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gayenerd · 3 years

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The Band You Love To Hate By Tom Lanham of RIP (There’s no date on this but I would say 1995 or 1996?)

Eyes wide as a barn owl's. Spines stiff with anticipation, like a hungry scorpion. The two teenage girls sit stock-still in their booth at a posh Berkeley diner, practically bursting with excitement, but without the faintest clue how to handles it. Clueless, you might call them. A few feet across the linoleum aisle--with his back to them, oblivious to all the oh-my-gawd facial expressions--sits the object of their adulation, dressed in unassuming black jeans, black T-shirt, shredded black Converse, and a beat-up black baseball jacket. But even with his once-green dreadlocks tamed to a short black business cut, Billie Joe Armstrong--yes, the snaggle-toothed MTV ragamuffin from megaplatinum neo-punkers, Green Day--is as easy to spot as Michael Bolton at a Rogaine convention. Although the kids want to leap up from their seats and race over for an autograph or a jittery hello, they don't dare. Instead, they're forced to deal with their seething emotions as if they were eating post-tonsillectomy ice cream: a lot of numb gulping and a quick pain chaser. This is the blessing of being Billie Joe Armstrong. Alas, it's also his curse. By the time you read this, the irascible little rocker will have turned 24. And exactly two years ago, he and his wacky bandmates--drummer Tré Cool and bassist Mike Dirnt--lolled around the trashy basement flat they shared, getting stoned and sneering at the idea that Dookie--their just-released "sellout" on big-time Reprise--would ever amount to more than a nice drink coaster. Fame? They were more preoccupied with their bong collection, stacks of rock 'n' roll bubblegum cards, and a thriving sea monkey tank displayed prominently on a window-sill. Most of their furniture had springs poking through--they didn't care. Armstrong regularly picked boogers from his gold-ringed nostril and then flick them onto the scary shag carpet--what did he have to worry about? Too bad he couldn't have foreseen the all-too-near future. Green Day happened to be in the right place at the right time. The three-chord slam-a-rama Dookie--a pop-edged return to decade-old punk ethics--became the surprise hit of '94, going on to sell over 11 million copies. Armstrong, accustomed to frenetic club performances, began translating the group's infectious energy to larger and larger venues. Demand continued to grow at a staggering pace; Green Day fought back. They turned a satellite MTV Video Awards performance into a "spit-cam" fest by urging the crowd to gob any camera lens it could ("[The cameramen] tried to make it look like it was cool, but it wasn't"). Last October, Armstrong and company issued their 32-minute follow up, Insomniac, almost as an afterthought, with little promotion, a visually offensive video (for "Geek Stink Breath") and--at least initially--a strict no-interview policy. Simultaneously, they ditched their high-powered Cahn-Man management team and are now virtually managing themselves. Along the way, Armstrong married his long-time sweetheart Adrienne and last March fathered a son, Joey. In typical down-to-earth fashion, the couple spent their honeymoon a few blocks from home at Berkeley's prestigious Claremont Hotel, not on some exotic island. Beginning to see the problem here? How does a street-smart kid from humble beginnings skyrocket to world-class notoriety and yet--with his music in millions of homes and his privacy suddenly a right that needs defending--still adhere to the simple ideals, the simple lifestyle that spawned him? Is "successful punk" an oxymoron? Insomniac provided few clues--it was more of the same slacker-ennui sentiment, more defeated, disenfranchised grousing set to speedy, memorable hooks. Or, as Armstrong barks in the aptly-dubbed "Walking Contradiction," "My wallet's fat and so is my head...I'm a victim of a Catch-22." And that, in essence, was the topic this tortured artist wanted to discuss at the diner. The old "be careful what you wish for" adage. The classic "problem with success is finding someone to enjoy it with you" truism. Armstrong, who takes occasional sips from a vanilla milkshake, but mostly stares morosely at the floor, seems to be dealing with superstardom in a relatively normal way. Don't be fooled by the steady stream of negative vitriol that follows; he's analyzing it, breaking it down, figuring out ways to disconnect his kinetic career. Or at least turn down the volume for awhile.

RIP: We know what's going right. But what's going wrong?

BILLIE JOE ARMSTRONG: Lots of things, really. Actually, when I came here today, I said I didn't wanna talk about anything good, because I don't really have anything good to talk about. Goin' on tour pretty soon--don't really wanna go. Just because I've been kinda torn. I wanna stick around at home. I don't like playing arenas, and I realized I didn't know what I was getting myself into on the last tour, but I went into it being positive and getting excited about it. But I didn't realize that I was the kind of person to whom it's too much of an event and not really a personal thing anymore. And I started to realize how much I liked being the background music to this scene at the club. And now it's.... I dunno. People expect so much. It's cool and stuff, and it can be a lot of fun, a really good experience. But when you play that many arenas.... The first time we ever played those big kinds of shows at the Shoreline (Amphitheater in Mountain View, California), there was weirdness--we were playing for a lot of f?!kin' people. And I hate to say it, but sometimes it just feels like another gig. We played every day, 50 gigs this last leg, and it just wears on ya. There's all these people, and they think "Alright. I paid my $15--you better impress the f?!kin' shit outta me right now!" And I realized that for Joey, the rock and roll touring life is not a good atmosphere for a kid. I tried to make it to where it would be, bringing lots of his toys out. But there are no familiar surroundings for him. And he likes all the attention--people come up and say hello to him every day, people who are on tour with us. But he doesn't have his own room or a home to go to every day. So, no more touring for Joey.

RIP: Turned on Regis and Kathie Lee this morning to find their gossip columnist dishing dirt on Green Day. How Insomniac didn't do nearly as well as predicted, how it was a disappointment to the label. A failure, supposedly.

