#IT'S BEEN FOUR YEARS AND A CLIFFHANGER BITCH I AM ALIVE AGAIN | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

nochiquinn · 2 years

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campaign 3 episode 23: you're tearing me APART delilah

liam: dat ass

that's still one of the smoothest ones she's had yet

"keep it up, you might have a career in this yet"

I'm going to try to watch Calamity. I don't have anything against Brennan, I just unfortunately associate his face with smug d20 fans who pop up every time they've decide CR is morally bankrupt again.

what kind of godawful cliffhanger are they going to leave us on for four weeks

marisha what did you do

well-oiled machine

hey. hey chetney. hey chetney whatcha doin.

hey chetney WHATCHA DOIN

CHETNEY

do it DO IT

GRINCH STYLE

JESUS

he's been writing this in his head for weeks.

CHETNEY

"I wouldn't want to see him in a Whole Foods"

"she is not armored. she is a merchant."

"you can't NON-LETHALLY behead someone!"

did you get your clothes

Reverse Kool-Aid Man

DOORS

"just assume if you give it to her you never really wanted it in the first place"

"where was that?"

GIFT

I'm gonna CRY

I'm CRYING

I tormented myself with vax's exit earlier today, why do this to me

"your big moon, your little moon, and whatever comes next" more like put me in the GROUND"

"that's in-character, whoever's etsy page he got that from, it's lovely"

FANTASY PREPPERS

tantrum hole

collapsible guillotine

travis' face for .2 seconds when laura SUGGESTED shopping

8 whole adults

I Love Him

weh

LIAM

how many times is this episode gonna make me cry before break

DON'T LET THEM TAKE YOUR HEART

whisper so hard my stream froze

"what did you do with YOUR makeup kit"

"so you're the captain's best friend?"

nb tief!

swedish nb tief!

"you don't do what we say, we throw you overboard"

"like twenty. so many. they just keep making problems!"

honestly I don't get tommy wiseau from this, they talk too fast

tommy wiseau talks like he's been drunk for 30 years

the henley looks like one of those padded shirts you wear under armor, just bulky and scratchy and blech

"you're scarier than I am, you know that, right?"

Very A Lot

I love them

"hey dad" hey what

is it just Liam Makes Me Cry Day or

dragons

DRAGONS???

SKY EEL

SKY MANTA

what in the treasure planet

"I SHIP IT"

TREASURE PLANET

oh man hands for scale, it BIG

speed of WHAT

WHAT points of piercing

fuckin sky porcupine

I came back to "the cake is a lie", what the fuck

I hate it

everybody looks really good in this lighting

taliesin stop doing that with your arm

demon? demon manta??

"I DON'T LIKE THESE BIRDS"

"because they're POOPHEADS"

WHAT'S GONNA WORK

TEEEEEEEAMWORK

need art of orym doing a pull-up on the ballista

god bless gordi

"I want one!"

FLY

taliesin DID compare her to a summers

(I may or may not be dozing off, idek why orym's overboard)

"everybody alive except laudna?"

laudna: [carves up sky eel] imogen: GROSS :D

"I had a weird dream and was like 'fuck it', that was weird but cool!"

"you did good! you flew!"

listen I know I say this immediately upon meeting every party but I mean this more than I have ever meant it before: CANON POLYAM WHEN

liam

he's milking the creature

"look out, fellow toymakers"

love the mental image of ashton just coming out of the room and being like "…..sure." and keeps going

I've been playing forbidden west so getting specific parts off of creatures is giving me ptsd

"I wanna know your intent" "that implies that she has intent"

laura's face is my face

"it's like trying to birth a cow"

the ROLLS tonight

I love her

don't ruin boba for me matt

matt throwing mental daggers at his description chart

"I had to!" "NO YOU DIDN'T"

"I'm grasping for. eyeballs."

"I feel like you should blame khalil because he's obviously asleep"

"that's not true at all. we start with the toes."

loudna

This Is What Flat Earthers Actually Believe

"who's on top and who's on bottom now" travis

I love laudna so much

delilah want magic rock

aw shit

delilah is why we can't have nice things

oh I was worried that was where her brain would go

this BITCH

"you wanna destroy whitestone because this is how you destroy whitestone"

"I have QUESTIONS"

"I fucked around and I FOUND OUT"

#critical role #spoilers #crititag #liveblog #reaction post #I had to edit this down since apparently there's a character limit #and I found it

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pikapeppa · 4 years

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Felassan/f!Lavellan: Ancient History, Part II

Chapter 25 of The Love That Grows From Violence (post-Trespasser Felassan x Tamaris Lavellan) is up!

