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life-observed · 3 years

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Interview: Anthony Bourdain’s Ideal TV Audience Is Anthony Bourdain (SKIFT)

Anthony Bourdain, now in his 14th year as a chef-turned-author-turned television host makes television for Anthony Bourdain.

His desire, along with that of his long-term production team at Zero Point Zero, is to make travel shows that don’t appeal to a well scrutinized demographic. But appeal they somehow manage to do, despite a decidedly contrarian approach to the modern grand tour. In his shows we see poverty, political conflict, development run amok, violence, and how people really live like locals. Even the scenic cathedrals have a complicated backstory.

And it is succeeding. Bourdain is on his third network and regularly wins his time slot: At CNN Bourdain has turned his Sunday evening segments into some of the channel’s most-watched non-election related programming, regularly doubling the audiences of Fox News and MSNBC combined.

“I don’t make television for an audience really,” Bourdain told Skift. “I make it for the same reasons when I cook. You don’t see the customers when you’re cooking in a kitchen. You put the plates up to the window and the highest and the best thing that could happen is the cooks on either side of you look at it in an approving way. You put it up fast, you put it up good.”

You would think that a profane ex-chef with outspoken views on everything would not play well with a mass audience. But Bourdain brings in more then the urban foodie set each week. His deep dives into a list of destinations that are as frequently found in Bradt guides as they are in Fodor’s manage to tell a story through food, engagement with local issues, and avoidance of popular tourist sites.

The latest season of Parts Unknown on CNN begins this Sunday night with a visit to Manila, the Philippines during a natural disaster and holiday celebrations. We spoke with Bourdain twice earlier this month. Those conversations have been edited and combined, below.

Skift: Someone at Travel Channel once told me that it was the channel people ended up on when the show they wanted to watch wasn’t on. Why isn’t travel TV more compelling?

Bourdain: It shouldn’t be hard. It should be easy. It’s the best job in the world. I have a ridiculous and very unusual amount of freedom to go where I want, do what I want, and tell stories the way I want. It’s something I wonder about when I watch other shows. Why don’t people just talk like normal people? Why do they use TV voice? That’s a question that I’m always struck by. Why do they have to stick with a format? You’ll notice at the end of every segment they always sum up what we just saw, then they tease out what we’re about to see after the commercial.

Television in general is an environment where most of people who work in television live in a state of perpetual terror that they’re going to wake up and not be on television anymore. They’ll do anything to not risk not being on television anymore. That means talking down to the audience, using TV voice, sticking with certain conventions to avoid brand erosion or confusion just in case you missed it. “You just saw the world’s best hamburger. Next we’re going to be eating a hamburger with avocado!” I don’t really understand that.

I guess I know that I could get another job if this one falls through.

It seems to me if you just talk like a normal person that would be a huge improvement on a lot of otherwise promising or good shows. I think there are exceptions. I think what Eddie Huang and Action Bronson [on Viceland] are doing is really refreshing for exactly that reason. They talk like they do in real life instead of “When we come back it’s not just burger … it’s a burger with bacon!”

Skift: How is your audience different now than when you were at Food Network or Travel Channel and how does that influence how you do your show?

Bourdain: Not at all. I don’t think about who my audience might be. That is the road to madness when you start thinking about “who’s watching,” “why do they like me,” “who are they,” “what is my demographic?”

That’s evil shit to start thinking like that.

I don’t make television for an audience really. I make it for the same reason when I cook. You don’t see the customers when you’re cooking in a kitchen. You put the plates up to the window and the highest and the best thing that could happen is the cooks on either side of you look at it in an approving way. You put it up fast, you put it up good.

I make television the way I do to please myself and the people I work with. We push each other to be creatively satisfied and have a good time and be different than what we did last week. I really, really don’t ever and never have thought about who might like me or not like me and what might they expect. Networks — thank God not this one — but my previous networks are all too happy to provide good hard data on what audiences like and who’s watching. That’s in my experience the beginning of a really ugly phase.

What audiences want is barbecue shows. I don’t want to do barbecue shows. Maybe one every five years. I like barbecue just fine. I don’t want to be standing there eating fucking corn dogs. I’m not running for president, thank God. I don’t have to eat corn dogs.

Skift: You’ve been doing television and traveling for about 14 years then. What do you think are the biggest changes over that period in how Americans both eat and travel?

Bourdain: If you do a poll of what motivates people to travel to a particular place, the food is now the number one reason. I’m sure that that’s a significant change. I think people are less interested, or at least I hope, scouting online to go up the Eiffel Tower, look around and then come down again. I think they’re looking to have a more, for lack of a better word, real experience.

Skift: You’ve used food as the way to get into sticky situations and get a conversation. Is there any other way to get into those conversations, or do you think that food is the essential way to connect with people?

Bourdain: As I said, it’s not the answer to world peace, but it’s a start. It’s the beginning of a conversation, and if you don’t eat what’s offered, if you’re unwilling to try people’s food, if you’re unwilling to eat out of your comfort zone in order to be a good guest, that’s the end of a conversation. It’s the end of any possible relationship, so all it is is a start. It’s a good start. The willingness to sit down and experience a little slice of life outside of and different than your own. Usually, that’s a very rewarding experience. Obviously, I love it, but, as I’ve found over the years, it’s opened up the world for me in really unexpected ways. I think it’s just a beginning of a conversation.

Skift: Chris Collins, one of your producing partners, spoke at our conference last fall. He said the spirit at the start of your show was creativity and utter confusion, which is good TV. You’re more than a decade in now. How do you keep this gonzo or independent spirit alive when you’re one of the top rated shows in your time slot?

Bourdain: If you talk about confusion, if the network is confused or they’re uncomfortable then we’re doing God’s work. It’s that simple. If our most loyal fans turn on the show and for the first five minutes already unsure that they’re watching the right show that’s a good day, too.

Skift: Food tourism seems to be a low-cost, high-return way for destinations to really differentiate themselves, and get people to come. It’s easier to have a great hot dog joint than to build an Eiffel Tower. What destinations out there do you think have leveraged their food scene to best push tourism.

Bourdain: I’d say probably Singapore. First of all, they’ve been very smart about understanding that their food culture is interesting and worth travelling for, and I think they’ve managed to preserve and protect, as best they can, other traditional food culture, while changing and taking into account modern requirements for health and safety, and traffic control, and that sort of thing. I think Singapore is probably the best example of a national push to promote their food.

Canada, particularly Quebec, could do a hell of a lot better. They have such amazing, amazing, food, and really great chefs and I think the interest’s there. I just don’t know that they’ve promoted it as well as they could.

Skift: Since you’ve been doing this for so long, you’ve gone back to some destinations. When do you know is the time to go back and take a second look, or a third look.

Bourdain: That’s sort of a personal challenge that we, me and the crew, ask ourselves all the time. Can we go back to Los Angeles and do another show in this most photographed of locations, but find a new perspective? A completely different look at it?

As soon as we can think of a different angle, a unique one, a creative one, that’s satisfying to me and my creative partners, we’re going. Especially if it’s a place that I love spending time in. We’re always looking for any excuse to go shoot in Vietnam. Rome, I’d love to keep going back to. Creatively, it’s satisfying to be able to figure out a way to go to a place that’s as over-photographed as L.A., and yet tell the story differently, from a unique point of view.

Skift: Right. You started at CNN when they were cutting back on bureaus, when most of the shows are Wolf Blitzer arguing with people in a room. How do you get to do things on CNN that in a way they don’t let their traditional journalists do anymore? The hour long deep dive into a destination?

Bourdain: When they first reached out we were shocked and sort disbelieving and skeptical. The first thing me and Chris and Lydia [Tenaglia, of Zero Point Zero] did was we picked up the three most difficult — the shows the Travel Channel hated the most, really, really hated and were most uncomfortable with. The most fucked up sort that didn’t even fit on Travel Channel much less ever on CNN. We sent them in and said “Are you sure? Could you watch these on a video then ask yourself are you sure you’re calling the right person?” They said “Yes, we know who we’re talking to. We like what you do. We’d like to help you be even better.” They’ve honored that initial commitment religiously since that first conversation.

I’ve never had a stupid conversation with CNN, ever. They’ve never called and started a conversation with “Wouldn’t it be a good idea if?” They’ve never called and said, never has a conversation started how about, never, nothing. There’s been almost no push back. We’ve sent them some really difficult stuff. I don’t know the answer to your question. I just know that they said they were going to be really cool to work with, that they would help me in any way that I wanted to be helped. They would give me unparalleled freedom to go anywhere. They would not restrain me from telling the stories I wanted to tell. They have honored that commitment. It can’t have been easy at times.

That Tokyo show with …

Skift: The bondage?

Bourdain: Rope bondage and tentacle porn, we knew were setting them up. Something that was really unlike anything they’d ever put on to be sure and was in a vulnerable time. Jeff Zucker had just come on board. People were very skeptical of what the fuck is CNN doing with some celebrity chef? It took real balls to put that up without a peep and they did. They have lived up to their initial commitment. Again, I’ve never had a stupid conversation. I’ve never had a conversation like that on the phone, wincing, wanting to pound my head into a wall — never.

Skift: You’ve kind of gone everywhere, eaten everything. I would imagine you get jaded at some times, but what still excites you about travel and food?

Bourdain: Places where I’m very aware that, no matter how many times I’ve been there. I know nothing. Japan is always going to be exciting to me because I will never know Japan. As often as I’ve been there, and as passionate as I am about the culture and the food, I understand that I will never know enough. I will never be comfortable with how much I know about the place.

Same with China. There’s just not enough time in this life, or any life to really know those subjects if you didn’t grow up in them. So that’s endlessly interesting, endlessly challenging, and endlessly gratifying to me. I like looking up a very steep learning curve, and struggling to at least feel less ignorant.

Skift: Speaking of Japan, your collaboration with Roads & Kingdoms. You put out that great book last fall [Rice Noodle Fish]. What’s next for you with your collaboration with them?

Bourdain: We’re looking forward to another book, this one on Spain, and we’re looking to expand what the site does. We’ll continue to do great journalism, telling stories that other people aren’t telling, and telling them better. We’re looking at going in a number of directions with the partnership and hoping that gives some overlap between Roads & Kingdoms and a lot of the other things that I’m doing.

I’m not looking to rule the world. I’m just very happy with the work at Roads, and very proud of the work that Roads & Kingdoms is doing, and I just want to bask in the reflected glory.

Skift: You can’t travel to destination, come back and tell hundreds of thousands of people about it without there being an effect on the place like Southeast Asia’s Lonely Planet Banana Pancake Trail. How do you think about your impact on a place once you’ve gone away and told everybody about it?

Bourdain: I think about it more and more. We try to do no harm. We try to do as little harm as possible. I am aware of the fact that I’m in the business of pointing a camera at cool little off-road places in the hope that the people from that neighborhood will be pleased and surprised.