BJA: Well, it's like, we didn't set up this record. We didn't. We didn't do any promotion beforehand, we completely quit doing interviews, and basically we just wanted to go on into it. We weren't even sure if we wanted to do a video. And then when we did a video, it got yanked from daytime rotation because people were getting grossed-out by it. So I think we did alienate a lot of people. So that was expected, that it wasn't going to sell a lot of records.

RIP: NOFX have taken it one step further. They refuse to talk to press, make videos, pander potential singles to radio. They don't want to get any bigger.

BJA: I dunno, maybe I'm just getting jaded or something. But I just got cable again and I can't stand anything. Six years ago you could hear something that was different and know that it was different. So it'd be "alternative" or whatever. But now it's like you get this Joan...Osborne? With the ring in her nose, waving the alternative rock flag, when she's just...not, ya know? And I'm thinking, I hate all this music that's coming out now--the past year was just hell for music. But people are buying it, so then I'm thinking, Maybe they're the ones that are good and I'm the one who sucks? I just don't know if I really wanna be involved in the rock world anymore at all. Period. I don't necessarily have anything against a big record company or people who what to join up with a big record company. It really is right for some people, but more and more, I don't think that I'm really meant to. And I hate to sound like that, because I don't like taking things for granted. I don't like to talk about my problems when there's some kid struggling in his garage somewhere saying "F?!k him! He's just taking it for granted. Shit, I wish I could do something like that, but I'm just stuck here in Biloxi, Mississippi, and I can't even get a gig." I'm so confused right now.

RIP: It must be odd to know that, with all those millions of albums sold, drunken frat boys are probably staggering around to your music right now. Your audience grew far beyond your control.

BJA: Oh, totally! We became what we hated. Which is, the people I despised in high school--and now--are buying our records. We initially became a trend, so there was no way I expected to sell as many records with Insomniac as with Dookie. That's one of the biggest-selling records of the decade. We get slagged by the punk rockers, and it's like, I don't blame them. If you draw that much attention to yourself, that's what you're gonna get--attention--and it's not personal anymore.

RIP: Ever think about giving it all up?

BJA: There isn't a day goes by in the past year and a half that I haven't thought about quitting. I went to this party on New Year's Eve, and this band Juke, and another band, the Tantrums, played in a friend of mine's backyard. And a lot of my old friends showed up, and everybody was just dancing. And I was dancing, and getting really muddy, and I was having a great time. I can't remember the last time I sat down and listened to a record from beginning to end and felt this incredible spine-chilling music. And it's because I haven't been able to go out and watch bands play at my free will. I'm not gonna live in a closet, I'm not gonna vegetate myself.

RIP: But it has to be difficult, when tons of kids know your face. You're on your way to Michael Jackson-dom, where you have to wear a disguise in public.

BJA: If you think about the Beatles, at that time all people had to go by were the photographs on the records and every now and then a television appearance. So when they'd come to town, people would just flip out--it became this huge public event every single time. Whereas now, everything is so saturated kids don't even have to leave their home to go to a show anymore. They can sit in the comfort of their living room, and your favorite rock star is gonna be entertaining you while you sit down and have your microwave burrito.

RIP: The Milwaukee cops weren't pleased with aspects of Green Day's Milwaukee show last November. Why were you arrested?

BJA: I dropped the pick and--actually, I even forgot about it--I just mooned the crowd, which is pretty harmless compared to what I've done before. And I wasn't even thinking about it--I just went out and started playing again. Then I went backstage and was hanging out with Adrienne, and this guy Jimmy who does security for us goes "Come on--there's a car waiting for you outside right now. You've gotta get out of here!" I said "What's wrong?" and he said he didn't even know. So we get in the car and all of a sudden about ten cops come walking over, fully surrounding the car. So the guy puts the cuffs on me, throws me in the car, and I get tossed in the holding tank for two, three hours. I wasn't in the bullpen--I was in with the other ones, the not-so-bad ones. They made me take all my jewelry out. And my shoestrings, so I wouldn't hang myself or something. I dunno. I just don't know how to fit into rock music anymore. I don't know what I like about it anymore. I don't like anything about it anymore, to tell you the truth. To tell you the real truth, I'm a pretty miserable person right now. I'm totally depressed, and my wife can vouch for that because she's around me. In fact, she's the only person who's really around me. I dunno, the whole thing with the mainstreaming of punk rock. I just feel lost in the whole thing...I don't really know...I don't wanna...I dunno...It's miserable, it really is. It's f?!ked up.

RIP: For every original voice that comes along, there will be countless mad signing dashes for any and all sound-alike artists, with no thought given to the artist's longevity. Just throw the record out quickly and hope it sticks.

BJA: The thing is, a lot of musicians have gotten so comfortable with this big so-called "Revolution in Rock Music" over the past decade. First it was like, "F?!k the corporations! F?!k the corporations!" And then people just sorta got cozy with that, and forgot that these bands are getting lost in the shuffle. And I'm talking about the ones that never get noticed at all and just get kinda bitter. The 15 minutes of fame is getting shorter and shorter. And now music is totally going backwards--the first half of this decade, there were a few things going on that were interesting. It wasn't my favorite kind of music, but it had a sensibility about it. If you think about Nirvana and Pearl Jam and that whole Seattle scene, and even the Offspring--there was this thing going on that was more honest, in a lot of ways. It wasn't like, beer, drugs and pussy, like what went on through the '80s with all the hair bands. But now what we've got is Hootie & the Blowfish....

RIP: Who are probably a lot like you. They seem like nice, regular guys who--through no real fault of their own--are suddenly assimilated into pop culture.

BJA: Yeah, but that's the problem, is that they are nice regular guys. And they're totally comfortable with that, and they sort of put that out, to where they don't really have...I dunno, there's a certain amount of attitude that, say, someone like Cobain or Vedder has that they don't have. But it's becoming way not...real anymore or something. Maybe not real to me. It's just turning back into what it was in the '80s. It's like, "Hey, everyone! We're Huey Lewis and the News!" I dunno. Maybe nobody knows what the f?!k I'm talking about anymore.

