) frequently push him too far, especially considering his generally noncombative and pacifistic nature. There is much interpersonal drama and much singing about it, with a very vocally trained cast. After several seasons of slow buildup, the show was forced to suddenly rush to its ending in only a few (infamous) episodes after an arc where Henry had a romance with an Angel in male human form. Henry Ichor The Movie and an ensuing miniseries, End Of Henry Ichor, helped bring the show to a more thematically satisfying conclusion.

Although he has played a creative or consultant role in many animated projects, Alex Hirsch is best known for the one he was actually the showrunner for, Disney Channel's smash hit Sunnydale. Focusing on a small California town constantly plagued by supernatural threats, Sunnydale generally followed a simple monster-of-the-week format, but kept audiences on the hook with teases at a deeper underlying mystery. The show almost didn't get a season two, as Hirsch found working with Disney very tiring, but he was eventually persuaded; season two ran through the rest of Hirsch's ideas at a faster pace, and concluded the show with the leads graduating from Sunnydale High.

For a brief historical moment, Daron Nefcy's show, Ender vs. the Space Bug Army, looked like it would become the successor to Sunnydale, keeping Disney Television Animation prestigious after Sunnydale ended. However, though Ender drew in a big crowd, and lasted almost twice as long as Sunnydale, it was not ultimately as well-received. EvtSBA is a children's space opera, wearing its Starship Troopers (Joss Whedon) inspiration on its sleeve, but also clearly copying some (superficial) notes from Philip Pullman. Set in a future where mankind has come into violent conflict with bug-like aliens, the show follows unbearably smug boy supergenius Ender as he is sent to military school to prepare for interstellar warfare. The show has an extremely cutesy and hyperactive tone; typical filler episodes include the one (generally taken as meta about fandom drama) in which Ender's siblings' futuristic internet arguments prove instrumental to the survival of the human race. Later seasons get a bit more serious, but focus heavily on shipping. The show is infamous for its ending, in which Ender, for his final exam, destroys the Formics' home planet and releases a psychic signal that eradicates the Formic race. Although the show explicitly notes that this includes many individual Formics who we have previously known as sympathetic characters, it is nonetheless played as a happy ending in which a hostile colonial power is defeated. Ender has ended the war; he has beaten the Space Bug Army.

"Meugh-Neigh. 'Meugh' like the cat, 'neigh' like the horse." "Does it mean something?" "No answer; none at all."

Orson Scott Card is an extremely prolific author of speculative fiction. Although it isn't as close to his heart as the Steel Gear series, in which he got to flex his military sci-fi muscles and allegorically retell stories from his faith, he is undoubtedly best known for Ishtar's Curse. Initially a short story and later expanded into a full novel, the plot concerns young Princess Ishtar, or Star, heir to the heathen fairy kingdom of Meugh-Neigh. (In later novels, she changes her name to Bethlehem Diaz, or Beth.) Spoiled and destructive but magically talented, Star is sent to twentieth century Earth so she can develop the wits and the strength of character to be a viable wartime leader for her people - or at least so she can be kept out of the way. After several years of personal growth and magical misadventures with companions she met on Earth, a more grounded Star devises a spell to erase the magic that makes up the bodies of most of her throne's enemies. This plan works, and merges Meugh-Neigh into the Earth as a small and ordinary European country. However, though her subjects are eager to celebrate her for this, Star is devastated when she realizes that she has killed trillions of innocent spirits, and, seeking to atone, she takes on the title of Speaker for the Dead (also the title of the book's first sequel). Although it's frequently ranked highly in lists of fantasy novels of the twentieth century, Ishtar's Curse has received some harsh criticism, with the standard line being that Star is an idealized fantasy of a repentant Hitler figure, and that the text presents excessive justifications for her actions. The story has also been called a reactionary response to Wilde's The Little Mermaid. After more than twenty years, a film adaptation of Ishtar's Curse was released in 2009, starring Dakota Fanning, to mixed reviews. The box office took a further hit due to a boycott campaign, after Card's views on homosexuality (and, relatedly, his membership in the LDS Church) became widely known. In the end, it lost the studio a lot of money.

Hideaki Anno is best known for the classic smash hit anime he made for Studio Gainax, Einstein Goliath Nestorian, a psychologically intense deconstruction of martial arts shonen like Yoshiyuki Tomino's Dragon Ball. Einstein Goliath Nestorian concerns a mystery man known only as Saitama, who finds that he has become dissatisfied with life and alienated from the world after only three years of training have enabled him to easily surpass any physical challenge. The original series is known for its sudden, surreal, and clearly budget-driven ending, although this was quickly alleviated with a similarly surreal but more definitive finale movie. Although many Western anime fans often think of Einstein Goliath Nestorian as pretentious and ultra niche, it was actually a huge mainstream hit in Japan, with a colossal franchise of adaptations, merch, and spinoffs (notably including a series of Retrain films, which began as extremely close shot-for-shot remakes of the original series but wound up spiraling into a very different updated timeline).

Previously most noteworthy for his 2003 visual novel Oreimo, Gen Urobuchi was tapped by Shaft for their extremely successful and acclaimed anime Ohayou Hana!, hailed as a deceptively dark deconstruction of the teen idol genre. The plot concerns a girl, Saionji Mayuri, who leads a double life, being of little note at school, out of costume, but spending much of her time as #1 idol Hana. Her mental stability begins to deteriorate as she realizes that the adults in her life - especially her father, himself a former idol - have groomed her to serve as a drugged and hypnotized propaganda mouthpiece for a shadowy conspiracy. She winds up in the worst of both worlds as her ensuing breakdown, and her handlers' response to it, destroys both of her lives and brings ruin to those she cares about. In addition to the popularity of the actual anime, many of its songs became decontextualized J-Pop hits. The idol anime genre would then receive a glut of edgy lesser imitators, like Love Live: School Idol Project, Cheetah Girls, and magical girl fusion Symphogear. Although the original Ohayou Hana! was a self-contained twelve-episode story, it received a sequel movie shortly thereafter, Ohayou Hana! Rebel!, which ended on a cliffhanger that has still not been resolved over a decade later. The upcoming Ohayou Hana! MK Ultra! is expected to get things back on track. An abridged series originating on 4chan, focusing on cropped screencaps from Ohayou Hana!, called the title character "Miss Ohio", producing the memetic tagline "being Ohio is suffering".

Zack Snyder first came up with the idea for Madoka around 2000, a long time before he'd actually get to make it; he put the project on hold in 2006 to make his adaptation of Worm Turns. He developed the idea with his wife Deborah and a cowriter, Steve Shibuya. Inspired by the Disney Princess phenomenon, as well as Naoko Takeuchi's Pretty Cure (one of the few anime that had already become a hit in the States), Snyder wanted to tell a coherent story about fights between magical girls who could make anything happen, who could make any fantastical world or visual appear. In Snyder's film, we follow Madoka Kaname, a teenager attending a Catholic school in Los Angeles. Madoka and her friends are approached by a strange young woman who goes only by "Mommy", and her animal companion (a CGI-ed up squirrel-cat thing), QB. They offer to make the teens into "magical girls", granting them one wish each in exchange for a life devoted to spiritual warfare. (Another mysterious new girl, Lilly, urges them not to take the deal in the strongest possible terms.) This turns out to be a scam; QB is pitting the magical girls against one another for his own reasons, and in the end, every magical girl and her wish gets corrupted. Despite much of the film's plot being a horrific bloodbath - the MPAA demanded a lot of cuts to get it down to a PG-13 rating - there is a happy ending; Madoka finally makes her own wish and uses it to topple QB's whole system. Madoka isn't often discussed nowadays but it was a major discourse bomb when it came out in 2010, alternately being called misogynistic Orientalist trash and a subversive feminist masterpiece. Snyder, for his part, often notes that QB is intended as an allegory for exploitative forces within the entertainment industry that treat young women as disposable resources with an expiration date; this is already clear to anyone who's watched the film, which is not exactly subtle in its symbolism. He also explains that the film sexualizes the girls in an effort to shame the audience, to get people to understand that they are objectifying the characters in the same way that QB does. The soundtrack's got a really cool ethereal cover of Nine Inch Nails' King Nothing on it, which is probably the most remembered part of the film today.

Selena Gomez became a star by playing Violet Parr on Disney Channel's superhero sitcom The Incredibles. While the show was initially a very throwaway villain-of-the-week affair whose leads had to keep their powers hidden from the public and their caped escapades secret from the government for self-explanatory comes-with-the-genre reasons, it would eventually unfold that the show was set in something of an X-Men-style dystopia where superheroism had been outlawed and supers oppressed by the government as a potential societal fifth column.

Brad Bird directed one of Pixar's most celebrated films, Wizards of Waverly Place; it was Pixar's first film with a predominantly human cast. Disney was hungry for a fantasy property after losing a bidding war for the Luz Noceda rights. It had strong populist anti-eugenic themes, with an elaborate wizarding hierarchy of antagonists who seek to remove the Russo family's magic as part of an effort to curb wizard overpopulation. The sequel came more than a decade later, and wasn't nearly as good.

In addition to Worm Turns, Alan Moore is notable for the heavily metafictional comic Pagemaster, about a boy, Richard, who finds a magical library that contains all stories that have ever been or could ever be told; he becomes lost and imperiled in assorted pieces of historically noteworthy literature (initially ones in the public domain, though later volumes would start using legally safe serial-numbers-filed-off versions of modern stories). The 2003 film, in which Sean Connery played the librarian in one of his last film roles, is widely regarded as a terrible, deeply-toned-down adaptation that didn't grasp the tone or themes of the original story at all; it only covered the first half of the first volume, in which Richard meets "genre spirits" who wish to sort all stories into rigid categories. In a later volume, Pagemaster Millennium, an aged Richard Tyler, who has since taken on the mantle of librarian himself, meets a teenage girl, heavily implied to be Luz Noceda, who has also become lost in the library. She has become corrupted by an eldritch book, or "Necronomicon", written by "the Wrong Author", heavily implied to be the devil (and/or Hugo Astley, an Aleister Crowley caricature from W. Somerset Maugham's The Winged Bull). Flushed with demonic power and enraged by what she's become, a monstrous Luz tears through the library in a blaze of hellfire, seeking to destroy all of literature and the world. It is only through the intervention of the Fat Controller - heavily implied to be God - that Luz is defeated; he mercifully erases her by hitting her with a train, and laments what she became.

#queued post #the scrambled timeline #I tinkered around with the ordering of these entries so much that I guess this is a scrambled post for the scrambled timeline #credit to hieronymous-botch for the Alex Hirsch's Sunnydale idea #credit to Lorelei for the Orson Scott Card's Steel Gear idea

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monsters-conquer-the-world · 7 months

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OOZEPUNK

WHAT IS OOZEPUNK?

Oozepunk is the term I'm coining for the microgenre of urban heroic sci-fi horror-fantasy that first exploded in the mid-80s with movies, shows, and comics like Ghostbusters, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, The Toxic Avenger, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Hellboy, Street Sharks, and others. Lots of natural crossover with Biopunk and Cyberpunk, aesthetically and philosophically.

Your childhood trauma didn't let you forget Roger Rabbit heavily featured colorful nightmare slime, did it?

A ragtag gang of weirdos (often horribly mutated--more on that soon) band together to save a city that doesn't understand them. Grimy sewers, abandoned buildings and graffiti'd brick walls are lit up by neon lights, streams of mysterious, glowing goo and/or the unearthly lights of futuristic particle weapons--ideally all of the above!