If I go to a little dive bar in Manila, I’d like Philippinos that I bump into years later to say, “How did you find that place? Only neighborhood people know about that.”

On one hand that’s success because that’s exactly the type of place I like and exactly the kind of television we like to make. I also understand that by doing that oftentimes if I were to go back to that bar it would be filled with tourists. We changed the basic character of the place. There have been a few times where we just found a place that was so pristine and awesome that I just didn’t give the name or the location. We just said we shall call this Bar X. I’m not going to tell you where it is because you’ll fuck it up.

It’s something that we wrestle with and we try to be really careful about. We’ve really tried to not do harm. More often than not, most of the time a place gets busy. The owner’s perfectly happy to expand their business and maybe open up another store. That’s happened many times, particularly in Southeast Asia. The customers who loves it the way it was are less happy about things. I try to find a balance. Television can be a destructive force. However, much we may not want it to be, it’s something we think about.

More importantly, when we’re in a place like China or Cuba or Vietnam where the government pays attention, shall we say, to what people say as far as being critical of the government, we think very much about the fact that I could come back to New York and say whatever I want. I’m free to have an opinion. If I come back and shoot my mouth off I have to consider the people who were good to me when I was in the country. What the effect be on them? People have said how could you go to China and not talk about Tibet? A lot of people in China were really, really good to me and took a chance on me.

Iran is a better example. A lot of people took real risks to be welcoming in their home, to be honest with me in the hope that I would not go back and say something that would blow back on them. That’s something, those kinds of consequences are things that I think about. I’m not Dan Rather. The story doesn’t come first. You know what I mean?

Skift: Right.

Bourdain: I am willing to edit stuff out to not hurt people.

#anthony bourdain #travel #content

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lywinis · 4 years

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do you have any richie headcanons that you would like to share?

BOY DO I EVER. I love one (1) gay disaster bastard.

I’m gonna cut this because it got long LMAO, hope you like info dumps!

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Richie is most likely ADHD. He carries a lot of the markers, but his parents didn't believe in that shit when he was a kid, so now he finds his own ways to cope. He doodles in the margins of his notebooks. He forces himself to write things down manually, instead of using a laptop, because he knows he'll just surf the internet and not get anything done.

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He grew up almost overnight, shooting up his junior and senior year of high school. He was a beanpole until college, where he packed on some muscle.

He didn't do much physically, preferring to play video games and sleep through his classes, but he's pretty good at disc golf.

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He went stag to prom. Most girls had figured out he wasn't interested and he didn't dare ask a guy because even with Henry in Juniper Hill, there were still bullies in Derry. It's okay, though. Stan and Eddie both went stag, too.

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Despite his slacker attitude, Richie is intelligent. His original material is razor sharp, and while he does often go for the quick and easy low blow, a lot of his jokes are simultaneously witty as well as filthy. He'll find the thing that makes you laugh the hardest, then stomp on it, wringing it dry. As he got older, he learned how to fine tune it, rather than repeating it like a little mynah bird until it was old and sick.

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He's had a handful of relationships between his last summer in Derry as a teenager and his return as an adult. Mostly they ended in the other party ghosting Richie, or otherwise breaking it off.

He dated a couple of girls until he felt safe enough to try dating guys, but even then it wasn't healthy. He was expected to be 'on' all the time, to keep up the Trashmouth persona rather than just being allowed to be himself. In return he found 'good enough' -- people who used him for his growing fame, giving him crumbs of attention and affection.

As the years wore on he stopped dating and started growing bitter. Eventually the writers on his show started him on the whole 'your mom' schtick again, and it was easy to hide behind that. Richie the chad, crushing puss and cracking jokes. TMZ keeps trying to get the scoop on his personal life, so he feeds them bullshit instead of admitting he goes home to an empty apartment or his silent tour bus at the end of the day.

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Because he grew so fast, he was clumsy, seeming not to know what to do with his hands and feet. Coupled with possible ADHD, you see a man who is contained energy that is back and forth across the stage, tends to be very high impact on the stage.

It also led him to self image issues, coupled with the aforementioned ghosting. He doesn't like taking his shirt off in public, or really under the gaze of a partner. He doesn't often allow himself that vulnerability, instead preferring to hide behind vulgarity and to draw attention to that rather than himself. Avoiding the mortifying ordeal of being known.

He tends to be skittish about intimacy, figuring that anyone who wants to be with him is there for a reason, rather than just because it's him.

("I sound like a fucking tool," he mutters. "Sorry, that's a hangup that needs work. Never worked that one into the bit. 'Hey, folks, I discovered my secret: you can lead me around by the dick if you kiss me on the mouth and stay the night.' Yuk-yuk-yuk.")

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He has a younger sister -- Leslie Ann Tozier, born late to his parents in 1993. She ended up going to college and becoming an advice columnist for the Portland Press Herald. She keeps out of his life, and they have a strained relationship. (She thinks he was the golden child when really it was Derry fucking with their parents and making them placid about Richie's mischief.)

She doesn't show for Christmas usually, citing that she's busy and can't get away now that Wentworth and Maggie live in Arizona. Richie tends to make sure he's got something booked at least two weeks before Christmas to give her a chance to see them without him being there.

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He likes gummi peach rings. They're in his rider for shows, it's really the only demand he makes.

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He was rebuffed every time he tried to write his own material. His manager has seen how wildly unpredictable Richie's energy is and refuses on the basis that he thinks Richie won't be consistent. The company that gave him his break contracted him for a couple of years, but now he can reasonably expect to break away from them if he so chooses.

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His middle name is Wentworth. His father insisted. Bill is the only one who knows. He was sworn to secrecy years ago.

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Richie's a panic puker. He tends to heave up his guts in fear-wracking, stressful situations. See: when Mike calls him about Derry, and when Henry Bowers jumps Mike in the library. This also translates to his first gig, that sort of thing. Usually it's fine and it wasn't a huge deal while he was under amnesia but it gets really bad after he goes back to Derry. Eventually it subsides with therapy and after Pennywise is dead.

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Richie and John Mulaney have this sort of weird rivalry. Richie thinks he's fucking hysterical and is maybe not so secretly jealous that he's worked SNL where Richie was always passed over, Mulaney goes out of his way to fuck with him. Richie swears up and down he's gonna introduce Missus Patricia Blum Uris to Mulaney's wife Annamarie because they'll rule the fucking world.

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Richie's done cocaine, hates how it makes him feel. Whereas most experience this sort of high energy, he's more sedate. (Thanks, ADHD! Think: Richie just snorted a bump of Ritalin.) It makes him a grumpy fuck and the withdrawal is not pleasant. He's sworn off the stuff, though it used to be a regular thing at the parties he frequented.

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He has a personal paparazzo named Mitch who used to be pretty cool and then Richie sobered up and realized where all those candids were coming from. Mitch can usually be recognized by his sweaty, stained Chicago Cubs hat (in LA, the home of the Dodgers). He drives a shitty souped up Miata, the engine can be heard from a block away but he always seems to get the drop on Richie regardless. Mitch considers Richie his meal ticket and will actively drive off other paparazzi if he can. It's not altruistic.

Mitch eventually pursues Richie too far, ends up in a fist fight with a risk analyst from New York who just comes outta NOWHERE, screaming a stream of abuse the whole way and leaves him with a black eye and a broken camera after he shoves it in Richie's face after a public panic attack. The bastard even had the balls to sue him after taking the memory card from his camera and chucking it down a drain. (It was weird, though, the guy wouldn't get too close to the drain, like he was afraid he'd get dragged in.)

Afterward, Mitch can never seem to get a good close shot. He spots Richie all over town, but he's always being blocked by someone. Once, he got a photo of author Bill Denbrough by mistake - and he couldn't even sell it because it was blurry. There always seems to be a crowd around Richie Tozier now. A very vocal, active crowd. He has to switch to long range lenses and it gets less personal for him. He ends up making less money because no one's interested in the new Richie Tozier because he's not really a disaster anymore, not since his bomb on stage and breakdown last year.

#IT #Richie Tozier #lywinis writes #lywinis memes #waverly-earp

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arbeaone · 5 years

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OPEN Magazine The Serial Kidders Issue Published on October 09, 2014

[ View larger version here ] Text from the article can be read below. (There may be some errors.)

SERIAL KIDDERS

NOEL FIELDING

By Zoe Yvonne Delaney

Noel Fielding the man Phil Jupitus magnificently described as 'a Gothic George Best', is 41 years old! Forty freaking one. This is like when I learned that Gwen Stefani was actually my mum's age, all over again. It’s not that he's especially baby faced; it’s just that he looks like he'd be more at home smoking outside Bold St Coffee with graduates, rather than down the local pub, playing darts (I have no idea what men in their forties actually do; I'm just lazily stereotyping). Either way, he's looking good for his age - he could probably still blag a student ticket on an Arriva bus.

Perhaps ‘The Fountain of Youth' from Fielding's most notable work The Mighty Boosh, actually does exist? In the hit TV show, Fielding played the ultimate confuser ("Is it a man? Is it a woman? I'm not sure if I mind!"), Vince Noir. Alongside his highly wound sidekick Howard Moon (Julian Barratt), The Boosh amassed a cult like following and took viewers on a surreal journey through time and space with their unique brand of comedy. Androgynous Vince; with his childlike outlook on life, narcissism and impressive hair hubris ("A basic back-comb structure, slightly root-boosted framing with a cheeky fringe") quickly became one of the most popular characters in British comedy. The multi-award winning comedy troupe went on to produce three BBC series; two live UK tours and see Fielding and Barratt dubbed the funniest double-act in Britain' by NME.

Since we last saw him in Zooniverse and Nabootique, Noel has been busy going solo. There has been two series of the inescapably whimsical Luxury Comedy, an inspired stint as a team captain on Never Mind the Buzzcocks, the infamous appearances on Big Fat Quiz and now he's about to embark on a nationwide tour - his first in five years. An Evening with Noel Fielding promises to be a magical mix of his eccentric brand of stand-up comedy, live animation and music. There will even be some special guests too as he's taking his brother, Mike Fielding (Naboo) and Luxury’s Tom Meetan along with him on the 34 date stint. It certainly sounds like it’s going to be value for money. I caught up with Noel to discuss the upcoming Liverpool date but to be honest, we mainly ended up chatting about beards, Cliff Richard and Russell Brand's move into politics.

OPEN: So, your live show is called An Evening with Noel Fielding - it sounds more like an ITV special with the likes of Michael Buble rather than a comedy show?