BJA: I get so irritated by people. I think I'm more bitter than I've ever been in my whole life, to tell you the honest truth. I think Insomniac is much more of a bitter record than Dookie. And I think the older people get, the more they kinda get angry. I think a lot of people feel like they get cheated by lief somehow--no-one is ever completely satisfied. There's maybe a few. But I mean, I'm in a place where I don't really wanna be. It's like, sometimes I feel like we're losing our passion for playing music. And that's the f?!ked-up thing, when you lose passion for what you love, then it's like, Is this marriage headed for divorce or what?

RIP: Theoretically, you can fight back a couple of ways. Like Cobain, you could make a record almost calculated to offend all the bandwagon-jumpers. Or take as much time off as you'd like. Who says you can't go live on a desert island for two years?

BJA: That'd be nice. I'm just not enjoying life right now. I'm really not. I'm so cluttered, I can't even speak. Yeah, I do feel like I'm getting old, and I'm kinda bitter about that. I'm not excited about being onstage anymore, and I was really trying to convince myself that I was. Really. Before we did this last U.S. tour, every time I did an interview--I don't know if you read the last Rolling Stone piece--I was like "Yeah! I'm excited! I wanna play these arenas!" and stuff. And then just every night, it started sucking, it felt like a routine or something. It felt almost choreographed in a lot of ways. And I was yelling "f?!k you!" to people, but I didn't know who I was yelling "f?!k you" to anymore.

RIP: Last time we spoke, you said you went out of your way to change every single show, make each one different.

BJA: Well, I think it's just the stress of getting up in front of all those people all the time, every day. It's like, "Do I really feel like downing another f?!cking pot of coffee and a bottle of wine before I walk onstage to do this again? Just to get myself ready to go?" You know, for all those people. And every night I always do something different and stupid. But at the same time, it'd be really cool to just say "F?!k you!" to people and like, walk off. And then they'd get it. It's like, "I'm really telling you to f?!k off this time! Time to pack up and go home." It'd just be so nice to start from scratch again.

RIP: In many ways you can. That's the music-making system trying to program your behavior. And obviously you've broken quite a few rules already--you don't even have to be talking to me right now, actually....

BJA: Oh no. I really wanted to do this interview, just because the last interviews that I've done, I've been miserable, and I was pretending not to be. I really was, I was lying. Not to the reader, not to the person I was doing the interview. But I was lying to myself, convincing myself that I was really happy with how everything is going.

RIP: So you always knew what you wanted, and now you've got it, in spades. You're having trouble figuring out what's next?

BJA: I didn't even know what I wanted back then. I really didn't. I didn't know if I wanted to be huge, totally successful. I never knew that. I was struggling so hard even to sign that f?!king contract--when I was sitting there, I was contemplating, "Should I just run outta here right now? Am I making the biggest mistake of my life?" A lot of people say, "You're totally disillusioned with what money can do for people," but money never meant shit to me. There's something very passionate to me, very romantic, about living on the street in a lot of ways. Just because I really like my lifestyle back then. I was totally content, in retrospect. A lot of it has to do with the fame. I dunno, I'm trying to talk right now and just totally stuttering.

RIP: It's not like you chose music--it chose you, and you can't help it.

BJA: Yeah, it's cool when people really get it. But what a lot of people don't understand is that we're a band that's been around a lot longer than people know. And that's the thing. The difference between this and what happened between Kerplunk and Dookie--in a year, I got married, I had a kid, and I sold 11 million records worldwide. That can do something to ya, ya know?

BJA: Sometimes I think it'd be cool to just hang out with my friends, drink beer, smoke cigarettes. The more I think about it, the more I'd be really happy with that. I don't think that we're feeling quite like a band anymore--that's one problem we have. There was this certain rock 'n' roll underdog think that we always had--we always drove for something, always drove from town to town in a small van. And you know, I f?!kin' like touring like that--it's like culture shock, really, driving around in a van, setting up my amp when I get there, and playing. That's rock 'n' roll, that's what it started out as. A bunch of sweaty pigs in some tiny f?!kin' bar having a hootenanny, that's what punk rock was to me, that's what drove me to it. I love rock music in its simples, rawest form. And I think we're the only band, really, that plays rock 'n' roll.

RIP: Has all this put a strain on your old friendships? Do your pals treat you a little differently now?

BJA: When I come up to friends I haven't talked to in a while, there's a weirdness. And the ones who are really close to me don't really bring up anything, but that thing is still there; it's still in the air. And sometimes I'll just not say anything the whole time we're hanging out. I'll be totally quiet, because the only thing I'll have to talk about is my band, and I get so sick of talking about my band and myself. So I'll just be quiet, since that's the only thing there is to me, except for my son and my wife.

RIP: Pretty soon, you'll be boring everyone with slide shows--"There we are at Yosemite!"

BJA: Ha! Adrienne was telling me the other day, "When you were in there dancing with all your friends, while the band was playing, you were so happy because you were so in your element." And I've even gone as far as saying we're not a punk band anymore. But no matter what, that's still gonna stick with me forever, because I love the music, I love the energy of a new band coming out that creates this sense of urgency about 'em. I'll never be able to kick that habit. I love hangin' out with my friends who have small fanzines--kids just writing their guts out about whatever the hell's bothering 'em, and putting it on a Xerox machine and then handing it out for a quarter apiece at shows or at a party. All I wanna do is just try and work it out. I was sitting there the other day, counting all the records that the Replacements put out, stuff like that, Dan thinking how [Paul] Westerberg totally came across to his audience and did everything, everything that the wanted to do in music. He wasn't extremely successful for it, but the guy has influenced people, and a lot of 'em don't even know that they are influenced by him. All I wanna do is just write good songs and stick to it. I wanna develop--not being experimental--but go into different styles, go across my boundaries of the two-and-a-half minute punk song with a three-and-a-half minute jazz song, or maybe get into a little bit of swing or rockabilly.

