#and this becomes interview story material for like three months

[mirai-e-jump]

Uchusen Vol.184 (Spring 2024) Bakuage Sentai Boonboomger | Detail of Super Sentai ft. Main Cast & Staff Interviews (translations below)

Publication: April 1, 2024

Iuchi Haruhi x Hayama Yuki x Suzuki Miu

"First, regarding the three of you, we'd like to ask, what motivated you to pursue the entertainment industry and acting in the first place?"

Iuchi: When I was in my second year of middle school, I saw the TV drama "Death Note" starring Kubota Masataka-san, which motivated me to become an actor. When I was in elementary school, I was really lacking confidence and always wanted to be someone other than myself, so when I saw Death Note, I felt that I could become someone else if I was an actor.

Hayama: I joined my current agency at 16 after being contacted in Osaka. At the time, I wanted to become a hairstylist, and at first I was thinking of turning down their offer, but the agency contacted me for over six months, and my mother said, "Since they're going this far, why don't you take atleast one audition?" And so, I took it and passed, and now I'm sitting here (laughs). I can say this now, but I did my first job without knowing what I was doing……But as I did it, I learned to enjoy the work, and from there I decided to become an actor.

Suzuki: When I was little, I was a regular reader of "Nicola," a fashion magazine for middle schoolers, and I'd carry it with me everywhere I went every day. It started when my sister recommended that I audition as an exclusive model. I applied when I was in my fifth year of elementary school and made it to the final round, but was rejected there. I was so disappointed, that I applied on my own the following year and was accepted.

"Why did you decide to also pursue acting after joining as a model?"

Suzuki: It started when I took acting lessons at my agency. At first, I wasn't very good at the lessons, but after 2-3 years, I had a moment where I felt that acting was fun. It all started with something trivial during a lesson, but from there I wanted to become better, and now I'm working hard at acting.

"Have you watched any of the previous Super Sentai or other tokusatsu productions?"

Hayama: I loved "Kamen Rider Kabuto," and had the transformation items for all the Kabuto Riders and I used to play with them with my younger brother.

Iuchi: I also watched alot of them. My house was full of Kamen Rider toys and my cousin's house was full of Super Sentai toys, so we used to play with them at each other's houses. I remember "Kamen Rider Wizard" being my favorite.

Suzuki: My older sister liked Super Sentai, so because of her, we used to watch "Mahou Sentai Magiranger" together. The other day, when Director Watanabe Katsuya asked me, "Have you seen any of the older tokusatsu shows?" I said, "I watched Magiranger!" and he said, "I used to film that too." I was deeply moved and happy to think that I'm now creating new heroes together with the people who created heroes for me to admire when I was a kid.

Hayama: Someday, we'll also become the ones who people admire.

Suzuki: I want to become one!

Iuchi: There's no doubt.

"What were your first impressions of Boonboomger?"

Iuchi: When I saw the materials for Boonboomger at our meeting, I felt that the designs and naming were back to the "taste" of the old days compared to the recent Super Sentai (laughs).

Hayama: When I read the script, my impression was that Boonboomger would be a cheerful and easy to understand show that both parents and children could enjoy together.

Suzuki: When I first saw the visuals, I thought it was quite original (laughs). It's like it was etched into my mind at first sight. The tires being slapped onto their faces leaves an unprecedented impact.

"How do you feel about the characters you're playing?"

Hayama: I had heard that he was a really cool character, and that's what I thought when I read the script, but as the story progressed I couldn't help but wonder……Is Ishiro really that cool? (laughs). My impression of him changed.

Suzuki: Mira is an innocent, energetic and cheerful mood maker, and I get the impression that she's similar to me. I think it's very easy to play, and that I'm able to project what I have into the role.

Iuchi: My first impression of Taiya was that he was interesting but difficult. When I read a script, to form my first impression, I often think about how the character's personality is similar to that in an anime or movie, but that didn't come out at all with Taiya. Gradually, I'm trying to find my own version of Taiya.

"What were your first impressions of each other?"

Iuchi: I've been together with Yuki-kun since the audition. I was Red and Yuki-kun was Blue, which is a common combination, and while everyone at the audition was nervous, my first impression of Yuki-kun was that he was sharp, cool, and very much Blue. It's completely different now (laughs).

Hayama: Hey?! (laughs).

Iuchi: Once I got to know him, there wasn't a hint of coolness (laughs).

"What about Suzuki-san?"

Iuchi: My first impression at the meeting was that she's someone who pays close attention to her surroundings, and she gives off the image of treating each person in the way they'd like to be treated.

Suzuki: That was your first impression?! I'm glad (laughs).

Iuchi: My impression of Suzuki-san hasn't changed (laughs).

"Hayama-san, what about you?"

Hayama: As Haruhi mentioned, I often worked with him from the early stages of the audition. I wasn't aware of it at first, but Haruhi had also passed the audition, and I was happy that the partner I was competing with for so long was there. My first impression of Haruhi was that he was a quiet person. But when it comes to acting, his voice changes, or rather, the way he speaks changes. His on and off switch is amazing. Now that I can see more of Haruhi's natural side, the image I get is that he acts appropriately for his age (laughs).

"What about your impressions of Suzuki-san?"

Hayama: The four male members of Boonboomger are surprisingly shy, and when we're unsure of what to say, Miu-chan will talk to us and bring the four of us together, so I have the image that she's a caring person. Now, she's surprisingly outspoken and is showing new sides of herself.

"Suzuki-san, what are your impressions of these two?"

Suzuki: Haruhi-kun has a very distinct voice. I got the impression that he was someone who spoke in a very calm and comfortable tone. Also, at the first costume fitting, when they asked if anyone had any problems with their costume, Haruhi-kun raised his hand and said, "I don't know how to walk in these sneakers." The heels on Taiya's sneakers are about 6cm high, and I was really impressed by the way he walked in a very unusual way, without bending his knees, he looked like a penguin (laughs).

Iuchi: They had a high bottom like heels. I've never worn heels before, so I didn't know how to walk in them (laughs). I ended up having the insoles lowered so I could walk safely.

"What about Hayama-san?"

Suzuki: My first impression was that he was a cool person. It's different now (laughs). He's very silly, very meddling, and an interesting Kansai person.

Hayama: How strange (laughs).

"Filming has progressed and we think you've gotten a feel for your characters, but what parts of your performance are you mindful of?"

Iuchi: As mentioned earlier, I still haven't fully grasped Taiya himself yet, but I decided to create Taiya not by thinking about him, but by thinking about the kind of character he is when he's with "this person." I'm getting to know Taiya through his relationships with the people around him, such as the sense of distance between him and Ishiro, and between him and Mira.

Hayama: There are many things about Boonboomger and our character's pasts that I can't talk about yet, but I've had the opportunity to learn more deeply about Ishiro's relationships and the way he interacts with people, and thanks to that, I feel I have a better grasp on my performance as Ishiro.

Suzuki: It's a small detail, but when I speak with a loud voice, my voice tends to come from higher up. However, Mira is an aggressive kid who's always moving forward on her own, so I try to act with the image of putting her voice forward as much as possible. When I saw the broadcast of the first episode, I felt that my voice came out too high, so now I'm trying to express Mira's momentum by bringing my voice forward.

"Did you two get any feedback on your performance from watching the finished footage?"

Iuchi: Taiya's a character who isn't overly emotional, but the Director pointed out that I was too conscious of this and that there was little intonation in my line delivery. When I watched the first episode again, I realized that when the sound effects and BGM were added, my dialogue was drowned out and lost. My voice is loud during battle scenes, but I thought it sounded kind of monotonous in other scenes. I felt that alittle more inflection and speed could be added from the time I'm Taiya before transforming into BoonRed.

Hayama: For me, it was more a reflection than a new discovery. At first, there were parts where I didn't fully understand what the Director was saying, but after watching the footage, I finally realized what it was he was trying to say. I'd like to make the most of it in future shoots.

"After watching the footage, It seems that everyone's performance may change in future episodes. So, is there anything you'd like to challenge yourself with in Boonboomger?"

Iuchi: I'd like to act with more emotion. Like Mira, she's happy, angry, or sad to the fullest, Taiya hasn't had a scene like that yet, so I'd like to try it.

Suzuki: I'd like to try the so called "swapping episode." The other day, we all practiced for a possible situation where our roles have been swapped. For example, I tried predicting what Ishiro would be like in Mira by saying certain lines. So, if there was a swap, I think everyone would be able to do it at a pretty high level (laughs).

Hayama: For me it's action. The first time I practiced action, it was so difficult that I couldn't imagine what it would be like to film it while acting and saying lines. But, I think I can learn alot from it, so I want to give it a try.

"And finally, please tell us some key points to watch out for to make Boonboomger even more enjoyable."

Hayama: Some may feel that Ishiro is a cold person based on his attitude toward Mira at first, but he's a character kinder than anyone else. He doesn't view things with a biased perspective, and is a man who treats people with respect. So, as the story progresses, please pay attention to the relationships between Ishiro and the people around him. I especially hope people look forward to his relationship with Mira.

Suzuki: The five of us are all unique, and if we were in the same class, we would never belong to the same clique. What will happen to these five going forward? I think we may clash with each other when we're together, but how will we change and "become one color"? I'd like you to pay attention to that.

Iuchi: I'd also like you to pay attention to the battle scenes. The staff told me that they place importance not only on coolness, but on how to incorporate a comical touch to the coolness. The voice actors adlibs are also amazing, for example, in the first episode, Mizuki Nana-san, who plays Ittasha, adlibbed "Ka-click" before saying "Ignition," and Matsumoto Rica-san, who plays Bundorio, also adlibs, which is always fun. Because I've read the scripts, I can see that there are alot of lines that aren't in them, and I think you can especially see that in the battle scenes. I'd be very happy if you could pay attention to the comical side within the coolness.

Saito Ryu x Soma Satoru

"First, please tell us how you both became interested in the entertainment industry and acting."

Saito: When I was in my second year of high school, I won the Grand Prix in the Junon Superboy Contest, and that's when I entered the entertainment industry. When I was in middle school, I had the opportunity to think about my career path, but at that time I couldn't find what I wanted to do. However, I admired heroes and wanted to do something to help others, and after that I studied to become a high school teacher. Still, since we only have one life, I wanted to do something even bigger, so I applied to Junon, and that's when I decided to pursue a career in the entertainment industry.

"Does that mean you admired (super) heroes? Did you watch tokusatsu shows?"

Saito: I watched Super Sentai and Kamen Rider. Heroes who purely fight for the sake of others are cool, I admired them. Boys like that kind of thing even after they grow up, don't they? I thought that I wanted to get a job where I could protect people, like a firefighter, policeman, or a school teacher who leads people.

"BoonBlack, who's also a police officer, is a perfect role for Saito-san."

Saito: This character is the very embodiment of my dream!

"Soma-san, what about you?"

Soma: When I was in high school, I was thinking about what I wanted to do, but nothing came to mind. I thought that I might be able to change if I came to Tokyo, so I moved to Tokyo, found employment, and worked in sales for four years. I had alot of connections during that time, and as I worked at my current agency, and was given the opportunity to do things like model, my desire to do acting grew stronger……and that's how it all started.

"What kind of roles do you want to play?"

Soma: I'd like to play characters who are psychopaths (laughs). Genba Bureki isn't a psychopath, but he's a mysterious person whose true identity is unknown, so I think there are some similarities. I've always wanted to take on a role like that, so I'm really looking forward to discovering many new things about myself by playing the role of Genba.

"Saito-san, you said you admired heroes, so can you tell us about the tokusatsu shows you watched during your childhood?"

Saito: I'm from the generation of "Engine Sentai Go-onger," but I was really into "Kamen Rider Ghost." I love historical stories, especially "Romance of the Three Kingdoms," so I was waiting to see if any generals from the Three Kingdoms would appear in Ghost.

Soma: I used to watch "Kamen Rider 555" and "Kamen Rider W," and for Super Sentai, I still have the "Ninpu Sentai Hurricanger" book that I got in preschool at my parents house.

"Soma-san later made an appearance in Avataro Sentai Donbrothers……"

Soma: After playing the role of a playboy (the one who tried to pick up Sononi in episode 8), I finally became a hero this time (laughs). The first filming location for Boonboomger was the same for me in Donbrothers, so I thought, "This is where I was picking up women!" It's kind of inappropriate to say though (laughs).

"When it was announced that the two of you would be appearing in the next Super Sentai production, including your family, what was the reaction from those around you?"

Saito: I didn't tell my family until the very last moment before the production announcement. On the day of the announcement, I told them in a video call that, "I'm going to be playing the role of Black in the next Super Sentai." My father, mother and older sister froze for a moment and then burst out laughing for some reason (laughs). They congratulated me, but then my mother immediately said, "More importantly, there's no snow in Akita, so we can't make snow huts (kamakura)." I thought, "What do you mean more importantly?!" (laughs). No matter how hard I tried to explain it to her, my mother kept talking about snow huts. Especially since I don't come from a family that makes a living off building them (laughs). Still, rather than them expecting too much, I think I preferred it being this easy, so I didn't feel any pressure.

Soma: I think my mother was particularly pleased. Also, my older sister has a 3 year old child, so I'm hoping that when they're older, they'll watch Boonboomger. I want to tell them that their uncle is a Boonboomger.

Saito: If my nephew asked me to "Henshin!" I think I'd do it immediately (laughs).

Soma: I'd call Ono Yukimasa-san (BoonOrange's Suit Actor) to transform for me (laughs).

"What were your initial impressions of Boonboomger during the auditions?"

Soma: At the time of the audition, I didn't even know the name "Boonboomger" yet. However, when I read the script, I felt that the atmosphere would be alittle different compared to recent Sentai.

Saito: I went into the audition thinking that I wanted to be Red, but my image of Red was that from older productions……I imagined Red as a super hot blooded and serious character, but Taiya isn't like that at all. Rather, I'm more like Jou, and as a result, I perfectly fit into his character (laughs).

Soma: Since I'm 27, I didn't aim for Red. I have the impression that recent Sentai casts include older members among the younger ones, so I was auditioning with a pinpoint aim for that position.

"Did you two meet each other at the audition?"

Soma: We met in the third or fourth round of the audition, right?

Saito: I remember my impression at that time. Satoru-kun was really mysterious and I didn't know what he was thinking. Because it was an audition, everyone was very intense, but for better or for worse, only Satoru-kun was just mysterious. He was so laid back, but he had such a strong presence that I thought, "Who is this guy?" That's why I was scared of him at first. But when I talked to him, I found out that he wasn't like that at all (laughs).

Soma: He spoke clearly and had a fresh feel to him, and I felt at ease knowing that he wouldn't be playing the same role as me.

"What are your impressions of Red, Blue and Pink?"

Saito: To be honest, from the beginning of the audition, I felt that Haruhi and Yuki-kun were Red and Blue.

Soma: That's for sure.

Saito: Haruhi's voice and way of speaking are truly Red. The moment I heard his voice at the audition, I immediately "shifted gears" that Haruhi was already Red (laughs). It's not good to focus solely on Red, as Yuki-kun's way of speaking and personality are also Blue. Then I thought about what I could do and gave it a try.

"What about Suzuki-san?"

Saito: I'm not very good at remembering women's faces and names, and I don't really remember much about Miu-chan from the audition……However, I was impressed by a girl who gave me a fist bump, and later I found out that that girl was Miu-chan (laughs).

"Now, please tell us about the characters you're playing."

Saito: Jou's a character with a high amount of freedom, and I'm often asked to adlib or "try something" on set. It's a really incredible role, but it's difficult. The other three male members are cool or mysterious and don't show much emotion. Jou shows his emotions, so I try to express them through my face and body, but it's still difficult. I'm learning how difficult it is to express myself, because I sometimes feel that I'm not expressing myself well, or that it's unnatural. I hope to bring out more of the pitiful and clumsy, yet still lovable character of Jou.

Soma: Up to the current episode that's aired, there are many aspects of Genba that even I don't understand. However, he's the kind of character who will reach out to you when you need him, so I hope I can express both his sketchiness and kindness. He's a character I've never played before, so it'll be difficult.

"What are you mindful of when playing your roles?"

Soma: I'm the oldest of the Boonboomger members, and Genba is also older than the other characters, so I'm conscious of giving off a sense of seniority by speaking in a calm manner. And then there's being suspicious (laughs).

Saito: I feel that Jou's a character that's as close to me as possible, and I think it'd be good if I could bring him closer to me. However, when I try to express Jou's straightforward feelings, I find it difficult to do so. Because the character is so close to me, it's difficult to express the parts of him that are different from me.

"Was there anything that the Director told you during filming that left an impression on you?"

Saito: Director Watanabe Katsuya told me, "You're a rugged and passionate guy like the old Reds, give it your all." I was happy and could feel the Director's passion.

Soma: Genba's hair is orange and permed, so the Director's first order to me was, "I don't want him to come off as a player." I was conscious of the way I spoke and the tone of my voice, keeping my voice low so it doesn't sound too loud.