Beyond the "cracked concrete and gutters full of liquid plutonium" aesthetic, Oozepunk prankishly asks "What if catastrophic aberrations of science, particularly DUMPING TOXIC FUCKING WASTE STRAIGHT INTO THE ENVIRONMENT created fucked-up monsters... but they're HEROIC fucked-up monsters!" These catastrophic aberrations of science grant the heroes incredible powers, but COST them their place in human society. (Ghostbusters and Roger Rabbit eschew character mutation in favor of discovering that the undead and olde tymey cartoons are real [and exploitable!], respectively. 'Busters and 'Toon sympathizers alike are treated like insane idiots and/or frauds in their respective universes.)

Oozepunk heroes are challenged not only by strange supernatural beings, but by human society itself. The Ghostbusters battle with local politicians as much as they do the undead. In the recent (and delightful) TMNT: Mutant Mayhem, Splinter warns the Turtles of humans and their obsession with "milking" mutants for their blood--on top of the villainous mutants they're trying to thwart!

Crank up the creep factor in Oozepunk and you get awesome anti-establishment goo-horror like 1988's The Blob, The Stuff, Street Trash, and probably a bunch more. Toxic Avenger is a batshit crazy splatter-comedy (i.e. classic Troma)... and still garnered sequels, a kid's cartoon and toyline!

And there's a Shredder's Revenge-style Crusaders beat-em-up coming out next year??

youtube

This looks dope as shit

Ghostbusters and TMNT are the only current, "evergreen" (or radioactive green!) Oozepunk franchises I can think of off the top of my head, but Oozepunk elements are buried in almost all of the stories and settings I love the most. Heroic kaiju like King Kong, Godzilla and Gamera paved the way for our freaky friends, but so did comics characters like Fantastic Four's Ben "The Thing" Grimm, The Hulk and Swamp Thing. Hell, I think I blame SESAME STREET of all things for starting me down the Oozepunk path.

Surprise! I've loved screaming trash monsters with secret hearts of gold since I was a fucking baby, and they've ALWAYS been there for me!

But it's not just Oscar, Sesame Street as a whole is a proto-Oozepunk utopia, years before the big Ooze-splosion of the 80s. Muppets, monsters, talking animals and chill humans all live and work together to scrape by with a little dignity in a gritty-but-wholesome urban world!

Sesame Street, a decades-long reminder that educational childrens' programming can and SHOULD be cool as hell looking and loaded with all kinds of friendly mutant freakuloids.

OOZEPUNK! Whaddya think?

#oozepunk #ghostbusters #teenage mutant ninja turtles #toxic avenger #toxic crusaders #street sharks #who framed roger rabbit #ooze #slime #hellboy #sesame street #goop #goo #Youtube

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sadquickchristmassnowman · 4 months

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Hiiii I have a community question I wanted to ask!!

Abed mentions all sorts of movies and tv shows through out Community, but I just wanted to know if maybe you have like a list of which ones are real and which ones he seemed to like more than others.

I can only think of the dark knight because of the dvd Annie broke, and the Star Wars movies (except he apparently hates the prequels) and cougar town!

great question! sorry for the delay on a response.

so, he mentions/references an insane number of movies and tv shows throughout the series, and I unfortunately do not have a list of every single one. although, I am (VERY slowly) working on an in-depth episode-by-episode analysis of the entire series, and listing every pop culture reference is a subsection in that. but that's not helpful right now. moving on

I don't have the picture, but there's this questionnaire abed filled out (outside of the show, it must have been uploaded to a website as promotional material for the show). he says his favorite movie is a tie between:

ghostbusters (1984, comedy/horror)

an american werewolf in london (1981, horror)

back to the future (1985, sci-fi/comedy)

blade runner (1982, sci-fi/action)

stand by me (1986, adventure/comedy)

stripes (1981, comedy/war)

star wars (1977, sci-fi/fantasy, also called "a new hope")

star wars: the empire strikes back (1980, sci-fi/fantasy)

star wars: the return of the jedi (1983, sci-fi/fantasy)

ferris bueller's day off (1986, comedy/drama)

jaws (1975, thriller/adventure)

raising arizona (1987, comedy/crime)

jurassic park (1993, adventure/sci-fi)

seven (1995, crime/mystery)

the matrix (1999, action/sci-fi)

the goonies (1985, adventure/comedy)

the breakfast club (1985, comedy/romance)

real genius (1985, comedy/sci-fi)

better off dead (1985, comedy/romance)

the fog of war (2003, documentary/war)

pulp fiction (1994, crime/thriller)

(btw if anyone knows what I’m talking about and has the screenshot please rb with it! I cannot for the life of me find it lmao)

I believe this is a list he apparently made in 2009, either in the first few weeks of school or right before the school year started. so it's possible he would answer differently as the series progressed. also, I do take some of these extra-canon things with a grain of salt, as on the same form he said his favorite place on campus was study room D or something, when obviously they definitely meant to write study room F. so, the credibility of my source for this information isn't exactly rock-solid. although, he does mention a lot of these movies on screen, and expresses love for many of them (the most notable ones probably being star wars episodes IV-VI, the breakfast club, and pulp fiction)

as you can see from the list, abed particularly loves american movies from the 80's. just a trend I thought I’d point out.

here's a few others he mentions loving, or just pretty notably references:

the dark night (2008, action/crime, as you mentioned)

rudolph the red-nosed reindeer (1964, musical/animated, is the whole basis of 2x11 abed's uncontrollable christmas)

the shawshank redemption (1994, horror/crime, is the basis for his plot with troy, annie, and shirley in 4x05 cooperative escapism in familial relations)

freaky friday (I believe it's the original one from 1976 specifically, but it's been remade a bunch. comedy/fantasy. it's the basis of abed and troy's story in 4x11 basic human anatomy)

rambo/first blood (series starting in 1982, action/thriller. abed talks about how messy the progressive series titles are in 3x14 pillows and blankets)

ocean's eleven (2001, crime/thriller, the basis for the heist scene from 3x21 the first chang dynasty)

hearts of darkness (1991, documentary/war, abed mentions it while pointedly filming dean pelton's production of his greendale commercial rather than helping with the commercial itself. similarly, hearts of darkness filmed the making of apocalypse now)

apocalypse now (1979, war/action, see the above explanation)

die hard (series starting in 1988, action/thriller, abed mentions wanting to do a die hard homage for christmas multiple times throughout season 4)

good will hunting (1997, thriller/romance, troy and abed's story in 1x24 english as a second language is filled with references to this movie. abed is doing homages on purpose, troy is not)

my dinner with andre (1981, comedy/drama, abed does a very elaborate homage at jeff's accidental expense in 2x19 critical film studies)

indiana jones (raiders of the lost ark, temple of doom, and the last cruscade only. he mentions loving the first three indiana jones movies in 1x04 social psychology)

aliens (1986, action/adventure/sci-fi, he and troy dress up as an alien and ripley in 2x06 epidemiology) (side note, I believe they're specifically referencing aliens, which is a sequel to alien. could be wrong though)

blade (1998, horror/action, they watch it over the course of 3x15 origins of vampire mythology after troy and abed assert multiple times that it is an amazing movie)

I think he generally talks about movies more than he talks about tv shows, but he does mention quite a few of them. some notable mentions are:

friends (1994, sitcom, mentions at least twice)

m*a*s*h (1972, sitcom, mentions in passing in 1x05 advanced criminal law, and references throughout 1x13 investigative journalism)

the cape (2011, action, mentions throughout 4x13 advanced introduction to finality)

who's the boss (1984, sitcom, is the premise of his whole storyline in 2x20 competitive wine tasting)

LOST (2004, sci-fi, mentions at least twice)

obviously there are a LOT more, but I just tried to list some of the most important ones, plot-wise and for understanding of his character. hopefully I’ll be able to get back to everyone with a super long list of every tv show and movie he ever mentions lmao, but that'll take a while. (there are lists online that say they list every movie and tv show abed has ever mentioned, but ngl I don't 100% trust those, so I’ll make my own lmao. but I put the link to one of them if you're curious. here's another one too)

at this point anyone who has seen community knows there are some really really big ones that I haven’t mentioned yet. pieces of media that are INTEGRAL to abed as a character. I was saving them for last lmfao. they are:

kickpuncher

inspector spacetime

cougar town

if I had to pick a holy trinity of media for abed, it would be these three things. these are EASILY the things he talks about the most, which is interesting, as both the kickpuncher movie franchise and the inspector spacetime series are completely fictional, and only exist in the community universe. (this is probably so they can show abed actually watching some of the shows/movies he talks about, without the obvious copyright issues that come with playing clips from an already existing movie/tv show on your screen. they kind of do that with blade in 3x15, but they only play vague fighting sounds, and never show their tv on our screen. anyway. not relevant.) to answer one of your questions from the ask, I believe those two are the ONLY fictional pieces of media abed talks about. as far as I know, everything else he mentions is real, including cougar town.

kickpuncher is obviously reminiscent of sci-fi/action films from the 80's, like robocop. like I said earlier, taking their place so that they could have a more substantial role in abed's on-screen life without any copywrite worries. it's a whole franchise, so there are multiple movies: kickpuncher, kickpuncher 2: codename: punchkicker, kickpuncher 3: the final kickening, kickpuncher: detroit, kickpuncher: miami (?), and kicksplasher (?). kicksplasher is apparently shown as a poster on abed's wall, and I’m assuming it's from the same franchise, although that could be wrong. the point is there's a very elaborate universe for kickpuncher, and it's a big part of abed's, and later troy's, film taste. the first time they mention it is in 1x15 romantic expressionism, when abed, troy, shirley, pierce, and chang all get together in abed's dorm room to make fun of stupid movies together. it's funny that it was introduced as a stupid movie to watch ironically, then troy and abed both end up genuinely loving it lmao. classic

inspector spacetime is obviously reminiscent of doctor who. they're both british sci-fi series that have been running for decades. doctor who uses a police box to travel the multiverse, while doctor who uses a telephone box. doctor who has malicious daleks who chant "exterminate," while inspector spacetime has blorgons who shout "eradicate." the concepts of the shows are obviously the same, with the actor for the doctor changing every season, etc etc. they're essentially the same exact show, but, like I said before, changed slightly so they can world-build without getting copywrited. there is something a little bit silly about this, though. it's definitely a continuity error and it's up to everyone whether they want to accept it as canon or not, I guess, but there's an episode where abed is actually wearing a doctor who t-shirt. (it also references bill and ted, but the doctor who part is what's relevant.) here's some pictures:

awesome shirt tbh, but it is a little bit funny that is essentially makes it true that doctor who and inspector spacetime both exist in the community universe. and, these pictures are from the cold open of 4x11 basic human anatomy, which is way after inspector spacetime is introduced to the show (3x01 biology 101). so, is inspector spacetime just a rip-off of doctor who? is abed a fan of both shows? if he is, clearly he likes inspector spacetime better. anyway. I would guess that this wasn't intentional. but that is definitely a tardis on that shirt. maybe it's just a classic season 4 continuity mistake. oh well. I guess that's just how the cookie crumbles. anyway.