RIP: With such staggering success, you could walk into Reprise and tell 'em you're doing an album of saxophone solos and they'd allow you that creative luxury.

BJA: Well, I never wanna be that experimental. I don't wanna get into synthesizers and shit like that. The thing that was cool for me with Insomniac was that I think we definitely set a foundation for ourselves, because we put out our hardest record to date, totally in-your-face all the way through, and now we're able to go anywhere we want. We can do that now--we do have that going for us. That is, if people are still interested. Which is kinda weird for me to say....

RIP: Your craft will always remain the most important thing of all, even if you're just writing for your own amusement.

BJA: Yeah. No matter what, I'm gonna be writing songs for the rest of my life. I mean, I already have a shitload of new songs right now. But I just wanna do some other things with it. We've sold a million of Insomniac so far. But I definitely want to be respected as a musician. Well, more as a songwriter than as a musician. I wanna be f?!kin' normal, is what I wanna be. The thing is, I've seen so many freaks and so many weirdos and crazy punk rockers and drunks and junkies. But for a lot of those people being weird is easy. It's so easy to be strange--the hard thing is to try to be normal. There's no such thing as normal, ya know.

RIP: How's your mom feel about all this?

BJA: She's kinda worried about me. She doesn't know what to think of everything. We have a hard time communicating with each other, just because I don't like to talk about it that much. So she feels like she has to walk on eggshells around me all the time.

RIP: You buy her anything cool once the money started rolling in?

BJA: Nah--she doesn't want anything. I've asked her. She's been living in the same house for over 20 years, and she's content living there. But I did give her a trip--she went to Hawaii, her and her boyfriend. And I think travelling is really good--if you paid for someone to travel, so they can go and explore and see some things they've never seen before. But I think that's probably where I get it from. I get so content with not having much. And then you get all this stuff, all this attention, and you don't really know what to do with it. You don't know how to channel it.

RIP: Most outrageous thing you've bought for yourself?

BJA: I got my car primered! And one thing I did do was build a home studio. So I've been recording all my friends' bands for free. I produced this band called Dead and Gone, and Social Unrest, Fetish and the Criminals. And I have this side-project called Pinhead Gunpowder--nothing's up with it right now, but we played at the beginning of '94 a few times. RIP: Sounds like you've got more than enough pressure valves to let off the steam. Still, do you worry about death?

BJA: Yeah, I do. But I have too many reasons to stick around. One is my son and my wife. And I don't feel like I'm finished yet. I'm not done, ya know? And the beauty of it is that death is forever and your problems aren't. And that's why I'm talking about my bad shit, because you vent that, you get it off your chest and you can move on to something else. There's gotta be a positive side to all this--so you just sort of try and dig it out. Get rid of all the bad--out with the bad air, in with the good air.

RIP: You said about Green Day that you think your "bandwagon is coming to a close and all that's gonna be left is just a band. Hopefully." So then will you start writing happy songs?

BJA: I thought about writing a totally sarcastic song called "I'm So Goddamn Happy," just talking about how happy I am. Actually, I'd like to put out a double record--I'd like to put out tons of music. But I never wanna become an egomaniac. I just wanna keep things down to earth, so I think it's really important for us to take a long break after all this stuff. We just put out two records back to back, one year after another, and now we can sit back and work on ourselves as people again. So we don't parody ourselves. And it's so hard to be a father and a musician at the same time. If I get into one thing and I pay close attention to it, like if I'm with Joey and I start neglecting my music, then I feel like I should play more often. So I start playing my music, and then I'm going, "Am I neglecting Joey?" So it becomes hard to do everything at the same time.

BJA: I wanna create a very mellow and sound atmosphere for him, because I don't wanna make any mistakes for him--I want him to be able to make his own mistakes. And even when it comes to swearing--I don't cuss in front of my kid. I'd rather him get it from some dirty-mouthed kid at school. Then at least I'd know, I could go "Thank God--my kid is in a real world and he's learning these things from his surroundings." That'd be a good thing. Because the best things you ever learn are the things you learn in kindergarten.

Finally, after more than an hour worth of gut-spilling, Armstrong suddenly observes four brace-faced girls, each no more than 12 years old, idling over by the cash register. They're there on the pretext of getting change. In reality, they just want to ogle punk icon and pin-up darling Billie Joe, stare at those caterpillar eyebrows and chiselled cheekbones up close. Another oh-my-gawd event. "I gotta go--it's gettin' weird," the reluctant rocker whispers, literally leaping up from the booth. "I can feel eyeballs all over me already...." And as fast as that, he's gone. "Was that...was that...B-B-B-B-Billie Joe?" stammers one swooner. "No," says the waitress, with a subtle smile. "That was just some guy who usually eats here alone, nobody famous at all. You know, just an average guy." A little white lie to herd the young 'uns out. But nevertheless the truth.

#i know it wasn't healthy for him #but i miss when he would use interviews as free therapy #the discussion about how he hates playing bigger shows is interesting #obviously he figured it out because i think he genuinely likes playing arenas/stadiums now #i wonder how he did that #like did he get tips from other rock stars #or did he just work thru his emotional baggage about selling out #article #interview #articles

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peter-parkers-passport · 4 years

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Flower Child (Peter Parker x ofc)

Chapter 3: Strange Nights

warnings: language, depictions of anxiety, poor Lila not catching a break

To say that Lila was weirded out by the events of the night before would be a semi-inaccurate understatement. She wasn’t weirded out, to her, it was more comparable to meeting a celebrity. Like when Peter told her how he came home to Tony Stark sitting on his living room couch. Peter Parker walking through her house felt like playing out something that was supposed to stay in her head. And her dad was definitely not part of the picture.