"Have you spoken with the post transformation Suit Actors?"

Saito: At the beginning of the story, when Jou doesn't appear much and doesn't transform, I didn't have much of a chance to talk to Shige-san (Ito Shigeki). However, I had alot of performances where I was suspended by wires, and Shige-san gave me advice on how to move.

Soma: I can't talk about BoonOrange in detail yet, but I'm trying to make him look more mature while talking with the Suit Actor Ono Yukimasa-san and the Directors. Other than my own role, I'm paying attention to the performance of the Nejiretta. Within Boonboomger, I like the Nejiretta the most!

Saito: Satoru-kun imitates the Nejiretta any chance he can get (laughs).

"Going forward, is there anything you'd like to do in an episode of Boonboomger, or is there anything you'd like to try as an actor?"

Soma: I'd like to do a swapping episode, which may become an annual thing. I'd like to play a character that I'd never play, someone like Mira.

"In our interview with Suzuki-san, she also mentioned that she'd like to do a swapping episode. However, she predicted that Ishiro would be in Mira (laughs)."

Soma: She's been taken (laughs). But, it'd be fun to swap characters with anyone.

Saito: You love the Nejiretta so much, that you'd swap with one of them (laughs).

Soma: I'll go all out when the time comes! (laughs).

"Saito-san, what about you?"

Saito: I'd like to do a battle scene before the transformation. Of course, I want you to see Black's battle after his transformation, but I also want to fight myself. I've been taking action lessons and I think I can do some basic things, so I'd like to do some pure action scenes. I hope the time will come when I can show you the results of my daily muscle training (laughs).

Soma: When changing clothes, everyone else changes in the dressing room, but he changes his clothes on set and shows off his muscles (laughs).

Saito: I'll pull myself together and make sure I'm ready for you all to see me without being embarrassed (laughs).

"And finally, could you tell us about some key points to watch out for to make Boonboomger even more enjoyable?"

Saito: I think Super Sentai in recent years has had many heroic action scenes, and the Robo battles are also very powerful. I hope you'll enjoy the real thrill of tokusatsu. And then there are the Sanseaters. They're not just villains, but rather, lovable characters who are somewhat clumsy, so I think you'll enjoy it even more if you pay attention not only to us Boonboomgers, but also to the enemy characters.

Soma: Don't forget the Sanseaters and Nejiretta (laughs). The members of Boonboomger have distinctly different colors and personalities, so I think you'll be able to discover new aspects of each character every time. I'd be happy if you enjoy discovering these new aspects of every character each time you watch.

Producer Kuji Yoshito x Main Writer Tomioka Atsuhiro

"Kuji-san has been involved in the production of many Super Sentai series, but this is his first interview with this magazine. May we ask about your background?"

Kuji: I joined Toei in 2011, and was one of the rare new employees at Toei who loved tokusatsu (laughs). I was involved with "Space Sheriff Gavan The Movie," and for Super Sentai, "Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger" and later "Shuriken Sentai Ninninger," but after that, I was transferred to the Educational Video Department and was separated from tokusatsu. Last year, I heard about the use of LED walls in King-Ohger and was very interested, so I gathered information within the company and visited the filming location. I don't think this had anything to do with it, but I was later transferred to the Drama Planning and Production Department and joined the team as a Producer for King-Ohger. As a tokusatsu enjoyer, this was something I couldn't have hoped for, but on top of that, as I was entrusted with the job, I was told that, "You'll also be the Chief Producer of the next Sentai…"

"In addition to the production currently being aired, he'd soon take charge on a new one…! Did you have an idea who the Main Writer would be at that point?"

Kuji: I originally loved "Battle Spirits," which Tomioka-san wrote for. Because of that impression, I was hoping to work with him someday. So, as soon as I started thinking about the new project, I consulted with Tsukada Hideaki, who had worked with Tomioka-san on the anime "Fuuto PI" as Chief Director, and said, "I'd like to meet Tomioka-san! Please introduce me!"

Tomioka: Suddenly, I received an e-mail from Toei, so I assumed it was a request from Toei Animation.

"Tomioka-san has participated in many productions by Toei Animation, such as ONE PIECE and Dragon Ball Super."

Tomioka: When I read it carefully, I was so happy that I jumped up and down because it was a request for a live action production, which I had longed to do. However, there was no mention of the "to" character for "tokusatsu" in the e-mail, so when it was decided that we would meet……I wondered if I'd be able to write about "Kasouken no Onna." After hearing about the Super Sentai series, I wanted to write a live action drama, which is why I originally entered this industry, and furthermore, I wanted to write a tokusatsu hero story, so I said, "I'll do it!"

Kuji: He was very enthusiastic. I was also very happy because we were taking a chance. Joining in on Tomioka-san's high motivation, the conversation proceeded at a rapid pace from there.

"What was the reason you originally wanted to write tokusatsu?"

Tomioka: I love toys! Even when I was working on my debut work in anime "Brave Exkaiser," I was collecting toys of the Gattai Robos. I always wanted to write a tokusatsu show that's closely intertwined with the toys, but I could never find the right opportunity to do so. And then, Kuji-san approached me. I had written stories for various productions in the past while keeping pace with the toy release schedule, so there was no trouble in creating the story. When I heard that the motif this time was cars, I was excited and thought, "I can do car action!" but then I calmed down and realized that you can't really do car crashes in the city nowadays. Nagahara Hideichi-san, my Scriptwriting mentor, wrote "Seibu Keisatsu" in which they drive an armored car through Ginza and had car action, so I'd like to create a world like that someday (laughs).

"It was decided from the beginning that cars would be one of the motifs, right?"

Kuji: Although the keyword was ultimately decided after discussions with TV Asahi and Bandai, I originally wanted to use "creative" as a keyword. Of course, there are many Sentai productions that use cars as a motif, but if we were to upgrade them to modern values, I thought it would be possible to incorporate the "manufacturing" that children are familiar with from videos and games. For example, in the past, the super machines would be given to them by a large organization or an unknown entity like, "We'll give this to you guys!" So instead of that, I thought that building and riding machines from their own hands would be an easier choice for admiration in the modern day. From there, I expressed to Tomioka-san this desire to portray a team doing something creative while gathering together for a mission.

Tomioka: In other words, it's like "Fast & Furious" (laughs). In addition, it's tempting to make cars talk as a way to appeal to younger viewers, but if you're really conscious of the fact that they're cars, it's better not to make them talk. I wanted to express that a machine is the best it can be because of the awesome power of the human driver. Also, in addition to the Boonboom Cars, the five of them would've had a car (through production), and I suggested that their occupations be car related, but that didn't work out……As you can imagine, we can't send out five cars all at once.

"At the same time as Tomioka-san, was pilot Director Nakazawa Shojiro also sent an offer?"

Kuji: When I was thinking about the image of the heroes I wanted to create, I wanted a Director who would take the direction I had created with Tomioka-san and push it even further beyond our imaginations. I think that Nakazawa-san is a Director who adds twists to the story, not just pure coolness. I asked Nakazawa-san to direct the pilot because I wanted him to take Boonboomger to a place where my sensibilities couldn't go. Besides, Tomioka Atsuhiro x Nakazawa Shojiro was the combination I most wanted to see. This combination is "alchemy" at its finest.

"Because of the use of LED walls in the previous work King-Ohger, we think there was more filming on set than on location. On the other hand, in this production, there's alot of filming on location due to driving cars. What were your guidelines for filming?"

Kuji: They really pushed King-Ohger to the limits to see how far they could go with their technological capabilities. This allowed the staff to share the work "calories" for each process. As Tomioka-san mentioned earlier, it's difficult to produce five regular theatrical cars. However, I had alot of discussions with the staff about the possibility of producing many Boonboom Cars by using assets (3DCG model data). Live compositing is used to represent the Boonboom Cars cockpit, the highway space, and the maintenance room. While considering sustainable work calories, I thought about how to produce the best image in a timely manner.

"In the first episode, Mira joins the Boonboomger and the story begins with a three member team. How did you come up with the story?"

Tomioka: We were thinking of doing something that would be most pleasing for children, our main audience, in other words, the classic battle hobby for boys. Taiya and Ishiro, and even Bundorio were already a team, and were strong from the beginning. In my experience, this structure, where it's important to be strong from the beginning, and then add the newcomer Mira to further strengthen them, is something that children feel good getting into. When I heard Kuji-san's idea of each person being a car related professional, Shirakura Shinichiro-san, who happened to be present at the meeting, said, "It's like the Hissatsu series." Actually, I love the Hissatsu series, and Shirakura-san's words made me really excited, thinking, "I can do something that I've always wanted to do but haven't been able to do!" I hope I can portray adults that children will admire to become. The style that's often depicted in the Hissatsu series is that a newcomer (Mira) joins the professionals, and the pasts of the other members are slowly revealed. Then it naturally becomes a story about the bonds of the team. The story line of Boonboomger is moving in an increasingly interesting direction as we incorporate ideas from other Scriptwriters one after another.

"Looking back at the Super Sentai series over the past few years, Ohsama Sentai King-Ohger, Avataro Sentai Donbrothers and Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger have been written almost exclusively by a single Scriptwriter. Tomioka-san, you're working with multiple Scriptwriters to create Boonboomger, what's your goal?"

Tomioka: I believe that by incorporating ideas that come from other people, not just myself, the characters will be able to develop. I'd love to write all the episodes by myself, but I think it's more appropriate if this production is written by a team of multiple people. Besides, it'd be boring to keep the heroes I've always wanted to myself. The style I like is to call my friends and then we all go wild in this new world together. First, since I was approached for "Fuuto PI" by chance, I was sure that Higuchi Tatsuhito-kun, who was in charge of the composition for the Fuuto series would be invited. Additionally, I approached Yamaguchi Hiroshi-san, who worked with me on "K-tai Investigator 7," once the project had been decided to a certain extent. Yamaguchi-san also writes to the extreme at full power. When I came to the Toei Tokyo studio with Yamaguchi-san, he said, "You're always on the opposite side, right? (at Toei Animation)" (laughs). Also, we have a younger man named Morichi Natsumi-san participating. Higuchi-kun and I are inspired by each and every tokusatsu scene, and our members have a deep and reassuring love for the characters. I've also reached out to Konuta Kenji-san, a former Writer for "Uchusen," and I'm hoping to work with this team until the final episode. There's also the fact that each of us wants to write only for the characters we have a strong attachment to (laughs). Like the Sanseaters……

"We'd like to ask you about the enemy characters here, but the Sanseaters seem to have a formation that we've seen in a production that Tomioka-san has worked on…….?"

Tomioka: Team Rocket from "Pokemon," right? (laughs). This time, due to various restrictions, the enemy doesn't have a hideout, so I wondered what kind of enemy I should make…..When I thought about it, I suddenly remembered the Greeed from "Kamen Rider OOO" and Heart and the others from "Kamen Rider Drive." Every time they're in some unknown place, they're talking to each other. When I thought about if I could get any inspiration from that……I came up with Team Rocket. I thought, "Villains who sleep outdoors!" (laughs).

Kuji: It was Tomioka-san's idea. There was no reason to hit the brakes anymore. We all stepped on the gas during the meeting.

Tomioka: To begin with, Yamaguchi-san and I grew up watching "Himitsu Sentai Gorenger," so when we think of Sentai enemies, we got the impression that they're monsters who are abit stupid and do interesting things.

"Listening to his story, we can see that Tomioka-san, who is an authority in children's productions, is putting into full use what he's cultivated. However, you haven't worked on a tokusatsu show since K-tai Investigator 7, and this is your first time working on a Toei tokusatsu production. Did you feel at a loss in that respect?"

Tomioka: In "K-tai," the enemy wasn't monsters. The main focus was on fighting hackers, and the only thing "tokusatsu" was the cell phones (Phone Braver) moving. In contrast, in the Super Sentai series, there are monsters, they become giant, the heroes announce themselves, they transform, and…..alot of other things. I thought I knew what I was getting into, but when it came time to actually write the script, it was difficult.

"There's something you have to do each time."

Tomioka: That's right. On top of that, in order to create something interesting, we received a variety of ideas from tokusatsu Director Butsuda Hiroshi for the giant battles, as well as feedback on what to do with the regular sized battles from Directors with past experience. The interesting part is the drama part, where the Directors don't often express their opinions. Therefore, when thinking about the drama part, I prioritized what Kuji-san wanted to create. I think this is the biggest difference from anime.

"Do you mean that you put the Producer's opinion first?"

Tomioka: In my experience, it's rare for a Producer to lead a production by himself, because in the case of anime, the opinion of the author is important if it's an original story, and the opinion of the Director or series creator is important if it is an original production. However, when Toei's tokusatsu shows are first announced, fans are always wondering who the Chief Producer is, aren't they? It's refreshing to know that fans are also paying attention to who will lead the production.

Kuji: That's what Tomioka-san says, but from my point of view, I'm being too dependent on him. Normally, the Chief Producer of Toei tokusatsu productions usually leads the discussion in meetings, but Tomioka-san took my opinions into consideration and organized the discussion by saying, "This is what you want to do, isn't it?" By incorporating the opinions of other Writers, he makes it even more interesting by saying, "This one's more explosive!" I think this is reflected in the footage in a good way. Maybe this is a style that hasn't been used in the past 47 series.

Tomioka: Come to think of it, in anime, a series composition chart is created to show what happens from the first episode to the final episode, but it seems that they don't usually prepare one for the Super Sentai series.

Kuji: Even though we have a rough idea of what we want to do, it has a strong "live" feel, so there's a possibility that we'll have to adjust the story halfway through.

Tomioka: I couldn't help but be anxious about that……So, before writing episodes 3 and 4, I told Kuji-san, "I want to decide how the story will develop until the end." Of course, taking into consideration the scheduled release of items and Robos, I made a series composition chart, and decided to some extent how many episodes with Taiya would be depicted in the series. But basically, we hope that everyone will enjoy each week's explosive episodes. And then, I'd be very happy if you thought, "That was fun! Let's play with toys too!"

"Boonboomger is finally airing, and it's going to be a year of excitement. We'd like to ask you about some key points of interest that readers who are looking forward to Boonboomger can enjoy even more."

Kuji: Boonboomger is a show that'll cheer you up when you watch it. The staff has put together what they think is "cool," so whether you're an adult or child, there's sure to be a key point in each episode that'll stick with you. We're working diligently on this production, hoping that it'll be a show that'll allow people to absorb the exciting energy on Sunday mornings and look forward to the following week. We'll continue to rev our engines so that we can provide excitement to everyone of all ages and genders!

Tomioka: I see this production as a story of friendship between Taiya and the alien Bundorio, and a growth story depicting the relationship between the Boonboomgers. In addition, as a toy lover, I'm excited to write about how much I can make the Boonboom Changer and Gattai Robos more appealing. Of course, we'll do our best to bring out the charm of the untransformed actors and make this a production that'll make children want to play as Boonboomgers. Now that they've finally started running, where will they go from here? I'd be happy if you look forward to watching them all year long!

#can't do car crashes these days 😔 #bakuage sentai boonboomger #boonboomger #super sentai #uchusen #taiya hando #hando taiya #my scans #my translation #ishiro meita #meita ishiro #mira shifuto #shifuto mira #jou akuse #akuse jou #genba bureki #bureki genba #tokusatsu #toku cast #interview

[freddiemercurylegendabovelegends]

Today, on April 22nd, 1989 - Queen Story!

Queen filmed promo video for “I Want It All” at Elstree Studios, Borehamwood, UK, director David Mallet

🔸Roger Taylor: Yes, it is our first studio album since 1986, I think that the reason for, for the delay, no, not the delay, for the long wait in between was that we wanted to sort of go away, and just recharge our batteries, quite logical really, and er, and just sort of generate some, some new energy and enthusiasm for, for being Queen

John Deacon: After we did the, the tour in 1986, which was a very big European tour, we were all absolutely exhausted, and shattered, and basically we didn't want to really work together or see each other for a while

Roger Taylor: To get into the whole cycle of er, just making an album, then going on tour, then coming back home and making an album again, we wanted to get out of that

Brian May: We said right, we'll take a little break, we're not, we're not going to split up, but we just er, we need some space for ourselves, and when the time is right, we'll make the album, rather than, you know, somebody says you've got to make one so we make one, so we waited, and we did some, did various other things, you know, Freddie and Roger both did solo projects, and I'm half way through one, and did a lot of producing

John Deacon: That took at least a year to a year and a half, and then towards the end of that second year, er, we sort of met up, and Freddie suggested, I think it was Freddie, perhaps we'd try a little time in the studio

Roger Taylor: So we went into the studio, saw what it was like, and we enjoyed it very much, and we still didn't have any material, so then we decided to go in for the long, for a long, longer time

John Deacon: You know, the third year was spent making the album, so the, in a way it was a two year gap to us, rather than three years, and er, and what was the, I've forgotten the second part of the question already

Interviewer: Did it help you to return to the studios feeling refreshed?