NOEL: Haha, that is the angle I'm going for, there are going to be a lot of Frank Sinatra covers [...] When I booked it, I didn't really know what kind of show it was going to be - I hadn't written it. I was thinking it may be an amalgam of things; I knew I wanted to do some stand-up, I have some characters and have people with me - quite a mixture. But yeah, I was aware of what I did with the title. I did do it slightly tongue in cheek because it’s really not the sort of show I would ever do and it really made me laugh - it’s the sort of thing Barry Humphries would do.

They'll definitely be a mention to Michael Buble now you've said that though. The thing is with 'An Evening With...’ is that it sounds like you're 70 and ITV are giving you a pat on the back for being amazing but Buble has got to be incorporated into it too, now.

A lot of the Operation Yewtree suspects loved a good old fashioned 'An Evening With...' but I reckon were safe with Buble. We hope.

Yeah well this doesn't go to print for a few weeks so you never know....

What’s happening with Cliff at the moment, is he alright? I hope to God he didn't do anything. If Cliff goes then the whole fabric of society will disintegrate.

The whole of the 70's are going to be in prison, that's what’s happening. Oh it’s horrible.

It's looking that way. Now your last solo show was scheduled in 2010 but, according to the fountain of knowledge that is Wikipedia, it got postponed due to you working on The Boosh movie. Where the hell is that film?

We didn't really know what to do. Oh God, I don't know what we were doing. We were supposed to be going to America to do a show... then we decided no to that. Then we started writing a film but we didn't know which one to write so we wrote half of a film, it was a musical like Rocky Horror, and then a different half of another film. They didn't go together, obviously, which wasn't useful to anyone. We ended up doing neither of those things and I started working on an animated thing while Julian worked on something else - it was a bit of a shambles at that point. Also, that last big Boosh tour, it was like 100 dates - I was wasn't really in shape to tour.

But I'm back! Has it really been that long? 2010? I like doing that keeps people on their toes. It looks like its took me four years to pluck up the courage to come back on tour but I've done three series of the Buzzcocks, two of Luxury and I've done little bits of stand-up, but not a tour. I have been busy.

I’m not judging. Are you looking forward to this long awaited tour then?

Yeah, it’s going to be nice to see some faces. Comedy is best with an audience otherwise it all feels a bit weird; making it in secret and putting it on telly. You don't really know how its gone; you get ratings and a few reviews but its not the same as going out into a room full of people.

When I was texting all my friends showing off that I was interviewing you, I noticed that the iPhone decides to autocorrect your name to Noël. What do you think about Apple giving you a Christmassy edge - too hipster?

I was born on Christmas Day, just like Jesus. Haha, no I wasn't...

I knew, I have read your Wikipedia after all. Speaking of hipsters - the man who created Vince Noir must be a tiny bit hipster?

You know what, no - I'm not like that. I’ve got loads of friends from Shoreditch who've got massive beards, short hair, tattoos - that seems to be the new hipster look doesn't it? When I went to Brooklyn, the Williamsburg crew all had massive beards - it’s quite funny, it’s like sitting in a convention of lumberjacks. Everyone looks like their dad, it’s all quite weird.

I can't really grow a great beard. And also, I’ve never wanted a massive beard. Do I really want something that covers up my face? That seems like a waste!! Haha, no, I'm joking.

Too late, that's going to be the headline of the interview.

The truth is I'm just not very good at growing a beard. It all goes a bit rubbish. Russell can grow a good one, Russell Brand.

Ahhh, speaking of Russell, he tweeted you the other day - are you guys really going to reunite as the Goth Detectives for The Big Fat Quiz of the Year?

Yeah we might be...(intriguing voice)

Really?

Maybbbbbeeeeee

I want an exclusive, come on.

Ahhh ok. I don't know if I'm allowed to say.

I'm taking this as a yes, Noel.

Ah, are you? We might be, we might not... hahaha. I haven't got black hair anymore - I can’t do it!

You can! Come on, hair dye is like a fiver from Boots.

Alright then. Five quid from Boots, yeah? I'll speak to Russell and see what he says. He’ll find the Big Fat Quiz too flippant now he's a politician.

He has gone political of late, hasn't he? Are you planning to join him on the revolution?

Well, the thing is, I'd like to... no, basically. Hahaha. I've heard that he's currently writing a political manifesto.

Really?

I know! Its insane isn't it? He's gone serious. And I think Eddie Izzard is running for Mayor at some point - all the comedians are going for it. I better get involved somehow. I don't really know how; it’s not my vibe, that. Maybe I could remake The Monster Raving Looney Party?

You could form The Goth Detectives Party with Russell?

The Goth Detective Party! Everyone has to wear black! We can spray all the Boris Bikes black, it will be amazing. I'm up for that lets do it!

When you discuss this with Russell I want full credit.

Haha, okay. I’ll wear a badge saying "It was Zoe's idea" and if it all goes wrong we’ll definitely, definitely say it was your idea.

Yeah but if it goes right then I'm laughing, I've started a political revolution.

If it goes really wrong then we’ll all have to grow beards.

Deal. I'll probably grow a better one than you by the sounds of things.

Haha. Basically we’ll grow massive beards and stand in Shoreditch then all my mates will get arrested instead of us. My mate Baccy has such a good beard, its huge. I was like, "how long did that take?" and he claims two months. I was like, "get lost it would take me about ten years to grow that". What do you think about them, you like them?

Not for me. I'm not sure why girls are pretending we really fancy men with them - grow a personality, not a beard. My dad had a beard growing up, so I sort of have a fondness for them, though.

My dad in the 90's had a beard, sleeve tattoos and smoked rolls up - he'd be so on trend now.

He was the pioneer of the look.

Either that or just a bit lazy. Now we've gone a bit off topic with talk of beards and politics - any plans for the return of The Boosh?

Maybe. The thing is, never say never. It’s difficult because when you get involved in something you have to see it through and it takes a while. I don't know when we’ll both be free but we still do fantasise about writing the film.

Well you should get cracking, Wikipedia has blown your cover with that one-you've got people excited!

I know! We need a year where we can sit down and write. People have such a fondness of The Mighty Boosh and it lives on in their memories so we don’t want to come back and do something not as good.

True. A lot of the great series bow out after two or three series.

Ah yeah, that's true. If we came back and do something not very good then we’ll have undone all the good work that's been done. It’s tricky. You never know what to do.

You can give me a ring once you've wrote it and I'll let you know...

Yeah we'll try that I'll send it to you and you let me know.

That would be great. I promise I won't leak it - I won't even save it to iCloud or anything!

I'll send it to you in a beard!

I best start befriending those who enjoy the lumberjack look, then.

#Noel Fielding #An Evening with Noel Fielding #OPEN Magazine #`❦

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mitchsmarners · 5 years

Text

semi charmed life | chapter five | 4.5k | mature-ish?? |

“You guys have kept in contact this whole time?” Bill asked, brow disappearing underneath hair line as he looked like his old friends in amazement. “And you guys are.. what? Room mates?”

Eddie avoided looking at Richie as he answered. “Yeah, uh… room mates. Something like that.”

[or: the adult!losers reunion, done 2000s sit-com style, just like we all deserve.]

PREVIOUSLY ON SEMI CHARMED LIFE: “I applied to some museum job in New York on a whim earlier this year”. “ “I meant to turn it but every time I went to I… I just couldn’t.” “ I think you’ll find the most sudden of changes are sometimes the best ones.” | . “You and Richie adopted two kids? Two actual human children and this never came up?”” “Is your and Eddie’s invitation for a place to stay still open?” | Be in your seat at 7 am on Monday morning or don’t bother showing up again . | . “I did some shit that I’m not proud of. My best friend… I… I was so desperate to get away from this place, and I kind of betrayed him.”

Richie rolled over, smiling at the smooth comfort of his large duvet, as he pulled the sleeping form of his husband closer to his chest. He knew that starting just next week, he wasn’t going to be able to enjoy the long known comfort of slowly falling asleep next to Eddie, something he’d gotten overly used to within the last ten years. Ever since moving into that simple, rat-ass New York apartment that housed them only for a few months before they realized how much money they were wasting on a two-bedroom place, Richie and Eddie had spent every night side by side. There was, of course, always those few exceptions- when Richie’s parents had divorced, and Eddie hadn’t been able to go back to Derry as a support system because of his work, or when Eddie had gone out of town for a weekends for car shows and Richie couldn’t follow him like a trophy husband- but the couple had spent the majority of their adults lives sharing their bed.

At the start of next week, Richie would be switching over to the late show at his radio station. It was going to mean many more late nights, working until 2 or 3 in the morning depending, but it was huge raise and Rich Records finally moving onto his own show, run and controlled completely by himself. His music, his words, all his choices. It was an absolutely amazing opportunity, something that really pushes Richie’s career. He’d been offered the position almost half a year earlier, but when it had put in front of him he and Eddie had been in the process of adopting Marty and Richie had turned it down without question. There was no possibility of Richie switching over to working nights with a newborn baby in the house. The DJ they’d hired when Richie turned the job down hadn’t worked out, and when Richie received the offer once again he and Eddie had been in agreement: you didn’t turn a career altering promotion down twice.

As his start date loomed closer, Richie thought on it more and more. Wondered if he made the right choice, giving up his nights with Eddie. They were going to be saving a bundle on childcare- what with Beverly staying with them now, and Richie now being home during the day- but Eddie’s baby-leave from work was ending around the same time Richie was starting on nights… and with sleeping Eddie in his arms now, Richie was already mourning something he hadn’t lost yet.

Even asleep, Eddie Kaspbrak would gravitate towards Richie’s touch. The second Richie’s arms had tightened around him, Eddie had nuzzled into Richie’s neck and shifted his legs so they tangled together in the sheets. Richie felt almost as though his heart was vibrating, marvelling at how after twelve years in a relationship that Eddie Kaspbrak could still make him feel like a thirteen year old with a crush.

Eddie let out a small huff, blinking up at Richie and smiling sleepily. “How long have you been up?”

“Not long,” Richie hummed, rubbing soft circles into Eddie’s back. “Seems like our little babies gave into the subliminal messages I left them to bother Bev in the mornings instead of us.”

Eddie laughed. “Baby, I love you, but I don’t think you’re smart enough to just plant subliminal messages into the minds of our children.”

“Childs minds are very vulnerable,” Richie said wisely, leaning in to press feather light kisses to just below Eddie’s ear.

Eddie hummed, the small conversation about their children’s possible mind control long forgotten as Richie’s lips trailed lower. His arms came up to wrap around Richie’s neck and pull his husband closer, pressing their lips together and pushing their chests flush to one another. Richie would almost be embarrassed at how quickly he was reacting, but he could definitely reason it out to himself that they hadn’t had sex since before leaving for Derry… and it was a scarce enough occasion then, as well. A fussy newborn was twice as hard when you also had a hyper-active toddler to chase after all day long. Sex definitely became something that was put on the back burner, but never forgotten.