Regardless, her dad made tomato basil as promised, and got acquainted with the boy Lila had been secretly crushing on for forever. Lila picked out a record from her mom’s collection (Sheer Heart Attack from Queen’s repertoire) and they all enjoyed the conversation that lasted through the evening. And for a while, Lila merely observed the two of them talking about a wide variety of topics. Content with only piping in here and there, it wasn’t until Peter started talking about Tony Stark’s clean energy initiative that Lila really started investing herself in the conversation. It was something she and her dad had talked about countless times, trying to incorporate several of Stark’s inventions into their store to minimize their carbon footprint. Peter listened with great and genuine interest, pitching several ideas to Ted and Lila about how to better involve the clean energy they wished to use. Dinner ended with Ted jotting notes down on a legal notepad as Peter spoke rather excitedly.

When it was time to do the dishes, it was mentioned that Peter’s aunt was May Parker, the woman the Landry family volunteered with on Sundays down at one of the local homeless shelters in Queens. Peter smiled a small, proud smile as Ted talked about how amazing her work was in the Queens community, how she was instrumental in keeping everyone close and friendly with each other. Almost bashfully, Peter repeatedly said thanks, knowing May would be thrilled to hear that. He was politely insistent that he help clean everything up, and it became an assembly line of dishwashing. Ted washed, Peter dried, and Lila placed them in the dishwasher. Lila thought the night was ending, until Peter asked if she had Mr. Puth for AP Literature. Peter missed the homework assignment for that day, and wondered if Lila had it written down somewhere. Which she did, it was in her planner, which was in her backpack, which was in her bedroom since they got home.

She anxiously led Peter down the hallway, furiously blushing as her dad mouthed to her to keep the door open, and walked into her bedroom. She silently thanked the Asgardians that she made her bed and pick up her room that morning before school. Peter looked around the room with a polite interest, noting the brick wall, the bed, the large desk, even larger bookshelf, and the record player perched in between. “You guys seem to really like record players,” He noted, walking further into the room. He could smell the faint notes of the candle that sat on Lila’s desk, and it didn’t go unnoticed the picture of the beautiful woman that matched all the other pictures around their house. This one was different, she had a little girl perched in her lap, both elegantly dressed, and they were looking at each other like they had the funniest secret between them in the whole world. When Peter looked back to Lila, he saw she was looking at the same picture.

“Yeah, my - my mom and dad kind of bonded over that stuff. I g-grew up on the sound, since they both had an extensive collection. And when records started coming back, I started building my own. It was - it was a way to feel closer to my mom.” She walked over to her bookshelf, where an entire shelf was dedicated to vinyl records. She pulled one out, smiling softly at the cover, and placed a record on the player. Soon, soft notes of trumpets filled the room. She then went over to her desk, where her backpack was sitting in her chair, very aware of Peter still looking around her room. In her mind, she was going over any and everything that could possibly be judged. Part of the reason why she kept her room minimally decorated was so she could avoid that-

“You’re into photography?”

Lila’s head whirled around, back to the bookshelf where Peter now stood. He held her camera in his hands, observing the model and its features as well. She blushed, gripping her planner tightly. “Yeah, uh - just a hobby. I like - I like looking back at how much New York’s changed just over the c-course of my life.”

“Do you mind?” Peter held up the camera, asking if he could look through her photos. She shook her head and invited him to sit down on her bed. She sat down on her desk chair and watched with bated breath as he looked through all her pictures. It wasn’t something she was embarrassed of, or felt they were very private, but she knew that Peter was an avid photographer, and felt that they were on too different of skill levels to be comparing each other’s work. Yet again, Lila was surprised by Peter’s kindness, for he smiled at every picture she took. “These pictures are really… happy. All of them.”

He looked back up at her, silently asking for an explanation. She shrugged, sighing as she thought about it. “Yeah, well, some photographers capitalize on pain, and anguish, and stuff that really m-matters. I guess... I think people sometimes forget that h-happiness matters too. I know all about - about anguish, and pain, and - and sadness. S-So I think it’s important to remember that happiness happens all around us. And I take happy pictures so I - so I remember that.” A look that Lila couldn’t read ran through Peter’s eyes, before a smile took over his features.

The pair spent the next hour talking about random topics before Peter had to leave. They were so wrapped up in their conversation that Peter almost forgot to get the homework assignment from Lila. And Lila didn’t even realize that her stutter lessened significantly over the course of the pair talking to each other.

*****

“One black coffee,” Lila declared as she held out a thermos to Michelle. She found her friend at the foot of the stairs, her hands moving across the pages of her sketchbook as she took on the morning scene. MJ glanced up, eyeing the coffee suspiciously, like Lila had slipped arsenic in it just because. She then looked up to Lila, who sighed, “My dad made some this morning. Apparently, he’s scheduled to provide arrangements for a charity event with the Osborn’s, and has to get started on it today. I asked him to save you some.” Michelle merely stared at Lila, and she took it as a need to fill the silence. “I didn’t have any, okay? I had some Earl Grey this morning.” A skeptical raise of the eyebrow made a huff pass Lila’s lips. “It was decaf.”

“It’s just that the last time-”

“I’m well aware of the last time I had caffeine,” Lila stated grumpily as Michelle took the thermos from her, savoring the drink. She was with Lila that Saturday in April, when Lila’s anxiety had taken a turn for the worse. It was nearing the anniversary of her mother’s death, and Lila was feeling not at all like herself. Michelle suggested coffee and a bookstore, trying to get her mind off of her troubles when she realized that it was a mistake. She’d left for a few minutes to look at sketchbooks when she found Delilah sobbing over a kitten calendar. Realizing that the caffeine probably only made things worse for her, Michelle made Lila promise that she’d cut it out of her life entirely. Lila agreed wholeheartedly, and hadn’t touched it since.