John Deacon: Yes (laughter) yes

The first few weeks of the recording we did a lot of live, er, material, a lot of songs um, ideas came up, some jamming, we had a few ideas that were already prepared, er, 'I Want It All' was one of the, one of the few songs that was actually, written before we went in

- From 'The Miracle' Interviews

Various and separate interviews recorded with Brian, Roger and John on the set of the 'Breakthru' promotional video, May 1989

👉"We were heading into the period where we decided to share the credit for all the songs, and John has said that [the song] was pretty much a finished song when we went into the studios – that's true, it was just this riff that I was obsessed with for months. The actual title was a favorite phrase of Anita's, a very ambitious girl: 'I want it all, and I want it now '... We were never able to perform this song live. It would have become something of the staple core of the Queen show, I'm sure, very participatory. It was designed for the audience to sing along to, very anthemic."

- Brian May, interview 2003, from Greatest Video Hits 2

#i want it all #queen 1989 #1989 #davidmallet #promo video #freddie mercury #queen band #london #zanzibar #legend #queen #brian may #john deacon #freddiebulsara #roger taylor #the miracle album #uk

[j0kers-light]

His Lighthouse: To Be Found (LedgerJoker x f!reader)

To Be Found 

series summary:

Y/n is an aspiring writer living in Gotham City and struggling to find her next muse. Her recent novel is getting all the buzz, earning her far more attention than she signed up for. But when a chance encounter results in her nursing The Joker back to health, will she find the time to write another best seller or will her own story become front page of the Gotham Gazette?

chapter summary:

Its an average Thursday with Y/n struggling to ignite her writing mode. What start’s out as a normal night for Y/n, quickly turns into the worst weekend she’ll ever experience. That is... if she survives the whole ordeal. 

Without further ado, I hope you enjoy the story!

Last Chapter  |  Next Chapter

It always rained in Gotham but that didn't dampen Y/n's mood. After spending majority of your life in the rain, your body simply adapted to it. An umbrella felt like an extension of your hand nowadays.

Today's forecast was a light drizzle, stuck in between being a nuisance and the beginning stages of a downpour. This was Gotham, so it leaned more towards the latter. Paired with the unbearable humidity and the constant rain, your natural hair didn't stand a chance here.

"Why did I move to Gotham?" You asked yourself wistfully.

Still inside your apartment you sighed at the wet, dreary city outside and packed your trusty umbrella into your tote bag before mentally creating an outfit geared around your rain boots.

For a lazy Thursday afternoon, things were relatively lax at your residence. Soft soul music played from your record player and you took the liberty of living alone to dance around because truly, no one was watching.

One of your giant floor length windows overlooked a nearby park a few blocks away and thankfully you had no neighbors on either side of you to witness you dancing.

You had nothing but your royalties to thank for your cozy Old Gotham apartment near Grant Park. As a matter of fact you had a clear view of it and parts of the Fashion District come night time. You loved the gothic architectural charm of Downtown mixed in with the modern restoration and because of its respectable distance away from Otisburg and Burnley.

Everywhere in Gotham was dangerous but at least you didn't sleep in Joker's playground.

GCPD and Wayne Tower were within walking distance of your apartment if need be, something that put your parent's minds at ease back in Blüdhaven and it ultimately became the final factor in renting the place. Well that plus the original claw foot bathtub but safety came first!

Just mentioning the name of your hometown made your skin crawl. You were forever grateful you escaped that God forsaken city only to land in far worse conditions, but you chose to bear it. Your dreams were limited back home. At least you had a chance to embrace them here in Gotham City.

Ever since you were a little girl the art of creating stories fascinated you. Buried deep inside your mind was the power to create different worlds for people to explore and escape to.

What started out as a simple pastime after studies grew and caught the attention of your school teacher. From there you wrote in local underwriters contests and dabbled in the underground poetry scene until you were eventually scouted out by a publisher. Three novels into an original series with a few standalone books on the side, you were quite a big deal within the YA fiction world. You got a taste of your dream and nothing would stop you.

With your recent book tour complete and the final recording for your third tv interview done, nothing was available to occupy your thoughts which meant it was fast approaching.

Writer's block. Every writer experienced it but the feeling always hit you the worst. By no means were you under a strict contract but as the months rolled by with no new book material, your manager expressed her concerns.

'You gotta give me something to work with, Y/n. I don't want your contract to lapse. Just a few pages! I'll take a novella draft at this point just.. please send me something to beta.' 

You loved Cindy. She meant well and had been the person who scouted you out of Fat Joe's coffeehouse back home and took a chance with you. She saw your potential and wanted to see it flourish. Her keen editing eye and patience for your slow updates made you two the perfect team. Add in the fact she was around the same age as you and boom, everything was golden. 

Who said your manager couldn't be your friend? 

You didn't want to disappoint Cindy but there wasn't any creative juices flowing upstairs. You moved to Gotham to have unlimited inspiration readily available but recently, nothing jumped out at you. The absolute worst case scenario would be getting a new book idea identical to your previous work. A consumer didn't want to read the same story told twice, much less by the same author. 

In time something would reach out and grab you, no need to force greatness. The Greeks Among Us came to you during a midnight stroll past the seedy GC Olympus nightclub in town and your best seller to date, Will Hunter Bill hit you in line at the butcher's market. 

Your loud exclamation in the store terrified a few people but when an idea hits, you tend to get excited. You purchased your meat and jotted down the storyline on the subway ride back home. Two weeks later, Cindy got five rough draft chapters dumped on her desk with the promise of more to come. 

You can't eat a steak anymore without smiling wide. That book was your David, your Mona Lisa- and you feared nothing else would top it's perfection. 

You wish you could pen another bestseller! Oddly enough your thriller hit started out as a flop until a few kids online created a cult following for it and made it mainstream. The true message for the story went over so many people's heads it collected dust on local bookshelves until the Mayor's wife was spotted reading it at her hair appointment. 

Before you knew it, copies were flying off the shelves and Cindy was begging you to write a sequel and boy did you deliver. Your hit series gained attention around the East coast and attracted all types of readers- even infamous ones.  

The Riddler used a direct quote for one of his deadly culling game traps, giving your publisher a liability lawsuit scare.

Then Two-Face was recorded giving his split review about it. He demanded justice for the book's murderers, going on and on about how they needed to be punished and given a fair trial. They were fictional characters! These psychopaths really knew how to test your patience. 

As long as people enjoyed your work that's all that mattered to you. Sure notoriety was great, the royalties were even better, but seeing a fan nose deep and distracted by your story that they couldn't spare a moment away, was worth the late nights spent toiling in front of your laptop. 

It was only natural that you wanted to give the people more material to read, however you knew your writer's block was fast approaching like a freight train. 

You so desperately needed a muse to fight it off. Usually a long walk through the city would spark the mood but it was too dangerous to go out on the weekends (or any day really, Gotham's crime did not rest) especially during the hours your insomnia kept you up. 

You could hear your friend Barbara now. "It's far too dangerous to be walking around at night Y/n! Have you lost your mind?" 

Cue you chuckling to mask your labored breathing. Of course you were out walking whenever she called. It seems she always caught you red handed. 

Barbara stayed up during late hours but you knew computer analytics usually worked at night. A phone call from her at 3AM was normal. Both of you were night owls so no feelings were hurt. 

"Don't worry Barbs! I'm uh.. on my way back right now. I'm walking up Hamilton street as we speak." 

You heard her fingers stop typing over the phone and knew the tongue lashing was imminent. Sometimes Barbara played the part of the 'mom friend' a little too well. Your real mother would be proud of the redhead. 

"Y/n. Isn't that like thirty minutes from your place?" She sighed and resumed her rhythmic tapping. "I'm gonna put a tracker on you one day."  

"Haha, don't be so overprotective Mom. It's not that far!" Little did you know Barbara considered bugging your phone numerous times with a bat tracker but she respected your privacy. 

Now she was regretting that decision. Maybe she could plant one on you at the next brunch you two planned. For now she would settle for keeping you on the phone until she heard your apartment keys jingle in the door. "Okay! I'm back home Barbara. Can I go now?" 

You didn't mind her nightly check-ins. Barbara was good people and a very close friend within your minuscule social circle. 

You didn't get out much and making friends wasn't your strongest suit but after you got lost at your own charity event (another mindless event to promote your first book in the series) and found Barbara talking with a very handsome guy in an empty corridor, the two of you instantly clicked and became fast friends. 

You apologized for intruding on their moment but Barbara waved off your apology and kept it moving. She introduced you to Dick Grayson and thereafter to the savior of Gotham himself, Bruce Wayne. 

Both men hid their relief when you didn't immediately worship the ground they walked on. In fact you didn't recognize their faces or make the connection as to who they were since you were far more fascinated by their matching lapel pins. 

"It's Will's family crest! Where did you get these?!" You gushed, only to be startled out of your fangirl moment by Dick clearing his throat. 

It jumpstarted your brain to notice your hands placement that was practically glued to Mr. Wayne's chest. From what you could feel and you felt quite a lot.. he was very buff for a rich businessman. Maybe he worked out to get the ladies? Anyways.. 

"Oh!" Your ears flushed red. "I'm so sorry! I'm usually not so touchy-feely with strangers. I guess I got too excited! I've seen a lot of fan merch but never one so detailed.." 

"Fan merch? I don't quite follow?" He questioned. 

"It's short for merchandise old man.." Dick chuckled in the background.

Barbara facepalmed and gestured your way. "Bruce, this is Y/n L/n, the author of Will Hunter Bill."  

It took Bruce two seconds to process their comments before he switched into his philanthropist mode. He became the one apologizing for not recognizing you and rambled on about how much he loved your work. You mentally checked out after that. 

"You.. you read my books?" 

His gentle laugh was soothing but it didn't compare to his smile. No wonder so many women fell for his charms. 

"Of course! The way you captured and deceived the audience for half the book only to discover that we the readers are responsible for the murders occurring in the book. It's simply genius. I encouraged all of my staff to read it in their downtime. People need to learn that their actions can influence others inadvertently, no matter how minuscule it may seem."

You soaked up his praise that day. No one summarized your book series so perfectly like Bruce did. 

Cindy appeared and tried to steer you away to mingle with other potential connections and sponsors at the event but you stayed with Mr. Wayne, "Please, call me Bruce." okay.. you stayed with Bruce and Barbara, the latter whom you already exchanged numbers with. 

Two hours passed and not a second of it was wasted with the deep conversation you and Bruce held. 

You didn't care about how your close proximity to Bruce was perceived. You were socializing and making new friends, all while talking about your passion for writing. Let the press have a field day. You would deal with the rumors later. 

The following months after the event gave you enough time to establish a close friendship with Barbara and Dick to call them on speed dial whenever. Be it a quick chat or a long conversation about absolutely nothing, they would answer but you didn't dare program Bruce's number into your phone. 

It was probably his main business number he gave you but the slip of paper sat like a stone in your purse for months after the event, taunting you. 

It didn't feel right calling up such a busy man just to chat. I mean.. what would you talk about besides your books? You two had nothing in common! 

Barbara teased you about it every chance she got. "Bruce rarely gives out his number to people so someone made a great first impression on him." 

You rolled your eyes, "Barb quit it. It's probably his work number, plus he's almost twice my age!" 

You two were sitting at a local restaurant that was handicap accessible, enjoying the rare occasion both of you were free. The humidity from outside fogged up the restaurant's windows but it was pleasant inside away from the rain. 

Her green eyes mimicked yours as she laughed. "Are you sure? Was the card black or slate grey?" She waited for your answer but frowned when you looked unsure. "What's wrong, you don't remember?" 

"It wasn't a card Barbara. He gave me a piece of paper with a number written on it." 

In total, only two minutes passed before you realized just how dumb you were. "Oh my God! Bruce Wayne gave me his personal cell number and I've been sitting on it for almost a year!"  

Your loud shout gained attention from the nearby tables but so did Barbara's howling laughter. 

"This isn't funny Barb!! I don't want the guy to hate me!" You whined. "Oh do you want him to like you?" She replied just as fast. 

"Gah! Here you are encouraging this behavior like a devil on my shoulder! What would my mother say if she knew that Bruce Wayne, of all people, was interested in me?" You tried to explain. 

"Congratulations?" Your glare only fueled her laughter. 

"Oh come on he's not that old.. and age gaps are becoming more popular if you're so worried." Was she trying to convince you or herself? "Look, I've known him for years and I highly doubt he noticed your lack of response with how busy he is and if he did, so what? Just tell him the truth." 

That was the point, you didn't want to accept the truth. It seemed impossible that Bruce Wayne, a successful billionaire, playboy, and philanthropist, in a league of his own, and drop dead gorgeous no matter his age, was interested in you. 

Not to discredit your own success but it didn't (and would never) match Bruce's. 

Despite being a popular author in your prime, until a movie producer came along your stories would be just that. Books on someone's bookshelf. Your fame would fade and so would the steady income. It was no wonder many authors never became wealthy from only their literature. 

Cindy tried to get you to schmooze with some silver screen board directors at the charity event but you choose to dissect your series page by page with Bruce instead. 

The way he talked about your characters and gave them more personality than you ever could had you starry eyed. You joked that he should write only to receive his deep chuckle. "I don't have the time but maybe I can commission you to pen a biography for me." 

You never blushed so much before. He trusted you of all people to write something so important? Surely he was joking. You discovered while talking with Bruce that he had a good sense of humor. 

You hoped your words didn't insult him. "Well I would need to study you and your life in detail to make it authentic. And no offense Mr. Wayne, but that would take quite a bit of time.. time you don't have." 

He smiled at that. "That's true but," Bruce brought his glass up to his lips as if you weren't waiting for his response with bated breath. "I thought I told you to call me Bruce, Y/n." 

"Oh right um B-Bruce. I'd love to write your biography but the matter of time in which to study you is still an issue." 

Instincts should have warned you. Common sense all but threw it in your face but in that moment you didn't put the puzzle pieces together. Bruce liked you. 

He reached out to tuck a wayward curl of hair behind your ear. His fingertips left a slight burning sensation on the curve of your ear and it made your entire body freeze up. 

"Ask of me anything. I will defy my own will to grant your desires." Bruce cited with a confident grin. 

"Did you just quote.." You were beyond speechless.

No one quoted The Greeks Among Us to you before. It was the second book of your oeuvre and the most neglected due to its Greek mythology and ambiguous ending. The fact he quoted it perfectly and from memory confirmed that Bruce was truly a fan of your work. 

"I can make time for you, Y/n. Do you have a pen and paper?"  

You nodded robotically. A writer without a pen and paper wasn't worth her salt. The tiny clutch you carried was bottomless; a sticky pad was given to Bruce along with your favorite ballpoint pen. He jotted something down and handed everything back to you while ignoring your eyebrow dipping in confusion.

"Call me whenever you're ready to begin." He was going to flirt a bit more but Dick appeared and whispered something in Bruce's ear. 

From the dark look that schooled his features, whatever he was being briefed on wasn't good. 

Bruce left you with a warm smile and a suggestion, more like a command, to call the night short and go home. You were tired and Cindy was busy rubbing shoulders with the stiff suits on your behalf. You weren't needed here so you took Bruce's advice and went home.

Little did you know not even five minutes after you left the party, it was robbed by local criminals looking to strike it rich. An unfortunate but normal occurrence that happens in this city. Another thing its citizens simply adapt to.

You on the other hand were still new to Gotham. Next month would be your one year anniversary of moving to this living hell. But your dreams were possible here. You could live a relatively normal life surrounded by your books. The very stack of books you almost tripped over while dancing.

You quickly corrected your balance to avoid a nasty fall and decided to stop dancing for now. Everything was all fun and games until someone got hurt.

The rain was still beating against the windows outside. During your deep reflective thoughts the rain had picked up from its light drizzle to the steady downpour you had predicted earlier.

Johnny Charisma was now crooning in your apartment and your tote bag was still lying open on the couch waiting for more items to be shoved inside. 

You blinked rapidly trying to remember what you were doing before your brain went down a rabbit hole but came up short. You shook your head but in the process you spotted the breaking news banner on your tv. 

It wasn't unusual for you to keep it on as you worked kinda like a much needed break for your overworked eyes.

As if the tv screen was any better than your laptop but with the tv muted your brain had space to think unrestricted. You found the tv remote and raised the volume. Immediately the news anchorwoman's voice flooded the room.

"...The Joker has once again escaped from Arkham Asylum custody and is at large at the current hour. We do not have any leads as to how he escaped the infamous island but police personnel are once again advising all citizens to shelter in place until he is arrested, effective immediately. We are uncertain of how long the curfew will last but we can confirm The Joker has killed six people during his escape. Commissioner Jim Gordon has not responded to any comments about the Asylum employee in critical condition but we will update you if he does. All of us here in Gotham expect to see Batman's signal in the sky tonight and in the many nights to come. Reporting live from GCN.."

You muted the tv coverage. Great. Just wonderful! Another curfew for the city in fear, all over a clown. When would your fellow citizens begin to see these criminals for what they truly were, normal human beings crying out for help?