Richie gripped Eddie’s hips and rolled them so Eddie was settled on top of him. Eddie leaned onto his elbows, grinning almost wolfishly down at him. “Oh? It’s like that today, is it?”

Richie blew a kiss and rocked his rapidly hardening cock against Eddie’s thigh. “Let’s be real, isn’t it always?”

Eddie laughed breathily, leaning down to lock his teeth against Richie’s pulse point. Richie’s smothered a moan, and started rocking his hips upwards faster as their bedroom door banged open. “Rich- shit!”

Beverly cupped her hands over her mouth and turned away quickly. “Oh my God, I’m sorry. Jesus fucking- I am sorry.” Eddie was already rolling off of Richie and Richie couldn’t hold back his groan. “I just… I wasn’t sure how to do Marty’s bottle and I… I’m sorry, you can… finish, I-“

“I think it’s safe to say this is finished,” Richie said as he tumbled out of bed. Eddie let his gaze travel down his husbands body as Richie moved from the room, then muffled a loud groan into pillows that smelled like them.

→ → →

Mike walked behind his supervisor who was talking a mile a minute. It was only his first day, but it certainly felt as though they thought he’d been here for years on years. “I know it’s only your first day,” the supervisor whose name Mike had either forgotten or had never been told in the first place. “That’s why we’re putting you in with Spencer. He usually does the tours for the high school students, which you’ll be tagging along on today.”

Mike nodded, having to wonder if was the normal fashion in which a high price train their new employees: by dropping them completely on their heads and hoping no damage comes to them. Mike saw the high schoolers then, standing around in groups and talking amongst themselves. There was no sign of leadership outside of the teachers who stood around with them, openly more excited for the class tour than the students were. Panic prickled at Mike’s chest as he approached. “Hi, I- I’m Mike,” he said, not knowing what the appropriate term of introduction would even be. He thought to himself once again at how completely untrained he was for this job, thinking on how this must be what a baby birds were like- tossed out of the nest whether they knew how to fly or not.

A sandy-haired boy who, admittedly looked too old to be in a high school field trip, stepped forward and flashed Mike a quality smile. “What are you going to be showing us today? Like, why should I even give a shit about this tour?”

Mike stalled, eyes going wide, as whispers moved through the group of students. He knew he was supposed to be professional in this sort of situation- explain the tour, explain the great interests of history, the importance it held in the lives they were living now. The issue now, of course, was that Mike had no idea what tour he was supposed to be giving and it made it quite hard to be professional when he was thrust into a job he didn’t know how to do.

“We, uh-“ Mike cleared his throat, feeling his whole body begin to go hot. His heart raced in his chest and he was about thirty seconds away from dropping this job, and going back to Alexander and Derry right then. “We’re doing our tour on… Uh-“

“You don’t know?” The guy sneered, stepping towards him. Mike’s stomach twisted up uncomfortably and he truly thought for a moment that he might throw up everywhere. “What kind of tour guide, are you?”

“It’s…” Mike swallowed harshly. “It’s my first day, I don’t… I wasn’t told that I’d even be doing a tour until about thirty seconds ago. There’s supposed to be higher up, but they’re not here yet or they’re late…”

“No,” the guy smirked. “They’re not late.” He walked from the crowd and moved to stand beside Mike. “Hey guys, I’m Spencer. I’m going to be your guide today, you already know Mike, and we’ll be visiting our Mesopotamia exhibits today. You’ll have an opportunity to do some group searching everywhere, however-“

Mike watched his partner lead the groups of high schoolers off with his mouth dropped open.

→ → →

“I could go back to school,” Beverly said mildly, tapping a sloppy heart cut from red construction paper to Richie’s nose. Richie raised his eyebrows at her as best he could with drawings taped all over his face.

“Go back to school for what?” Eddie asked, his head resting in Richie’s lap and grinning up as his husbands’ face quickly became invisible beneath colourful paper. Frankie was half hung over Beverly’s shoulders, pointing out the exact places that Bev should be placing the drawings on Richie.

“I don’t know,” Beverly admitted. “But I’m twenty seven years old, probably soon to be divorced and unemployed. I can’t just live here forever, mooching off my high school friends.”

Eddie frowned at Beverly. “You can stay here for as long you want, Beverly, you know that. But I would suggest maybe, finding even the simplest of jobs. Wait tables, work in some customer service. Yeah, it fucking sucks but… when was the last time you worked, Bev? You certainly made it sound like your husband ties together everything.”

Bev nodded. “I had a part time job in college, but when Tom and I decided to get married, I dropped out of school and from the job. Tom made more than enough money to support the two of us, he was good that way. I could focus on my art and clothing… it’s still something I want to do, honestly, but-“

“Then do it.” Richie said fiercely. “You think anybody except Eds supported my ‘I want to be a DJ’ pipedream? Of course not. I mean, failing to graduate high school really made people realize that an academic world wasn’t really for me, but…”

“That wasn’t your fault,” Bev and Eddie said together, Eddie with old-bitter anger still in his voice but Beverly as though it was simple fact of life. Something that couldn’t be helped. Richie supposed it was closer to what was true than the anger Eddie held, the resentment that had rebirthed itself in Richie. Eddie continued speaking, however. “And you went got your GED. You graduated, Rich. Anybody who wants to act otherwise isn’t good enough to be part of your life.”

Beverly pressed a small yellow circle that might have been a sun to Richie’s still-freckled cheek and smiled at him. “You went and got your GED?” The last time Beverly had spoken to Richie before their reunion had been a twenty minute phone call on Richie’s twentieth birthday, where he’d ranted on about the corruption of the education system and how he’d never go back.

A small bashful smile came over Richie’s face, and his eyes flittered up to the little girl who was falling asleep on Beverly’s shoulders. “Three and a half years ago, when Eds and I first started talking about adoption. I wanted our baby to have two parents they could be proud of.”

Beverly’s heart panged painfully in her chest, glancing down at where Eddie was staring up at Richie with burning eyes. Unwelcome and unwanted, thoughts of Tom came into her mind. How for as long as she’d thought she’d love her husband, there had never been a love between them like she was seeing between Richie and Eddie in this simple moment. Never mind the moments that she hadn’t looked at growing up, but couldn’t help but see now. She wasn’t sure anybody had ever looked at her like that, not even Richie when they were together, but there was a small tingle in the back of her mind. A forgotten poem, a crush that carried years… But what was forgotten wasn’t quite remembered just yet, and the burning in Beverly’s heart didn’t yet have a known source.

→ → →

Ben Hanscom had decided that if he walked any farther, he may collapse and never get back up. Sighing, he sat down on the white marble steps and looked up at the sky. The sun seemed redder than normal, and he wondered if he could stare at it long enough it would give him the answer to finding happiness in life.

“Ben?” A voice that was familiar but all so random carried over to him. Ben whipped around and saw Bill Denbrough walking towards him, hand-in-hand with a beautiful dark haired girl. “Why are you sitting on the side of the road?”

“I’m considering quitting my job and moving here,” Ben said, only half joking. “But it’s not very comfortable.”

Bill raised his eyebrows at the woman who could only be Audra, and Ben allowed himself a moment to be happy that his friend had worked things out with the woman he loved before reverting back to his resolution to feel as very little as possible.

Then Bill was crouching beside him and resting his chin on his fist. “How you doing, buddy?”

How was it that Ben Hanscom could have lived in the same city as Richie Tozier, Eddie Kaspbrak and Beverly Marsh for the last five years and not run into them once but Bill Denbrough had moved here only less than a week earlier and he was already finding Ben sitting on the street, at his lowest?

Ben let out a soft puff of air. “I think Derry broke me.”

Bill nodded as though no sentence had ever made more sense in the world.

→ → →

Mike stuffed his belongings into his bag, knowing how aggressive his posture was but not being able to find it in himself to give a damn about it. If this was his first day, then he suddenly wasn’t so confident in his decisions to uproot his entire life to move here. At least at the Derry Library, he hadn’t been being treated like utter shit.

“First day?” A female voice carried over to him, startling Mike out of his funk. A beautiful dark-skinned woman was smiling sympathetically at him. “You’ve got the they paired me with Spencer on my first day look all over you.”

Mike sighed and rolled his eyes. “So, he treats everybody that horribly?”

The girl chuckled. “I’m not sure what he did, but I still feel safe in answering with a yes. Spencer Pearsons doesn’t believe in easing people into it. He’s more of a sink or swim kind of dude.”

Mike shook his head, rubbing at his cheeks. “Yeah. I got that much. Dude’s a dick.”

The girl patted him on the shoulder, still grinning. “You’re still here.” She pointed out, nodding towards the clock. “ You made it through a day with Spencer Pearsons, which is more than can be said about the mass majority of new hires. So what’s it’s going to be?”

Mike shook his head, frowning. “What do you mean?”

“Are you going to sink… or are you going to swim?”

→ → →

Richie pulled back the shower curtains, pressing a hand to Eddie’s mouth before his husband could let out the scream that Richie knew was bubbling up in his chest. Richie slid in behind him and pulled Eddie’s back flush to his chest. Eddie let out a small sigh, hand coming up behind him to tangle in Richie’s damping hair.

“If I recall…” Richie whispered against Eddie’s cheek. “We got interrupted this morning.”

Eddie whimpered as Richie’s hands moved down Eddie’s stomach towards his rapidly growing arousal. Eddie tugged at Richie’s now-full wet curls, and squeezed his closed. Just as Richie’s hand moved to curl around Eddie’s member, they both jumped apart at the sound of the bathroom door smashing open.

“Pops!” Frankie’s little voice carried over to them. Their daughter knew enough about privacy not to pull back the curtain- the same way she now knew to stop trying to take her pants off in public, no matter how much she hated them- but didn’t keep Eddie and Richie’s hearts from launching into their throats. “Pops, are you almost done? You promise we would make cookies today and it’s already 4 on the clock!”

Eddie sighed, leaning his head against Richie’s shoulder and giving his husband an apologetic frown. “Yeah, Frankie. Almost done. I’ll be right out.”

“Okay…” The little girl said, pausing for a moment. Then. “Daddy, do you wanna me to bring you your ‘pecial curly shampoo? You weft the new bottle in your room.”

Eddie covered his face with his hands, and tried to ignore the way his husband’s body was shaking behind him with laughter. “Nah, Franks, that’s all good. Why don’t you go find Bev and get her to help grab all the ingredients for the cookies, yeah?”

Little footsteps padded towards the bathroom door. “Don’t call me Franks!” Came the shrill shriek of laughter before the door slammed shut. Eddie likely would’ve sunk completely to the shower floor if Richie’s arms hadn’t been holding him up.

“That’s it,” Eddie said dramatically. “We are never having sex again, we’re going to traumatize our daughter.”