cougar town time! yes, it's a real show. I didn't think it was but it is. what's not real is cougarton abbey, the short-lived british remake that britta gets abed into in 3x01 biology 101. but yeah. it has 6 seasons and is streaming on hulu, if you're interested. I’ve heard it's not good but who knows for sure. something cool about cougar town is that abed is actually in an episode. let me be clear: not danny pudi. ABED. it's similar to the story abed tells about being invited to the cougar town set and shitting his pants while having an existential crisis about the layers of reality. here is a youtube clip of the scene. I found out about it while stalking danny pudi's wikipedia page months ago, you know, a typical sunday afternoon activity, and I saw a cougar town credit on there. I didn't even know it was a real show at that point so you can imagine my surprise lmao. anyway. idk if you knew that already but it's one of my favorite community easter eggs. so funny.

okay! I hope this is enough information to suit your needs, and I am once again opening the floor to anyone who wants to add anything 💯 this was fun, thanks for the ask, and stay fresh everyone ✌️

#classic sadquickchristmassnowman blunder of writing an entire goddamn essay to answer a simple fucking question #also just to be clear george lucas went back and fucked with the original star wars trilogy #so unless you really put some work in to find the original versions of the original trilogy #you won’t be watching the versions that abed loves the most #sorry my indoctrinated me into his elitist star wars opinions #but I’m keeping it in the tags as to not clutter up the information with more of my senseless yapping #anyway #community #nbc community #community nbc #abed nadir #media analysis #community encyclopedia

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group-oc-tournament · 11 months

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Bracket

Round 1-

[part 1]

The London Five (@possiblyelven) vs La Banda di Fiori (@raybotonline)

The Abby's Abbey Gang (@pigeonperch) vs Sexymen Descendants (@wiiabee, @sporesgalaxy)

The Fuckening Narrators (@duskdragon39, @serethespider, @laurenbrightwing, @error-marigenous) vs Raquel and Raffaello (@siripedra)

The Backwater Trio (@speculative-world) vs In a State (@breach-of-conduct)

The Postmen (@patronsaintofdemons) vs Team Dysfunctional Brothers (@scentedtyrantwitch)

80's World (@plugandplaytimemachine, @eatsteas) vs Diamondback Explorers (@laikacore)

Brine Lab (@jokerslego) vs Single Parent Crossover Au (@derelictheretic, @deputyash)

Cephalodon (@decapod-appreciator, @annalisaa) vs Cindy et al (@arethereanynamesleftover)

The Comedy Skit Retinue (@kirjanikv6ilill) vs The Crew of the Phoenix Fire (@sol-shines, @dreaming-of-stories-and-stars)

[WITHDRAWAL] vs Cebu Chaos (@sol-shines, @dreaming-of-stories-and-stars)

The Surviving Six (@the-anemoi) vs Fantasy Danganronpa Dropouts (@kdm13, @thedreamparadox)

End of the World Party (@bingobongobonko, @cabletiesofficial, @localfool-thecreature, @spaginithethird, et al) vs The Anchor Bay Gang (@pankomako)

The Cyclone Family (@snakolyte, @averagenotnormal) vs Mercury and co (@scentedtyrantwitch)

#announcements #bracket #round 1

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k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9 · 1 year

Photo

#Beetlejuice (1988)#Beetlejuice #80's #80s #movies #80's movies #fantasy horror comedy film #fantasy horror comedy movies

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agirlwholovesrockstars · 5 months

Text

unchained melody

☆ EDDIE MUNSON'S MASTERLIST ☆

❣ AGATHA'S MAIN PAGE ❣

Summary : you've waited for decades to find your purpose, a trip to Earth isn't so bad.... is it?

Word Count : I'm not making this long as I can 😩

Warnings : 18+ Eddie Munson x FEM!reader, language, Eddie is 20 but reader would be probably much more older since she's a fairy, VECNA & UPSIDE DOWN DIDN'T EXIST IN THIS but still set in the 80's of course, Jason Carver being a bully (he'll appear very briefly, I promise) calling reader a bitch, use of y/n, cheating (not on reader), mentions of past life of Eddie (briefly too), mentions of Eddie doing drUg deals

What to Expect : fairy!reader‼️ fluff, fantasy, comedy, magical and a bit of angst

Note To Reader : I wanna make this idea come to life so badly and I hope you'll love it! 🥺🫶🏻

Author Note : I just wanna imagine how Eddie would react if he found himself a freaking fairy and he would absolutely go nuts for it and take care of that whimsical being like his life depends on it fr

"W-What the fuck?!"

Eddie falls back down on the ground while clutching of his safekeeping lunchbox that he sells with Chrissy earlier

His hands are shaking and his whole body trembling to what he just witnessed at the moment

He is petrified that something blasted out of nowhere coming from the sky

He tries to get up, his heart rapidly fast as he walks towards at the possible danger

But, he wants to suspect what it is

The smog and the gusting wind whooshes away like nothing happened

He looked around in the woods to see if someone's out there, there's no one

He hesitates to check at the mysterious whatever that was, maybe, he'll might die of being curious

Before he turn his heel backward, a sudden soft glow shining on the area

He squints his eyes as he tries to look harder on the ground

When his eyes finally saw that he's dying to see, it widen and he gasped

The safekeeping lunchbox slipped off from his hands making a "clank" sound

He couldn't quite understand if this is just all a dream or maybe he took too much of the shit that he's having

He rubbed his eyes as if you'll disappear after he does it but you didn't it

He crouches down, reaching out for your hands to touch you

He wants reassurance that you're real

That this isn't just some hallucination

When his fingertips touch the smooth, soft delicate skin of yours is so foreign

He never felt something so different from any other human being before

He let out another gasp, yeah, you're fucking real, alright

"Okay, what the hell is happening" he talks to himself

"Maybe, I should stop selling this, the universe is now testing me to quit it" he raises his hands up in surrender

He gets up and paces back and forth as he glances at you

He taken noticed that there's so many sparkles around you and my god- your hair is like he'd never seen anyone with that marvelous hair it looks so weirdly healthy

Eddie already made up to this mind that you're a fairy, considering how you seem so unhuman-like, okay, you're beautiful that's granted but to him- you're so....unreal

Your clothes are like something came out of the pictures from his favorite fantasy books

He tilts his head because it looks so legitimately that it isn't just some Halloween party costume

You're breathing but still unconscious

Eddie didn't even remember that he'll be late for his next class

You're a stranger and hell- he didn't even know you

But, he can't leave you like this especially in the woods alone

He put the hand on the top of his head, he is so stressed out

He isn't even sure if this is some kind of joke or not

He holds you carefully by the shoulders shaking you slightly as he tries to wake you up

The moment you moved, he raises his brows as he tries to give you space and moves back away a little bit

Your eyes flutters open, your vision is still blurry as you try to comprehend to where you are

You helped yourself up as you look around you, the time when your eyes meet his

Your heart pounds, your eyes light up and you smiled at him

He furrows his brows and he looks at you in confusion

You start to walk towards to him still having the same expression as if you knew him

You really did though, a tad bit

"You look so much better in person!" You spoke in delight and excitement?

"Wh-What?" He extends his hands in stop gesture as you halt your tracks

"Oh, right, I'm Y/N! It's such a pleasure to finally meet you!" You take his hand as you shake it politely

He rips his hands off you and he kept walking backwards as you moved forward to him

"I-I didn't even know you!" He scarily said it out loud

You're taken aback from his outburst as you tilt your head at him

The look you gave him, he suddenly knew that you probably don't remember anything of what happened to you that you're clearly fucking fell out from the sky

"Uh- Y/N- y-you fell from the sky" he points it out in the air

You follow his gesture as your eyebrows both raised together and now you're finally understand why he is so uncomfortable at your presence

You swallowed, you immediately felt the emotion and the feeling that he's having

You can't blame him, he is scared and also he's right, he didn't knew anything about you

"I'm sorry, Eddie- please forgive me, It wasn't my intention to frighten you"

He collects himself for a while as he scans your face, you're telling the truth

He sighs "Look, I-" he paused, trying to pick up the right words to say "I was just out here making a deal- I was supposed to go back to class after it but as I headed back to the building, you- just blasted from the sky on my way there and I don't know why this is happening to me, I don't know why am I talking to you right now, you know me, I don't know you and I have no idea who even are you?!?" He exclaims while rambling

You shake your head "I knew coming here is such a bad idea" you murmured

You walked back away from him

"I should've listen to the rules"

He knits his brows and he follows you

"What? What are you saying?" He blocks your way

Your joyful aura has faded away so quickly, he can't help but feel so sorry for it?

You just stare at him, you shrug- "It doesn't matter anymore"

"Hey, this whole day is so freaking odd to me it's not even over yet, so- don't you dare try to walk out on me, I just want answers"

His tone changed and his face is serious

"you promise- you won't freak out this time?"

He nods

"I'm a fairy, Eddie"

"Are you being for real?" He still refuses to believe until....

You showed him your perfectly detailed wings

He flinches at the sudden appearance of it but recovers quickly soon after

"Y-You're a fairy?!" His eyes goes all over your wings, a small smile tugs on the sides of his lips

You catched it as you finally bought back your mood

"Yeah" you grin at him enjoying the sight of him being genuinely amazed at you

You wouldn't do this for other random people but for Eddie? You trust him and get comfortable for some reason

He finally looks at you with soft eyes "Why are you here?"

Before you can respond, you saw the familiar face over his shoulder, he noticed your expression changes

"Hey! Eddie- there you are! we've been looking everywhere for you" Gareth shouts out loud

He turns his whole body to look at his friend, he grew nervous if he saw you but when he looked back, you're gone

He studies his friend, he knows something is up but he decides to not ask him about it

"You don't want Principal Higgins to give you another suspension, hmm?" Gareth crosses his arms as he smirks

"Oh- get the hell outta here, Gareth" Eddie picks up his safekeeping lunchbox at the ground as he subtly looked everywhere in the woods finding you

Gareth walks beside him, Eddie blurs the voice of his friend talking as he finally found you, his whole face lights up

You wave at him with a lovely smile on your face

He nods his head slightest move as he smiles back at you

"Eddie? About the rehearsal later?"

His friend's voice pulled out of his trance with you

"Uh- yeah, right- after class"

He looked back and you were nowhere to be found

Eddie couldn't wait any longer to go home already, he's been jumping his knee up and down

As soon as he saw the clock strikes at 3pm, he get up fast and went outside of the classroom

He went at the back, the empty hall- he breathes deeply as he shook his head sideways

God- he wishes he isn't losing his mind

"You're not losing your mind, Eddie"

He jumped yet again that you appeared out of nowhere

"Y/N?"

You smiled "Hi, again"

"I-I have so many questions" he says as he memorizes everything about you

Your face and your sweet smile that you always gave him

You nod as you reached for his cheeks that he got caught off by your action "Maybe later, Eddie- you have a rehearsal with your friends, right?"

"Yeah, wait, how did you know-"

"Dude, come on- let's go" Jeff throws his arm around his friend's shoulder

When he finally gets home, he sets aside of his beloved guitar to his room

The moment he thinks to call you- he screams in shock

You winced at his voice

"Holy- fuc- you gotta stop doing that!" His hand flies to his chest as he tries to calm down

"I'm sorry!" Your face makes the cutest frown with that small voice

He chuckles slightly "It's alright" he dismissive his hand to you

You finally lay it all out for him, he watches you intently and he listens carefully

Thank goodness, Wayne- we'll back in the morning

"So" he thinks for a second "You're here to help me?" he makes a point gesture to you and back to him

"Yeah, don't get me wrong, I enjoy and love what I was meant to do, I aced all the tests- I did it well like literally everything but after I finished it- you supposed to have a person to guide that you know deep within yourself that you chose the right one, especially when you're a newcomer that must happen"

He leans closer looking at you across at the small living room

"You didn't have any?"