Maybe because you were an optimist or perhaps just touched in the head, but you had no fear for these so-called criminals who tormented the city. Blüdhaven was far worse. It housed the rejects of Gotham trying to restart their lives.

Your neighbors growing up were serial killers. You went to school with their children. Most of your family members still had active lives in crime and your old unpublished work was based off of their stories. Crime was all around you growing up, so what was the purpose of a curfew for just one person?

So what if Joker was running wild in the city? The odds of you meeting were lower than one percent.

Although you did need groceries.. so it might bounce up to 0.5 percent if you took a trip to the store.

Whether it be a natural disaster, normal grocery shopping, or a current shelter in place curfew, Gotham citizens always stocked up like Armageddon was coming. The shelves would be empty by dinnertime if you didn't go now.

Another glance out the window made you sigh. "My hair is gonna get wet." At least the rain would buy you some time before the rush hour crowd clocked out from work.

You groaned but shuffled to your kitchen while grabbing a pad of paper to make a quick list. You had the basic kitchen essentials like milk, bread, and eggs but if this writer's block was anything like its counterpart from the beginning of the year, you needed a plethora of snacks to hold you over.

Since it was Thursday you jotted down ingredients for a hearty, rainy weekend dinner and wrote down a few other things you were low on. Drinks, chips.. ingredients to make some homemade desserts and hopefully they stocked up on your favorite fruits to make a fruit bowl. Your tiny list quickly grew but you rather be safe than sorry. Of course the city curfew was lax but you didn't feel like leaving the house anytime soon once you settled yourself indoors.

You needed to get motivated and start a new work. Not only to save your lapsing contract but for your own sanity. A day spent without writing felt like torture to you.

Your hands itched to type or research a source, anything! As the next song played on in the background, you ventured to your room to get dressed for the rain.

Your closet was a treasure trove of finds ranging from foreign designer threads, to thrift store overalls, to lazy day sweats, but today you decided on an off duty model look for your shopping trip.

You fished out your cobalt blue leather pants and your thigh high snakeskin boots, nodding at your vision. No oversized cloggy rain boots here, you stepped out in style.

The rain was a permanent feature here in Gotham but it never stood in the way of a killer outfit. A simple white crop top was added to your ensemble before you dug out your floor length puffer raincoat you bought on an urge. It was slate grey with blue undertones that would work perfectly with your bold colored pants.

Just because it was dull and gloomy outside didn't mean you had to be.

You twirled around in the mirror nodding to yourself at a job well done. All you needed now was some silver hoop earrings and a way to style your hair.

In its current state it was bound to get wet and curl up on you so you decided to rock the wild frizzy look until the wheels fell off. Wash and go's were another permanent fixture in your life. Hair day would have to be tomorrow; no more putting it off.

With a final outfit check in the mirror your tote bag was thrown over your shoulder along with your phone being shoved into its designed side pocket.

Your list was tucked away from the rain and you locked your apartment before riding the elevator down to the front lobby and making small talk with a neighbor as they walked by.

"It's another rainy one huh?!"

They were soaking wet and that made you cringe and open your umbrella as you walked outside. The rainfall was steady. Could be worse, but you took it in stride.

The congested sidewalks and honks from taxi cabs to the distant police sirens in the city were background noise compared to the loud pitter patter of rain. It had a way of hogging all of the attention as it washed over the city and drowned out the hustle and bustling noises of Gotham. A peaceful reprieve in the city of crime.

You boarded the subway without any issues. Your puffy coat and umbrella shielded you from the rain unlike the other passengers you spotted on your way to the station. Gotham citizens either chose to shield from the rain or to embrace it.

The ones who chose to embrace the weather were in various states of wetness. Some were bone dry like you or soaked completely through but most were in between, neither wet nor dry.

It made no sense to expose yourself to the elements, possible illnesses, and overall discomfort simply because you didn't want to carry an umbrella.

It was Gotham; a little rainwater wouldn't kill ya but a random citizen most definitely would and probably enjoy themselves while doing it. The city you moved to...

A calm feminine voice announced your stop. You hadn't moved from your standing position by the door and you were the first person out when the subway doors slid open. Living in Gotham for almost a year educated you on the tips and secrets necessary to stay safe.

Every adult has their favorite grocery store where they memorized the store layout and/or knows the butchers and other workers. That was normal right?

If not, you didn't care. This store was a little on the pricier side but their selection of food was worth it.

You entered the store, shaking your umbrella dry before sliding it into the storage area; a normal amenity in a rainy city like Gotham. Upon paying the small renting fee for a shopping cart, you pushed it around the front of the store as you dug out your shopping list and pen.

"Don't look at the fresh flowers, Y/n. You don't need any more flowers.. stick to your list!" Although you fought temptation, you still ended up in the florist section browsing through the vast options.

Your mind was working overtime to save you from your impending writer's block. Dancing around the apartment didn't work so it moved onto buying pretty things with the hopes of baking sweet treats if the flowers failed.

The florist saw your wandering eye and waved from behind the counter. "Hi Y/n! Care for your favorite bouquet?" She turned to get started when your undecided tone graced her ears.

"Nah, not today Morgana. Can you surprise me this time? I'm thinking something bright and whimsical to promote some motivation." You eyed the single stems on display and knew she would work her magic yet again. Morgana never disappointed you.

She smiled brightly. "Free creative reign?"

"Duh of course! I'm gonna shop around but I'll come back and pick them up when I'm done. Have fun; there's no limit."

From one artist to another you knew your words sparked the match in Morgana's mind.

Her brown eyes sparkled brighter than her smile. You heard her long ponytail whip through the air from how fast she turned to begin. She looked like a woman on a mission, already grabbing stems to form a base. You smiled and pushed your cart towards the produce section to start shopping.

Oddly enough, the shelves were still relatively stocked but you did beat the 5PM work crowd. You took your time and stuck to your list browsing through the options. You were debating between two packets of meat when your phone rang.

"Oh geez.. who could that be?" Dropping both packets inside your cart to free up your hands, you quickly answered your phone. "Hello?"

"Thank God you answered! Did you not get my text messages Y/n?!" Barbara's frantic voice sounded off in your ear until you pulled it back to check your phone. Lo and behold, ten plus messages increasing in worry from being ignored greeted you.

"Oops.." You scrolled through other messages as you waited for Barbara to scold you.

Sure enough, "That's it? All I get is an oops? Anyways.. I've been trying to reach you. Did you hear about the-"

You totally forgot you were in the grocery store. A sharp ahem drew your attention away from Barbara's phone call to a middle aged woman trying to get by with her buggy.

Your apologies meant nothing to her but you did your best to get out of her way. She snatched a whole chicken out of the bin and gave you the stink eye until she turned the corner. Who peed in her cereal?

"...Y/n? Y/n, can you hear me?!"

Where was your brain today? You scrambled back onto the phone. "Yes, I'm here Barbara! I'm at the store and this Karen caught an attitude. You were saying?" Her fingers missed a key creating a familiar noise. One you memorized by now.

"Does anyone honor my dad's curfew?" She sighed.

You added a packet of beef to your cart. "Nope."

"I see." Barbara said. "But people should be indoors where it's safe!"

It was your turn to sigh. Pushing your cart towards the non-perishables, you picked up a few boxes of baker's chocolate and stocked up on flour and sugar. "No offense Barb but when isn't The Joker free? I'm still relatively new to the city and I don't get the hype for a shelter in place. It's just one guy.."

"Who killed nineteen people in half an hour." Her rhythmic passes across the keyboard started up again and each key echoed loudly in your ear. Maybe you could gift Barbara a new keyboard for Christmas, preferably one with silent keys. The body count however had you confused so you asked.

"Nineteen?! The news said he only killed six."

"Y/n, my dad's the Commissioner. Please tell me you don't believe anything GCN reports? Let me guess, they used their favorite lie, "Commissioner Gordon has not responded to any comments, but hey we didn't reach out to him in the first place to receive such a response!" You kept quiet on your end.

"Your silence confirms it. I can't believe people will listen to GCN before they believe the words of my father, who is the Commissioner! Please go home, Y/n. At least for me? I don't know what I'd do if you were hurt." Barbara mumbled.

You came to a stop in the middle of the store. Her words touched you deeply for you never had a friend growing up that cared about your safety. You led a lonely life but you were slowly opening up and letting people in it.

"Awww love you too Barb! I'm almost done shopping. I promise I'll head straight home. Remember my contract lapse is creeping up so I really need to get into my writing mode and produce something. I promise I won't be going anywhere until Joker is captured or I have a book idea drafted."

You turned down the snack aisle and selected various goods to join your growing cart. Somewhere in between your phone call with Barbara you did away with your list and got whatever you wanted.

Sure you might have some trouble carrying it all back home but you needed more food than what you originally planned.

Who knows how long recapturing Joker might take but you knew it would take even longer for you to draft a story with your current uninspired mind.

"Thank you Y/n. I can work in peace knowing you're safe."

A few more pleasantries were exchanged over the phone before you and Barbara hung up. The rest of your shopping trip went by uneventfully and you purchased your items including the fresh cut flowers that Morgana arranged. She was nervous about your reaction which was completely unnecessary. You would buy thorns and dead roots if she arranged them, the woman was a genius.

A beautiful bouquet of white roses coupled with ivory and lavender mixed elegantly between thistle leaves and blue snapdragons. She added Veronica's and purple scabiosas to round off the display. It looked and smelled delightful. You hoped it would liven up your apartment and boost your creativity.

You declined the store's offer to help deliver your purchases to your residence, (you weren't poor, but definitely not rich enough to afford the tab) and heaved the four heavy bags, two in each arm, with your umbrella hoisted in your grip out the store. Your flowers were wrapped in brown kraft paper and tucked securely in your tote bag. It was a struggle, but you made it back home without getting robbed, soaking wet, and without dropping and/or losing anything.

The first thing you did when you stepped inside was turn on your record player for background noise to unpack to.

Everything had a place and slid neatly into it. Your flowers survived the trip although being slightly smushed on the subway ride. No major damage, so you trimmed the stems before giving them a proper home in your favorite flower vase.

From your writing desk you could smell their sweet aroma. You opted to move your work space from your spare guest room out to the living room to give you the perfect view out the floor length windows you loved so much. The people walking in the park outside and on the city streets below allowed your mind to wander and take a break while you typed.

You loved your apartment's layout and so did Barbara the many times she came over. The open space was ideal for her wheelchair and she was also a big fan of the bright yet cozy aesthetic your place showcased.

Speaking of the redhead. Now that you were fully settled, you sent a text to Barb letting her know you were safe.

An immediate buzz announced her thanks along with a promise to try and check in with you later. She mentioned being super busy tonight and that might impede her promise but she would try her hardest to honor it.

No worries! If not we can talk tomorrow :) 

You hit send and tossed your phone onto the desk. A vanilla beeswax candle was lit and a bowl of snacks from the store sat to the left of your laptop with a drink. The scene was set and with you tucked away inside from the rain, all you needed to do was start writing.

. . . . . .

But nothing came. A few hours had passed in your failed attempt at writing. Staring at the empty word document, the cursor blinked slower than normal as if taunting your lack of progress.

You didn't type a single word but the entire bowl of snacks was gone. Your candle was halfway burned through and the rain outside had let up to its original light trickle.

"This is going nowhere." You said.

You buried your face in your hands and groaned. "Focus, Y/n! Pull ya self together. No need to flesh out an entire story. All Cindy needs.. no, all I need is an idea. The rest will come later. It always does."

You glanced over at your mood board hoping for a spark. The designated white wall was devoid of clippings or other media of art. "Oh, I didn't update that." You picked up your phone only to see the low battery alert staring back at you.

"That's what I get for not charging all day." You inserted the charger into your phone, holding back a few frustrated tears.

All your normal avenues of inspiration weren't working all except for one. You were tempted but you promised Barbara you wouldn't.

You promised you wouldn't leave the apartment until you started a rough draft. Although you couldn't start a story you weren't motivated to write. The loophole presented itself.

A quick glance at the clock made you cringe. It was well after midnight but this was your golden hour. What harm could a ten minute walk do? You could walk a few blocks down to Repp Street and be back before anything dangerous happened. But you did make a promise…

"No walking around the city at odd hours of the night" but what Barbara didn't know wouldn't kill her. You needed a walk to clear your head and get the gears upstairs back a turning. Nothing bad would happen! As a writer you should've known better. You probably just jinxed yourself. 

Regardless if something did happen, you made an executive decision to go anyways and blew out your candle before shuffling over to your rain boots.

You put them on along with your puffy grey jacket from before and stepped out of the apartment. Your keys were still in your pocket so you walked down the hallway to the stairwell.

You didn't share the floor with anyone but Ms. Langstrom downstairs was adamant she could hear you walking back and forth at night. The old scientist forgot there was a whole maintenance floor separating you from everyone else. It was one of the many pros of owning the penthouse.

A con was the elevator didn't run this late. No matter how much the rent was in this middle-upper class building, they put restrictions on its hours of operation.

Just a short walk you told yourself, (the eleven flights of stairs didn't count) a couple of blocks around the corner, and then back, that's it.

It didn't dawn on you that you left your phone charging on your desk or that your alleged two blocks turned into a full walking exercise over the bridge to Somerset and into Chinatown.

You never walked this far on foot before but with your scattered brain the distance was nothing. The smell from the Chinese street vendors and restaurants wafted in the air, clearing up your thoughts and stimulating your imagination.

You haven't penned a historical fantasy book yet. Warm wonton soup, splashes of calligraphy ink across stark white ancient scrolls, and the distant twine of an Erhu played, on or was that sirens?

Sure enough you broke out of your trance to the sound of police sirens in the distance. Six GCPD cruises flew down the street giving you a mini heart attack but you were grateful for the distraction.

"Wait, how did I get here?" You looked left and right taking in your surroundings. It seemed only a few minutes had passed when in reality, it was almost two hours.

Red, yellow, and purple neon lights in traditional Hanzi characters flashed on every building and colorful streamers hanging from the rooftops enclosed the street, giving it a cozy and intimate feeling. It was a town of color vastly different from the bleak streets of Gotham. Ornate dragon statues stared back at you behind piles of trash and strings of red paper lanterns shined brilliantly from the rainstorm.

Inspiration was all around you waiting to be documented. You had an idea. Right now. You patted your pockets for your phone to jot them down, but froze.

"Where? Oh no. No no no no!!" If you didn't write this idea down it would fade away with no hope of returning. Where is your phone?! 

A vision of your sought after device charging at home popped in your mind. "Dang it!" Just your luck you forget to bring it!

In your anger you didn't notice the approaching figure. You kept searching through your empty pockets, (like that would do you any good) right into the stranger.

Somehow in the tumble his, or was it your balance, gave way and both of you crashed onto the pavement. Thankfully a few trash bags cushioned your fall, thus staining your coat, but that was the least of your worries.

Hovering above you was Gotham City’s worst nightmare: The Joker. Up close he wasn't as scary as the media painted him out to be. What terrified you the most was the 9 mm digging into your forehead.

It clicked off the safety right as his voice warned you.

"Make any noise and I'll blow your pretty little head off." His other hand gestured wildly to mimic your brain exploding before righting his balance above you.

You nodded as police dogs barked loudly and pulled their owners past the alleyway you and Joker fell into. Was it a blessing they didn't find you or a curse? More sirens and shouts rang out, getting closer and closer. Maybe you would stand corrected.

"This way!" One officer yelled while leading the rest. A helicopter circulated above and flooded the area with light yet it narrowly missed the two of you as you hid in plain sight.

Joker's body weight pressed you further down towards the pavement almost like he heard your thoughts. He couldn't afford to get caught and he was pleasantly surprised you were keeping quiet as the police personnel went by.

Usually his hostages would be sobbing uncontrollably by now or babbling nonsense in their delirium. He definitely would have shot them for it but you? You were different.

You remained calm although he felt the way your heart beat wildly in your chest but that could all be chalked up to the normal adrenaline rush after a jog. Joker glanced down at your attire and knew that wasn't the case. You were dressed like a rich spoiled brat caught in the rain. Snakeskin boots and leather pants? Were you asking to get mugged?

He chose to ignore how your pants hugged your figure… and what a figure indeed..

You breathed a sigh of relief or perhaps of regret when the helicopter and police left the area. Joker berated himself for checking you out and not paying attention to the search party. For a moment everything was quiet until you remembered Joker was practically lying on top of you.

You also remembered his threat from earlier and dutifully kept your mouth shut but it was getting uncomfortable as the minutes passed.

Was he gonna leave and do whatever wanted fugitives did in their downtime? Your weekend was free but that didn't mean you had all night to spend lying in some dirty alley.

The one time you leave the apartment without your phone you would run into the very person the entire city wanted to avoid. Whatever happened to your one percent chance rate? The one time you didn't shelter in place.. this would happen!

Your annoyed sigh got Joker's attention. His hooded eyes flickered over to you and scanned your features.