In which there is more lore dumping and hopefully no huge glaring holes, kjghkg. Part I of the lore dump is here.

It’s a long one (>9300 words), so only the first little bit will be here. Formatting on Tumblr just takes soOoOoO long you guys. Read the whole thing on AO3.

***************

There was a brief stunned silence, which Tamaris eventually broke. “It didn’t work, though,” she said. “Putting their dragons in the deep roads to keep the Blight in was pointless. If Ghilan’nain already had a piece of red lyrium from fucking Andruil—”

Felassan cut in. “The Evanuris didn’t know it was futile. They didn’t understand the nature of the corruption that red lyrium would bring.”

“But we know that now,” she argued. “We know now how red lyrium spreads. And by ‘we’, I mean the whole Inquisition, including Solas. We know red lyrium can be grown like fucking plants in a garden, so why the fuck was he so mad about the Wardens wanting to kill the archdemons if all the archdemons do is lead the Blights?”

No one replied for a moment, and Tamaris realized with a jolt that she’d been yelling.

Then Felassan laughed.

Tamaris’s belly twisted with guilt. His laughter sounded so weary. Here he was, trying to lay out thousands of years of ancient history for them, and how did she repay him? By yelling at him.

He rubbed his face tiredly, and Tamaris sighed and leaned into his side. “I’m sorry, Felassan,” she said quietly. “I’m not mad at you, I’m just…” She waved impatiently at herself. “I’m being a bitch. I’m sorry.”

“You’re not being a bitch,” he said. “You’re frustrated. There is a difference.”

“Yeah, there is, and I’m definitely being a bitch,” she retorted.

He lifted his head from his hand and smiled at her. “You are a master of charmingly crass apologies.”

She smiled faintly in return and laced her fingers with his. “Fuck off.”

He laughed again, and it sounded more genuine this time. “All right. Maybe Varric can summarize what I’ve shared so far.”

Varric nodded. “Ghilan’nain’s crazy gets rewarded by making her an Elvhen god. Meanwhile, Andruil found some red lyrium, probably from the Titan’s heart, and brought it to Ghilan’nain as a present. Chuckles finds out too late about the red lyrium and warns Mythal, who goes looking for proof and comes back with some well-warranted worries, and she gets all her god buddies to donate their dragons to guarding the Titan’s heart, since that’s where the Blight comes from.” He lifted an eyebrow at Felassan. “Or so you think.”

“A fine summary,” Felassan said. “You have my thanks.”

Varric scoffed at his faux formality, and Dorian sighed. “Well, if you think the Blight came from a Titan’s heart, I suppose it’s a good thing that the Titan we saw with Valta has mysteriously sealed itself off since our visit, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Tamaris said grimly.

Varric scratched his chin. “But I don’t get it. How can the Titan heart be the source of the Blight? It didn’t have the Blight when the elves first found it, did it?”

“Not to my understanding, no,” Felassan said.

“Then how could it be the source of the Blight?”

Felassan rubbed his mouth before replying. “I’m honestly not sure. But I do have a theory, if you’d like to hear it.”

“That’s what we’re here for,” Varric said wryly.

Felassan gave him a faint smile. “The theory concerns the nature of magic. Or I should say magics, plural.” He looked at Tamaris. “Tamaris, Dorian: you both know the feeling of magic – the hum of power that you can feel in your body and your blood when you draw from the Fade.”

“Yes, of course,” Dorian said.

Felassan nodded. “Magic drawn from the Fade has a certain… a certain vibration, for lack of a better word. Or a pattern of vibration that is unique to the Fade.” To Varric he said, “You could even call it a song, if you were being fanciful. Magic of a dwarven nature — that is, that’s tied to lyrium — vibrates, or sings, in a different manner that is difficult for non-dwarves to control. I’ve spoken of this to Tamaris already, but when Templars ingest lyrium, they are forcing themselves to perceive this song that was never meant for them. It gives them powers, but it changes the way their minds and bodies work.”

Varric’s eyes widened. “That’s what makes them addicts.”

“Yes,” Felassan said.

“But if that’s the case,” Dorian asked, “why are mages able to use lyrium? How does lyrium enhance our abilities without making us ill if it sings in a different frequency than our magic?”

Felassan pulled a little face. “I’m not entirely sure. But I think it’s possible that lyrium-based magic and Fade magic can, um… damned common tongue.” He muttered to himself in Elvhen for a moment. “They might… resonate?” he said. Then he frowned. “Is that the word I’m looking for? Ah, I’ll have to use it for lack of anything better. I think these forms of magic are able to resonate if the lyrium is tamped down by being in a diluted form. If it’s diluted, the two forms of magic can sing in harmony to make an even stronger song.”