A honk sounded from behind them, and Lila turned around in time to see Peter narrowly avoid being hit by Flash Thompson’s expensive car. He greeted Peter in his usual fashion (“Sup, Penis Parker!”), and drove around to the parking lot. Silently cursing Flash out, and making sure to make their next tutoring session extra difficult, her eyes once again landed on Peter. She saw as he clenched his jaw, and took out his headphones. Walking over to the stairs, she gathered up her courage to say, “Good morning, Peter,” as he walked by her. He glanced to the side, and smiled softly at Lila, not forgetting what she told him about Flash yesterday. He waved to her, then to Michelle, and headed inside. Lila turned back around and looked to Michelle, blushing as she noticed MJ watching the whole interaction. “That was what the coffee was for.”

Michelle took a sip, “It was for Peter?”

“No, no, it was for you,” Lila tightened her ponytail before resting her hands on the straps of her backpack. She waited for Michelle to put her things away before heading up the stairs with her friend and into the school. “I just wanted to say thanks for pushing me to talk to Peter.”

“I didn’t push you to do anything of the sort. Talking to high school boys is pointless.” MJ’s locker was the closest to the two of them, and she pulled out everything she needed for her morning classes. She silently handed back the coffee to Lila to hold and placed her bag into her locker before shutting it. Taking the coffee from Lila, they headed down the hallway to her locker, so she could get ready for the day as well.

Lila smiled, knowing that Michelle had her quirks, and had her ways of being there for Lila, though she’d never outright admit it. This was one of them. “Thanks for knowing it’s not - it’s not pointless to me.” All she got in return was a nod.

*****

The next time Michelle showed that she was there for Lila was during lunch, when the two of them sat at the end of a table. On the opposite side were Peter and his friend, Ned Leeds, another boy Lila knew from academic decathlon. Michelle hadn’t taken her eyes off of her book save to drink out of her milk carton. Lila was working on her homework, occasionally eating some of the veggies and hummus she’d packed. She usually would’ve been editing something or other for Sophie’s podcast, or helping her dad with certain orders for the shops, but Liz Allan had mentioned that Lila might need to practice some more with the other teammates for nationals. She did an excellent job the day before, but Liz wanted to make sure she could be competitive in every aspect of what they were likely to be tested on. So there she sat, working on calculus homework across from her best friend.

Speaking of Liz Allan, she was busy working across the cafeteria, setting up homecoming posters and banners alike around the room. Lila would’ve thought nothing of it, but then Peter and Ned had to start talking to each other. Glancing over at the pair of them, they were sat next to each other rather than across like Lila and Michelle, and they both had awestruck expressions on their faces. Following their gaze back to Liz, Lila’s stomach sank. “Did Liz get a new top?”

“No,” Ned answered easily. “We’ve seen that before, but never with that skirt.” The pair of them and Lila looked back over at Liz, who was sporting a very preppy sweater and jean skirt, paired with white high tops. There was nothing remotely outstanding about Liz’s cute outfit, but Lila couldn’t help but start feeling uncomfortable in her soft sweater and jeans, wondering why she didn’t start wearing cuter clothes…

“We should stop staring before it gets creepy, though,” Peter suggested, still not taking his eyes off Liz.

Michelle, who noticed Lila’s grip on her pencil tighten significantly, but otherwise showed no outward signs of distress or discomfort, looked over to the two boys. “Too late,” She said. The boys looked over to her and Lila, who was also looking at Michelle with a confused expression on her face. “You guys are losers.” If she felt the kick that Lila landed to her shin, she didn’t show it. She simply turned back to her book.

“But, then why do you sit with us?” Ned asked.

Looking back up at them, Michelle answered, “Because I don’t have any friends.”

If the boys weren’t bewildered before, they sure were at that statement. Both pairs of eyes slid to Lila, who still had a slightly wide-eyed look. A pale pink sat on her cheeks when they both looked at her until Ned looked back at Michelle. “I thought Lila was your friend.”

“Is she?” Michelle didn’t even bother to look up from her book at that statement. Peter and Ned both looked back to Lila, who merely offered a shrug in response. She was about to say something to them when her phone buzzed with a text from Sophie. She saw the time displayed on her phone and realized she had to leave if she wanted to talk to one of her teachers about some of the homework. She started putting everything away, but not before tapping Michelle’s foot with her own, much more gently this time, as a way of saying thanks for supporting her when she was letting her mind and her jealousy get the best of her. Then she scurried off out of the cafeteria.

*****

“Next question,” Liz said, staring between the two tables perched on the stage. She stood in front of them, note cards on her stand as she read them off. “What is the heaviest naturally-occurring element?”

Sat at one of the two tables were Abraham and Cindy, then Ned and Charles. Lila sat next to Michelle at the edge of the stage, both reading different books. Lila’s was still for school, while MJ’s was merely for fun. Although, she wasn’t sure how Of Human Bondage would be a book to read for fun, but who was Lila to judge. Charles, a boy with big glasses and an even bigger sense of humor, rang the bell on his table. “Hydrogen’s the lightest,” He answered confidently, before adding, “That’s not the question. Okay, yeah,” He went back to look at his notes, but the other table rang the bell. “Uranium!” Abraham answered, and Liz nodded approvingly.

“That is correct. Thank you, Abraham.” Abraham had a smug look on his face as they turned back to their notes. Lila’s gaze flickered over from Liz to Flash, who was sitting with his feet propped up and was reading what looked like a comic book. She saw Sally laying on the floor, feet in the air as she worked on her own homework. “Please open your books to page ten.”