You break your eyes away from as you look down as you shake your head

"No, I don't- I was there for decades, nothing came up to me that connects with me"

He gives you a sympathetic smile

You blink at him as you continue to explain further more "Newcomer's are allowed to explore the earth to find what's their purpose with one specific person but they're aren't allowed to interact with humans"

"Did you just disobeyed your rules?" He's amused by even a magical creature like you can do stuff like that

"Yeah, I'd have to or else I'll just stare at the abyss" you half-joked

"Everyone up there, they already knew their purpose at the first place and I'm just like so caught up in the middle that I feel like I'm losing my time" you paused, you don't wanna sound too sad

His gaze on you softens as you glance at him, he really does care, you can see it in his eyes

"Every fairy has their purpose like for example, A fairy can help you with love, your talent, even with something more personal like finding your place in the world, a family, anything, even with emotions too"

"And you?"

"I-I still don't know what's my use for the people" you softly replied as you duck your head down

He nods slowly as he spoke again "Does anyone every human have their own fairy?"

"Not all of them- we only appear when a human has a pure kind heart"

"I have a good heart?" He says it aloud in disbelief

"Yes, you do, Eddie" you smile at him

You wanted to say it to him about what's the main reason behind all of this but you don't want to overwhelm him, maybe, soon

"Wow" he grins at you as he looked back at the kitchen

"You might be hungry"

"Do you mean food?"

He looks at you perplexed at your tone "Yeah- wait- do fairies eat food?"

"We don't"

"You're kidding?"

"No, I am not"

"How in the world are you even alive at this point if you don't eat?!"

You shrug "Magic, I guess?"

He snorts "Okay, fair enough"

He's embarrassed not having real food in the house and it's not his fault, he is just not used having guests at his trailer

He prepares Mac & Cheese and regretting giving it you since you said that "fairies don't eat" but that won't even stop you for trying

It's your first time so you copy his movements by bringing the spoon to your mouth

You start to chew until it hits your taste buds and you squeal of how good it is

He chuckles at you in amusement

He bids goodnight to you as headed to his bedroom- you wonder why you're both separated to each other

The moment he enters the bedroom, he almost stumbles to his footsteps

"What did I say about that?!"

"Can I sleep beside you?"

He is dumbfounded at the question as he clears his throat

"No, we can't"

"Why not?"

"Because-"

"Am I not allowed to? Is it forbidden?"

He scratches his head "Y/N" he sighs in tiredness

"I always thought-" you gasp "Is it the human rules?! Do you have like those too?"

He doesn't want to argue with you anymore and he doesn't have the energy to explain it you

This whole day is a lot to take in

"Okay, fine- you want to sleep beside me?"

"Yeah" you reply happily

He just chuckles in your enthusiasm

Phew- good thing he changed his bedsheets, he doesn't want you to see the stains beneath it

He doesn't have a extra blanket so you both share

His whole body stiffens when the moment your body flush down at the mattress as you move around a little to get comfortable

You're the only girl and fuck- you're a goddamn fairy that he bought home

"This is nice" you say

A smile grows on his lips as he looks at you, his eyes went down to your clothes

"As much as I adore your dress- can you sleep like that?"

Every move you make your dress makes rustle sounds "Oh, you mean pajamas"

"Exactly"

"I think I can make up something"

You make a gesture to your hands until a sparkling soft gleam shoots right between your hands targeting your whole posture and it flashes a new set of clothes

He uses both of his elbows to sit himself up

"Woah, if only dressing up was easy like that"

It reveals to be a fluffy white cotton pajamas

You giggled as you take a look around to his room

"I love your room, it's so you"

He chortled "Uh- thank you"

"You mean waiting by decade, did you mean that you're more than 100 years old?"

"Try thousand "

"What- no way- you look"

"Young?"

He nods

"Yeah, time flies different at my place but when you're like thousand is like 20 years old in fairy years"

"Fairy years, huh?" He chuckles

You laugh "Billions are the oldest ones there"

He smiles down at you

"Hey, Y/N"

"Yeah?"

"You don't have to worry about not finding your purpose, you'll get there as long you don't give up"

You didn't expect him to say that you smiled at him widely even more your heart flutters to his words

"Thanks, Eddie, goodnight"

"Goodnight, sweetheart"

Eddie woke up while sleeping on the side of the bed, he brings his whole body to face you

There you are- sleeping peacefully, he checks the clock- it's 5am he wakes up too early as he groans slightly

He watches you sleep until the sun hits your skin- it's like the most extraordinary thing that he ever witnessed in his eyes

There's so many shimmers all over, he hasn't seen that wound under your forearm probably from the fall yesterday, it healed on it's own

"Oh my god" he whispers but he is indeed freaking out not wanting you to wake up

You started stirring in your own sleeping position, he froze, you open your eyes slowly

"Hi" you say with a smile

"Hello, Y/N"

"Eddie? boy- you're home?" Wayne calls out from the other side of the room

"Shit" he gets up and scrambles to pick a clean shirt and pants

You immediately sit up from his bed watching him

"You're nervous" you say

"Y-Yeah- I am"

The moment he reaches for the doorknob, his hair is messy so you click your tongue and say "Wait"

He looks back and you make a gesture to your hands shooting another soft gleam

Out of all the hair care treatments that he did, yours is far more better than he ever did

"Oh" he touches his hair, he blushes

"You're welcome" you smile

"Don't go anywhere, okay?"

"I won't"

He smiles at you as he went outside of the room

"You can uh- stay here until I get back home" he says as he jumps out of his van, it's Reefer Rick's house

Since Wayne is resting at the trailer, he finds another place where you're safe

Not that Wayne can't be trusted- it's just that he will be fucking grounded at the thought he bought a girl home

"Why can't I come with you?"

"To school?"

"Yes?"

He struggles to explain "No- It's too dangerous for you to come with me"

"I could protect you"

"W-What?!"

"If there's monsters I could fight them"

He laughs at your serious tone but that's true he has a lot of enemies at school

He notices that you're not laughing

"You would do that for me?"

"Absolutely! I could teach them some lessons that they'll probably won't bother you again if they try"

"You're serious?"

"Yes, that's my duty"

He unlocks the house letting you both inside as he closes the door, he checks the cabinets at the kitchen, there's plenty of food for you there

"I just can't understand why I can't come with you"

"Y/N" he walks towards you "People aren't like me"

You furrow your brows "What do you mean?"

He sighs "People ain't always nice" he knows it all too well, there's a glint on his eye that you're struggle to read

That's another thing that you should learn

"I just don't want you to get hurt, that's all"

"Okay"

He smiles and walks back at the front door "I'll be back, I promise"

"Eddie"

"Yeah?"

You hug him unexpectedly as he freezes at first but he hugs you back with unfamiliar tingling feeling on his stomach, he looks down at you with a smile

"Jeff, he's behaving very weird yesterday" Gareth argues with Jeff

"Yeah, right" he scoffs

"It's true! He's hiding something, I just know it"

"Hey, guys"

Gareth pretends to act cool

Jeff just whistles out of nowhere

He chuckles "What's going on?"

"Spill it out, Munson"

"What?"

"Gareth says that you're hiding something"

"I am not"

"You're lying!"

Eddie glares at Gareth and Jeff squints his eyes at his friend

"Y/N? I'm back?" He throws his bag on the couch

"I missed you!" You hugged him from behind as he takes a sigh of relief

"Missed me?" He raises his eyebrows, you're very sweet- it's just that this is all new to him, he never had a girl this close before

"Yeah"

Eddie smiles fades too shortly, he heard a rattle outside, he shushes you as you follow him

He grabbed a stainless steel pole, a suspense is growing in the atmosphere as he is ready to hit someone with it

"Woah, woah! Eddie- it's us!" Gareth raises his hands in surrender

"Oh my fucking god!" Eddie sighs in exasperation, he drops the stainless steel pole making a "cling" sound

"Eddie? Are you alright?"

Jeff's eyes widen and Gareth eyes flash with mischief he smirks at the sound of your voice

Eddie became tense as he begs for his friends not to come inside, he tried to block them out of the way, but both of them snickered

It's beyond of his control as he exclaims "Goddamn it!"

They both make a run for it, the moment when they're inside- Jeff and Gareth stopped

Eddie runs his hair in a stressful manner

You got startled at their appearance- you both recognized them immediately

"Are these your friends?" You beam at them

Jeff and Gareth shared a knowing look

"Care to explain, Eddie?" Jeff says

Gareth stares at you in amusement

"Listen, it's not what you think it is"

You felt a danger coming in as you shouted "Move away!"

Jeff, Gareth and Eddie are shocked to hear your voice

They both move out of the way as they went outside watching you in the middle as you stare at the sky

"Y/N? What is it?!" Eddie follows your gaze

"Look!" Gareth points it out a comet coming fast forward to you

"What is she doing?" Jeff says as they watch the scene unfolds

It looks like they're fairies as well but much more darker

A fought them all off and a big woosh of an impact when you had enough of those creatures

"Duck!" The three of them went down when bunch of broken trees flying everywhere

He taken noticed that the more you use your powers your glowing becomes more stronger it's the same thing that he saw from the fall

When you successfully defeated all of them you breathe heavily but a kind smile sitting on your face like nothing happened

Eddie smirks both to his friends, looking at them with jaw-dropped expressions on their faces

"They're gone, it's safe now" you say placing both of your palms to his friend's shoulders

They both sat in silence as they couldn't believe what they just witnessed

"I thought you're hiding a girl from us, not a fucking fairy?!?" Gareth exclaims as you just giggled

Jeff stands up sits besides Eddie as he explains everything

You sat down with Gareth as he looks at you curiously

"That all happened yesterday?!"

"You got that right"

You played with magic while Gareth watches in awe

Eddie and Jeff glances at you both

You can change the colors from Gareth's flannel as both men overhears Gareth saying "Wow, that's so cool!"

"She's here to find her purpose?"

"Yeah, I still need to know more though- she told me that right after you trained, you supposed to have a person ready- she waited for decades nothing showed up to her-"

"That's awful"

"Yeah, I know- I guess she picked me"

"You say that she could protect you right?"

"Yeah?"

"Wouldn't be awesome to bring her around school and watch her kick the fuck out of Principal Higgins?" Jeff jokingly snickers

Gareth chimes in "Yeah! That's gotta be amazing!"

You're fixing Gareth's hair using your powers as you join in the conversation

"Who's Principal Higgins?"

"That's the fucker who got Eddie held up back when he's supposed to graduate"

Before you could respond, Jeff adds

"Even Jason too! Kick his ass- Y/N!"

"Wait- til' Dustin hears about this-"

"No- Absolutely not! You guys are the only ones who can knew of her existence here"

"Your friends have good hearts" you plainly say with a smile on your face

"They both have good intentions and it seems like they only want to protect you like I do"

"I thought you said- I'm the only one?"