“Hm,” Dorian said thoughtfully. “A plausible theory. I’ll have to think on it, but I like it at first glance.”

“I’m thrilled to please you,” Felassan said with a smirk. He released Tamaris’s hand and leaned back casually on the couch. “Now, we know that lyrium is actually the blood of Titans, and that Titan hearts are a source of enormous power. Tell me something, all of you: did you hear a pulse from the Titan’s heart? Was there an actual heartbeat?”

“Absolutely,” Dorian said.

“Yeah,” Varric agreed. “It was slow, but really obvious.”

Felassan nodded in satisfaction. “That’s what I thought. I’ve never seen a Titan’s heart, you see. But I’m fairly certain that the song of lyrium is generated by the Titan’s heart. And…” He chuckled and rubbed his chin. “May the Dread Wolf never catch my scent. He’d surely gut me for telling you this. Especially since it’s just my suspicion and I could be wrong.” He smiled at them again, but his smile held a hint of a grimace. “Let’s be sure to keep this among the four of us, shall we?”

“Certainly,” Dorian said.

“No problem, Jester,” Varric said, and Tamaris nodded her agreement.

Felassan exhaled slowly and rubbed his mouth. “I would hypothesize that what you call the Blight is actually a corrupted vibration pattern or ‘song’ caused by a damaged Titan heart.” He looked at Varric. “That’s why I thought it interesting that Valta called herself ‘pure’ once she connected with the Titan — an undamaged Titan, I should say. The lyrium from the damaged Titan became impure and corrupted.”

Varric frowned. “But why would a damaged heart mean that the song makes people turn into crazy fanatics? Why does it make them so much sicker than regular lyrium ever could?”

“Now, this might sound like even more of a stretch,” Felassan said, “but I wonder if it might have something to do with the Titans having feelings. You know, seeing as they’re alive.”

Tamaris’s gut jolted. How had she not thought of that? “Oh. Fuck,” she said blankly. “Yeah, I suppose if a parade of strangers came out of nowhere and experimented on your people and started tearing out pieces of your heart, you’d be pretty pissed.”

“Stands to reason, doesn’t it?” Felassan said drolly. “And as we all know, rage can be a corrosive, noxious thing. The Titans feel rage, their rage changes the song, the song makes people into the worst versions of themselves...” He shrugged. “But that’s all conjecture.”

“It’s extremely well-considered conjecture,” Dorian said.

“Thank you,” Felassan said brightly. “I have had a little bit of time to think about it. Just a couple thousand years, you know.”

Tamaris sighed. “Fuck. All right. Well… well, all right. This tells us what the Blight is, then.”

“What the Blight possibly is,” Felassan corrected. “It’s all just hypothesizing.”

She nodded, then shot him a little frown. “Why did you say Solas would gut you for telling us this?”

“I suspect he wanted to keep the so-called ‘root of all evil’ away from you,” Felassan replied. “And I meant you specifically, avise.”

She blinked. “What? Why me?”

“Because he loved you,” Felassan said.

She frowned. “So?”

He gave her a chiding look. “He watched red lyrium corrupt Ghilan’nain, who was once one of his dearest friends. He watched it ruin our entire empire. Can you really not see why he would want to hide the knowledge of its source from the woman he loved?”

“That’s a paltry excuse,” Tamaris retorted. “All that tells me is that he didn’t trust me not to misuse the information.” She wrinkled her nose at him. “How are you defending him about this? You’re the one sitting here telling me all of this information!”

“I am, yes,” Felassan said. “But remember, avise: I am explaining him, not defending him. As for why I am telling you, the reason is simple.” He leaned toward her and lowered his voice. “I am not Solas.”

Her heart squeezed at the seriousness of his expression. She understood what Felassan meant in the context of this conversation: that unlike Solas, he trusted her with this information. But this was not the only way that he and Solas were different.

Where Solas had been a fluctuant wave of hot and cold, Felassan was a constant wash of warmth. Felassan was certainty and humour and openness, and Tamaris did not need the reminder of how different he was from the Solas she had once thought she loved.

“I know you’re not Solas,” she said quietly. She squeezed his knee. “I know, Felassan.”

His expression softened. Then Varric cleared his throat. “So, uh… so we think we know what the Blight is, and the dragons were probably there to keep it in check. What happened next?”