You were definitely something to look at but he was a busy man. He couldn't get distracted by some normal citizen with a pretty face. Since when was the last time he admired a girl simply for her looks and not by her usefulness as a hostage? Well currently you were a hostage but he felt no urge to kill you. Yet.

There were other ways you could be useful. Joker shifted his weight and even with his high tolerance for pain he couldn't hold back his low groan

The unexpected noise made you blink and break his orders. "Um.. are you okay?"

Silence. 'Well duh. What else were you expecting, Y/n? A response?'

He didn't pull the trigger or reprimand you so you pressed your luck again but right as you parted your lips to speak, he rolled off you. Was it wrong to miss his weight on you? Were you finally losing it? He did feel kinda nice– warm and solid, smelling faintly of rain and gunpowder, a shockingly good combination.

You watched as he awkwardly fell onto his side next to you. If he didn't want to answer your question fine, but you knew something was wrong.

Joker's gun was no longer pointed at your forehead, allowing you to sit up and search for the cause of his grunt. The red glow from Chinatown illuminated the narrow alleyway that you and Joker rested in and upon first glance, he looked fine.

The GCN’s news prioritized the deaths and injuries of the Asylum workers but failed to report Joker's condition. Not like anyone cared but somehow in his escape he sustained some kind of injury.

Laying on his side you noticed he favored his left leg more and now that you got a closer look at him, you saw that he was bleeding.

"Oh um you're bleeding!" Your head snapped up hearing his sarcastic laugh, though it sounded more winded than it usually did on tv. "As one typically does when.. ah shot."

"Y-You've been shot? Where? How did you run from the cops with a..."

"Ahtttt." Joker waved his gun in your face. That was one way to end a conversation.

Here you were trying to be a Good Samaritan and forgot who you were talking to. "This isn't my first rodeo toots. It's just a scratch." To prove his point, Joker jumped to his feet, scaring you with his agility before rightened his suit jacket and looking ready to leave.

You almost believed his act until his leg buckled under its own weight when he tried to walk away. You sprung into action and caught him– well you kept him upright, the wall behind you did most of the catching.

Joker's appearance was tall and lanky but as you held him up you discovered the truth. He was all muscle underneath his tailored suits and haunting visage. You didn't know how to process that new information and wisely steered the conversation elsewhere.

"You need a doctor." You huffed out. Your face was so close to Joker's that you saw his tongue dart out to lick the outline of his grease paint.

"No, I don'T." He stressed the t in don't.

You noticed that Joker articulated certain words to get his point across during his theatrical conversations and deep monologues. As an author you found his speech pattern very intriguing but right now he was being stubborn. "Yes you do."

"Hmm. Me and my.. uh primary care doctor never quite goT along. Let's just say.. he's no longer accepting new patients, if you know what I mean." You did. This was the infamous Joker you were talking to. The physician was probably dead and decomposing in the Gotham River.

But while that disturbing thought danced around in your head, the constant reminder that Joker still had his gun and most likely plenty of other weapons on him failed to deter your crazy decision.

Squeezing your eyes shut, you blurted out the invitation. "My apartment is in Old Gotham. Do you think you can make it that far?"

'Stupid stupid stupid! You have officially lost your mind!' Your inner self screamed after your suggestion. How dumb could you be inviting Joker to your place? This was not a tea party at a slumber party!

Joker was... well The Joker– a madman that killed because it was fun and you opened your mouth and invited him over. The awkward silence stretched on as you waited for his response or for your death. Whichever came first.

"Harboring a fugitive, are you sureee about that?" He asked. You could hear the grin in his words, slick like oil.

"Well, you do have me at gunpoint. I don't think I can just up and leave now can I?"

He let out a chuckle or was it a masked cough? Just how bad were his injuries? "Pretty and smart, I like that." He stood straight, taking you with him, and poked your rib cage with his gun. "Lead the way."

How the two of you managed to walk from Chinatown back to your apartment with Joker’s injured leg shocked you. Even at 2AM the streets were busy with people yet you kept to the backstreets and stayed in the darkness to avoid being spotted.

Joker cracked morbid jokes the entire walk back and when you two crossed the bridge over into Old Gotham, he quickly noted which direction you were leading him to.

"Now here I thought we were, uh, getting along. Care to ex-plain why we're headed towards GCPD?" You froze, feeling his gun dig into your side again.

Thankfully you stopped in an alleyway near Repp street.

Ironic, since this was your original stopping point for your walk but you kept going and ultimately landed in the mess you were in now. Supporting half of Joker's weight while being paranoid at being caught. The realization of how far you walked mentally and physically tired you out. Joker's gun was the last thing on your mind when you turned and snapped at him.

"My apartment is on Quinn street overlooking Grant Park. I'm not dumb enough to lure you to the police, Joker. It just so happens that I live in the same vicinity.

"Ah, so you're just dumb enough to help me. Gotcha."

You sighed and kicked off the building you were resting on. With your arm around Joker's waist and the other keeping his arm around your shoulder, you chose to ignore his insult.

"We're almost there. See?" You nodded up the street to a cluster of apartment buildings. "Do you see that white building with the all glass roof? That's my place, it's the next block over. C'mon."

Maybe the adrenaline rush helped or maybe you were that anxious to get home, but it felt like you teleported Joker to your apartment only to run into another problem. The lobby staff was gone for the day so you didn't have to worry about being outed. The problem was the elevator itself.

Joker noticed your hesitation and rolled his eyes. "What now? Aren't we going inside?" You made eye contact with the Prince of Crime and in your panic, explained.

"The elevator doesn't work at night." He licked his lips, giving you another flash of his tongue. He saw where your eyes dropped to and leaned in closer.

"Will that be a.. mmm, problem for us?" He finally had a moment to appreciate your fear.

A shame it wasn't directed towards him but he admired it all the same.

Your doe eyes took on a pinched edge and the color darkened a few shades as you tried to strategize. Oh but he loved your wild untamed curls that shook about your head. The humidity finally got a hold of them and he happened to like its chaotic state. Though he took an issue with the abuse you doled out on your bottom lip.

He tsked to himself and playfully slapped your cheek. You jumped at the contact. "Hey, hey. Look at me! There she is... Now, will thaT be a problem?"

"Y-Your leg... I live on the top floor."

You watched Joker sigh and crack his neck. It made for a scary sight and you knew nothing good would follow it. Imagine your surprise when he scratched his forehead with his gun (did he not value his life?) and shooed you with it. "Show me."

"Huh? Show you what?" Joker escaped your hold and stood on his own. "Uh.. the elevator, sweetheart."

"B-But.."

"Shhh shh shhhh." He cooed to you softly. "Trust me on this. I'm a man of many talents." His dark glare hinted to those many talents, some you didn't wish to think about..

You nodded and after glancing around for witnesses, ran to the front door with Joker hot on your heels.

You used the nighttime keycard to grant you access and the low hum of the door opening and then closing steadied your pounding heart. You looked over your shoulder seeing nothing but darkness himself patiently waiting for your next move.

Right the elevator. You walked towards the lift and sighed. "Like I said, it doesn't work after midnight. I'm sorry but we'll have to take the stairs."

"Gimme that." Joker said, already snatching your keycard out of your hand.

He flipped it over, inspecting the black device and then the lift and its power pad. You wondered how he was going to override the restriction but he was The Joker for a reason. In less than two minutes he cracked some invisible code and the elevator whirled to life on its way to come pick you up.

You lived here almost a year and never could get the lift to work after midnight. "How did you do that?"

The door chimed open waiting for its passengers, offering much needed light to the dark lobby however Joker adopted his sinister persona again and slowly backed you into the elevator. Your back hit the mirrored wall with Joker coming to a stop in front of you.

You were at a loss in front of his towering height. He didn't break eye contact with you as he stabbed the twelfth floor button on the panel.

Cornered. That's how you felt trapped in an elevator with Gotham City's deadliest criminal. His eyes took on a more greener hue in the artificial lighting and you couldn't look away. His black war paint was smudged a bit from his sweat and it bled into the white, and the distressed look made him even more menacing.

Once again your gaze dropped to his mouth where his scars were covered with red paint. It was probably the adrenaline still raging but you boldly lifted your hand up to touch them. That is until Joker grabbed your wrist.

He looked disappointed for a split second until he perked up with an eerie smile. "You wanna know how I got these scars?" He craned his neck, showing them off but your eyes flickered up to the elevator floor dial indicator flashing two.. three..

"Why won't you look at meee, hmm? Do they scare you?" You turned to Joker with furrowed brows.

"What? No, I actually like them. They remind me of the scars Bill gave.. was it Jess? No, Mallorie at the retreat lodge." You held back your laughter at Joker's deadpan look.

"I'm a writer. I-I write things, m-mostly books and your scars reminds me of a character I created in-"

"Will Hunter Bill. I should've recognized that face of yours. You're Y/n L/n."

Why did your name sound so alluring when he said it? You would think about that later, shock was hitting you full force right now.

"You know me?"

"Hmm." He pretended to think and curled a strand of your hair around his finger in the process. The elevator was slowly creeping up toward your floor but not fast enough. There was only so much of Joker in this close proximity that you could handle.

"You wrote… Distracted By Her Justice did you noT?" He put emphasis on his t's again. His pronunciation of certain words almost made you snicker but the words itself caused your brain to screech to a halt.

Distracted By Her Justice was the first novel you ever wrote during a small internship back home in Blüdhaven. Cindy had yet to discover you but she read the short story and hired you because of it. You then went on to write a few lesser known books and your current hit series WHB.

The fact Joker knew about Her Justice let alone read it horrified you. "How do you know about my first published work?"

Joker swayed on his feet but had enough energy to cup your face. His touch was gentle at first until he tightened his grip on your chin. His unpredictable mood swings scared you as the elevator grew closer and closer to your floor.

What did you get yourself into? You noticed his face paint also covered the inside of his mouth this close up. Maybe that was the reason he licked his lips so much? But why would he wear something that's uncomfortable?

Ignore the fact that you noticed. Seriously, what was your fixation with his mouth? You had other things to worry about like the way Joker sagged his weight on you between the 9th and 10th floor.

He sighed and pressed you more into the elevator wall. You didn't know it but Joker's energy was waning and fast.

Before he bumped into you, his henchmen were doing a terrible job at escaping the authorities. He broke out of Arkham around lunchtime but it took forever getting off the island and back to the mainland. They took refuge in an abandoned warehouse until an anonymous tip ratted them out. Joker's plan was to retreat back to Amusement Mile but GCPD were swarming the place awaiting his arrival. He hated being on the run and the pouring rain wasn't helping his mood.

Another move towards Otisburg resulted in a shootout with the police and although Joker lost a few of his men, he killed more of Gotham's finest.

Yet the shootout continued. Joker hated guns. They were too quick and he didn't get to savor a kill but he was wise enough not to bring a knife to a gunfight. His mind didn't register he was shot until a henchman pointed it out. It was more of a nuisance than anything, but he managed to escape with only three goons at the end of things.

Two would scout ahead while the other secured a getaway car. Joker waited an hour. Then two, but after three hours without the scouts or the getaway car returning, he knew he was alone. Police sirens in the distance made him laugh aloud. Gordon and his men were working overtime tonight.

If he wasn't sporting a nasty gunshot wound, Joker probably would have stayed in his makeshift hideout but he needed medical attention and fast. Wherever this bullet was lodged wasn't good. Perhaps a hostage could help in his situation but before he could scope out his surroundings, his location was compromised. The Canine unit had found his scent and forced him out of the warehouse and onto the streets of Chinatown.

'Head north towards West Mercy Hospital. Snatch a resident on their smoke break; anyone would do.' Joker knew his plan was foolproof but he didn't factor in his blood loss or you getting in the way.

He bumped into you and his remaining energy just gave out. He lost consciousness periodically during your interaction together but you didn't seem to notice.

He was a good actor after all and quickly took control of the situation. Joker was about to force you into finding him a doctor but you surprised him with your offer of staying at your apartment. He checked you out far too many times tonight; he knew rich people when he saw one. Paired with your naïve heart and generosity, this would be too easy.

Only problem? You weren't afraid of him or his dangerous personality, nothing scared you away.

Joker liked that. You were a challenge to crack and ultimately break. Being held at gunpoint shocked you at first but overtime your muscles relaxed and you didn't shy away from his presence, if anything on the walk to your place you snuggled up closer to him.

He noticed your stolen glances and how your eyes always wandered back to his mouth. You were intrigued by him. Like an innocent lamb trying to befriend the lion.

Joker didn't have any plans after escaping Arkham but riding an elevator up to one of his favorite author's place wasn't on the agenda.

He was a man of chaos but also of literature. Studying people's psyche and predicting their next move before it happened took a high level of intelligence. Joker didn't care for elaborate plans (okay maybe just a few) but he liked to be knowledgeable and reading literature regardless of the genre, helped him immensely.

He stumbled upon your oeuvre by chance and read your books in order. He enjoyed The Greeks Among Us for its ambiguous ending.

Would Thaleia embrace her hatred for her own people and annihilate them all or descend back to the human realm to die with her revenge unsatisfied? He loved how the reader got to pick which open ending to believe.

His favorite book of yours was Distracted By Her Justice. You dived deep into the social and political injustices within Gotham but covered up the controversial views by making the characters high school students learning about romance.

It read like a teen romcom but Joker and other like minded individuals knew better. Almost all of your books had a double meaning behind the flowery rom-com plot. He desperately wanted to meet you and talk about your philosophies but why would a normal citizen like you want to meet him? It would never happen.

Then you wrote Will Hunter Bill. Joker knew then you were a scholar under-appreciated in this era. And so young! He could only imagine what you would write as you matured. Your books were based on real life issues that were swept under the rug here in Gotham City and for once he thought someone would blow the whistle and expose them.

Standing in this elevator with you as your e/c eyes took him in, he felt ridiculous for thinking it, but you were probably the only person capable and bold enough to do it.

Unfortunately Joker lost too much blood and he wasn't thinking straight. You were nothing but a naïve little girl reaching out in horror to catch him. Wait..

"Joker! Are you okay?! Please say something!" Just a few seconds ago he was alright, (albeit lost in thought) and staring off to the side.

You knew he was looking at something beyond this elevator when his eyes rolled back and he began to fall.

You caught him for the second time tonight and with perfect timing. The elevator arrived at the twelfth floor of your apartment. The doors opened with a soft ding that gave your stomach butterflies.

You were finally home 

Just a few more feet and you would be at your front door. You took a deep breath and used the last of your adrenaline to adjust Joker's weight in your arms and half carried, half dragged the psychotic clown to your door 

Joker mumbled something inaudible as you fumbled with the key. He was resting on your pocket that held it but after some careful maneuvering, you fished them out. You got it through the lock and with a twist, a gush of cold vanilla scented air hit you before gravity worked its magic and he started leaning towards the floor 

"No no no turn left! Go left!" Somehow you guided Joker to your couch before he slipped into unconsciousness, leaving you alone with a wanted criminal in your apartment. Reality kicked in fast.

"Oh my God. I'm harboring a fugitive."

#ledger joker #ledger joker x reader #reader insert #black!fem!reader #batman #dc comics #smut #joker smut #slow burn #yandere #romance #angst #Long Reads #cross posted on wattpad #cross posted on AO3 #his lighthouse

[speedofsoundsketches]

I like you’re shadow and jolt comic giving me insperstion to create my own comic with my oc and shadow tbh I pictured my oc and shadow doing the same as shadow and jolt which is giving me courage to do my own comic with them fancomic obviously but do you have any tips on how development of a comic would work how long did it take for you to plan the comic

I've been working on this comic for about five years this coming November. From the start of developing the story to when the first comics were posted, it was about a three or four month long period of early development.

To be honest, I'm never NOT developing the comic. Each update is sort of treated as a self-contained session and while I have a plan of how everything connects, you don't really know how it'll actually work out until you're making the pages themselves and piecing the puzzle pieces together to make it all coherent. If you go to my Patreon, you'll see all the raw, first drafts of my comics and how much they changed in the final pages.

The following are my personal tips but I highly recommend also reading this post by the creator of Lackadaisy on the same subject. I followed her example for my work a lot and thankfully she's open about her secrets. :)

Tip #1: Know what your End Goal is for your comic

A lot of eager hopefuls start with a strong passion for their stories and it seems clear in your head how it will pan out. Over time, your interest starts to dwindle, passion is replaced with procrastination, writer's block occurs and you wonder why this thing you loved so much has become a total chore.

This is often due to not knowing the overall POINT to making your comic at all. What's the theme? The message? What do you and your audience GET out of it?

Shadow and Jolt has a clear progression and ending in mind that all relates to the Themes and Messages I want to impart to my readers. Try dissecting your favorite Sonic stories (or any story in general) and analyze why you like them and what made them impactful to you. Determine their themes and messages then observe how each part of the story, character arcs and such were written to serve them. What were the creators trying to tell you or make you experience?