"I could protect you and the people around you that are kind to you"

Jeff and Gareth grins at Eddie

Eddie smiles at you and he almost forgot that his friends are there

He rolls his eyes "To the hell with it"

"I'm just worried something will happen to you"

"Don't be"

He loves your fairy aura appearance but it seems to obvious to go inside of the school with that

"Can you like change a bit of your-"

"Oh, yeah right- I can disguise"

Your hair from ebony went to chestnut brown and your clothes became more normal-like but still it isn't just some fabric that you could get in stores

A white skirt and a gray cardigan with black boots

"You look g-great" he became flustered complimenting you

"Thank you, now- let's go"

A bunch of high-schoolers eyeing you both as you hold tightly to Eddie's forearm

"Why is everyone looking at us?"

"It's because I am an outcast" Eddie wanted to say

"They aren't just used to see me with-"

"With what?"

"A girl"

"Oh"

At lunch, Eddie is becoming more anxious, you reached for his hand as he relaxes a bit

"You're okay? Y/N?" Jeff looks at you in concern

"Yeah, it's a lot of youngsters though" you say as you look around the room

"School cliques are fucking territorial" Gareth says as he flips someone off

"Well, someone got a new girl"

You felt Eddie's body tensed at the sound of his voice

That's Jason Carver

Something about this person makes you feel nauseous just by his presence

With one look at him, you knew that he did a lot of bad stuff to Eddie and that alone just pisses you off

"You got a problem, Carver?" You say

Eddie, Gareth and Jeff looked at each other

"I'm not talking to you, bitch"

the three men both rised up to their feet as they shoot daggers at their sworn enemy

You stopped Eddie by holding his chest as you walk slowly to Jason

Eddie, Gareth and Jeff follows you from behind

"I really don't get why you're so mean to Eddie"

All of the students are watching the scenario

The look you gave him is intense that he can't even look you in the eye

For some reason, you made him feel guilty

"Is it because he is everything that you're not? Carver? That's what annoys you?"

The "oooh's" from the students made him feel more worse

"You're a big man with a little dignity, Jason- that's what you are- do better" you scoffed

"Who do you think you are?" He walks closer to you as you push him back

"I am here to tell you to back off!"

"You think you could get away with that easily?"

"Don't test me or I'll tell everyone that you're fucking another girl besides Chrissy"

The whole students that gasped in shock

"Oh shit" Gareth jumps and Jeff cups his mouth

Eddie is surprised became amused that you cussed for the first time and he let out a smug smile to Jason

Chrissy slapped Jason's face as she storms out of the cafeteria

"Hold yourself accountable from your mistakes, Jason!" A cheerleader shouts and gives a smile at you

A bunch of highschool girls went straight to you

"I'm so glad you did that he's getting away with everything just because he has that "popular" title"

You're getting crowded and nod to everyone else that keeps saying "Thank you" to you almost like everyone is celebrating from what you did

In the corner of your eye, you see your friends, Eddie, Gareth and Jeff watching you as they both ramble in excitement

Eddie is the longest one to hold your gaze and he smiles at you

You kept your word to Eddie as the three of them as they watch you reasoning with Principal Higgins

"What's she saying?" Gareth whispers

"I can't lip read" Jeff whispers back

Eddie shushes them both as they try to understand your expressions

You went outside and they both wait for your verdict

"I got it covered" you wink at Eddie as the two of his friends jump in victory behind his back

"What did you do?"

His face doesn't seem like he's convinced, a part of him is relieved but also he isn't?

"I told him that your father doesn't define who you really are" you speak softly to him

His eyes went melancholy being born having "Munson" as your last name, life gets even more tougher

"I picked as fast as I read him what's the reason behind holding you back and that is why" you added as you watch him closely

He became all too quiet but he gave a sad smile to you

You're with him for over a month now and you both grew close.... too close

It feels like you both feel attachment to each other

First blossoming memories with you is getting amazed at the popcorn popping and you sigh in delight of how good it is and Eddie just loves you for it- popcorn is now one of your favorite foods

Eddie introduced you to all of the music that he worships so much- he turned you into a metalhead fairy, he didn't expect you to like it but you did it

Eddie takes you to watch movies at the local theatre and saw "Casablanca" with him

You tried so much harder to learn what love is but it seems like you must to know how it feels first before you learn to what it is

Unbeknownst to you, Eddie watches you as you react at the scenery of the film, appreciating every cinematography and the actors in it too

He's never felt this happy before and it scares him, What if somehow your job is done, what will happen to him?

Can he live without you on his side?

He ignores every feeling that he's having for you and for godsakes- you're just doing your responsibility and here he is falling for you

He bet didn't know that you're also falling for him too- you just didn't know that how it works and it is now happening

You watched him perform at The Hideout for the first time and there you are cheering him on as you look at him gleefully

In a minute, he just took his eyes off of you as he dealing with the crew and staff

A guy approaches you and oh gosh- Eddie felt on rage and jealousy for some reason

He knows about men that cannot be trusted that he just want you for- come on- let's be real here- fucking sleep with you

Before he can interrupt your conversation he overheard him saying "Can I take you home with me?"

You're so polite and also innocent for the obvious predator that wants to lure you into his trap

"Hey, dude- she's my girlfriend" he snarky announced to the guy, the words he just said carries with so much weight before he can stopped himself for saying it

The man recognizes him in one look and walks away quickly

"Y/N, that's what I mean about people that aren't nice"

"Oh, that, I'm sorry but I told him, No- and he wouldn't listen"

He is still furious you can see it in his face "You're good though? Right?"

"Yeah, I'm okay"

"Let's go home"

He's pilling the pillows from his bed as you watch him

"Eddie"

"Yes?"

"What's a girlfriend?"

Fuck

His words are coming out jumbled and his cheeks went crimson red

"U-Uh- that's the term for dating someone" he avoids your eyes

"Dating?"

"Y-Yeah- th-that happens when y-you found love and if you're dating for a long time then-"

"Then what happens?"

"You both get married"

"So we'll get married anytime sooner?"

That's when he tries to stifle a laughter but he can't help but laugh from his stomach forming a boom cackle

You laugh with him while being confused

His laughter dies down as he spoke "That's not easy, Y/N"

"I really don't get it- I mean we're both like dating for a month and that's like very long now"

He just shakes his head and chuckles

"Don't you want me?"

His silly demeanor changes into soft and serious expression

"I do" he thinks to himself

"I really like you, Y/N"

You smile widely at him

"So we do get married!"

He just started sniggering, you really don't get it

You both go back and forth for bickering with each other until you both get sleepy

You dozed off for a few hours and you woke up and it seems too much early for you to waking up at this time

You want to feel him and try to understand him a lot more

There's something that is blocking you off to look deeper into him

You gently touched his chest as you closed your eyes as you went for his core memories

It started so pleasing until his father wasn't emotionally available became a drug dealer that he wasn't proudly to became one too, her mother was everything but died too soon, he missed her everyday, Wayne was the father figure that he never had

He experienced being bullied, he is often discriminated in the town because of his family history, he's an outcast mostly belittling him by the popular ones at school, that's why he always appeared so scary to intimidate the other people who dares to harm him or make fun of him at any possible way, it's a facade to keep bad people out of his life

There's one thing that captures you, the one thing that you could never take your eyes off

Despite his life being so much in despair and agony, he is still.... Eddie.... he never changed and that is why he created this world for people like him and that made your heart swell and a tear went down on your cheek

You suddenly get up and swiped the salty tears from your cheek, you're feeling something so different

You've never cried before and somehow it also made you feel jubilant about it- you learned something new

"Empathy" you hiccupped from your uncontrollable sobs

The challenge is to make him believe that he is lovable and so much deserving of love, you must make him feel that he does matter and not a nobody

Eddie wakes up from your sniffles and he sits up so fast that he hold you by your forearms

"What's wrong, sweetheart?" He uses his thumbs to wipe your tears, this is the first time he sees you vulnerable

"I-I just need to tell you that while I'm searching for a specific person, you just- caught my attention in a snap and I don't know why but for some reason that I was really made for you, something else that is pulling me in that I must go with you"

"That's the reason why I'm here, Eddie, my world didn't gave me a choice because something already has taken the position of it and it's you"

Eddie's heartbeats faster than anyone who runs in a marathon from your words

You just pull him and hug him tightly

"If I could change the way that you see yourself, Eddie- you're a wonderful person"

"That's- oh- sweetheart- that's the most nicest thing that I ever heard"

You both hugged at each other didn't care how long it takes it just feels you whole lot better

Everytime you spend time with him, you learned new things and you can also feel that your time with him? it will be over soon

So, that's why you take the chance to be with him always

"Hey, Eddie"

"Yeah, kid?"

"I just wanna say what you told me really helped a lot and I just wanted to say thank you" Dustin says with a cheekiest smile

"I'm always here for you"

"See you later at the campaign!"

"That's such a sight to see, Ed's" you approach him as soon as the kid was out of the scene

"Yeah"

Come on, say it, it's now or never, Munson

"Y/N? Is this your doing?"

"What do you mean?"

"I dunno- I just feel like light as a feather, I mean- I always been myself but right now being like this since then and I've never stopped myself for doing it- I feel wonderful"

Tears welled up in your eyes as you look down while walking, you just mask it with a smile

Your time has come

"No, it's not my doing, Eddie-"

You feel weak all of the sudden and felt a force pulling you

You fall down from your tracks as Eddie panicked to you catch you before you hit the ground

"Wh-What's going on?"

You can't stop the tears from falling and faking it that you're okay, you let the tears stream down your face

Eddie eyeing you with so much concern

"I finally had it, Eddie"

"What?"

"I found my purpose"

You held his cheeks as you caressing it with your thumb softly

"Empathy, Compassion and Understanding is my gift to you, I successfully made you realized it"

"Y/N- I'm not that good enou-"

"You are, stop doubting yourself, you're unapologetically you, Eddie"

"I-I don't know what to say" his eyes became glossy as he looked around to help you with-

You hand out the "Unchained Melody" tape by The Righteous Brothers, it's a gift that he gave to you

His eyes flashes the same look that you had before and now it's all clear to you, the air between you has shifted

You love him

He takes the tape as he looks at you

"I understood what love means" you smile sadly

He will never forget that night

He taught you how to dance at a local diner that plays the song- it's midnight- there's only a few people there- but to you both it's like you're the only ones left in the world

That's the time when your eyes both locked and you both knew your hearts speaks for each other the same

It's the most affectionate and romantic that you two had ever been

You really wish you had more time

"Thank you, Eddie" you sobbed as the soft gleam strikes down again

"Where- are you going?- What's happening- please- I want you to stay!"

You hugged him tightly as you could

"I need you to stay with me, Y/N" he whispers as he held you so bad that as he cries with you

You kissed him on the cheek as you let it linger for a moment

"When will I ever see you again?"

"I wish we could"

He watches you fade little by little as he couldn't hold you anymore

"No- please! Y/N!- I love you!"

You gasp at his declaration as you smile at him sweetly

"I will never forget you, Eddie, we will be together again someday, my heart belongs to you" your voice echoes as the wind runs through his skin as he breathes it in

He stare at nowhere in the middle of the woods while kneeling on the ground

He looks at the tape and that breaks for him to cry about you again

6 months later

His dream of snatching his diploma and proving the naysayers wrong, thanks to you and for himself that he fights to do great things by helping himself

It's a blissful feeling to himself while looking in the mirror with a big smile on his face

The green toga and his Uncle Wayne on his side proud smile etched in his features

His friends celebrated at the graduation

He kept looking at his diploma with his name on it as he couldn't believe that he made it

"Hey, are you doing well? Eddie?" Gareth asks while sitting beside him

The crowds roar in joyous party going on inside the gymnasium

"Yeah, I'm good- I just wish she's here to witness all of it" he said with a small smile

Gareth gives him a pat on his back but he can see it in his friend's eyes that he longs for you

The first program with the cheerleaders ends as he walks outside of the gymnasium

He wants to clear his mind as the afternoon cool air kisses his skin, he exhales as he looked up in the sky and closes for a while

Listening at the birds chirping, the leaves rustles on the ground, as the students clamoring noise became only a blur

"What do you wish for?"