Felassan looked away from Tamaris and smiled at Varric. “Unfortunately, this is when things started to go downhill for our poor Rebel Wolf. For indeed, this is about the time when he started being called by that infamous moniker.”

CLIFFHANGER, SORRY. Read the rest on AO3!

#felassan #save felassan #felassan romance #felassan/lavellan #felassan x lavellan #the love that grows from violence #pikapeppa writes

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daleisgreat · 5 years

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Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season Three

-Welcome to the continuing chronicles of my seasonal recaps of Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG). Today I am highlighting season three of the BluRay set (trailer), and from what I have gathered from countless interviews it is the breakthrough season with a strong majority of good-to-great episodes and where this Enterprise’s cast was embraced and accepted by Trekkies around the globe. To catch up on entries on my first two seasons, click here! I wish I can crank these out faster than every five months that I have been averaging, but I have settled into a weekly routine where after I finish the last shift of my 60-hour work week I kick back and relax with a cup of rich gas station hot cocoa and a few savory turkey sausage links while watching the next episode of TNG and it is, no lie, one of the favorite parts of my week! -I once again want to get things started with addressing some new cast changes/removals and other new constants that start to become apparent with this season. The most noticeable change is the return of Dr. Crusher (Gates McFadden) and the removal of Dr. Pulaski (Diana Muldaur). Crusher explains she is back from her assignment at teaching recruits at Starfleet and other than one or two quick references of Pulaski this season, she is not seen at all in season three. Q (John deLancie) returns for his annual hijinx in ‘DeJa Q’ in a fun episode that sees his powers stripped away and begging for acceptance by taking any spot on board the Enterprise. Whoopi Goldberg returns as the all-knowing, mystical bartender ‘Guinan’ in a handful of episodes. Whoopie shines in this role that is perfect for her and I absolutely adore the few times we are treated to her this season and she plays a pivotal role in some of the most iconic episodes of the series this season.

There are now established constants by the third season of TNG that may have appeared once or twice before, but are now more frequent or a new standard all together. The third season debuted the new uniforms for the cast and replaced the one-piece spandex-based costumes the cast detested in interviews over the years with more comfortable looking fleece/sweater-esque two-piece outfits for the rest of the series. They are an obvious improvement and still retain the spirit of the originals, but look more professional and less ‘gymnastic-y’ than the previous uniforms. The poker game makes its return for a handful of episodes this season, and I always enjoy the levity and relaxed beats whenever a friendly round of cards transpires. Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) is now a regular tea drinker in season three after dabbling with coffee last season. I wrote in all caps in my notes ‘FIRST RED ALERT SOUND EFFECT’ early on in season three, and it remained a constant every few episodes as the Enterprise more semi-regularly started to engage in brief dogfight skirmishes and engagements throughout the season. It was not every episode, maybe seven or eight at most, but it was starting to transition into becoming the new normal I originally associated TNG with from the episodes I caught in my childhood. I paused the episode and took a picture with my phone and included it here that I believe saw our first cliché ‘red-shirt death’ this season. To my surprise, it was the only one I noticed in season three and I am fully expecting to see more gratuitous over-ambitious non-credited red-shirts meet their early demise next season! Finally, I was delighted to see Dr. Crusher return to her being awful at her profession. She once again did not succeed to keep patients alive at the table this season and failed at her attempt at the ‘Pulaski Method’ of trying to erase memories. I did however very much enjoy her bitch-slapping Wesley (Wil Wheaton).

-Speaking of Wesley, he got a step up in duties and rank this season which felt well-earned and I found myself accepting him as one of the regular mainstays in the cast which is coming a long way from how grating he was in the first season. Another first season character I had issues with was Counselor Troi (Marina Sirtis). Other than two or three episodes this season where she is the focus of the primary narrative, her role is dialed back mysteriously more than it was in season two with her having only a line or two an episode. It does not help that Troi’s featured episodes are the rare clunker episodes this season that sees the yearly visit from her eccentric mother that winds up with them both being kidnapped and Troi falling for a guest negotiator that yields one of the most bizarre scenes of the series. The only other qualm I had with this season were weaker Holo-deck scenes compared to season two. One crew-member uses it for his own exaggerated fantasies by hitting it off with Crusher and Trois and successfully dueling the guys and the other is more ridiculously exaggerated takes on recreating scenes that lead to William Riker (Jonathan Frakes) being accused of murder. If there is any redemption for those scenes it is because they fall into the ‘so-bad-its good’ variety.