Richie giggled. “Nah, we’re just going to traumatize her just enough that she’s funny. She doesn’t even know enough about the world to think of what’s happening here. She’s just a born cock block.”

Eddie slipped out of Richie’s arms and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “To be continued?”

Richie rolled his eyes. “In eighteen years?”

“If we’re lucky.”

→ → →

Ben slammed the shot glass back down on the bar table and turned to point at Audra. “Your boyfriend is a dumbass.”

Bill made a loud, offended noise while Audra let out a high pitched, almost angelic giggle. “Oh, I’m aware. Definitely aware.”

“Wow,” Bill muttered under his breath, taking another sip of his whiskey despite the fact that he was already swaying in his seat. “Some friend you are, Hanscom.”

Ben laughed, signalling for a refill from the bartender. “Did he ever tell you about the time he broke his collar bone? Bastard was lucky he didn’t die. Richie Tozier and Bill Denbrough were a force of idiocy to be reckoned with back in high school, couldn’t stop them from doing stupid shit. Didn’t help when Bev and Stan were always- hiccup- encouraging them.”

Bill hummed to himself. “Richie Tozier was the biggest dumbass I’ve ever met. Now he has two kids. Fucking wild how shit changes.”

Ben blinked and crinkled up his nose. His brain tried for a moment to process the information Bill had just dumped on him before deciding that he was just a little too drunk to do that, and it pushing it from his mind. “Stanley Uris was the king of truth or dare.” Ben rambled on after giving up on Richie and his apparent children. “He managed to never do or say anything embarrassing, but always got the best stories.”

“Sent my ass to the emergency room more than once,” Bill nodded along. “Think the bastard targeted me.”

“Course he did,” Ben snickered. “We all did. You’re very easy to take advantage of. You only had to look a drink to get tipsy, Denbrough.”

“That’s not true!” Bill exclaimed, swaying and nearly falling from his seat. Audra raised her brow at Ben, who grinned cheekily at her.

“Anyway, his collar bone…” Ben said, mind unhazing enough to remember what had started his conversation. Being drunk at 4:30 in the afternoon was something Ben Hanscom hadn’t experienced since his college days, but with Big Bill Denbrough by his side, he couldn’t bring himself to feel bad about it. “Stan dares Bill to jump off Richie Tozier’s roof into their back yard pool right… and the Toziers have this three story house, it’s really… and Billy here, is a dumbass. So off he goes, fucking misses the pool and cracks himself right against the cement around it.”

Audra pressed a hand over her mouth, eyes going wide.

“It’s fucking mayhem.” Ben cackles. “How Bill didn’t die on impact, I don’t think we’ll ever know. Some sort of higher being was looking out for him but his collar bone.. God it was gross. Eddie Kaspbrak was crying, Richie just like… screaming absolutely nonsense. Bill’s drunk ass is laughing, and I think Stan… I don’t know I think Stan went home the second Bill hit the ground-“

“I still say it’s because he didn’t want to be found at the scene of his crime,” Bill said, eyes closed and swaying in his seat.

“Yeah,” Ben nodded seriously. “But yeah- then Richie just… he fucking just… punches Bill’s collar bone into his chest. Just closes his damn fist and goes for it. BANG. Then Bill’s screaming, the neighbours are definitely going to call the police. It’s basically, stay there with Bill and get caught under aged drinking… or make a fucking run for it.”

“SO OF COURSE THESE BASTARDS!” Bill shouted suddenly, eyes wide with memory. “They just take the fuck off. Even Tozier! At his own fucking house! Mike Hanlon and little Elii Tozier were the only people worth a damn that day.”

Ben rolled his eyes. “Mike and Elii were only people sober. It’s not that deep.”

Bill scowled but a small smirk was still tugging at his lips. “I could’ve died.

Ben shrugged and knocked back his entire glass of high end whiskey in one go. “Yeah. But ya didn’t. Would’ve been Stanley’s fault anyway.”

A dark look came over Bill’s drunk face. “Wasn’t everything?”

Ben put his empty glass down and turned to look at Bill with a serious, sober face that didn’t match the amount of alcohol he’d drank at all. “No.” He said firmly. “In the years I knew Stanley Uris, he only ever did one thing seriously wrong- and we all just decided you know, fuck that guy. That guy’s a piece of shit. But it was, you know, it was one bad thing. One bad thing in seven years. You knew him longer. The only person who gets to hold it against him is Richie. The rest of y’all need to get the fuck over it.”

Bill blinked, frowned, opened his mouth, then frowned again. Then broke down into giggles. “You said y’all.”

Ben rolled his eyes, but found himself laughing, too.

→ → →

Mike picked up the freshly set up home phone in his apartment and stared at the numbers. He started punching in the number he knew wasn’t a Maine area code and tried to ignore the guilt in his stomach. The phone rang once, twice, then just as Mike was thinking of hanging up, the line picked up.

“Hello?” Stanley Uris’ voice carried through the line and Mike felt that old calming sense settle over him.

“Stan? It’s Mike.”

“Mike? Mike Hanlon?” Stanley sounded understandably confused but Mike was pretty sure he could hear the smile in his voice. “What’s up?”

“I just…” Mike sighed. “I guess I’m starting to question some stuff, and you were always the most reasonable person I ever knew.”

Stan laughed slightly on the other line. “I don’t know if I deserve that title, man.”

Mike was shaking his head. “Nah, yeah, you do. You can’t let one bad call decide your entire worth. Nobody gave Eddie a final call when he keyed Greta Bowie’s new car back in junior year, or Bill when he put that hair killing shit in Richie’s shampoo after he dumped Bev.”

“I don’t know if those are really on the same level as what I did,” Stan said slowly. “But I appreciate the effort, Mike.”

“No, Stan, they were.” Mike said firmly. “They were actions of stupid teenagers, stuff we would never do know because we know better. If it’s the hill Richie wants to die on, then let him. Don’t bury yourself there with him.”

Stan cleared his throat on the line, his voice sounded watery when he responded. “You know, I think you have a talent for saying exactly what people need you to say. Always have.”

“Yeah,” Mike said. “But you have a pretty similar talent. So, please, set my head on straight.”

“Well…” Stanley chuckled. “Don’t know if I can do that miracle, but I can try to help you out of whatever this situation is.”

Mike’s entire brain stalled, drawing a small noise of him. “You… You know, then?”

Stan sighed. “Yeah, I… I guess I always knew? Maybe not even we were kids, but in high school? Yeah. I just never said anything. Figured it was your place to tell us, especially in a town like Derry.”

Mike was nodding even though he knew that Stan couldn’t see him. “Did you do the same with Eddie and Richie?”

A moment of silence then: “What about Eddie and Richie?”

“Uhh…” Mike coughed awkwardly. “Nothing, I- Nothing. I started my job at the museum today and it was pretty shitty. My partner is dick and everybody just thinks its fine. That I’ll either get the hang of it or quit and-“

“They’re right,” Stan interrupted. “You’ll either get the hang of it or quit. So, Mike Hanlon, I guess you gotta chose. Are you going to at least try to stick it out or are you going to go back to Derry with your tail between your legs?”

Mike huffed out a breath. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.”

“Usually am. But thanks for noticing.”

→ → →

Eddie returned from the grocery store and looked around his silent, and mostly dark house in wonder. “Richie? Bev? Where are you?”

Richie wandered out from the living room, wearing the grey pair of sweatpants that Eddie had a preference of slung low on his hips and nothing else. “Baby,”

Eddie trailed his eyes down Richie’s visible torso. “Hey… uhm,” his throat was suddenly so dry it made it a little hard to talk. “Where is everybody? The girls?”

“Got Bev to take ‘em,” Richie said softly, scratching at the back of his neck and looking slightly nervous. “Because I… I start my overnights next week and you go back to work, and we’ll be opposite schedules and I was hoping to spend some time together before then but if you’re mad that I sent the girls away for the night I can… I can get Bev back here and we never have to- I’m sorry-“

Eddie crossed the room quickly and pressed his and Richie’s lips together. He pulled back and stroked at Richie’s cheeks. “Don’t apologize. I absolutely trust Bev with the girls and you’re right, we need this.”

Richie nodded, their faces so close together that his nose dug into Eddie’s cheek. “Okay, well, then… In that case…” Eddie could feel him grinning. “Why don’t you take me to bed, my love?”

#reddie fic #reddie #benverly #benverly fic #it fanfiction #my writing #semi charmed life #hi this is my favourite chapter so far

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robininthelabyrinth · 7 years

Text

Fic: The Swiftest Course (Ao3) (Chapter 2/8)

Fandom: Flash, DC’s Legends Pairing: Barry Allen/Leonard Snart/Mick Rory, Eddie Thawne/Iris West Summary:

Barry of Allen is on his way to the capital of Tortall for the final part of his knight training, hiding a secret that could threaten his career there. He’s determined to keep his head down and not get into trouble.

He isn’t expecting to meet Len, Corus’ Rogue, or his right-hand man, Mick. Or meet Princess Iris and his new friends, Cisco and Caitlin.

He certainly wasn’t expecting to be roped into adventure.

(It’s the Gods’ fault, really.)

A/N: For joyous-lee, who purchased one of my stories for the FandomTrumpsHate event. She requested a Tortall AU, with Barry as Alanna. Thank you so much for your patience, and I hope you enjoy it!

——————————————————————————————–

"I don't think I like that guy," Barry groans one evening a week later. Iris has smuggled some muscle pain relieving balm out of the infirmary for him and is rubbing it into his back while Cisco and Caitlin keep watch.

"Of course you don’t," Cisco says. "That's 'cause he's a dick."

"My dad says 'all knights go through something like this' and cites the Lioness and Keladry of Mindelan," Iris says, scowling. "Like that's not a reason to change the system, rather than a reason to keep it the way it is."

"It's okay."

"No, it's not! That creep deserves to get kicked out of the program, not - used as some sort of life lesson for the rest of us! Ugh, and he keeps trying to flirt with me, which, no."

"Agreed," Caitlin says, nose wrinkling a little. "I've tried to explain to him that I have a boyfriend, but he just doesn't take the hint. He all but said that I was lying because I was shy and didn’t think I was pretty enough for him!"

"Wow," Cisco says. "That's even more dickish than I'd thought."

“You’d think that because my dad goes ballistic at the thought of me dating anyone, ever, he’d have some issues with me being sexually harassed, but nooooo, apparently that’s just fodder for his argument that I wasn’t cut out to be a knight,” Iris says.

“Maybe it’s his way to try to encourage you?” Barry offers. “Since any idiot would be able to tell that telling you that you can’t do something is a surefire way to get you to do it, I mean. Like, I’ve only known you for a week and…” he trails off. Iris is smiling. “No?”

“Nah,” she says. “My dad’s just blind about certain matters. God only knows what he’ll do when it comes time to marry me off for king and country.”