He open his eyes as the familiar voice that he always missed to hear

He turns around slowly to find where it is and his eyes lands on you

Your eyes are misty to see him once again

"Y/N?!" He says unbelievably, he runs towards to you as you did too

You held at each other's hands

"I-I don't understand- how did you came back to me? I thought when you said your mission was over, you go next to the other person?"

"Well, our mighty and respectable leader saw everything, but yeah- I got scolded like a teenager when I got back there but they felt like it's for the best that they offer me that I should stay and remain with you"

"Really?"

"Yeah"

"And also-"

He slams his lips onto yours as you got cut off at your mid-sentence, your eyes went wild as you cupped for his cheeks, you kissed him back

You both breathe heavily as you pulled back with giggles

"I am not leaving you anymore- that's what I'm trying to say" you chuckled

He nods as he looks at you with those glazing chocolate button eyes "Never?"

"Never"

You finally taken the moment to notice that your job to help with him is like the extravagant thing you've ever done

"I'm so proud of you, Eddie!" You say happily

He turns around to show you his outfit as you squealed with a smile, he carries you as he twirls you around as you yelp and laugh

"Eddie- I have something to say"

"Can you continue talking about it later? I just missed you so freaking much" he pulled you in a hug as you melt with it

He tugs you inside of the gymnasium but you stopped

He knits his brows together

"I love you, Eddie"

He grins and his eyes and his warmth feels like your place to be- it's your home

"I love you too so much, Y/N"

He takes you on his side squeezes you in as you both you and his friends enjoy the once in a lifetime celebration

This is your time, your world, your moment, take it and cherish it <3

#Spotify #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson #eddie munson fic #stranger things 4 #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson fluff #eddie x fem!reader #eddie munson x y/n #fantasy #fairy #magical #enchanted #agirlwholovesrockstarsfics

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mrjoeiconis-blog · 1 year

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From the Archive: BE MORE CHILL TRACK BY TRACK May 16, 2018: Hey, hi, hello. My name is Joe Iconis. I’m a writer and performer and, most notably, the person to blame for the music and lyrics of Be More Chill. I wrote the show, a musical adaptation of Ned Vizzini’s novel, with Joe Tracz and it premiered in a production at Two River Theater in New Jersey in 2015. A cast album was made and was enjoyed by the amount of people you’d expect to enjoy a cast album of a musical that played for six weeks in New Jersey. Then suddenly and without warning, after two years of release, people, in particular young people, discovered the show and became obsessed. One hundred million streams of our cast album later, the show made its Off-Broadway debut in summer 2018 at the Pershing Square Signature Center on 42nd Street, before transferring to Broadway!

Before we launch into the madness of a track by track breakdown of the Be More Chill OCR, let’s talk about the Be More Chill score itself, shall we?

The first thing that excited me about adapting Ned Vizzini’s gorgeous book into a musical was the opportunity to write about the issues teenagers face through a sci-fi lens. I’ve written plenty of teens before. I love that they wear their emotions on their sleeve but don’t always have the vocabulary to properly articulate those emotions. But here was an opportunity to not only delve into the minds of young people, but to tap into some of my favorite genre influences: monster movies of the 1950’s, Sci-Fi/Horror flicks of the 70’s and 80’s, and Teen Comedies of the 80’s and 90’s. In short: John Hughes (Sixteen Candles, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) meets John Carpenter (Halloween, The Thing.)

Be More Chill is a classic musical comedy in disguise. It reeks of technology and is filthy with moderns sounds, problems, references, etc. But make no mistake about it: The show is as traditional as they come. Well, sort of.

The songs themselves are total showtunes; it’s the orchestrations that place us firmly in the genre world.

As I’d write the tunes on piano, I’d dream about what they’d sound like when given the full 80’s sci-fi treatment, and Charlie Rosen’s orchestrations satisfied my darkest, quirkiest musical fantasies. We worked closely on the specific sounds of this score. Our holy grail (especially when it came to underscore) was John Carpenter film scores. John Carpenter has directed countless horror classics, but he’s also famous for writing his own film scores. He was an electronic music pioneer and his work is immediately recognizable.

Other sonic influences included Oingo Boingo, Bernard Herrmann, Weezer, Tangerine Dream, The Offspring, and contemporary musicians with a retro flair like Sky Ferreira, Kavinsky, and Johnny Jewel.

“Jeremy’s Theme” Written at Joe’s 16th Street Apartment 2012/Two River Theater Library, during rehearsals 2015 I’ve always thought of this as the music that would accompany the production logos in a horror movie. The “American International Pictures presents… A Roger Corman picture…” cards. It immediately places the audience in an unsettled place. Something bad is going to happen and that bad thing is going to be otherworldly.

We’re actually cramming a lot of information into 30 seconds. Up top you’re getting the beep-bop-boop of computer circuitry. It’s the technological equivalent of a scary thunder storm in a creature feature. Next, our first synth line arrives. Hello, synth. Nice to meet you. Won’t you please overstay your welcome for the next two and a half hours? I drove Charlie slightly crazy in regards to the specificity of keyboard sounds I was looking for as I desperately wanted to be faithful to the Carpenter/Alan Howarth collaborations that inspired much of the score.

The track culminates with The Squip theme, played gloriously on Theremin by Danny Jonokuchi. The Theremin is a vintage electronic instrument played by the Thereminist moving his hands through the air to control pitch and volume. That instrument was used most often in 1950s sci-fi movies like The Day The Earth Stood Still, usually to accompany the visual of an alien presence.

We’re one of the only musicals to ever use a Theremin in its orchestration. Be More Chill is a show about kids obsessed with all things outdated and unloved and the show itself is obsessed with all things outdated and unloved! How very! (Heathers reference.)

“More Than Survive” Written in Joe’s 16th Street Apartment, 2012 After our eerie mini-overture, the audience expects to be confronted by a demon or a triffid or worse. Instead, we jump cut to the shockingly mundane sight of an average high school kid staring at his computer in his undies. I’m proud that the first event in the musical is our leading man being caught with his pants down. It establishes Jeremy us a decidedly unheroic hero and also kick-starts a theme of pantlessness that continues throughout the entire show.

The “C-c-c-c’mon” motif was one I came up with early on in writing the song. I wanted a repeated phrase that expressed the frustration of wanting things to move at an accelerated speed, and one that could also sound like the chorus of a pop song. I love immediately subverting the expectation of what Jeremy’s waiting for to load—“Is it a major homework assignment? A college application?” Nope, it’s porn! That moment establishes the spirit of Be More Chill right off the bat. It also makes for awkward car rides when kids listen to the album in the car with their parents. Sorry, not sorry.

In the actual show there are even more mini-scenes between Jeremy and the people in his life. I wanted this whole opening to feel cinematic and sweeping and place Jeremy in the center of a world that is swirling around him. Kind of like the “Head Over Heels” sequence in Donnie Darko.

The first person who connects with Jeremy enough to actually earn sung musical material is Michael. Michael brings his own music with him because he’s confident and, quite literally, marches to the beat of his own drummer.

Will Connolly’s voice just kills me on the album. He sounds like the love child of Michael Jackson and Billie Jo Armstrong.

Notice the little synth line underneath the lockers scene with Chloe, Brooke, and Jenna. It’s a quote of “Rich Set a Fire.” The little synth line underneath the first part of Michael’s scene? “Michael in the Bathroom.” The guitar line in the second part? “The Pants Song.” That audience has subconsciously heard so many melodies from the show before the first number is even over! Underscore is sneaky.

It should be noted that “More Than Survive” was the first song I wrote for the show. After sending it to Joe Tracz, I sent it to Jennifer Ashley Tepper, who is now one of our producers of Be More ChillOff-Broadway. She wrote back:

“I tried to listen to the Be More Chill song, got 60 seconds in, and got furious at everyone for all of the noise/ questions/ distractions at work... so I'm gonna go download these on my phone and sit outside or hide in the bathroom to listen. BRB!!!”

Hiding in the bathroom. That’s so Be More Chill.

“I Love Play Rehearsal” Written in Joe’s 47th Street Apartment, 2013 After hearing so much about her in the opening, this is the first time we actually get to hear from Christine herself. Charlie and I wanted her song to sound different from the angular computerized vibe of the rest of the score. Enter recorders!

Everyone associates recorders with elementary school music class and/or Renaissance fairs. That felt correct for Christine, who is warm, strange, confident, free-spirited, and literally dresses like an authentic Renaissance Princess at the Halloween Party in Act II! So much of Stephanie Hsu’s performance informed the song itself—she’s a brilliant actor and a soulful singer and it’s impossible to not conjure up images of her live performance when listening to her on the album.

The placement of this song moved around a whole bunch during our writing process and the eureka moment was realizing that the song’s not literally about play rehearsal. It’s a song about passion and freedom. It’s not the typical way to be introduced to a leading lady in a musical, which makes it perfect for Christine and for Be More Chill, in general.

The original second song in the show was an internal duet for Jeremy and Christine called “Touching My Hand.” It was about Jeremy pining for Christine and Christine wondering if she should go on a date with Jake. There was some nice character material for Jeremy, but it gave us information we already knew and it made the show feel like some cute romantic comedy. It also felt antithetical to the character to have Christine’s first real song moment be about a guy. That’s not her and we needed to respect that.

Note that the original full title of this song was “Why I Love Play Rehearsal By Christine Canigula,” which is very fussy and precious and I loved it but it’s too cumbersome and I knew that someone would inevitably make me change it so I just did it myself. (RIP Fussy, Too-Long Title That Joe Loved.)

“The Squip Song” Written at Joe’s 16th Street Apartment, 2012 It begins as a retro-sounding “cool kid in a ’90s movie” rock song (with some Oingo Boingo horns added in for good measure) and then turns full blown sci-fi/horror fantasia. And it all goes down in a bathroom. There are a lot of bathrooms in this musical.

This song is the first time we hear the “It’s From Japan…” refrain, which repeats ten million times over the course of the show. Gerard Canonico is a powerhouse of the highest order and he turned this song from a serviceable musicalized scene into a show stopper. The optional octave up jump on the second “It’s From Japan” is all Canonico’s doing. We had to add the big ending (including a toilet flush on the final button) just because it was so clear people wanted to clap after Gerard finished doing his thing.

Props to Josh Plotner on the vocoder, yet another retro instrument that’s rarely used in theater orchestration. It’s what makes the weird digitized voice sound. People usually think that it’s a mic effect but it’s all done live! Old school, baby.

For those who care: Gerard’s pronunciation of the word “correctly” is a nod to The Shining’s scary bathroom encounter between Jack Torrence and Delbert Grady.

“Two-Player Game” Written at Joe’s 47th Street Apartment, 2013/Rewritten during rehearsals at Ripley Grier Studios, 2015 I enjoy writing songs where characters have to work through some major personal issue while doing an unrelated task. (Ahem, “The Answer.” Ahem, “Ammonia.”)