-Last season I referenced how contemporary TNG-homage The Orville is filled with countless parallels and tributes to TNG scenes and episodes. I spotted another one in season three that saw how Picard accidentally violated the Prime Directive and exposed himself to an uncivilized world that was the impetus for that society worshiping Picard as a god. The exact same thing happens earlier this year in a season two episode of The Orville. To repeat myself again from last season’s recap, The Orville took a noticeable leap in quality in its second season and is a terrific modern take on TNG. Do not miss it! -The weak Troi episodes and subpar Holo-deck scenes are my only nitpicks for season three. All around this is easily the best season of TNG thus far. New recurring Enterprise crew member Reginald Barclay (Dwight Schultz) is introduced in a powerful episode that saw Geordi (LeVar Burton) overcoming his original annoyances with Barclay and connecting with him upon learning of Barclay’s Social Anxiety Disorder in a moving scene. In a fun lighthearted episode Picard is forced to go on vacation, and while on a resort stumbles into his own swashbuckling, Indiana Jones-esque adventure.

A couple other favorite episodes of mine this season saw Data kidnapped and turned into a collector’s showpiece. Watching it unfold and how the resolution came to be when Data outsmarted his captor was surprisingly gripping material in what looked like was going to be a yawn of an episode going in. ‘Yesterdays Enterprise has received a ton of critical acclaim as one of the best episodes in the series. It sees the Enterprise get exposed to a time-shift and crosses paths with an alternate universe Enterprise that causes the return of Tasha (Denise Crosby) and an ambitious performance by a young Shooter McGavin (Christopher McDonald). It is a darker episode as everything is not how it is suppose to be, and seeing the pair of Enterprises restore the proper timelines was an engaging ride the entire journey with a nonstop barrage of touching exchanges and movie-quality dogfights. I agree with the critics on that one with high marks for ‘Yesterday’s Enterprise’. I would be remiss if I were not to touch the other most talked episodes in TNG history with season three’s ‘Best of Both Worlds, part one.’ This season-finale sees the devastating return of the Borg and more is revealed of their nature and purpose when they kidnap and assimilate Picard to end this breakthrough season in one of TV’s most monumental cliffhangers. I can see why this episode got all the acclaim it did, especially when watching the bonus interviews afterwards when the writer wrote this episode without an ending in mind because he thought he was not coming back to the series. An obvious way to tell this two-part special of TNG is truly outstanding is because they were the only episodes in the entire run to receive their standalone physical release outside of all the other season sets.

-For newer readers to my TNG recaps, this is my obligatory paragraph giving props to the stunning work done by the HD transfer team for the BluRay to make TNG hold up far better in HD than anyone could have imagined. I also give regular season props here to the awesome hosts, Matt and Andrew of Star Trek: The Next Conversation podcast. Their detailed work at breaking down each episode scene-by-scene is informative and entertaining and helps me get the absolute most out of every episode! -Like last season there is a boatload of extra features (just over four hours worth!) and I will try to highlight a few of my favorites once again. Four episodic commentaries are available on three episodes, two of which for ‘Yesterday’s Enterprise’ that were fascinating to take in how much the writers and other crew reflect back the importance of that imperative episode. Past DVD bonuses return, along with a few new BluRay extras. A few separate extras detail how important ’Yesterday’s Enterprise’ and ‘Best of Both Worlds, part one’ are to TNG history and how Jonathan Frakes started breaking in directing episodes this season. There is another well-produced gag reel with the highlight being a young Wil Wheaton having quite a sailor’s mouth.