“I feel like the chances of us going to war with the relevant country when he finds out what happens on your wedding night are, like, 60%?” Cisco says. “And I’ve only been here two weeks.”

Caitlin snickers.

“He’s not that bad,” Iris says, shaking her head and grinning. “Well. Maybe just a little.”

“I’m surprised I haven’t seen him, actually,” Barry comments. “I would’ve thought, given that we’re so close to the courts…”

“He’s been out on same tour your mom’s on,” Iris says. “He’ll be coming back tonight, though, which is good. Mom misses him. Though I’m not sure if he’s coming back alone.”

“Oh?” Caitlin asks.

Iris shrugs. “Our neighbor to the north. The current Thawne, Eobard. He’s nice.”

“Thawne – wait, the whole big civil war thing? Where the reigning Thawne family was all but wiped out in that uprising?”

“Yeah – Eobard was some sort of cousin, but after the whole family died, he took over.”

“Seems fishy to me,” Barry says.

“No, no, he’s great. He comes by sometimes, teaches some classes in the mage university, some in the knights. He’s very nice."

"Being nice doesn't mean he didn't murder his family for power," Barry points out.

"Maybe you have to meet him to get it,” Iris says with a shrug. “He's really quite charismatic. And it's nice to have someone more interesting than Lord Merlyn around, so people stop talking about him all the time."

"I guess," Barry says. He’s not really convinced, but then again, he hasn’t met the guy, so what does he know? Maybe he is just that nice. Though that’s not a word he would have previously thought Iris would use; most of hte time, she has a bard’s turn of phrase. "I'm really just looking forward to seeing my mom."

-----

Turns out Thawne Eobard has indeed returned to Tortall with the king; in fact, they arrive sufficiently early that the instructors decide to give the students a special treat by bringing him in to teach the last class of the day.

Which they extend by an extra hour.

Barry hates everybody involved.

He wants to see his mom already; is that so much to ask?!

Still, it'd be rude to rain on everybody else's parade, so Barry pulls out some papers and starts sneakily doing some of his homework instead of paying attention. Iris will catch him up on anything important, finishing his homework means more time to spend with Mom, and at any rate Barry’s never known these guest speakers to say anything that's actually on an exam. Usually it's just stories of their heroic deeds and stuff, meant to inspire you.

Barry's all good in inspiration, thanks.

From Barry's brief glance up at the start of the class, Thawne Eobard is a pretty average-looking man, dirty blond and facile of face, and he favors a frankly horrific shade of yellow for his formal robes. He spends a lot of time playing with a yellow ring which sparkles a lot and makes Barry oddly queasy, so he focuses on his work instead.

He manages to get a lot done, since the class sits positively spellbound for the whole extra hour.

"That was great," Cisco says, eyes shining. "I see what you mean, Iris; he's really nice."

"I told you," she says, grinning.

"What was the lecture about?" Barry asks.

"Oh, you know," Caitlin says, which is rather unlike her usual precision of language. "His rule up in the north, allying between Bergen and Tortall, that sort of thing."

"And what'd he fill the other hour and a half with?" Barry asks skeptically.

"That was it, really. But he was very nice!"

Honestly, Barry doesn't even care what lecture he's missed. He just wants to see his mom.

"Catch up later?" he asks and walks carefully off when the others nod.

Carefully, both because he's still sore, and because being excited could activate his powers, and no one could know about those.

He still makes it to his mom's quarters in record time.

He knocks.

“Come in!” a familiar voice calls.

Barry cracks open the door and slips in.

His mother is darting from one side of the room to the next, scowling at a pile of paper. “Sorry about the mess,” she says automatically. “How can I help –” she looks up.

Barry waves.

“Barry!”

And she leaps up and she runs over and she wraps her arms around him and it’s everything he ever wanted. “Oh, Barry, Barry, my beautiful boy,” she says, over and over. “I knew you were coming to Corus – I didn’t realize that time of year had come already – oh, I’m so happy to see you!”

“You too, Mom,” Barry says, and puts his face in her shoulder so she won’t see his tears.

Nora draws him down. “Tell me everything,” she instructs. “Who have you met so far? Have you made any friends? You’ve been here – oh, my, it’d be a week already, wouldn’t it?”

“You were out on tour,” Barry tells her, which earns him an eye-roll.

“Oh, that stupid tour,” she says. “Even less useful than normal years, and that’s saying something. Have you been out into the city yet?”

“Not except on the way in, no…”

“You should,” she says briskly. “Too many knights never venture out from the courts, and that’s a crime and a shame, that they don’t know the people they’ve sworn their lives to defend. But that’s for later. Tell me about your classes!”

Barry smiles, and does.

------------------------------------------

“I’m just saying,” Len says, not for the first time. “I don’t know if it’s appropriate.”

“You’re the Rogue,” Mick says, utterly tranquil and as unmovable as a rock. “You don’t care about appropriate.”

“Appropriate for the Rogue.”

“You’re the Rogue. You decide what’s appropriate.”

Len contemplates beating his head against the table.

“I don’t suppose saying that as the Rogue, I don’t think it’s appropriate to have a rat as a pet, would convince you?” he tries.

“I’m sure you’ll change your mind,” Mick replies. He’s still petting that stupid rat he found Mother Flame only knows where.

“In here,” a cheery voice says, audible even from where Len’s sitting, bringing a blissful interruption to Len’s attempt to shift the unmoveable object that is Mick.

Len looks up.

“Hey, it’s that kid,” Mick observes. “From last week.”

“Ten days ago,” Len corrects automatically, but indeed it is, and he’s brought friends.

Barry sees him and beams, coming over. “Len!” he says happily. “And Mick, too! It’s good to see you.”

“Hello, Barry,” Len says, unable to keep his lips from curling up. Mick just grunts, but Len can tell he’s pleased that Barry remembered him as well. Most people just focus on Len.

“It’s my first day off,” Barry says proudly. “My mom – she’s at the court – she told me to make sure to go out, but I don’t know the city at all, so I thought I’d come see you.”

“And you brought friends, I see.”

“Well, yeah,” Barry says, utterly unselfconscious. “I told them I was going into the city, then Cisco said I was probably going to be kidnapped and sold into sex slavery and Caitlin told him he was stupid and you were probably just going to try to sell me things until I didn’t have any money left and Iris started saying there were laws against that, so in the end it was easier to convince them that I wasn’t going to be murdered, robbed, or otherwise vanished by bringing them along. Besides, neither Cisco or Caitlin know the city all that well; they’re new, too.”

Len blinks. Those were a lot of words. “Right,” he drawls, for lack of anything better to say. “Well, why don’t you introduce me?”

“Right! Here – guys, come over here – here, this is Cisco – uh –”

“Francisco Ramon,” the boy says. “But no one calls me Francisco but my parents.”

“And this is Caitlin Snow,” Barry continues, nodding at the blonde girl. Then he turns to the last girl, who’s pushing back her cloak to reveal her face. “And this is –”

“Iris, Princess and Duchess of the Western March,” Len drawls. “Yes, Barry, I do live in Corus; I’ve seen her before.”

Iris shrugs. “It was worth a shot,” she says wistfully.

“Oh, I don’t care,” Len clarifies. “There’s only one King in the Dancing Dove, and he doesn’t wear a crown.”

If Len was expecting Iris to be annoyed, he’d be disappointed. Luckily, he wasn’t. Instead, her eyes light up. “This is the Rogue’s Court,” she crows. “I knew it!”

“The Rogue’s Court?” Barry asks, blinking.

Len presses his lips together to keep from laughing. The kid’s adorable.

Mick leans over and mutters into Len’s ear, “You can keep him if I can keep my rat.”

“Not the same,” Len hisses back.

“- where the Rogue controls all the thieves of Corus, possibly of all of Tortall,” Iris is telling a spell-bound group. “They’re the representative of the poor of Tortall, the King of the streets, the poor man’s last resort. His job is to manage the crime in the city and kick the asses of the nobility if we start forgetting about the poor. So basically: totally awesome. This is where it all happens.”

“You’re going to be disappointed,” Len says, unable to keep a smirk off his face.

“I am not!”

“Sure you are,” Len says. “I’m the Rogue.”

Iris eyes him suspiciously. “No way.”

“To my sorrow, yes.”

“Really?”

“He killed the last one,” Mick says. “That means he’s in charge. No other competence test required.” He picks his rat up from the table onto his palm and tickles it under the chin.

“Will you please not do that?” Len says, closing his eyes. “At least not in front of visitors.”

“We’re making progress,” Mick tells the rat. “First he was saying I couldn’t keep you, then that you weren’t appropriate, and now we’re on specific to-dos.”

Len looks beseechingly at the group of grinning knights-to-be. “Tell him the Rogue’s terrifying second-in-command becomes notably less terrifying if he’s got a pet rat he coos over.”

“I don’t know,” Barry says, hiding a smile. “I think he’s a very scary rat.”

“Traitor.”

“He’s adorable,” Iris declares, leaning forward to get a better look. “What did you name him?”

“Faithful,” Mick says.

Len gives him an incredulous look at the same time as the four others. He hadn’t heard that before, either.

“Really, Mick?”

“That’s his name.”

“Like, um, Lady Alanna’s Faithful?” Cisco asks.

“Yep. That’s his namesake.”

“But the Lioness’s Faithful was a cat…” Caitlin starts, but Iris shushes her.

“I think Faithful is a lovely name,” Iris says firmly. “Can I…?”

Mick holds out his hand.

“Aw, he’s really quite cute and…” her voice trails off. “Oh. Huh.”

“Oh, huh?” Barry asks.

“Purple eyes.”

“Are you kidding me?” Len asks, leaning in, but no, she’s right. Purple eyes.

On a rat.

How utterly bizarre.

“Told you,” Mick says placidly. “Faithful.”

“…right,” Len sighs, dropping the question. He knows when it's just not worth fighting on an issue.

That’s when there’s a loud clatter and the sound of shouting. The would-be knights all spin around – undoubtedly eager to go do justice or whatever it is that knights do – but Len can hear the voices and he knows what this is.

He settles back in his chair.

Some of the bully boys drag in a tall blond man, dressed in a long black cloak designed to help with the rain. It’s clearly meant not to stand out and probably wouldn’t anywhere else in Tortall, but that by itself stands out plenty in Corus, where the Rogue controls the crime.

“I’m telling you, I didn’t –” he’s protesting in a faintly accented voice, only to fall silent when they throw him to the floor at Len’s feet.

“This is the one,” one of the bully boys reports. Thugs and enforcers; Len doesn’t have to like them – and he doesn’t – but they’ve more or less formed their own union in support of the Rogue. His very own bodyguard corps, but one with its own interests, and one that’s helped more than a few Rogues go the wrong way down the road of succession.