That's the difference between a story with intention versus one that's confused or directionless. Because even during writer's block, if you know what message you're trying to tell, it gives you a lighthouse to paddle towards and keep you from getting lost in the ocean of vague notions.

Tip #2: Script It Out!

Before I ever drew a single comic for Shadow and Jolt, the first thing I did to help me develop a more solid plan was to write scripts. Some were fully realized with dialogue and action sequences. Others were outlines to help me see the full picture from beginning to end.

I've written over 30 different scripts. Many are just a few pages each but some are about 50+ pages.

And guess what? Every single one of them STINK.

These are not my best work because they don't need to be. They're meant for playing around with character dialogues, motivations, relationships and manner of speech. If a script resonates with me enough, I'll try doing a draft of it in comic form to see how it feels on paper and continue tweaking things from there. It was such a horribly cliche story at first but it's ok because to determine what's wrong, I need to see it actually in front of me and not as some ethereal mess of images in my mind.

Tip #3: Gather, Research and Conceptualize

I cannot stress enough how much doing this has helped with this project.

References I used included the games I liked the most, their production history, interviews with Sonic Team, compiled images/inspirations I found around the internet, etc. I used all this material to strengthen the ideas I had so I could start drawing concepts.

Characters, vehicles, environments.... everything and anything gets concepts. Lots of sketches, sometimes with color. I've possibly gone through almost 10+ sketchbooks for just Shadow and Jolt alone. There were a lot of things that needed testing and fleshing out, especially because it's such a big project. (and I'm just one little ol' me ;-;)

From the beginning, the plan was that Shadow and Jolt would be based on the games so my research was spent digging into the entire timeline and reminding myself of what the games are about and how to capture their essence as close as I can. I'm not sure what setting you plan to base this story on but you'll have a different set of research to do if you plan to include things from something else like Archie, Boom or whatever.

Tip #4: BEWARE SCOPE CREEP

In game development, teams start by deciding on the full scope of the project and settle on what's going to be in the game. The team makes projections on how long it'll take to complete it, set deadlines and then move to act on it.

A few weeks into production, maybe you decide to add a new animated action for the main character. Maybe then you add in a new weapon that will require another full move set to program and animate. Maybe you want to add a new character that you came up with during lunch. Maybe you have a whole extra side quest that adds a whole new plot point that adds even MORE characters who all have unique functions and animations you'll have to make-

See how quickly that can happen? That's scope creep. You start adding way more than was initially planned, thus it ends up extending the time it takes to actually finish the project.

Obviously, it's less dire than a product meant for sale but the lessons are the same. With any changes you make, be mindful of how that's going to effect you getting the story done and if it even really adds anything to your End Goal.

Remember, you only have so much energy in a given day to dedicate to your comic. Manage it wisely!

Tip #5: Live life!

This is a bit of an odd one maybe but for me at least, it's super valuable.

I've mentioned in previous posts how real world experiences helped inspire my comic. Part of what makes Sonic's world feel so lived in is the dedication the team put into making each level feel that way! Sonic Unleashed is maybe the best example of this point. I feel that Sonic was made by people who not only wanted to make a fun game series but who use it to celebrate the actual act of adventure. Living life, seeing new sights, meeting new people, eating unique cuisine, you catch my drift!

Some of my best ideas came from having a lived experience. You won't be able to write authentic stories staying in a bubble of your own making. Outside of my fancomic, I like going on long walks, exploring places or simply hanging out with my friends. So my final suggestion for you is to live a full life and be inspired by it! Nothing beats reality anyway. :)

#art help #Shadow and Jolt #fancomic #comic #Sonic #thoughts #asks #ramble #webcomics #advice

[mama-qwerty]

The Reluctant Tutor

So I came up with the brilliant idea that Callie would be hired as the Wachowski boys' tutor, because they simply cannot be trusted to their own devices during the day while Tom and Maddie are at work. I started writing something but it just wasn't jiving with me for some reason. I may come back to it later. Or I may not. We'll see.

~~~

“Make it quick, boys,” Maddie called as her three kids raced into the library. “We’ve gotta pick up your dad and get home by three. You’ve got fifteen minutes.”

“Okay!” three voices chorused as the boys split up to scour their favorite sections for new material. Science and mechanics for Tails, comics and sci-fi for Sonic, and young adult adventure stories for Knuckles.

“Got something fun planned tonight?” Callie asked. The head librarian emerged from the bookstacks and placed a few books on the desk.

Maddie rolled her eyes. “It’s one of the stipulations under that agreement we signed with G.U.N back when they beat Robotnik. We have to meet with one of their agents every six months so they can ‘check in’.” She curled her lip. “More like ‘update their files on the boys’ powers’.”

“Ah,” the librarian said, flipping her long red braid behind her. “So, the equivalent of seeing that one uncle no one likes, but you have to under the guise of obligation.”

“Bingo.”

“I can’t imagine the boys are very cooperative in these little visits.”

A mischievous smile curled Maddie’s lips. “No they are not. Last time Knuckles refused say a single word, just glared at the interviewer the whole time. Sonic went to the other extreme and didn’t shut up the entire time, talking about everything under the sun except what they wanted to know.”

Callie snickered. “Yep, sounds like them. What about the Fluffmeister?”

“Tails pulled out the big guns.”

“Ooh, lemme guess,” the redhead said, counting off on her fingers. “Big puppy dog eyes, wrapped himself up in his tails, and full-on cried like his little heart was breaking.”

Maddie laughed, slapping a hand on the counter. “Right on all counts!”

Callie joined her friend in laughter, shaking her head as she ended in a sigh. “Those boys are a force of nature, I swear. Good kids. Smart as the dickens, but a handful.”

“Yeah,” Maddie said, leaning on the counter with a sigh. “So I keep hearing.”

The librarian turned back. “Everything okay?”

The other woman shrugged. “Let’s just say not everyone appreciates the boys like we do.”

Callie nodded. “I take it the tutor search isn’t going well?”

Maddie shook her head. “Another one quit this past week. He seemed to be doing well, but I got a call on Wednesday that he wasn’t coming back.” She sighed. “At this rate we’ll run through every eligible tutor in the state before the end of the month.”

“Remind me why you’re looking for a tutor in the first place,” Callie said, leaning against the counter, arms crossed. “Is this another G.U.N thing?”

Maddie shook her head. “The boys have become a bit too . . . let’s say ‘creative’ when left to their own devices while Tom and I are at work.”

“Uh oh.”

“Yep. We’ve come home to more destruction than usual lately. Tom and I agreed they need a bit more structure and supervision, at least until they mature a bit to stop thinking things like skiing off the roof is a good idea.”

“That’s a Sonic idea if I ever heard one.”

Maddie nodded. “And you know Mr. Gotta Go Fast. He greased up the skis and used a box fan to get more speed.”

Callie winced. “Oh man. Is that when he lost some quills about a month ago?”

“No, that was when Tails tried to create a flame retardant spray and Sonic was his test subject.”

“Yikes. Hey, wouldn’t Knux be the voice of reason in these scenarios? He’s not exactly the type to go along with this stuff.”

“Yeah, you’d think so. But leaving him in charge doesn’t guarantee a peaceful afternoon. He can sometimes let the power go to his head. And the other two team up to challenge his status as ‘the boss’.”

“I guess that makes sense. He’s not that much older than them.”

“Right.” Maddie sighed. “So we decided the boys could maybe use some formal education. They still need to keep a semi-low profile, which means they can’t go to school, so we’re back to our latest failed tutor.”

“Did he say why he was quitting?”

“Knuckles was ‘too intimidating’.”

“What??” the librarian cried, face twisted in disbelief. “Ridiculous. That boy is a teddy bear.”

“I can hear you,” a booming voice called from the YA section. “I am a fierce echidna warrior. Not a teddy bear.”

“You’re totally a teddy bear,” another voice said from the comic section. “A big, soft, snuggly-wuggly teddy bear.”

“I will hurt you, hedgehog,” the first voice responded, and the women at the counter rolled their eyes with a smile.

“I think you’re intimidating, Knuckles,” a third voice called from the mechanic section.

“Thank you, fox, you are indeed very intelligent.”

“Suck up!”

“Oy!” Callie said, lifting her voice over the others. “No yelling in the library!”

A beat of silence before a trio of voices called back, “Sorry!”

“So,” the librarian said, turning back to Maddie. “Did you call Mrs. Bellflower like I suggested?”

The vet nodded. “She was the first one who came out. Seemed like a nice lady, and considering she’d been a teacher for nearly 30 years, it seemed like a good fit. She lasted three days. In the end she said she wasn’t equipped for the boys’, ahem, ‘special needs’.”

“In other words, she freaked.”

“Yep. Sonic barely powered up—once—and she was out the door before the last sparks left his quills.”

Callie uttered an annoyed grunt. “I warned her. You can’t handle these boys like any other human kid. Sorry Mads. I’ll try to think of someone else to send your way.”

“Hey, Cal?” Sonic yelled, drawing another eye roll from the librarian.

“What did I say about yelling?”

“Sorry, but I can’t find that book on Tesla you told me about the other day!”

“It’s in the biography section.”

A blue blur zipped between bookshelves. “I don’t see it!”

“Well keep looking, it’s there.”

“I don’t think so! I’m standing right here and I don’t see i—oh there it is. Thanks!”

Callie shook her head, a small smile on her lips, as she turned back to Maddie. The other woman stood with a thoughtful expression, her brows slightly furrowed. “What’s with the look?”

“What about you?”

“What about me, what?”

“Why don’t you be the boys’ tutor?”

The librarian shook her head. “Oooh no. I’m not a teacher.”

Maddie shrugged. “You taught Knuckles how to write.”

“That’s different.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know, it just is,” the redhead said, flipping her braid back around her shoulder to fiddle with the end. It was a nervous habit she’d developed in her teens. “Besides, he practically taught himself, I just showed him the basics.”

“Not true,” the echidna said, rounding the bookshelves to their right. He carried a new Warrior Cats book. “Your guidance was essential in my early days on this planet. I am grateful for your knowledge and instruction.”

“See?” Maddie said, gesturing toward him. “You’re a natural born teacher. C’mon, the boys love you already, you’re smart, and they’re here almost every day already. Hell, you’re practically extended family. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it before.”

“Think of what before?” Sonic said as he and Tails approached the front counter. They each carried a few books. “What are we talking about?”

“How would you like Callie to be your tutor?”

~~~

And that's all I had because, well, like I said, it wasn't really working well. But I thought this bit came out okay.

Like this? Check out my other snippets. Reblogs are appreciated!

#writing snippet #my fics #sonic the hedgehog #sonic fanfiction #knuckles the echidna #miles tails prower #tails the fox #maddie wachowski #sonic wachowski #knuckles wachowski #tails wachowski #callie macpherson

[animefeminist]

“Differences Die At The Door”: A post-mortem of Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop

Content Warning: discussion of partner abuse, queerphobia, transphobia

Spoilers for Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop

Less than three weeks after its debut, the live-action Cowboy Bebop was snuffed out in the face of widespread critical indifference and social media backlash. From its mid-aughts inception as a Keanu Reeves-led pipe dream to its 2017 announcement as the Netflix series, the live-action Bebop was one of the more anticipated anime adaptations of the last decade. Yet within a few months, 2021’s Bebop felt like more of a distant memory than the 1998 original. While its inspiration continues to enjoy constant discussion and reference, discussion of the adaptation feels sparse. 

Now, let’s not mince words: Netflix’s Bebop is bad. Few adaptations miss the point of their source material as brazenly as Christopher Yost’s series. There are many avenues to critique it from, ranging from casting decisions to direction to the script itself, and much ink has already been spilled on all of these. But it’s prudent to get even more granular. If we trace each individual influence behind both Bebops, the fundamental failings of the Netflix show become even more apparent.  

The roots of Sunrise’s Bebop original are well-known and widely documented. A 2017 IGN interview with Shinichirō Watanabe lays out many of these influences, and nods to the team’s favorite films are constant. A lookalike to Taxi Driver’s Travis Bickle appears in the sequel film Knocking on Heaven’s Door, and the fan favorite fifth episode, “Ballad of Fallen Angels,” emulates scenes from two John Woo films—The Killer and A Better Tomorrow 2—during the iconic clash between Spike and Vicious. These works, and many of Bebop’s other influences, belong to an artsy male canon—stylish stories about desperate men in dire circumstances—and weigh heavy on the visual presentation. 

Read it at Anime Feminist!

#cowboy bebop #netflix cowboy bebop #faye valentine #spike spiegel #articles

[guilhermebene]

Use A Press Release To Explode Your Business Presence

Many business owners do not realize the benefits of using press releases to in order to make their online or offline businesses recognized. Because of this very fact those who do make use of them will bring a lot of new business to their offline or online business , if executed correctly. If you believe that your business isn't considered newsworthy, think again. Go to Google News or any other news related website and you'll get a lot of well-written, business related, press releases.

Press releases are simply unknown news. It doesn't need to be breaking news. It only needs to be notable. If you're offering an item or service that nobody knows about then you have newsworthypress release materials. This is what happens when you publish the press release. Your press release is submitted to news sites, large and small. The news website will look at your press release and decide whether or not it is relevant or not. Most of the smaller sites will be interested in it if it is properly written and is easy to comprehend. The major players like CNN will look for unique information. Sites like Google and Yahoo is where an online business can prosper since they are more apt to find an article that is well-written and is Internet or even better, it's search engine related.

The thing that you have to realize is that a press release is not an advertisement. It's a real-time, narrative, newsworthy story and should be written in that the way. When you write a press release the release must be written in a third person style as if a journalist was interviewing you. The reporter was reporting your story for the rest of the world. prwire That is, when you write a press release, you are the reporter, as well as the owner of the business being interviewed.

Making a press release could be a daunting task because we aren't experienced in writing this manner. Once you've completed a couple of these, it becomes much easier to complete. As with anything that we do the more often we do it the better we get adept at it. If you have a company that is new or already operating that you would like to share with the world, there's no better method to do it than with a professionally written press release. If one of the major boys, such as Google, Yahoo, or even CNN decides to take it on, expect to get clobbered with more business that you are able to handle which is a good problem to face.

If you think you're not capable of writing a press release yourself, you can always hire someone else to write the job for you. There are many services that will write it for you at a cost. Run your Google Search for Press Release Services. There is an array of companies who will perform this service for you. Many press release sites offer a free submission option and a premium service. Although you can submit with your free option, you can for the most part be able to, particularly if you're just starting out however, you should use the paid submission option due to the additional advantages it offers. If you submit a paid press release, your press release will be sent out in about a day or two, and be sent to more news sites. I would suggest you make an annual paid submission and then use the free service for the other times. Pay-per-submissions are fairly inexpensive. Prweb is one of the largest sites online and charges $40. Paying $40 every three months won't break anyone considering the extra advantages that it can bring to your company.

Another thing you need to know about sending press releases is that the majority of entrepreneurs will only send the press release every quarter at most, while many others will submit it only once and not do it again. If you're looking to stay ahead and ahead of the pack in the field of business you're in, you should submit a new press release each month by with the free submission services and pay for it every three months. this website You'll be surprised by how much better your business will do by using press releases, due to the free publicity it will bring to your business. Write a new press release every day and observe your business expand a lot faster.

[beautifultoyia]

Use A Press Release To Explode Your Business Presence

Many business owners do not recognize the advantages of using press releases as a way for them to make their offline or online business well-known. Because of this very fact the people who use them will drive lots of new customers to their offline or online business if done properly. If you think your company isn't relevant, consider reconsidering. Visit Google News or any news related website, and you'll get a lot of well-written, business related, press releases. prnewswire com

A press release is simply an unreported news item. It doesn't have become breaking news. It just has to be notable. If you're selling something or a service that no one knows about, then you've got newsworthy, press release material. Here's what happens when you publish an official press release. The press release you submit to news sites, big and small. The news site will look at your press release and decide whether your press release is newsworthy or not. A majority of smaller websites will pick it up if it is properly written and is easy to comprehend. The major players like CNN will be looking for distinctive information. Websites such as Google and Yahoo are where an online business can do well because they are more likely to pick up a well-written release that is Internet or even more importantly, it's associated with search engines.

One thing you need to realize is that the press release isn't an advertisement. It's a real-time and compelling story that is newsworthy and must be written that the way. When you create a press release, you must write it in a third person fashion as if a reporter was interviewing you. The reporter was reporting your story for the rest of the world. In other words, when you create a press release, it is you who's the journalist as well as the business owner who is being interviewed.

The process of writing a press release can be an intimidating task as the majority of us aren't used to writing in this manner. Once you've done a few of these it becomes much simpler to do. As with anything that we do, the more we do it, the better we become proficient at it. If you've got a brand company that is new or already operating that you want to expose to the world, there's the best way to do it than through a well-written press release. Should one of the big guys, like Google, Yahoo, or even CNN chooses to publish it expect to be bombarded with more business that you are able to handle. This is a good problem to have.