Then finally, Lila’s stare caught on to Peter, talking in a hushed voice to Mr. Harrington. “... Because if Mr. Stark needs me, I have to make sure I’m here.”

“You’ve never even been in the same room as Tony Stark,” Flash said from across the way, the degrading tone of his voice not sitting well with Lila. It never did. The way Peter tensed, Lila could tell it didn’t sit well with him either. That made her feel worse.

“Wait. What’s happening?” Cindy asked, taking everyone’s attention and putting it on Peter and Mr. Harrington.

Sally answered, “Peter’s not coming to Washington.”

Everyone felt a tinge of dread. Peter was one of their strongest assets on the team, and everyone remembered how he dominated the physics question that stumped everyone else in a competition last year. Cindy was just the first to vocalize her dismay. “What? No, no, no, no, no.”

Abraham rang the bell. “Why not?”

“Really?” Liz added, trying her best to be nice but her disappointment came through over much else. “Right before nationals?”

“He already quit marching band and robotics lab,” Michelle pointed out, to everyone’s confusion. The only person who wasn’t confused was right next to her, and her eyes got big. Lila panicked briefly, for everyone started to stare at Michelle for saying that out loud, wondering why she knew that. She looked at her teammates at the tables, who were all unashamedly looking her way, waiting for her to elaborate. “I’m not obsessed with him, just very observant.”

It did little to comfort her teammates, but Lila blew out a breath of relief. She was the one who mentioned all of that to Michelle in passing. She said it just to talk about it, not caring if Michelle was really listening. Lila supposed it was a little comforting to know that MJ did, in fact, actually listen to her when she talked from time to time. But then her mind shifted back into worry, wondering why Peter decided he needed to quit the team when he’d already given Mr. Harrington a permission slip to go with them all to Washington.

“Flash, you’re in for Peter,” Liz said, giving one last pointed look to Peter before returning to her cards.

Flash shook his head, not looking up from his comic. “Oof, I don’t know. I’ve gotta check my calendar first. I’ve got a hot date with Black Widow coming up.”

A bell was rung, followed by Abraham’s voice. “That is false.”

“What did I tell you about using the bell for comedic purposes?” Mr. Harrington scolded, before resignedly telling Peter it was okay for missing. The rest of the team went back to their normal practices, interchanging people who sat at the tables so that everyone (except for Peter) could get a chance to practice. Lila was improving, even managing to answer a few questions herself, which Liz praised highly. And at the end of their time, Liz pulled Lila aside and told her how great of a job she was doing.

She would’ve felt proud of herself, but Lila noticed Peter slip out before most of the kids could get their stuff. She sent a quiet thanks to Liz before following him out of the door. The bell overhead rang, and students started leaving their classrooms, making the hallway noisy again. She caught up to Peter, feeling a sense of déjà vu that she had to ignore. Like always, Peter seemed to sense that Lila was right behind him, for he turned around. He was looking relatively impatient, and that made Lila feel more nervous about talking to him. “P-Peter.”

“What’s up, Lila?”

She couldn’t beat around the bush, for she was starting to see patterns that she herself struggled to avoid for years. “I just - I just wanted to make sure you’re o-okay.” She saw him tense up slightly, not making herself gain more confidence. “I know we’re not - we’re not really that c-close or anything, but you - you seem kind of off.”

It was Peter’s turn to seem kind of nervous. Scratching at the back of his head, he looked down at Lila. “Really? How - how do you figure?”

“Quitting marching band, q-quitting robotics lab, and now - and now the decathlon. I don’t-” Lila swallowed, knowing that if she could help, she had to do her best. “ - I don’t want to overstep any b-boundaries by asking this but, would any of this - any of this h-have to do with - with your Uncle Ben?”

Peter’s eyes widened in understanding, and he shook his head. “Oh, no, it’s not-”

But Lila was on too much of a roll to stop. “B-Because when my mom died, I quit a - a lot of stuff, t-too. I sh-shut myself off from a lot of things that could’ve r-really helped me - helped me cope. And I just want t-to make sure that you’re doing okay-” Peter put his hands on her shoulders, not knowing how else to interrupt her. But it instantly shut her up.

Peter retracted his hands, smiling softly. “Thanks, Lila. It’s not that. I’m just - I want my internship to lead to a real job someday, so I’ve been taking more time to focus on that instead. You know, picking up extra jobs over there, it’s just taking a lot more of my time.”

Lila nodded. “I get it, my dad’s shop takes up a lot of my time. And I really like helping out over there, so I get it. Just - just make sure you soak up your t-time in high school, being a k-kid. It isn’t a-all so bad.”

He seemed to think about it, Peter’s smile growing a bit bigger. “I’ll be sure to do that. Thanks again, Lila.”

“S-Sorry you couldn’t make it to Washington,” She said before waving goodbye to Peter.

*****

“Ugh, my brain has been chucked in the deep fryer, Lila. Not even the Avengers are gonna be able to save me.” Sophie folded her arms on top of the counter and rest her head, shutting her eyes in exhaustion. Lila stared on in amusement, before turning back to her corner of the store and continuing to sweep. Collecting the scattered soil and placing it in the trash bin, she walked over to where Sophie was sprawled out and stood across from her in a motherly manner. Checking the clock, she realized she had every right to.

It read half-past seven, half an hour after the store closed for the evening. “Don’t you have, like, a giant test this week?”

“Friday,” Sophie groaned, not even moving from her spot.

Lila clenched the broom handle tighter and sighed. She was by no means a bossy person, it didn’t ever sit well with her, but when it came to taking care of the people she loved, Lila spared no expense. “And you told me you hadn’t even edited your next Origin Story. That’s supposed to be up on Saturday.” Sophie lifted her head from her arms to glare at Lila. Ignoring it, Lila set the broom down and placed her hands on the counter. “Look, why don’t you just go home? You can send me the file for your episode and I’ll do the editing before Saturday. You need to study for your test.”