There are two standout extras of the pack. Resistance Is Futile: Assimilating Star Trek TNG is a three part, 90 minute look at the writing process for TNG and how the writer’s scripts were constantly shuffled about and how some were miraculously stumbled upon for some landmark episodes. It is a fascinate look into what it takes for a script to get green-lit into production. Inside the Writer’s Room is a stellar 70 minute discussion moderated by Seth McFarlane as he interviews several TNG writers about how they got brought on board the show and their best and worst memories working on TNG in a highly entertaining watch. Some key takeaways from that panel include dealing with Gene’s TNG utopia, not realizing the success of season three at the time and using a ‘Techno-Babble Generator’ given to them as a joke for future techno-babble dialogue in later episodes. I would not be surprised to see Seth take notes for ideas from this to use a couple years later when he started up The Orville. -If you cannot tell by now, season three of Star Trek: The Next Generation is where the show becomes must-see nearly every episode. They were well on their way in that direction by the end of season two, but season three was when they started gelling nearly the entire season. I would still give the nudge to start watching the show off with season two, but for the time-deprived season three will do you no wrong with a ridiculous amount of classic moments and episodes to consume! For those interested in physical media and not just quick-binging on Netflix I highly recommend the BluRays for a tremendous HD-upgrade in picture quality, and over four hours of bonus content with most of it being must-see in its own way too. -Thank you all once again for joining me in of re-watching all of TNG! See you in a few months with my recap for season four! Past TV/Web Series Blogs 2013-14 TV Season Recap 2014-15 TV Season Recap 2015-16 TV Season Recap 2016-17 TV Season Recap 2017-18 TV Season Recap 2018-19 TV Season Recap Adventures of Briscoe County Jr: The Complete Series Baseball: A Ken Burns series Angry Videogame Nerd Home Video Collections Mortal Kombat: Legacy - Season 1 | Season 2 OJ: Made in America: 30 for 30 RedvsBlue - Seasons 1-13 Roseanne – Seasons 1-9 Seinfeld Final Season Star Trek: Next Generation – Seasons 1-7 Superheroes: A Never-Ending Battle Superheroes: Pioneers of Television The Vietnam War: A Ken Burns series X-Men – The Animated Series: Volumes 4-5

#TV/Web Series #star trek #star trek the next generation #Patrick Stewart #jonathan frakes #gates mcfadden #levar burton #Brent Spiner #Marina Sirtis #christopher mcdonald #Denise Crosby #Wil Wheaton #dwight schultz #data #picard #the orville #whoopi goldberg #seth mcfarlane

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writingguide003-blog · 5 years

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'A total blast': our writers pick their favorite summer blockbusters ever

New Post has been published on https://writingguideto.com/must-see/a-total-blast-our-writers-pick-their-favorite-summer-blockbusters-ever/

'A total blast': our writers pick their favorite summer blockbusters ever

As the season heats up on the big screen, Guardian writers look back on their picks from the past with killer sharks, mournful crime-fighters and time-traveling teens

Face/Off (1997)

Photograph: Allstar/Cinetext/PARAMOUNT

Madman bomber Nicolas Cage stole John Travoltas dead sons life. So gloomy FBI agent Travolta steals Cages face. When Cage steals his face and his wife and freedom John Woos Face/Off becomes the biggest, wackiest and most operatic summer blockbuster in history, a gonzo combustion that flings everything from pigeons to peaches at the screen.

Hong Kong cineastes might applaud a script with roots in the ancient Sichuan opera genre Bian Lian, where performers swap masks like magic. Popcorn-munchers, of which I am front row center, are here to watch whack job Cage and soulful Travolta, two actors who love to go full-ham, play each other and go deep inside their iconographies. Call it hamception. Or just call it a crazy swing that hits a home run as Cavolta and Trage battling it out in a warehouse, a speedboat and, of course, a church. As Cage-as-Travolta gloats to Travolta-as-Cage, Isnt this religious? The eternal battle between good and evil, saint and sinners but youre still not having any fun! Maybe hes not, but we sure are. Bravo, bravo. AN

Edge of Tomorrow (2014)

Photograph: David James/Publicity image from film company

Theres been an increasing sense of desperation clinging to the majority of roles picked by Tom Cruise in recent years. Outside of the still shockingly entertaining Mission: Impossible series, he was miscast in the barely serviceable Jack Reacher and its maddeningly unnecessary sequel, his awards-aiming American Made was throwaway and his franchise-starting The Mummy was a franchise-killer. But four summers ago, he picked the right horse just maybe at the wrong time.

Because despite how deliriously fun Edge of Tomorrow was in the summer of 2014, audiences didnt show the requisite enthusiasm. It was a moderate success (enough to warrant a long-gestating sequel) but it should have packed them in, its combination of charm, invention and sheer thrills making it one of the most objectively successful blockbuster experiences in memory. The nifty plot device (Cruise must relive a day of dying while battling aliens over and over again) allowed for some dark gallows humor and a frenetic pace that kept us all giddily on edge while it also contained a dazzling action star turn from Emily Blunt whose fearless Full Metal Bitch wrestled the film away from Cruise. Blame its relative failure on the bland title? Cruise fatigue? Blockbuster over-saturation? Then find a digital copy to watch and rewatch and repeat. BL

Back to the Future (1985)

Photograph: Allstar/UNIVERSAL/Sportsphoto Ltd./Allstar

Back to the Future very nearly wasnt a summer blockbuster. The reshoots required after Eric Stoltz was booted off, then the fact Michael J Foxs Family Ties commitments meant he could only shoot at night all meant filming didnt wrap until late April. Robert Zemeckis and Steven Spielberg duly pencilled in an August / September release.