If you think you're not capable of putting together an official press release on your own it is possible to hire someone else to write it for you. There are numerous services which will compose it for a fee. Do your Google lookup for services to write press releases. You will find a list of many who can handle this task for you. Most press release sites have the option of a free submission service along with a paid service. While you can submit using free submissions, you should use the free version of the service, and it is recommended in the majority of cases be able to, particularly if you're just starting out you should consider using the paid submission method because of the extra advantages it offers. If you submit a paid press release the press release will be sent out in about a day or two, and be sent to more news outlets. I recommend that you submit a paid submission quarterly and use the free service the rest of the time. Pay submissions are pretty affordable. Prweb is one of the largest on the web charges $40. The cost of $40 per month won't break anyone considering the benefits that Prweb can provide to your company.

The last thing you should know about submitting press releases, most business owners only submit a press release quarterly at most, whereas others will only submit it once and never do it again. If you want to stay ahead and ahead of your competitors in the industry you're in, you must submit a fresh press release every month with the free submission tools and pay each three months. You'll be surprised by how much better your company will do by using press releases due to the free publicity it will bring to your business. new hire press release Create a press release regularly and observe your business expand a lot faster.

[navytours]

Utilize a Press Release to Expand Your Business Presence

Many business owners do not see the benefit of press releases as a method for them to make their online or offline businesses recognized. Due to this, those who make use of them will bring many new customers to their offline or online company if they are done correctly. If you think your company isn't worthy of being featured in the news, reconsider. Visit Google news or any news related website, and you'll find many well-written, business related, press releases.

A press release is essentially untrue news. It doesn't need become breaking news. It's just important to be newsworthy. If you're selling something or a service that no one knows about then you have newsworthy, press release material. What happens when you submit the press release. The press release you submit to news sites, big and small. The news site will look at your press release and decide whether your press release is relevant or not. Most of the smaller sites will take it into consideration when it's well-written and is easy to comprehend. The major players like CNN will search for original information. Websites such as Google and Yahoo are an area where online businesses can prosper since they are more apt to find an article that is well-written and is Internet or even better, it is search engine related. new hire press release

One thing you need to understand is that a press release is not an advertisement. It's a factual and compelling story that is newsworthy and should be written such a way. When you create a press release the release must be written in a third-person manner as if a journalist was interviewing you and the reporter is reporting your news to the world. That is, when you create a press release, you are the reporter and the business owner who is being interviewed.

Writing a press release can be difficult because the majority of us aren't familiar with writing in this manner. But, after you've done a few of these it becomes much more easy to do. Like anything else is done in our lives the more we practice it, the better we become proficient at it. If you're a new or existing business that you want to expose to the world there is no better method to do it than with a professionally written press release. Should one of the big guys, like Google, Yahoo, or even CNN picks it up expect to be bombarded with more business that you are able to handle, which is a great problem to face.

If you think you are incapable of doing the press release by yourself, you can always hire someone else to write the job for you. There are numerous services which will compose it for you at a cost. You can do an Google search for press release services. You will find a list of many who can handle this task for you. The majority of press release websites offer a free submission option, as well as a paid service. You can submit your press release using free submissions, you should use the free version of the service, and it is recommended in the majority of cases particularly if you're just starting out you should consider using the paid submission option due to the advantages it offers. With a paid submission it is possible for your press release to go out within a day or two and will be submitted to more news outlets. I recommend that you submit quarterly submissions for a fee and make use of the free service for the majority of the time. Pay-per-submissions are fairly cheap. Prweb is one of the largest on the web costs just $40. The cost of $40 per month will not break anyone, especially when you consider the extra advantages that it can bring to your company.

Another thing you should know about submitting press releases, most business owners only submit an annual press release at most, while many others will only submit it once and never repeat it repeatedly. If you are looking to get ahead and stay ahead of the competition in the industry you're in, then it is recommended to submit a new press release each month by using the free submission tools and pay each three months. You will be amazed what a difference in your company can perform by using press releases due to the free publicity it will bring to your business. Create a press release regularly and observe your business expand a lot faster. pr wire

Blaze

[fiddlemod]

Use A Press Release To Make Your Business More Visible

Most business owners fail to see the benefit of press releases as a way to get their online or offline businesses known. Due to this, those who do use them will drive many new customers to their offline or online business if done properly. If you think your business is not relevant, consider reconsidering. Visit Google News or any news related website, and you'll get a lot of well-written, business related, press releases.

A press release is essentially an unreported news item. It doesn't have become breaking news. It's just important to be newsworthy. If you're selling an item or service that nobody knows about then you have newsworthypress release materials. What happens when you publish the press release. The press release you submit to news websites, both large and small. The news site will take a look at the press release and determine whether your press release is relevant or not. A majority of smaller websites will pick it up provided it's written properly and is easy to comprehend. The bigger companies like CNN will look for unique information. Sites like Google and Yahoo are where an online business can do well because they are more apt to read an informative and well-written press release that is Internet or, even better, it is connected to search engines.

The thing that you have to realize is that the press release isn't an advertisement. It is a factual and compelling story that is newsworthy and should be written in such a in a specific way. When you write a press statement the release must be written in a third person fashion like a reporter is interviewing you. The reporter is reporting your news in the public domain. In other words, when you write a press release, it is you who's the journalist, as well as the business owner who is being interviewed. prnewswire

Writing a press release can be a daunting task because the majority of us aren't familiar with writing in this manner. Once you've done a few of these it becomes much easier to do. As with anything that is done in our lives the more we practice it the better we get at it. If you're a new or established business you would like to share with the world there is no better way of doing it than through a well-written press release. Should one of the major guys, like Google, Yahoo, or even CNN picks it up expect to be bombarded by more requests than your company can manage, which is a great issue to be faced with.

If you feel that you are incapable of doing an official press release on your own it is possible to hire someone else to handle the job for you. There are numerous services who can write the press release for you for a small fee. Run your Google lookup for services to write press releases. You'll find several companies that will perform this service for you. Many press release sites offer a free submission service along with a paid service. Although you can submit with your free option, you can generally particularly if you're just beginning it is recommended to use the paid submission service due to the benefits it provides. If you submit a paid press release the press release will go out within one or two days and will be distributed to more news outlets. I suggest that you do a paid submission quarterly and use the free service the majority of the time. Pay submissions are pretty cheap. Prweb is among the biggest sites on the internet. It costing fees of $40. Paying $40 every three months won't break anyone considering the extra advantages that Prweb can provide to your company.

Another thing is important to be aware of when submitting press releases: the majority of entrepreneurs will only send the press release every quarter at most, whereas others will do it just once and never do it again. If you're looking to be ahead and stay ahead of the competition in the field of business you are in, you should submit a new press release monthly through the free submission services and pay each three months. You will be amazed what a difference in your company will perform when you use press releases due to the free publicity it can bring to your business. this website Write a new press release every day and see your business grow significantly faster.

[mautlan]

Utilize a Press Release to Expand Your Business Presence

Many business owners do not see the benefit of press releases as a method for them to make their online or offline businesses recognized. Due to this, those who make use of them will bring many new customers to their offline or online company if they are done correctly. If you think your company isn't worthy of being featured in the news, reconsider. Visit Google news or any news related website, and you'll find many well-written, business related, press releases.

A press release is essentially untrue news. It doesn't need become breaking news. It's just important to be newsworthy. If you're selling something or a service that no one knows about then you have newsworthy, press release material. What happens when you submit the press release. The press release you submit to news sites, big and small. The news site will look at your press release and decide whether your press release is relevant or not. Most of the smaller sites will take it into consideration when it's well-written and is easy to comprehend. The major players like CNN will search for original information. Websites such as Google and Yahoo are an area where online businesses can prosper since they are more apt to find an article that is well-written and is Internet or even better, it is search engine related. new hire press release

One thing you need to understand is that a press release is not an advertisement. It's a factual and compelling story that is newsworthy and should be written such a way. When you create a press release the release must be written in a third-person manner as if a journalist was interviewing you and the reporter is reporting your news to the world. That is, when you create a press release, you are the reporter and the business owner who is being interviewed.

Writing a press release can be difficult because the majority of us aren't familiar with writing in this manner. But, after you've done a few of these it becomes much more easy to do. Like anything else is done in our lives the more we practice it, the better we become proficient at it. If you're a new or existing business that you want to expose to the world there is no better method to do it than with a professionally written press release. Should one of the big guys, like Google, Yahoo, or even CNN picks it up expect to be bombarded with more business that you are able to handle, which is a great problem to face.

If you think you are incapable of doing the press release by yourself, you can always hire someone else to write the job for you. There are numerous services which will compose it for you at a cost. You can do an Google search for press release services. You will find a list of many who can handle this task for you. The majority of press release websites offer a free submission option, as well as a paid service. You can submit your press release using free submissions, you should use the free version of the service, and it is recommended in the majority of cases particularly if you're just starting out you should consider using the paid submission option due to the advantages it offers. With a paid submission it is possible for your press release to go out within a day or two and will be submitted to more news outlets. I recommend that you submit quarterly submissions for a fee and make use of the free service for the majority of the time. Pay-per-submissions are fairly cheap. Prweb is one of the largest on the web costs just $40. The cost of $40 per month will not break anyone, especially when you consider the extra advantages that it can bring to your company.

Another thing you should know about submitting press releases, most business owners only submit an annual press release at most, while many others will only submit it once and never repeat it repeatedly. If you are looking to get ahead and stay ahead of the competition in the industry you're in, then it is recommended to submit a new press release each month by using the free submission tools and pay each three months. You will be amazed what a difference in your company can perform by using press releases due to the free publicity it will bring to your business. Create a press release regularly and observe your business expand a lot faster. pr wire

[masonpelt]

My Writing About Musk Isn't About Musk

It seems like I've been writing a lot about Musk. Objectively I, and most other writers have been. I cannot speak for others, but for me Musk is just an object lesson in the bad part of startup land.  

I've been around startups since I was a teenager. I've seen so many gallons of toxic startup BS. Musk embodies all of it, in a neatly name-recognizable package. But he's just a repeating story of the same old nonsense.

My digipal @naynerz shared a draft of something she'd written about a particularly absurd requirement in many companies hiring processes. It's an excellent article and I'll let her publish at the time of her choosing. Reading her draft caused me to rerun an article from October with my takeaways from a bad startupish job listing.

https://masonpelt.substack.com/p/a-business-lesson-from-a-bad-job

To sum the article up in bullet points:

Founder/CEOs often scale way past their capacity to manage but stay super protective of the company.

The skills and approach that allow founder's to build, often complemented by delusional confidence and dumb luck, rarely scale with the organization.

When someone doesn’t know what they don’t know, the human tendency is to develop irrational proxies to evaluate.

Last month I had a job interview with a startup that was so bad I've written three articles about how not to conduct a job interview. The articles will likely end up published on my own channels because startup media has basically vanished. It seems like most startup coverage now begins with $100 million and 200 employees.

https://twitter.com/masonpelt/status/1598915778174033922 In August I wrote that Musk's flippant disregard for his contracts to acquire Twitter showed that smart contracts aren't really possible.  I didn't have to search for an example of a startup that owed money to my company. I just used the example where A Twitter cofounder was an investor. 

https://hackernoon.com/elon-musk-shows-the-limits-of-smart-contracts I have many other stories. I'm still pissed off about being stiffed on petty amounts of money from  startups back when I was 17. My friend @cullen has his own stories of nonpayment as a teenager working with startups. We are not alone, Musk embodies the startup world.  

In the context of a long and personal essay about how the behavior of those in entrepreneurship often mirror those with substance use disorders Musk's name didn't come up once. And yet, I shared this article with people because it explains much of Musk's behavior. 

https://pushroi.com/examining-entrepreneurial-addicting-to-the-ghost-of-a-friend/

The startup space overlaps with the fake guru space heavily. The personalities are often hard to differentiate. But small scale is uninteresting to readers, or worse institutional support is extended to pay the bills.  

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/fake-gurus-welcome-online-business-guru-grifter-industrial-mason-pelt/

In that article from 2020, I talked about the Forbes 30 under 30 lists and Forbes Councils as shams. "In 2017, the aforementioned Sam Ovens made the Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia: Industry, Manufacturing & Energy list. What does a man from New Zealand, selling the secrets to earning six figures, with offices in Dublin and New York City, have to do with manufacturing or Asia?

I’m not saying Ovens bought his way onto the list. But Forbes props up fake guru types with credibility. In fact, undeserved endowment of their trusted brand is built into the business model. Even now, Forbes takes money from people to become members of one of the Forbes Councils. With that nearly $2,000 membership, someone can write for the Forbes site and use the trusted logo on marketing material in perpetuity."

My attack on Forbes was part of why that article ran in the independent Arc Digital, and not mainstream or quasi mainstream tech press. At the moment I have three articles being pitched to editors about the startup world. All mention Elon Musk. Heck, I got a very polite rejection from one editor, because they had too many Musk stories. Fair, Musk, Holmes, and SBF all generate a lot of think pieces, because mainstream news will cover them. The articles are often just a repeating story of the same old nonsense. Only this way, people will care.

#startups #startup #elon #elon twitter #elon musk

[niannianyabao]

Nope

In interviews and promotional materials for his third movie, Nope, writer-director Jordan Peele has explained that the watchword for this project was "spectacle". After two years of pandemic-mandated movie theater closures, and filmmakers' growing fears that audiences would get used to the convenience (and safety) of streaming and give up on the cinematic experience, Peele's goal was to make a counter-argument. To create an experience as much as a story. On one level, it can't be denied that he has succeeded. Nope is chock-full of vivid and memorable imagery, cannily uses cinematic devices to evoke everything from dread to delight, and, in its last hour, delivers thrilling, pulse-pounding action. But this is still a Jordan Peele movie, which means that there's a barb hidden in all that celebration. For all that it is dedicated to spectacle, Nope is simultaneously engaged in analyzing what a desire for spectacle says about us, and about the people who produce it.

The story is set in and around a southern California ranch that trains and wrangles horses for Hollywood productions. A black-owned family business whose owners, the Haywood family, pride themselves on being descended from the first person ever to appear in a motion picture, a black jockey riding a horse. The ranch is currently run by OJ[1] (Daniel Kaluuya), with the grudging assistance of his sister Emerald (Keke Palmer). The two are polar opposites: Emerald is bubbly and outgoing, while OJ is taciturn and withdrawn—qualities that have only intensified since the sudden death of the siblings' father (Keith David) six months earlier, in a bizarre accident in which small personal items like coins and keys rained down from the sky at lethal speeds. In the wake of that loss, the ranch is struggling, and while OJ remains devoted to his duty to the business and the animals, Emerald is more skeptical. While Emerald pushes her brother to sell the ranch, he has resorted to selling some of his stock—temporarily, he insists—to a nearby amusement park, run by Ricky "Jupe" Park (Steven Yeun), a former child actor still trying to monetize his short-lived stardom in a Western movie from the 90s.

As the argument between the siblings brews and repeats for what is likely far from the first time, the film's McGuffin establishes itself. OJ, in pursuit of an escaped horse, glimpses something saucer-shaped darting through the clouds over the ranch. Here is where Nope sets itself apart from all the other movies of its type (including the ones, like Signs or Close Encounters of the Third Kind, that it explicitly references). OJ and Emerald experience the gamut of emotions one might expect from people who have glimpsed the impossible—disbelief, excitement, terror, wonder. But their focus, and that of the film, is not on survival, escape, or even mere proof. What the siblings want isn't to alert the world to the existence of aliens, but to reap the benefits of being first on the ground. To capture a cinematic-quality image of an extraterrestrial that will allow them to write their own ticket, putting themselves at the center of what is sure to be a media maelstrom.

Other people soon join the project—Angel (Brandon Perea), a bored tech store employee whom the siblings hire to install CCTV cameras and who becomes obsessed when he realizes what they're looking for; Antlers Holst (Michael Wincott), a wunderkind cinematographer who intersperses commercial work with nature documentaries, for whom this is his greatest challenge. Even as it becomes clear that the aliens are dangerous—as horses, and eventually people, disappear in extremely gruesome ways—this impromptu film crew remain united in the conviction that getting, as OJ puts it, The Shot, is as important as the world-shattering significance of the thing they're shooting.

Of Peele's three movies, Nope is the most messy—multiple themes and ideas, such as OJ and Emerald's dispute over the fate of the farm, are established early in the movie only to be dropped as it approaches its conclusion, and some plot points don't bear much scrutiny—and the one with the least going on beneath the surface—arguably the film's entire thesis has been summed up in its title. That it is nevertheless a thrilling, engrossing experience comes down, first and foremost, to Peele's skill as a director. Hollywood has classed Peele as a horror director (more precisely, as a non-horror-fan's horror director), but while there are some gruesome and terrifying images and ideas in Nope, its overall affect isn't that of horror. The film it most reminded me of, in fact, was its release-date neighbor Prey, with whom it shares several similarities (while also being, in several key respects, complete opposites). Nope does Prey one better, however, in how it slowly reveals and develops its alien menace, starting out with cryptic images (those ballistic coins and keys), moving on to barely-perceptible shadows, and progressively drawing back the curtain until its final scenes feature breathtaking images of some of the most imaginative and mind-blowing creature work I've seen on screen.[2]

It's that gonzo inventiveness that convinces me of something I've suspected since at least Us, that whatever other genres he chooses to filter his ideas through, Peele is first and foremost a fantasy writer. I'm using "fantasy" in its broadest sense, encompassing things like Nope and Get Out's SFnal McGuffins. What ties all three of Peele's movies together is the depth and specificity of their worldbuidling, the details and storytelling cul-de-sacs that he introduces in order to make their worlds richer, weirder, and more compelling.