There’s a reason Len prefers Mick. Of course, that’s the same reasons the enforcers can’t stand him.

“You sure?” Len says, lacing his fingers together.

“What’s going on?” Barry asks.

“This man has been accused of stealing from his fellow thief,” Len drawls, eying the man. “Now, I don’t know how it is where you’re from, but here in Corus, we thieves follow a code of conduct. It keeps us out of getting into too much trouble with the Lord Provost, and it keeps peace among our ranks.”

He smiles sharply. “And we don’t appreciate people who break that code.”

“I didn’t,” the man says again. “I swear it.”

Mick snorts in disbelief. “Punish him and be done with it,” he says, stroking his rat with a gentle finger as the rat crawls over his knuckles.

It is oddly threatening, now that Len sees it in action. Dismissive and yet not soft.

“If he says he’s innocent, you have to prove he’s guilty,” Iris says.

Len gives her a look. “No,” he says slowly. “We really don’t. This is the Rogue’s Court, not the lawman’s.”

“But then how will you know if you’re punishing the right person?” Barry asks. “Won’t it be worse if you get tricked?”

They’re not wrong, but…

“We have three eyewitnesses that put him at the scene,” Len says. “Two more that say he was arguing with the man beforehand, and he was spending some pretty pennies the very next day – pennies he refuses to explain how he obtained.”

“I can’t,” the guy says wretchedly. “I would if I could, but I really can’t. I just woke up with the money in my pockets. But I didn’t take his money. I really didn’t.”

Iris crosses her arms. “Maybe he’s being framed.”

“Maybe he’s lying,” Len points out.

“I’m not letting you punish him just because you think he’s guilty,” she says, bristling. “Not without some proof.”

Len and Mick exchange looks. They’d really only planned to give the guy a good tanning and set him on his way – standard for first-time offenses – but the guy was really sticking to his story.

And that cloak was so very distinctive. Very easy to fake.

Len sighs.

“Mick,” he says. “You have three hours.”

Mick nods and gets up, slipping out the side door.

“He stays here, under watch,” Len tells the bully boys. “He so much as twitches towards the door or a weapon, put him down.”

The enforcers nod, pleased, and retreat to stand by the door.

“What’s going on?” Barry asks.

The man looks up, hope in his eyes. They’re very blue.

“Mick’s going to look into the issue,” Len says. “If he comes back and says there’s not enough to convince him, you go free. If he says there is, you face the penalties you have coming, no more arguing.”

“That’s fine,” the guy says. “Thank you – I swear –”

“I don’t want to hear it,” Len says. “Really.”

He turns his eyes to Iris. They’ve gone a little starry-eyed. “Thank you for standing up for me, my lady,” he says. “You don’t know me – and yet –”

“I’m training to be a knight,” Iris says, but she’s smiling back at him. “Standing up for people – for justice – well, it’s what I do.”

He catches her hand and presses his lips to her knuckles. “It doesn’t take away from what you’ve done for me,” he says. “If all the world followed your example, we’d be better off. Thank you. What may I call you?”

“…you can call me Iris,” she says after a moment, slight flush on her cheeks, pulling him up. “You know, like the princess. And enough of that. What’s your name?”

“Sorry,” he says, smiling a little bashfully. “I forgot myself. My friends call me Eddie.”

“Nice to meet you,” she says. “Won’t you sit with us? You’re not from here, are you?”

“No,” he says. “I’ve never been to Tortall before, actually; I worked with a caravan and they fired us not far from here, so I thought I’d come here.” He winces. “I’ve only been here two weeks.”

“And you’re already in trouble,” Iris says, shaking her head.

Len rolls his eyes.

Barry notices him and grins, leaning forward. “They’re a bit much, aren’t they?” he whispers.

“Just a bit,” Len murmurs back. “He is new, though – you catch how his eyes didn’t even blink when she said her name?”

“What about it?”

“He doesn’t know who she is, and she knows it.”

“I’ll tell Cisco and Caitlin not to say,” Barry replies, eyes dancing with mischief.

“You do that. No need to spoil her fun.”

They fall to talking, since Len’s not going anywhere until Mick’s finished his investigation. It turns out Barry has some problems with a boy up in the castle – some jerk named Tony Woodward who’s apparently as massive as an oak tree and has taken a distinct dislike to Barry – and his friends have all sorts of suggestions on how to fix the issue.

Iris spends most of her time talking with Eddie. They apparently share an interest in neo-revival poetry, with a particular emphasis on how notoriously terrible Good King Jonathan’s love poetry was.

“You want me and Mick to take care of it next time he goes out walking?” Len offers. “My grandmother was Bazhir; I don’t hold for any of that desert rat talk, not in my city.”

“No!” Barry says. “I couldn’t ask that of you. No. If you’re the Rogue, you’re nobody’s fists for hire.”

Adorable.

He’ll have to ask Mick how serious he was about letting Len keep Barry. Especially if he gets Mick equal dibs…

Mother Flame curse it all, though; that means Len’ll have to accept the rat.

“It wouldn’t be for hire if I’m doing it ‘cause I want to,” Len points out.

“Still no,” Barry says, but he’s smiling. “But actually – could you teach me how to stop him? I have knight training, but so does he; I don’t know any tricks to beat someone the size of Tony. But you…”

Len raises his eyebrows. “What makes you think I know?”

“No way Mick would’ve let you get this far without teaching you how to stop him,” Barry says.

“Hey! Maybe I taught him.”

“Did you?” Caitlin asks.

“…no,” Len concedes. “Mick’s the genius when it comes to punching people. I just run the Rogue, that’s all. Barely worth discussing in comparison. King of the Streets? Eh, whatever, pay it no mind – punching people’s where it’s at.”

They all laugh.

“So can you do it?” Barry asks, looking eager. “If it’s not too much time…”

“I could see myself covering a few classes,” Len says.

“Caitlin and I can cover for you for chores if you teach us the tricks when you get back to the knight’s court, Barry,” Cisco offers. Caitlin nods in agreement.

“That would be great,” Barry says.

They end up talking logistics for the next hour until Mick shows up, a good hour and a half before Len’s deadline.

Everyone goes quiet for a second.

“He’s fine,” Mick says.

They break out into cheers.

Iris even grabs Eddie into a hug.

Len arches an eyebrow. Mick had been fairly convinced of Eddie’s guilt, and a hour and a half isn’t a lot of time to change your mind.

Mick shakes his head slightly.

They’ll discuss it later, then. That’s not promising – Len has been complaining recently about how strangely slow certain things have been going, and an incorrect identification with five witnesses means either a set-up or a conspiracy or both.

Probably just people bellyaching about how Len’s not a proper Rogue again, but worth investigating.

For the time being, Len turns to Eddie. “No hard feelings, yeah?” he says mildly. “But remember, if you intend to be a criminal in this city going into the future, you’ll obey the rules.”

Eddie smiles.

He looks like a puppy, but not quite as much as Barry.

“I promise,” he says. He dips his head a little, looking a little shy. “I’ve actually never been a criminal before. I’m hoping to find a job.”

Trickster help him.

Len sighs. “How ‘bout this,” he says, mildly pained. “I’ll get you a job, if you promise to not be a criminal. I got a feeling you’d be terrible at it. Give us all a bad rep.”

Iris is beaming so hard Len’s amazed her muscles haven’t seized up yet.

“Thank you,” Barry says, and smiles at him.

Len swallows. Barry's really pretty when he smiles like that. “Yeah, sure,” he says, aiming for dismissive. “Hey, Mick, I promised Barry here lessons in dirty fighting. You in?”

“Of course I’m in,” Mick says. “Are you crazy? I taught you everything you know.”

“You did not.”

“I knew it!” Caitlin giggles.

#coldflashwave #dccoldwave #mick rory #barry allen #leonard snart #iris west #Caitlin snow #cisco ramon #eddie thawne #my fic #tortall

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patheticphallacy · 5 years

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Hallo!

So let’s start this post by referencing the major creative crisis I went through this month, stemming from a blogging rut I found myself in beginning in July. I’ve got through it now, and I have basically the next month and a half of content already scheduled in preparation for my return to Uni, but the rut was real, guys.

I spend a lot of time on my posts and I found myself very low regarding the content and the amount of response I get to what I post. I know blogging is a lengthy process, I’m not going to immediately get response considering the blog is only just over two years old, and I genuinely love writing these posts and reviews. It’s a worry I tackle often, but sometimes it just gets to me and makes me feel kind of hopeless of ever getting over my general anxiety regarding interacting with other people. I keep my distance just because I don’t know how to make friends in the community, and I feel like that translates over to my blog sometimes too, but I’m really trying to change that by talking to more people!

Other than that: August was boring. I read, I watched random stuff, and I worked overtime shifts so I have enough money for rent when Uni starts. I’m honestly a pretty boring person during off-time from University just because of how far away I am from people, combined with my lack of money. Maybe next Summer will be more exciting.

I also want to add that my blog is going to be a lot busier now the end of the year is approaching. I always seem to have a calm period in November, but every other month, expect chaos! Good chaos, though. Friendly chaos. October is a great month for me as I love horror and supernatural things, which means I have twice as many post ideas.

READING WRAP UP

Assassination Classroom Volume 3-4 by Yusei Matsui– I expect to read more Assassination Classroom this month, but I ended up starting another popular manga series (that’ll come up later). I did enjoy these two volumes, and we got some intriguing looks into Korosensei’s backstory.

Ibitsu by Haruto Ryo– I hated this. Straight up. It felt very targeted towards the humiliation of teenage girls with a lot of unneeded torture and nudity, and I just felt sick after reading it, and not in a way I can enjoy with some stories.

Bond of Dreams, Bond of Love Volume 1-4 by Yayu Sakuragi– This is an age-gap romance between an 18 year old and his childhood friend who is… six/eight years older than him, one of the two. There were some really weird moments, for sure, and I won’t dispute that the age gap was kinda gross at points, but I feel like by the end the conversations on adulthood and the main character finally having his frustrations recognised meant a lot.

My Love Story Volume 7-13 by Kazune Kawahara– I’m in a perpetual state of mourning now that I’ve finished this series. It’s one of my all-time favourites. The ending is so heartfelt and they get into heavier issues towards the final volume that I feel helped carry the main relationship from feeling young into adulthood as the characters began college. It addresses jealousy and feelings of incompetence, while never belittling the trust these characters have in one another. It’s handled so maturely and so unlike other stories, and I’m satisfied with the conclusion, even if my heart is broken.

My Hero Academia Vigilantes Volume 4 by Hideyuki Furuhashi– Not as good as volume 3, but has some solid character development and we finally have a showdown of sorts. This does end on a cliffhanger, fair warning.

Starlike Words by Junko– Reaaaally didn’t like this. Poor development of character and relationship and the nudity felt gratuitous and gross, especially considering these characters are only 15/16.