But then people started seeing it. Test scores were off the scale. Said producer Frank Marshall: Id never seen a preview like that. The audience went up to the ceiling. So they bagsied the best spot the year had to offer 3 July hired a squad of sound editors to work round the clock and two print editors with instructions to get properly choppy. They did, and those big trims tightened yet further one of the tautest screenplays (by Bob Gale) cinema has ever seen. The only bit of fat they left was the Johnny B Goode scene: sure, it didnt advance the story, but the kids at those test screenings knew we were gonna love it. Back to the Future is a pure shot of summer cinema: grand, ambitious, insanely entertaining. Deadpool, Avengers, take note: a blockbuster can be smart as hell so long as it wears it lightly. In the end, by the way, the film spent 11 weeks at number 1 at the US box office. Thats essentially the whole summer. CS

Teminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

Photograph: Allstar/TRISTAR/Sportsphoto Ltd./Allstar

The first film I ever saw at the cinema was The Rocketeer. We drove into Bradford city centre, bought our tickets at the Odeon and sat through the 1991 tale which followed the fortunes of a stunt pilot, a rocket pack and a Nazi agent played by Timothy Dalton who sounded like he was from Bury rather than Berlin. The way into the multiplex there was a huge poster for Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Arnie sat on a Harley with a shotgun cocked and ready. My dad was a huge fan of the original but he still couldnt swing taking a seven-year-old to see it. It wasnt until I borrowed a VHS copy that I finally got to see what was behind that image. Skynet, dipshits, T-1000s, a nuclear holocaust and a motorbike chases on the LA river.

Blockbusters dont usually have that edge: theres a more brazen mainstream appeal. But Judgment Day was and still is an exception. It did huge numbers at the box office (more than $500m), was a rare sequel that was arguably better than the original and introduced really odd bits of Spanish idiom into the Bradford schoolyard lexicon. I probably would have been scarred for life watching it as a seven-year-old, but as a teenager it gave me a story I doubt Ill ever get tired of revisiting. LB

The Dark Knight (2008)

Photograph: Allstar/WARNER BROS.

The summer of 2008 was a busy one: Barack Obama emerged from a contentious democratic primary to become the first ever black presidential nominee of a major party. The dam fortifying the entire global financial system was about to burst. China hosted its first ever Summer Olympics. But somehow, and not exactly to my credit, what I remember most from that summer is the uncanny, ridiculously over-the-top publicity blitzkrieg that preceded the release of The Dark Knight, which has since emerged as not just an all-time great summer blockbuster, but an all-time great American film, period.

There were faux-political billboards that read I believe in Harvey Dent; a weirdly nondescript website of the same name; Joker playing cards dispersed throughout comic book stores, which led fans to another website where the DA was defaced with clown makeup. Dentmobiles, Gotham City voter registration cards, a pop-up local news channel: the marketing campaign might have seemed excessive had the movie not so convincingly topped it. Ten years later, as films like Deadpool and Avengers: Infinity War try to reach those same heights of virality, The Dark Knight remains the measuring stick by which every superhero movie, and superhero villain, is measured. JN

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

Photograph: Jasin Boland/AP

In many ways, Fury Road is summer: arid, scorching, bright enough to be squinted at. The driving force behind all the high-impact driving is scarcity of water, the essence of life in a desert where death practically rises up from the burning sand. Even in the air-conditioned comfort of a multiplex auditorium in Washington DCs Chinatown, watching George Millers psychotic motor opera left this critic sweaty and parched. My world is fire and blood, warns the weary Max Rockatansky (Tom Hardy) in the scripts opening lines. Staggering out of a theater into the oppressive rays of the sun, it sure can feel that way.

Millers masterpiece fits into the summer blockbuster canon in a less literal capacity as well, striking its ideal balance of dazzling technical spectacle and massively-scaled emotional catharsis. There was plenty of breathless praise to go around upon this films 2015 release, much of it for the feats of practical-effects daring, but the hysterical extremes of feeling cemented its status as a modern classic. I cant deny that Ive watched the polecat sequence upwards of a dozen times, but Millers film truly comes alive in Furiosas howl of desperation, and in Maxs noble disappearance into the throng. CB

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo

Its the music, its the giant boulder, its the Old Testament mysticism, its the whip, its the Cairo Swordsman, its Harrison Fords crooked smile, its the bad dates, its Karen Allen drinking a sherpa under the table, its the melted faces and exploding heads. Its all these things plus having the good fortune of seeing this at the cinema at a very young age, therefore watching most of it through my terrified fingers. (Indy tells Marion to keep her eyes shut during the cosmic spooky ending; way ahead of you there!)