There's no better example of this in Nope than the backstory Peele gives to Jupe, and how he elaborates on it. After his Western film, we learn, Jupe starred in a sitcom called Gordy's Home—basically, ALF with a chimpanzee.[3] That production came to an abrupt end when the normally friendly Gordy brutally attacked the cast and crew. The story of this catastrophe is related twice. When OJ and Emerald ask the older Jupe—who keeps a museum dedicated to the show in a hidden room in his office, complete with such gruesome mementos as his co-star's bloodied sneaker, to which he admits paying aficionados—he explains that the ordeal was best captured in an SNL skit parodying it, and then begins rhapsodizing about how well Chris Kattan embodied Gordy. When the film flashes back to the event, it is, unsurprisingly, a horror show (even as the gory specifics are left off-screen), one that has clearly left Jupe deeply traumatized. The juxtaposition of the two scenes not only makes for some typically excellent Peele vignettes, but brings home just how messed up Jupe is in the present. How, for reasons of both financial necessity and his own warped psyche, he has found himself repackaging and selling the most horrible thing that ever happened to him.

As this story and the centrality of the horse ranch suggest, one of the ideas Nope is interested in is the relationship between humans and animals, and especially those relationships that are utilitarian, exploitative, or adversarial. The film is divided into chapters, titled after various animals—the horses at the ranch, or Gordy. The point of that scheme becomes apparent halfway through the movie, when OJ figures out that the shape in the clouds is not a ship, and not an intelligent being, but an animal, driven by instinctual urges such as rage, territoriality, and most of all hunger. Jupe, it transpires, learned nothing from standing in the wreckage of past attempts to monetize a wild animal, and has incorporated the alien into a weekly show in which he feeds OJ's horses to it. That comes to a head when the alien, enraged by OJ and Emerald's attempts to trap it with decoys, swallows the entire audience of Jupe's show (not enough can be said about how Peele realizes this sequence, including some extremely disturbing post-consumption scenes that suggest horrors with a very minimalistic set and props). Having realized what their target is just as it loses all inhibition, OJ, Emerald, and their crew are faced with a stark choice of outcomes: get the shot, or get eaten.

As a central theme to the movie, this leaves something to be desired. Not to get all CinemaSins about it, but the idea of a an animal who has been happily subsisting off one or two horses a week, who suddenly consumes dozens of people, and then comes back for more the next day, shatters my suspension of disbelief to a million pieces. It's a glaring plot hole smack in the middle of what is supposed to be the film's major conceptual twist. More importantly, Nope simply has nothing to say about the emotional connections that humans and animals form, even in the most inhospitable of situations. For all his sense of duty to the animals in his care, OJ doesn't seem to like the horses very much. And no one in the audience of Jupe's shows, which have been going on for months, seems to have had any issues about watching a horse get devoured.[4]

When OJ figures out that the alien is an animal, he insists that his work as a trainer makes him uniquely suited to wrangling it—he even dubs it Jean Jacket, after the first movie horse he trained. But this ends up playing very few dividends. Despite OJ's insistence that he can "break" the alien[5], what he mainly does is evade and outrun it, while giving Angel and Antlers a good shot. To bring this back to Prey, it feels telling that despite the two films pointing their arrows of predator/prey, animal/person in the exact opposite directions, they end up delivering the exact same type of story in their final acts.

It's more interesting, I think, to consider the animal angle as merely one facet of a much broader theme, that of Hollywood and its periphery. Nope embodies that classic movie trope, the "love letter to Hollywood". But it never shows us the white-hot core of stardom, only the businesses and people that have sprung up to service it, feeding off it and being fed on in turn. It's a film about how living around the entertainment industry can warp your life even if you have nothing to do with it—Angel is at loose ends and willing to be sucked into OJ and Emerald's objectively bonkers project because his girlfriend recently dumped him after booking a pilot for the CW.[6] It's about people who experienced stardom briefly and were left unfit for any other kind of work—among the memorabilia littering Jupe's office is a poster for a reality series starring him and his wife, Amber (Wrenn Schmidt), as if to indicate that his only marketable skill is having once been famous. And it's about a whole host of different groups whose abuse and exploitation are necessary for the Hollywood machine to function. Which includes animals, of course, but also child stars, small businesses, and people of color.

OJ and Emerald's determination to get footage of the alien—even after they realize what it is; even after a torrent of blood and expelled undigestible items showers their house; at the point where any sane person would get in their car and just keep driving—can only be understood in the context of that relationship. Of their bone-deep understanding that while people like them are, in the aggregate, utterly essential for Hollywood's survival, on an individual level, they are completely disposable.

The film's title references the running online meme—one that is frequently framed as a reaction by black people to what's been termed "white nonsense"—of watching someone find themselves in the middle of a dangerous situation and, instead of having the good sense to back away from trouble, walk towards it with their cellphone camera turned on.[7] But here, it's the black characters who are putting themselves in danger for the sake of getting the shot. What the film suggests is that they are doing this because they realize that it is their only chance of sharing in the rewards that have passed them by. As Emerald points out, most film buffs know the name of the photgrapher who created the first moving image, but only she and her family know the name of the person captured in it. Nope is the least overtly political of Peele's movies, but it's hard not to think of the fact that in the last decade, a very common form of black "stardom" has been in videos documenting black people's suffering, humiliation, and even death, and wonder whether the siblings' determination to film the alien is a desire to take control of the narrative in a world where people like them are more often the subjects of it.

This doesn't always work, to be clear. Nope wants us to be simultaneously won over and scandalized by the way its characters risk life and limb for the sake of a viral video, but it often overshoots the mark. When Jupe announces to his audience that he has dubbed the aliens "The Viewers", it's hard not to groan—it's a joke that seems to have come from a different, more strongly satirical version of this story. The ending the film gives to Antlers is similarly over the top. And a sequence in the third act, in which a motorcycle-riding TMZ reporter (Devon Graye), his face obscured by a mirrored helmet, arrives on the ranch in the wake of the disappearances at Jupe's looking to score his own scoop, and keeps crying out "where's my camera?" after an encounter with the alien leaves him broken and near death, is a narrative dead end that runs the point the film is making into the ground.

Still, at its best, the final act of Nope is a dizzying balancing act, a thrilling sequence of clever planning, sudden reversals, and acts of derring-do that you can't help but root for, even as you're constantly reminded of how stupid and pointless it all is. In a lull before their final attempt to get footage of the alien kicks off, Angel nervously asks the other characters whether they're doing a good thing. They all say yes, but there's a palpable lack of conviction. This is about making bank and they all know it. While you can sympathize with all four characters' desire to, for once, grab the rewards that have eluded them, by the time the film approaches its end, when it's still unclear who, if anyone, has survived, you can't help tasting something bitter in your mouth. The triumph of finally getting The Shot is a mixed one, and when the dust clears and and we learn who has survived and who hasn't, it's hard not to feel that survival, for all that we like the characters and want them to endure, is also entirely unearned.

That's probably the intended response. This is, after all, a movie that opens with an epigraph of a biblical quote from the prophet Nahum, equating spectacle with horror. Nope's heroes embody the Hollywood ideal of being whole-heartedly devoted to moviemaking magic. By the time the credits roll, it's hard to avoid the conclusion that they are also all monsters.

[1] There's a joke here, but it's a fairly thin one that is made almost as soon as the character is introduced and then never comes up again.

[2] A similar transformation can be observed in Kaluuya's performance, which starts out tamping down on the actor's charisma to deliver a utilitarian, place-holding performance that almost feels like a waste of his skills, and gradually blossoms into a very specific, and incredibly winning, type of hero.

[3] In true Peele fashion, he has produced opening credits for the show, and if you were alive and watching things like ALF in the 80s and 90s, you can practically plot out the show's episodes yourself just from watching them.

[4] There is one exception, a moment during the flashback to Gordy's attack in which he and Jupe briefly connect. But its existence throws a sharper light over the absence of such connection in the rest of the film.

[5] A strange word choice for a young horse-trainer, since I thought "breaking" had fallen out of favor in that field. Maybe I'm wrong, or maybe this is another way in which the film is fundamentally uninterested in animals.

[6] This was a good joke to begin with, but the fact that in the interval between the film's shooting and now, the CW was demolished, and all its shows cancelled, in the wake of the WB/Discovery merger makes it ten times funnier.

[7] Few videos better exemplify the "nope" reaction—and the correct behavior when one encounters a dangerous wild animal—than this now famous clip of a black news anchor spotting a herd of bison approaching his location.

#tiantalk

[arpov-blog-blog]

...."One major reason that businesses could be reluctant to bend to conservatives’ whims going forward is it’s not clear that the Pride Month boycotts were primarily responsible for Target’s sales drop. As the Post’s report noted, “Target stock had already been experiencing a prolonged decline.” 

In June, CNN consumer reporter Nathaniel Meyersohn helped explain why:

It’s conceivable that some investors sold Target because of the negative coverage on Fox News and other right-wing outlets. But Target’s stock went on a nine-day losing streak and hit a three-year low this week because of broader changes in the US economy, the possibility of a recession, and Target’s over-exposure to discretionary merchandise, according to corporate executives and retail and investment analysts.

Anheuser-Busch, which faced right-wing boycotts after Bud Light partnered with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney, has a similar story. Conservatives took credit for its financial troubles, even though the company had been in decline for years.

Given this, it seems fair to say right-wingers didn’t bury Target with their performative outrage; they simply shoveled a few heaps of dirt.

Conservatives showed that when they band together in the name of reactionary politics, they can harm a company’s bottom line in the short term. But companies will have to weigh whether subjecting themselves to the whims of this horde — whose members seem to find new and more absurd scapegoats by the day — serves their long-term interests.

And the numbers don’t favor conservatives in a country that’s becoming increasingly diverse and increasingly tolerant of LGBTQ people. Writing for CNN in April, Danielle Wiener-Bronner explained why companies embrace diverse communities — an act portrayed by the right as nefarious “wokism”: 

The phrase “get woke go broke,” employed by some conservatives on social media, suggests that brands which employ inclusive campaigns are angering a significant enough portion of consumers to lead to a material drop in sales. But experts say that inclusive campaigns are, in fact, often lucrative for businesses, serving as an important tool to reach key demographics.

That article quotes a Bud Light executive who had said the beer brand had “been in decline for a really long time” and warned: “If we do not attract young drinkers to come and drink this brand, there will be no future for Bud Light.”

In other words: So-called wokism can be good for business. 

Mark Cuban, owner of the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, broke it down rather simply in a June interview, telling the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: “There is a reason almost all the top 10 market cap companies in the U.S. can be considered ‘woke.’ It’s good business.”

I think of the right-wing boycotts like a scarecrow: At first glance, they might ward off some cowardly companies from aligning with marginalized folks. But once you take a closer look, there’s not all that much to fear."

[ownightmare]

Use A Press Release To Make Your Business More Visible

Most business owners fail to see the benefit of press releases as a way to get their online or offline businesses known. Due to this, those who do use them will drive many new customers to their offline or online business if done properly. If you think your business is not relevant, consider reconsidering. Visit Google News or any news related website, and you'll get a lot of well-written, business related, press releases.

A press release is essentially an unreported news item. It doesn't have become breaking news. It's just important to be newsworthy. If you're selling an item or service that nobody knows about then you have newsworthypress release materials. What happens when you publish the press release. The press release you submit to news websites, both large and small. The news site will take a look at the press release and determine whether your press release is relevant or not. A majority of smaller websites will pick it up provided it's written properly and is easy to comprehend. The bigger companies like CNN will look for unique information. Sites like Google and Yahoo are where an online business can do well because they are more apt to read an informative and well-written press release that is Internet or, even better, it is connected to search engines.

The thing that you have to realize is that the press release isn't an advertisement. It is a factual and compelling story that is newsworthy and should be written in such a in a specific way. When you write a press statement the release must be written in a third person fashion like a reporter is interviewing you. The reporter is reporting your news in the public domain. In other words, when you write a press release, it is you who's the journalist, as well as the business owner who is being interviewed. prnewswire

Writing a press release can be a daunting task because the majority of us aren't familiar with writing in this manner. Once you've done a few of these it becomes much easier to do. As with anything that is done in our lives the more we practice it the better we get at it. If you're a new or established business you would like to share with the world there is no better way of doing it than through a well-written press release. Should one of the major guys, like Google, Yahoo, or even CNN picks it up expect to be bombarded by more requests than your company can manage, which is a great issue to be faced with.

If you feel that you are incapable of doing an official press release on your own it is possible to hire someone else to handle the job for you. There are numerous services who can write the press release for you for a small fee. Run your Google lookup for services to write press releases. You'll find several companies that will perform this service for you. Many press release sites offer a free submission service along with a paid service. Although you can submit with your free option, you can generally particularly if you're just beginning it is recommended to use the paid submission service due to the benefits it provides. If you submit a paid press release the press release will go out within one or two days and will be distributed to more news outlets. I suggest that you do a paid submission quarterly and use the free service the majority of the time. Pay submissions are pretty cheap. Prweb is among the biggest sites on the internet. It costing fees of $40. Paying $40 every three months won't break anyone considering the extra advantages that Prweb can provide to your company.

Another thing is important to be aware of when submitting press releases: the majority of entrepreneurs will only send the press release every quarter at most, whereas others will do it just once and never do it again. If you're looking to be ahead and stay ahead of the competition in the field of business you are in, you should submit a new press release monthly through the free submission services and pay each three months. You will be amazed what a difference in your company will perform when you use press releases due to the free publicity it can bring to your business. this website Write a new press release every day and see your business grow significantly faster.

[heinzerdaust]

Utilize a Press Release to Expand Your Business Presence

Many business owners do not see the benefit of press releases as a method for them to make their online or offline businesses recognized. Due to this, those who make use of them will bring many new customers to their offline or online company if they are done correctly. If you think your company isn't worthy of being featured in the news, reconsider. Visit Google news or any news related website, and you'll find many well-written, business related, press releases.

A press release is essentially untrue news. It doesn't need become breaking news. It's just important to be newsworthy. If you're selling something or a service that no one knows about then you have newsworthy, press release material. What happens when you submit the press release. The press release you submit to news sites, big and small. The news site will look at your press release and decide whether your press release is relevant or not. Most of the smaller sites will take it into consideration when it's well-written and is easy to comprehend. The major players like CNN will search for original information. Websites such as Google and Yahoo are an area where online businesses can prosper since they are more apt to find an article that is well-written and is Internet or even better, it is search engine related. new hire press release

One thing you need to understand is that a press release is not an advertisement. It's a factual and compelling story that is newsworthy and should be written such a way. When you create a press release the release must be written in a third-person manner as if a journalist was interviewing you and the reporter is reporting your news to the world. That is, when you create a press release, you are the reporter and the business owner who is being interviewed.

Writing a press release can be difficult because the majority of us aren't familiar with writing in this manner. But, after you've done a few of these it becomes much more easy to do. Like anything else is done in our lives the more we practice it, the better we become proficient at it. If you're a new or existing business that you want to expose to the world there is no better method to do it than with a professionally written press release. Should one of the big guys, like Google, Yahoo, or even CNN picks it up expect to be bombarded with more business that you are able to handle, which is a great problem to face.

If you think you are incapable of doing the press release by yourself, you can always hire someone else to write the job for you. There are numerous services which will compose it for you at a cost. You can do an Google search for press release services. You will find a list of many who can handle this task for you. The majority of press release websites offer a free submission option, as well as a paid service. You can submit your press release using free submissions, you should use the free version of the service, and it is recommended in the majority of cases particularly if you're just starting out you should consider using the paid submission option due to the advantages it offers. With a paid submission it is possible for your press release to go out within a day or two and will be submitted to more news outlets. I recommend that you submit quarterly submissions for a fee and make use of the free service for the majority of the time. Pay-per-submissions are fairly cheap. Prweb is one of the largest on the web costs just $40. The cost of $40 per month will not break anyone, especially when you consider the extra advantages that it can bring to your company.

Another thing you should know about submitting press releases, most business owners only submit an annual press release at most, while many others will only submit it once and never repeat it repeatedly. If you are looking to get ahead and stay ahead of the competition in the industry you're in, then it is recommended to submit a new press release each month by using the free submission tools and pay each three months. You will be amazed what a difference in your company can perform by using press releases due to the free publicity it will bring to your business. Create a press release regularly and observe your business expand a lot faster. pr wire