Here, the boys talk about self-worth and the desire to be somebody else while playing a video game. Of course, the video game is actually telegraphing the journey they are about to go on but to Michael and Jeremy it’s just another nothing-special hang sesh. When I wrote that little 8-Bit “Apocalypse of the Damned” theme that threads through the song, I was inspired by being a kid and plunking out the melodies to grandiose John Williams orchestral scores on my Casio.

The original version of this song was titled “Level Up” and it did a lot of what “Two-Player Game” does, just not as well. It also sounded exactly like a particular song by The Clash and once I realized how similar the two songs were, “Level Up”s days were numbered.

It should be noted that I am the world’s biggest stickler when it comes to rhyme. I’m super old-school in that I believe things either rhyme or they don’t; none of that “half rhyme” garbage. I think rhyme makes theatre songs easier to understand and actually heightens the dramatic intention of the lyric. Disgustingly, “Two-Player Game” contains an accidental fake rhyme. By the time I realized, it was too late to change the rhyme. Every time I hear it, I cringe, and you can pay me a million dollars but I won’t tell you what it is.

“The Squip Enters” The grand entrance of our antagonist: The Squip. It was important to our radiantly talented director Stephen Brackett that The Squip’s entrance feel larger than life. His staging of the moment was dazzling, and I needed to write a cue that rose to that occasion. The Squip enters to music that is tastelessly huge, appropriately so.

It should be noted that I wrote The Squip with Eric William Morris in mind and I’m so glad his iconic performance of the role is preserved forever and ever on the album.

“Be More Chill – Part 1” Written in Joe’s 47th Street Apartment, 2013 I had a lot of trouble figuring out the musical style of The Squip. First I went down a computer-y road, but that felt too in line with the sound of the rest of the show. Then I tried a sort of 1950’s Dick Dale Surf Rock take. (Mike Rosengarten’s nasty, relentless guitar line is a remnant of that version of the song.)

Eventually, I settled into what currently exists. There’s a timeless cool, laid-back quality to The Squip’s music. It’s approachable and sexy but never too scary or affronting. This is seduction music. The moments where the vocoder is adding the spooky digitized element the melody line (“don’t freak out and don’t resist…”) is where The Squip’s true colors are peeking through the façade just a little bit. By the time we get to “The Play” he’s given up on trying to seduce and is just trying to conquer, so his music sounds different.

The whole “Be More Chill” section is really just a classic “make-over montage” sequence (it’s even set at The Mall!) so I took some musical inspiration from make-over and training sequences as well. Think Karate Kid, Dirty Dancing, The Breakfast Club.

A lot of people are bothered by the harshness of the “everything about you makes me want to die” line. To me, that’s the whole point of the show. The tone may be comedic, but the characters in Be More Chill are actual teenagers struggling with actual problems. I don’t think being depressed or suicidal is a laughing matter, but I do think sometimes people feel like there is a voice inside their head telling them to hurt themselves. It would be insulting and untruthful to pretend that a kid like Jeremy wasn’t struggling with these thoughts.

The humor, the fantasy, and the harsh reality co-exist in every moment of the show. And, in my experience, in every moment in life. It’s about learning how to deal with it and knowing which of the many voices in your head you’re supposed to listen to. But we’re not at that particular song yet.

“Do You Wanna Ride?” Written in [memory temporarily scrambled] I have no memory of writing this mini-song, it just happened. It didn’t exist and then it did. Look, I made a spicy song about stopping for frozen yogurt where there never was a spicy song about stopping for frozen yogurt.

Lauren Marcus’s interpretation is a gift from the theatre gods and is a testimony to her brilliance as an actor, singer, comedian and all-around magic person. The yodel, the riff at the end, all Marcus. She’s the Goldie Hawn of musical theater.

“Be More Chill – Part 2” When I stumbled upon the idea of the “Everything about you is going to be wonderful” section, that’s when the song really clicked for me. After being berated for all the things he isn’t, Jeremy finally gets teased with the promise of unadulterated love and adoration. It’s the false promise of spam emails about penis enlargement pills or the aspirational Instagram accounts of the Kardashians. The idea of: “If you just do This, everything will be Perfect.” The musical equivalent of “Make America Great Again.” Cheerful, optimistic, secretly sinister. The writing and performance make me think that it’s a theme song for an awful 1980s sitcom that never existed in the first place. “Everybody Loves Squips!” maybe.

Props to Dan McMillan for aggressively hitting that gong at the end for a big finish.

“More Than Survive” (Reprise) Restart! The show essentially begins again and we fast forward through another day at school, this time with notes and instructions from Mr. Super Quantum Unit Intel Processor himself.

The chorus goes into a reggae feel for a few measures at one point. The idea there is that sometimes things are the same but feel a little different and you can’t quite put your finger on why. The familiar feels unsettling. Reggae is a style of music associated with Michael, so I like thinking that maybe Jeremy has Michael on his mind in that one instant before Squip wipes the slate clean.

“A Guy That I’d Kinda Be Into” Written in Ripley-Grier Studios 2015, during rehearsal This was the last song I wrote for the show. I wrote it very quickly on a rehearsal break after not being able to nail this moment for years. I love that Christine gets this unexpected jangly little rock song as her second big number.

Have you ever noticed how the female lead in musicals is often saddled with the most drag-ass songs? Part of my mission in musical theater is to never subject my female lead to an unmotivated obligatory ballad.

It should be noted that Christine ends both this tune and “I Love Play Rehearsal” with an unexpected non-rhyme. Christine is a character who subverts our expectations of her at every turn. Gosh, I like her.

“The Squip Lurks” I’m eternally grateful we got to include this taste of underscore on the album. I’ve heard rumors that this plays in theme parks during the Halloween season. That’s the highest honor I could ever receive.

The track name is a reference to “The Shape Lurks” cue from the Halloween soundtrack. And, yes, “Jeremy’s Theme” is also a nod to “Laurie’s Theme.”

“Upgrade” Written at a Two River Theater writing retreat, 2014 // Re-written at Ripley Grier Studios 2015, during rehearsal

The line “this is my favorite place behind the school” is one of Joe Tracz’s great creations, delivered incomparably by Ms. Marcus. I don’t know why I find it so funny but I laugh every time I hear it. I think it reveals so much about Brooke.

The notes of “Upgrade-upgrade-upgrade” in the first part of the song are the same notes as the pattern that begins “More Than Survive.” They are just a little scrambled up. The melody of “I already know what it’s like to be the loser” is the “Apocalypse of the Damned” theme song melody.

This song is notable as the first time the character of Jake sings in the show. Poor Jakey D. This is the only musical in history where the classically good-looking Prince Charming-type gets the least amount to sing. I still like the guy, though. It’s another testament to the brilliant Joe Tracz that a character like Jake, who could’ve been a one-dimensional asshole jock, is actually a kind, well-meaning popular kid. Dude can’t help that he’s pretty! Jake Boyd’s vocals are so sensitive and approachable and kind of remind me of Mr. Peanut Butter from Bojack Horseman.

The final chorus of the song is the same melody but we lose the swing and make it more of a driving rock. Damn. Things got not cute quick.

This song used to end with a long minor version of the “Na Na Na” theme from “More Than Survive.” It was very musically exciting and too long and did nothing to service the story and was cut.

“Halloween” Written at a Two River Theater writing retreat 2014 The Halloween Party is a mammoth sequence that begins Act II and I knew it needed its own theme song. I wanted to write a chorus that sounded like what it feels like to be shoved around in loud, hot, crowded room. The sort of song that would send anyone with social anxiety into a full-blown panic attack.

The Suburban Halloween Party is such a hallmark of the movies myself and my collaborators were inspired by and we endeavored to do those films justice and make the greatest Halloween party blowout sequence in musical theater history. Please note that when we wrote the show, there weren’t actually any other musicals with Halloween Party blowout sequences, so just by existing, we were automatically the greatest. Now we’ve got some competition. How fetch! (Mean Girlsreference.)

There’s an element of group awareness in the “Halloween” lyric. “Cuz a Halloween party’s a rad excuse to put your body through mad abuse.” That’s because we’re experiencing the party through Jeremy. This is his first big social event and as much as he’s trying to be part of it, he’s still on the outside. He’s got a detachment that allows for a bit of perspective.

The dance break was arranged by Broadway legend Rob Berman! He based the melody line on a part of “Halloween” that was subsequently cut. It’s the “who’s got the peach Schnapps?!” section. I often add it back in when I perform the song in concert.

Props to Amanda Ruzza’s propulsive bass line! Crank it up, crank it up!

“Do You Wanna Hang?” “Do You Wanna Ride?” strikes back! With new lyrics relating to Chloe’s Sexy Baby costume! Katie Carlson is yet another four-leaf clover in our incredible cast of musical theater misfits. Chloe is hilarious and monstrous without ever being a cartoon. She’s trying her best, just like everyone else, she just has… questionable taste. I’m so enamored with the way Katie does the final “Do you wanna stop?!” chorus. I think in that moment Chloe is trying so hard to be Britney Spears circa 1998. Which would almost work if she wasn’t literally dressed as an infant. There’s something charming and a little sad and completely hilarious about it to me.

We never actually address the fact that Chloe is dressed as a baby (well, a “sexy baby”) in the lyric. In two million years all that will be left of this world will be a fat cockroach, a copy of the Be More ChillOCR, and a few confused aliens wondering what she means by “get inside my diaper, boy.”

“Michael in the Bathroom” Written at Joe’s 43rd Street Apartment, 2014 Many times as a kid and even more times as an adult, I’ve fled to the bathroom to escape a social situation. It feels like one of those no-big-deal things that everyone does and those are the exact sort of scenarios I’m drawn to when writing musical theater.

I’ve always been partial to the “Best Friend” characters. I want to know more about them and never understand why they exist only in the context of the lead character. In every show I’ve written I’ve imagined that when a secondary character leaves the stage, they’re walking into another show where they’re the lead. “Michael in the Bathroom” is the moment when the ultimate sidekick is allowed to take center stage and be the star of someone else’s show. I hope it makes the audience think about all the other secondary characters in the show like Chloe or Rich. They’ve probably all had their own “Michael in the Bathroom” moments over the course of the show, we just don’t get to see them. Oh how I long to write “Jenna in Her Bedroom.” Or “Brooke in the Alley Next to Pinkberry.” Maybe for the sequel.

George Salazar’s performance of the song is magic. It’s one of those miracle moments when a song and a performer connect in a specific way. The music and lyrics are a road map, but there are so many people who make the journey of a song like this happen. It all came together through a collaboration between myself and Ned’s characters and Joe’s book and Stephen’s direction and Nathan Dame’s musical direction and Bobby Tilley’s costumes and every other element that goes in to making any moment of theater.

George is the first person to sing “Michael in the Bathroom” in the show itself, but while I was developing the score, the song was sung out of context by a few gents including Jason Tam, Seth Eliser, and Will Roland. They taught me much about the tune and I bow down to them.

I wrote the song in one sitting in 2014 and the content never changed, aside from the cutting of a short third verse right after the bridge. We cut it late in the rehearsal process in deference to the “too much of a good thing can be dangerous” rule of theater.