The modern blockbuster as we know it was created by Steven Spielberg with Jaws and George Lucas with Star Wars, so the hype was unmatched when the two collaborated in 1981 with Raiders of the Lost Ark. As a kid I had no idea this was a loving homage to cliffhanger serials from the 30s and 40s, I took it as pure adventure. The seven-and-a-half minute desert truck chase (I dont know, Im making thus up as I go) is probably the best action sequence in all of cinema (John Woos Hard Boiled does not have a horse, sorry), but watching as an adult one notices a lot of sophisticated humor, too. (Indy being too exhausted to make love to Marion, for example, is something that didnt connect when I was six.)

Its strange to think I watched these cartoon Nazis on VHS with my grandparents who had escaped the Holocaust, and no one benefits when you do the math to figure out how young Marion was when, as Indy puts it, you knew what you were doing. But for thrills, laughs and propulsive camerawork (though a little mild Orientalism), nothing tops this one. JH

Independence Day (1996)

Photograph: Everett/REX/Shutterstock

Short of actually calling their film Summer Blockbuster, rarely can a films height-of-summer release date been so central to a films raison detre. This being the mid-90s, when po-mo and self-referentiality was all the rage, brazenly hooking your tentpole film to 4 July was seen as a pretty smart idea.

Fortunately, all the ducks did line up in a row for ID4: a game-changing performance from Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum at (arguably) his funniest, a rousingly Clintoneque president in Bill Pullman and most importantly in that run-up to the millennium physical destruction on a gigantic scale. Much comment at the time was expended on the laser obliteration of the White House (an early shot from the Tea Party/Maga crowd?), but I personally cherish director Roland Emmerichs signature move of detonating cars in somersault formation. Like many other huge-budget films then and since, Independence Day was basically a tooled-up retread of cheap-as-chips format of earlier decades though who these days would roll such expensive dice on what is essentially an original script, with no comic book or toy branding as a forerunner? We shall never see its like again. AP

Aliens (1986)

Photograph: Allstar/20 CENTURY FOX/Sportsphoto Ltd./Allstar

An Aliens summer is one for moviegoers who prefer to sit in in darkened rooms when the sun is shining; the brutal confines of the fiery power plant make an excellent subliminal ad for air conditioning. In 1986, James Cameron took Ridley Scotts elegant, iconic horror template and turned it into an all-out action blockbuster, forcing Ripley once again to face down her nemeses in a breathless fug of claustrophobia, sweat and fear. Its relentlessly stressful and unbelievably thrilling.

I first saw Aliens many years after its initial release. Owing to its sizeable and long-lasting legacy, it was at once immediately familiar, yet also brisk and brutally fresh. I understood that it was a classic, but I wasnt prepared for just how good it is, for the pitch-perfect management of tension, the pace that never really lets up, the emotional pull. The maternal undertow of Ripleys protection of Newt, and the alien mirror of that, adds a level of heart unusual in most blockbusters, and her frustration at being a woman whose authority must be earned again and again, and then proven again and again, remains grimly relevant, 30 years on. Its also a total blast. Now get away from her, you bitch. RN

Jaws (1975)

Photograph: Fotos International/Getty Images

It is the great summer blockbuster ancestor the film that in 1975 more or less invented the concept of the event movie. And unlike all those other summer blockbusters, Steven Spielbergs Jaws is actually about the summer; it is explicitly about the institution of the summer vacation, into which the movie was being sold as part of the seasonal entertainment. It is about the sun, the sand, the beach, the ocean and the entirely justified fear of being eaten alive by an enormous shark with the appetite of a serial killer and the cunning of a U-boat commander. And more than that: it is about that most contemporary of political phenomena: the coverup, the town authorities at a seaside resort putting vacationers at risk by not warning them about the shark. The Jaws mayor has become comic shorthand for the craven and pusillanimous politician.

A blockbuster nowadays means spectacular digital effects, but this film is from an analogue world. It bust the block through brilliant film-making and an inspired score from John Williams, summoning up the shark with a simple two-note theme which became the most famous musical expression of evil since Bernard Herrmanns shrieking violin stabs in Psycho took the place of actual knife-slashing. I still remember the excitement of the summer of 1975, and the queues around the block at the Empire, in Watford, round the corner from the football ground. The inspired brevity of the title meant the word was repeated over and over again to fill the marquee display: JAWS JAWS JAWS as if they were screaming it! PB

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