These Witches Don’t Burn by Isabel Sterling– Another one that disappointed me. I have a review for this linked at the end of this post, just know that I had issues with the treatment of toxic relationships and a victim blaming attitude.

Peter and Alice by John Logan– An OK read that’s very meta, a play that imagines the meeting behind Peter Llewelyn Davies and Alice Liddell in 1932. It’s very tragic and the weaving of the characters they inspired into their own stories was incredible, but I found myself thinking the whole time about how this… probably didn’t happen. I know I should have suspended my disbelief, it just felt impossible.

One Piece Volume 1-11 by Eiichiro Oda– EE. This series is great! I literally started the longest running manga series I’ve come across so far and I don’t regret starting it, even if I did at first. The first 100 chapters have flown by with incredible character development and a wonderful world being shaped, and I adore it.

Their Body and Their Afterthought by Shelby Eileen– Not my favourite poetry collection. I don’t want to be too harsh, but it felt like it reiterates what I’ve read in other collections on similar themes and issues without ever offering anything new with form.

I Hate Fairyland Volume 1 by Skottie Young– I previously read this volume years ago. After a re-read, I’ve lowered my rating. I’ve just read way too many different comics and manga and whatnot to not be slightly critical. The art is still great, but it felt like I was struggling to get through this at points, especially after starting volume 2 and having to stop from boredom. It feels repetitive.

Sunshine, Sadness and Other Floridian Effects by Shelby Eileen– This collection was better than Their Body, luckily! It has some stunning imagery, calling up impressions of water and the turning of the tide in tandem with loss coinciding with moments of happiness, and I do recommend it.

Faithless #3/#4 by Brian Azzarello– Starting to get bored with this series. There’s only so much shocking stuff and nudity without any kind of explanation for it before you grow tired. I’ll carry on reading for a few issues; I’m just ready to drop it if nothing much keeps happening.

Pochamani Volume 1-5 by Kaname Hirama– Ohhh this was such a great series! It’s out of print so I had to read it online, and only the first five volumes are actually translated, which was so disappointing but I still recommend this series. It’s got the first fat main character I’ve seen in a manga series, and has so much conversation surrounding body shaming and positivity and the constant grappling with self-hate when you have a fat body. It means a lot to me, and seeing a romance where a fat girl is adored by her boyfriend is so wholesome.

The Diary of a Bookseller by Shaun Bythell– I literally started this last year and it took me that whole period of time to read 140 pages, and then in the space of a week I read the last 150. There’s definitely a sense of elitism and anti-genre fiction (especially what is typically branded as targeted towards women) which aggravated me, but the general humour was great and there was an interesting insight into the running of independent bookshops.

The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling– I feel like I’ve gone OFF about this book on here in August, but this book deserves it. It’s an intense psychological sci-fi horror where main character, Gyre, goes on a caving mission that ends up being more than it first appears. I love the relationship that develops between Gyre and Em, and I highly recommend the audiobook!

My Life with Bob by Pamela Paul– I have a whole review on my Goodreads that I feel summarises my issues with this book. I enjoyed this, but same with Shaun Bythell’s book, there’s a definite sense of elitism in some ways. I think Pamela Paul was willing to paint herself negatively in some respects and show the harmful thought processes she could have, and I appreciated that. My review is a lot more elaborate! Sorry!

Pen & Ink by Isaac Fitzgerald and Wendy MacNaughton– This is a fun side-by-side of tattoos with the explanations behind them from the people that have them. The stories are whacky and fun, in some places, but are also sentimental and heartfelt in others, and I like the different thought processes behind getting them and the way everyone still seems to love them.

My Hero Academia Volume 19 by Kohei Horikoshi– SO. GOOD. The real strength of this series lies in how well developed the characters and their relationships are, and this volume especially reaffirms that. Aoyama is so sweet and if he’s the traitor I’ll riot!

TBR JAR PICK FOR SEPTEMBER IS: WILLFUL MACHINES by Tim Floreen! My best friend picked this one out for me, thank you friend!

THINGS I WATCHED

I FINALLY went to the cinema again and watched BTS: Bring the Soul. I loved it.

I re-watched Daddy Day Care (don’t ask, it’s literally the only film I watched on Netflix the whole month and I hate that) and it opens with Ben– Eddie Murphy’s in-movie son– climbing out of bed and putting on the exact same Spongebob slippers my sister and I had when we were younger and it was amazing. I’ve never felt so nostalgic over something so unintentional in a film.

Not a watch, but a listen: the Teenage Scream podcast hosted by Kirsty Logan and Heather Parry, where they read and breakdown classic Point Horror novels from the 90s.

As always, I watched random stuff on deep dives on YouTube. This included: An Aesthetic History of The 1975, fat people don’t belong in magazines (it’s not what it sounds like), Being Lowborn w/ Kerry Hudson (an author interview! yes!), and I guess I’ll recommend the latest paperbackdreams video because I love Kat’s channel!

POSTS

University: Second Year Breakdown

A Bookshelf Tour: Part 1

REVIEW: These Witches Don’t Burn

Shakespeare Plays as Taylor Swift Songs

REVIEW: The Luminous Dead

Top Ten Tuesday: Read Books I Wish I Owned!

A Bookshelf Tour: Part 2

If you liked this post, consider buying me a coffee? Ko-Fi.

Goodreads|Twitter|Instagram|Letterboxd

August Wrap Up Hallo! So let's start this post by referencing the major creative crisis I went through this month, stemming from a blogging rut I found myself in beginning in July.

#august #books #movies #reading wrap up #tv shows #wrap up

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thearticulatesk · 7 years

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Jerry Seinfeld

Boondall Entertainment Centre Brisbane

August 9th 2017

★★★★★

I’m still quite the ingenue when it comes to reviewing and when it comes to Jerry Seinfeld I’m a confirmed fan for life, so here’s what I have to say bout his performance in the Brisbane Arena, Boondall on Wednesday July 9th:

It was the best thing I’ve ever seen.

Quite a complex review, isn’t it? Well I’m sorry if I don’t have 300 paragraphs of yada yada for y’all, but Jerry was on from the moment he walked onstage, and I daresay he stayed good and on long after he walked off it. Hell, can’t you just imagine him in a coffin one day, arms folded, looking around and going: ‘What’s the deal with the air flow in these things?’ because he was born to do what he does and I’ve no doubt that he’ll die doing it and linger on afterwards as a sarcastic presence in the air.

I consider myself to be quite the collector of comedians. I’ve been watching them on DVD and live for years and I’m no stranger when it comes to the muffled-splat of jokes falling flat- the empathetic ‘You can do it’ titters that come from the most easily-amused fans in expectant crowds after a comedian has swung and missed. (Often, it’s me) I’ve even seen this happen to Jerry a few times over the years (‘Move the shoes, move the shoes, move the shoes…’ Yes please move the shoes to a segue and faster) and it’s something that you just expect to see at any comedy show. I still fast forward certain bits of Eddie Murphy Raw and Delerious because I have no idea what he’s talking about and don’t care to look into it.

But not at Jerry Seinfeld nope, he shot one-liners and multi-faceted paragraphs out like he’d swallowed a fully-loaded wit clip and used every laugh as the bolt that he slid back for the next. I was sitting between an elderly gentleman and a guy ten years younger than me and they laughed at everything as much as I did, and the laughs were so big that we ended up swaying back and forth and over one another in our squishy seats with no personal space bubble necerssary because we were all in this together.

He is just so good at this. The comedian that came out before him was amazing and I think a lot better than anyone expected. We were still laughing at his jokes when Jerry waltzed out but from the moment the veteran opened his mouth, you could see why we all paid the steep price to get that ticket and then be squished in together- Jerry Seinfeld is the best stand-up comedian in the world and I don’t think he’ll ever be surpassed. He could go on tour at 90, and there will be tens of thousand of people waiting to see him just as there are right now to hear what he has to say about adult diapers.

Sure I guess there were a few things that didn’t resonate quite as well with the Aussie crowd as it would have with a bunch of Americans, but anyone who can call themselves a fan of Seinfeld would have shown up knowing to expect that because as far as generation X is concerned- he was our go-to educator for American culture for a very long time. We know that sometimes US comedians are going to talk about shit that we don’t quite get, but the beautiful thing with Jerry is that once it’s out there, it’s everybody’s joke now and that’s exactly what happened the other night. The crowd showed up wanting to laugh and so they did- uproariously for an hour and ten minutes straight.

In fact if there was any issue with his act, it was the fact that he was too funny- too relevant and too damn slick. We all showed up with this excitement of finally seeing him again, of getting him to throw another scrap of amusement our way after waiting for so long, but once it was over and we were inching our way out (and I was wiping tears off from under my cheeks as I am right now) you could feel the reluctance to leave in the air. It was as long as any stand up act is, but devesatatingly short. There had been so many new wonderful jokes- but not nearly enough to hit the spot now that we’d remember what it was like to listen to him ramble on.

In fact, it sort of felt like having one cigarette after years of going cold turkey, and now I’m craving something that I just cannot get enough of. When Seinfeld was wrapping up, it was easy to come to terms with it because by that point, he’d offered his commentary on basically every aspect of the modern world and new voices were popping up everywhere- voices that sounded fresher and more inventive and might just have something to say that he couldn’t or didn’t want to say.

But that was before the internet took over the world, before Netflix, before Instagram and before, well, everything that pertains to our daily lives now. Seinfeld was about a bunch of middle-aged singles living in a crazy city, but Jerry’s a married man and father now doing the adulting thing (like me) and I’m desperate to know everything that he has to say on all of the above now that he has so much more material. I want him back on my screen, five times a week, saying the stuff that no one else has the balls to say or the intellect to articulate. I want to see whole episodes about political correctness, Trump, North Korea and text messaging. I want to know what he think about putting kids through school, keeping a marriage interesting after an extended period of time, Tinder and equal rights for gays.

Jerry Seinfeld offered up a lot of insight into how his mind works nowadays, but his mind works so beautifully and quickly (and still without cussing) that I don’t think there’s ever going to be enough that he can say or do that will make people okay with the fact that he doesn’t feel like doing it as much anymore, and so as he disappeared behind that curtain, I began to weep just like I did when Time Of Your Life rolled on the Seinfeld Chronicles.

Strange how a show about nothing can be everything.

The Time Of My Life ‘Jerry Seinfeld’ Live Review Jerry Seinfeld Boondall Entertainment Centre Brisbane August 9th 2017 ★★★★★ I'm still quite the ingenue when it comes to reviewing and when it comes to Jerry Seinfeld I'm a confirmed fan for life, so here's what I have to say bout his performance in the Brisbane Arena, Boondall on Wednesday July 9th:

#Boondall Entertainment Centre #Jerry Seinfeld #Seinfeld Review

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