A few people have questioned my use of humor in songs that are otherwise quite serious. “Why do you have jokes in such a powerful song?” an uptight professor once asked. “Why is this hilarious showtune so stinking sad?” a late-nite comedian queried over drinks at McHale’s. The intersection of the comedy and the tragedy feels true to the human experience. The absurdity of having to work through things at the Worst Possible Moment is something I’ve experienced many times. Things are rarely all good or all bad but things are always messy. You find out you got into your dream school while you’re high at your racist grandfather’s funeral. You have to audition for a role on Stranger Things the same day that a mountain lion eats the family dog. (RIP Spot.) You have a panic attack while wearing a Halloween costume after fighting with your possessed best friend in the bathroom of High School Halloween Party. It’s all so forlorn and confusing and funny. To me at least.

Charlie and I worked closely getting the arrangement just right. We wanted it to ebb and flow and sound like a pop song at first, never giving away that it will eventually turn into this tour-de-force musical theatre mad scene. I like when orchestration is at odds with the content of a song and doesn’t immediately announce what the song is about.

After going on this monumentally poignant journey, Michael undercuts it all with a spot of sarcasm, carrying on the great tradition of musical theatre characters who don’t really mean it when they say “I’m so glad I came.” (Follies reference.) The whole thing ends with the most sardonic cha-cha-cha ever to button a number.

“The Smartphone Hour (Rich Set A Fire)” Written at Ripley-Grier Studios, 2014 Jenna Rolan finally gets her moment of glory, unexpectedly, as the star of a seven-minute dance number. Katie Ladner’s turn as Jenna is so specific and inventive. She deflects the casual barbs thrown at her because she is not letting anyone ruin the time she gets to shine.

I set out to write a song that dramatizes and activates the dangerous world that the Be More Chill characters exist in. We spend so much time with our kind, sensitive protagonists, it’s easy to forget the madness they are living in. It’s hard to be a teenager, especially today. It’s a menacing world where information travels at warp speed. As does gossip, rumors, insults, lies, etc. To me, “The Smartphone Hour” speaks to the ferociousness of modern teenagers and shines a light on the sort of environment that leads to bullying and depression and worse.

It’s also a splashy musical comedy dance number! I wanted it to feel overlong and unreasonably gargantuan. I thought for sure some smart theatre artist along the way would force me to cut this song. I decided I was going to fight for it. It may not cover a ton of story ground, but I felt that it was imperative to have the number in the show. It sets the audience up for the craziness that’s about to happen in Act II and lets us know that things have spun out of control—both in the story and in the show itself. I think subconsciously, the audience thinks: “A dance number about arson?! The rules of the show are changing! I hope nothing unexpected happens to the characters I love! They wouldn’t kill off Jeremy, would they? Well, if I’m watching a dance number about arson anything is possible! Oh no! #SaveJeremy!”

Luckily, I never had to fight for the song. As soon as Chase Brock got his hands on it, he made it longer, in deference to the “too much of a good thing can be wonderful” rule of theater. Rob Berman’s arrangement of the dance break sounds like a sleepover from hell on crack and Charlie’s smartphone sounds bear more than a striking resemblance to the sort of sounds normally associated with the sinister Squip. Gossip is Evil, kids.

I really feel like we made the best Michael Bennett number Michael Bennett never choreographed. The final shouted: “End!” was all Chase’s idea and I love it so much. It’s a moment that lives in the real estate between musical theater Cheese Ball and rock’n’roll Middle Finger. A neighborhood I often hang my hat in.

The notes of the phone buttons that are heard after “he told me cuz he’s my best friend” are, once again, the same notes as the “More Than Survive” intro figure. Just reversed this time.

The title is an obvious reference to “The Telephone Hour” from Bye Bye Birdie. “Rich…” is by no means a parody of that song, but I think they are spiritual cousins. It’s another example of Be More Chill having a foot in the past and a foot in the future.

“The Pitiful Children” Written at Joe’s 47th Street Apartment, 2013 / Joe’s 43rd Street Apartment, 2014–2015 / Ripley-Grier Studios and Two River Theater 2015, during rehearsals Oh, heavens, this song. The lyrics of this song changed a ton over the course of the rehearsal process and I never got it quite right. I love it on the album. It sounds like what would’ve happened if Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails wrote Les Misérables. Alas, dramaturgically, I don’t think I did a great job of telling the story that Joe Tracz laid out. Don’t be surprised if this one gets fiddled with in anticipation of our forthcoming Be More Chill off-Broadway production.

The orchestration of this song is one of my favorites in the whole show. It pushes The Squip firmly into digitized-demon territory. He’s worrying less about seducing people in this number and he’s letting his true colors show. His true colors are cold, industrial, heavy, and militaristic. There’s no question that this Squip has his sights set on world domination.

I like using lyrics that work dramatically and stylistically. The Squip’s “beep-bop-boop” is literally him speaking in his native computerized tongue, but it also conjures up images of an old-fashioned crooner scatting. It’s connected to Jeremy’s “C-c-c-cmon” and the Ensemble’s “Hey hey hey” and all the rest of it.

“The Pants Song” Written at Joe’s Family’s house on Long Island, 2014 My experience writing this song is very much an example of the comic/tragic thing that I often love to write about.

I had tried to write a song for Jeremy’s Dad for the longest time and could never crack it. Joe Tracz said to me: “I just wish Jeremy’s Dad could have a song about the lesson he learns. That if you love somebody, you put your pants on for them.” Essentially, I am an idea thief. I immediately knew that sentence was a song, I just didn’t know how to write it. We were doing a developmental reading of the show and I was feeling the pressure. There was a date I needed to have the song in by and I had nothing. The day before I needed to have the song, I decided that after rehearsal I was going to have a drink with my best friend Jason SweetTooth Williams and then go home and write the song. And then my Grandma died. After a long illness, my grandmother Flora (RIP Flora) left this damned earth at the Iconis home on Long Island. I needed and wanted to be with my family. After doing all the things that you do when a loved one dies, I went downstairs to my family’s basement at 2 AM and wrote “The Pants Song” in one shot. Sometimes you have to write a song about two guys in their underpants on the night your beloved grandma dies.

Paul Whitty starts in such a forlorn, hurt place at the top of this song. I bet the audience thinks this is going to be a perfect-time-for-a-cigarette-break “sad dad” number and then it turns into a total bop. Much like the “We love everything about you…” section of “Be More Chill,” this was another song that I wanted to feel like a rockin’ version of the theme song from a 1980’s sitcom. Only difference is, the mythical sitcom that “We love everything about you…” comes from is phony and corporate and the “Pants Song” show is heartfelt and cool, Must See TV material.

There used to be a song for Jeremy’s Dad earlier in the show called “The No Pants Song,” where he extolled the virtues of not getting dressed. It was a sad, lazy waltz. The whole thing was one-joke, but I did love the final stanza:

ALL THE EXERTION OF PUTTING ON, THEN TAKING OFF JUST TO PUT BACK ON SEEMS TERRIBLY UNNECCESSARY TO ME WOULDN’T YOU SAY? I’M FINE WITH A Y-FRONT COVERING MY FRONT EVERY DAY

It should be noted that many of my musicals feature moments of pantslessness for male characters. This feels fitting as I am often pantsless when I write said musicals. Write what you know, Joe. (ReWrite reference.)

This is the only song in Be More Chill that features a big, in-your-face key change. I’m normally very discreet about my key changes, but a tasteless shift up a step for two men dancing in their undies feels earned.

The in-store music playing in the background of The Mall sequence is actually a Muzak version of “The Pants Song.” The moment I wrote the tune I knew it was destined to be the annoying music played on a loop in the atrium of a mall. The sort of irritating ear worm that slowly drives the employees of Payless and Sbarro’s mad.

“The Play” As a kid who spent hours listening to the big action-packed climaxes of the Sweeney Todd OCR, the Sunset Blvd. OCR, and the Carrie soundboard bootleg (thanks, 1996 Playbill Online message boards for making that one happen!), I’m so thrilled we got to include ours on the album. The underscore is straight-up cinematic, with all the themes of the past two hours crashing into each other like violent zombie bumper cars.

A few people have asked me if the cascading downward piano line in “The Play” is referencing “Suppertime” from Little Shop of Horrors. While the two riffs sound similar I was actually alluding to, you guessed it, John Carpenter film scores. The 5/4 time signature and downward modulation are dead giveaways. But I do agree that the line sounds not dissimilar to “Suppertime,” which is fine by me! Little Shop was my first musical and has clearly influenced me in countless ways as a writer, especially on Be More Chill.

The “Michael makes an entrance” line came late in the game and is a testament to the “sometimes the best thing a writer can do is just musicalize the stage direction” rule of theater.

One of my favorite bits of orchestral business is the twisted music box version of the “More Than Survive” chorus. Hella Danny Elfman. (Shout out to Rich’s Nightmare Before Christmas belt buckle! The 1990’s are alive and well and living inside my musical.)

The “Squip Death” section was hatched by Eric William Morris and myself in the basement dressing rooms of Two River Theater. It’s hard to make out, but as the Squip is destructing he’s speaking Japanese. The Japanese was translated by my bestie-since-fourth-grade Michael Ettannani. We’ve all got our Michaels.

“Voices In My Head” Written at a Two River Theater writing retreat, 2015

The point of Be More Chill is that we’re always going to have voices in our head, both good and bad, telling us what to do. The trick is to figure out which ones to listen to. The fear and doubt and anger and anxiety never really go away, but you can find a way to manage them. At one point in our process Joe Tracz articulated this by saying: “At the end of the show, there are still voices in his head, but the loudest one is Jeremy’s.” Yet again, I am a lowdown dirty idea thief. I stole Joe’s words and turned them into our finale.

Since the show begins and ends with ensemble numbers led by Jeremy, I thought this was a nice opportunity to chart our leading man’s growth. I wanted the vibe of the chorus to be different from “More Than Survive.” It’s more laidback, it’s more confident, it’s more playful. It’s more (ahem) chill. Even when the Ensemble kicks in with the “Na’s Na’s” from the beginning of the show, it’s less aggressive than it used to be. There’s harmony and everyone’s singing together instead of singing at each other.

It was important to all of the creators of the show that the triumph of our show not be that Jeremy gets with Christine. The personal triumph for him is that he’s able to deal with his “stuff” enough to have a normal-person conversation with her. I don’t know if Jeremy ends up with Christine after the events of Be More Chill. Maybe he does. Maybe he ends up with Michael. Maybe he ends up with no one. It really doesn’t matter. What matters is that he has figured out that his voice is one that is worthy of being listened to. And that allows him to get on with his life and move forward. All of the characters being together shouting “C’mon, let’s go!” is a triumph to me. They don’t know what’s next, but they’re going to go through it together. An army of Creeps, taking on the world hand in hand.

Robert Altman used to talk about how he never understood why movies ended with weddings. Why is the story over just because two people kiss? There are no real endings in life except, maybe, death. Musically, I didn’t want the show to end with a big held-out chord or with arms-around-each-other “it’s all gonna be alright!” sweetness. I wanted the very end to feel raucous and alive and like the music is tumbling toward something. Toward the future.

The joke of the ending is that even though the kids at Middleborough deactivated The Squip and prevented a total take-over, chances are good that all of the neighboring high schools have been completely taken over. No one is safe, all we can do is prepare ourselves as best we can. They may offer you fortune and fame. Love and money and instant acclaim. But whatever they offer you don’t feed the… Squips? Sorry, wrong show. Smiley face, lipstick, kitty paw.

#be more chill #jeremy heere #michael mell #michael in the bathroom #Joe iconis #george salazar #will roland #be more chill musical #Brooke lohst

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