Sophie stood up straight, suddenly looking unsure. “But our dinner-”

“Let’s just save it for when I get back from the decathlon trip, and you’re done with your test. Y-You should go, Soph, I can close up shop. I’ve done it before.” Normally, it would’ve taken considerably more of an effort, but deep down, Lila knew Sophie was desperate. With a touch more goading, and assuring her that she would be fine to be by herself, Sophie left the store. Lila turned her phone’s music on as loud as it could go, and began wiping down the countertops. She then locked all of the necessary cabinets and doors before spritzing a few bouquets with a bit of water. Grabbing her backpack and putting her headphones in, Lila set the store’s alarm and left, locking the doors behind her. Checking the time, she noticed it was still before eight, and her stomach let out a low growl in protest of canceling her dinner with Sophie.

Lila walked to the corner, where Delmar’s bodega was thankfully still open. Taking her headphones out of her ears, she ventured into the empty shop, the chime of the bell signaling her entrance and echoing through the space. She heard a soft mewl come from the far side of the counter, and Lila eagerly walked over to pet the large cat. “Hey, Murph,” She cooed quietly, scratching behind the cat’s ears. His head leaned into her hand, and a soft purr tickled her fingers as they moved to scratch his chin. She almost didn’t hear Mr. Delmar walk into the room from the back, but as he did so, she glanced up and smiled softly.

“Lila Landry, a pleasure as always.” Mr. Delmar grinned at the girl. She returned the greeting, and strode along the outskirts of the store, picking up some toothpaste for her dad, which she knew he was running out of. She came back up to the front counter and ordered a sandwich to go. Mr. Delmar rang her up, a stern glint in his eyes. “Little late for you to be out. Shouldn’t you be at home?”

“I had to close up shop tonight, Sophie’s got a huge test this week,” Lila answered, scratching her wrist after she handed Mr. Delmar cash. She watched him count it out and open his till, preparing to say something else to her. However, Lila beat him to the punch. “Dad��s working late in Man-Manhattan tonight, the Ritz is apparently hosting the Osborn’s for some benefit tomorrow. And he wanted to get the final touch-ups in tonight.” It was effective enough to silence Mr. Delmar’s further questions, not that he really doubted her. She was more than capable of taking care of herself, and he knew that more than most.

After handing back the correct change to Lila, Mr. Delmar stated he’d head to the back to make the sandwich she’d ordered. Leaving her to her own devices, Lila quickly pulled out her phone and began unraveling her headphones and walking slowly around the store. She’d started placing the designated earbuds in each correct ear when she happened to look outside of Mr. Delmar’s shop. Catty-corner to the deli was a bank, which was usually closed before Landry’s was on weekdays.

Usually.

This time, when Lila looked over at the bank, it was full of people, as well as money flying everywhere. It reminded her for a brief moment of one of those machines that were at arcades, where tickets would fly up in a glass cage and the person inside would have to grab as many tickets within the time allotted. Only this time, the glass cage held four men with Avengers masks, and Spider-Man, who was being thrown around by a device of the likes Lila had never seen before. It was emitting a bluish light, and held Spider-Man in a suspended state that he seemed to struggle to get out of. Lila watched as another one of the men in a mask grabbed a shotgun, and she felt her blood go cold.

“Mr. Delmar!” She called with urgency, and she heard him stop working on her sandwich. “C-call 9-1-1, there’s - there’s… I don’t kn-know.” She saw Mr. Delmar in the corner of her vision stand next to her and observe what she had been staring at. Mr. Delmar was quicker to react than she was, and immediately yanked her back away from the glass doors. He rounded the counter and reached for the telephone that was charging in the corner. Dialing the police, he looked at Lila and sharply told her to stay away from the windows while he waited to be connected.

He nodded slightly when an operator picked up his call. He stepped closer to the doors to get a better look at what was going on and relayed what was going on into the phone. “Uh - Spider-Man is fighting the Avengers in a bank on 21st Street… No, no, they’re wearing masks that look like the Avengers… Do they have - yes, they are carrying weapons… I don’t… they’re robbing an ATM and there’s money everywhere-” He didn’t even have time to yell out in surprise when a vivid purple light shone through all the windows. Lila saw the light grow brighter before it crashed into Delmar’s, shattering the glass and making several things explode. The smell of smoke and dust filled her senses before a heavy shelf to the left collapsed on top of her, sending her small frame to the floor. A flare of pain radiated in her side before a rack of gummy worms went tumbling down, the edge of it hitting her in the head and knocking her out cold.

*****

By the time the laser had shut off, Peter was already sprinting towards the deli that was currently up in flames. Leaping over a pile of rubble, Peter glanced around, urgently looking for anyone in the store. “Hey, Mr. Delmar, you in here? Is anybody in here? Hello?” He didn’t have to search much longer, for Mr. Delmar was tucked in the corner, coughing on his share of smoke. Peter rushed over to him, throwing an arm around his shoulders and hoisting him upright. Before Peter left, he noticed a ball of fur trembling under an overturned table. He swept Mr. Delmar’s cat up in his free arm, and rushed the pair out of the building.

Peter helped Mr. Delmar to the streetlamp just outside his deli, where he proceeded to cough violently as he breathed in the clean air. Peter kept trying to give him his cat when Mr. Delmar gripped onto his shoulder tightly. Due to the inability to form complete sentences while his lungs filtered out the smoke and dust, Peter couldn’t really understand what Mr. Delmar was trying to say. Leaning closer, he heard Mr. Delmar say, “Lila.”

“Lila?”

“Lila, she… closed her dad’s shop… came in for… still inside… Lila…” Peter’s blood ran cold. Staring down the street, he saw the darkened sign of Landry’s Flowers, remembering that it was merely a few doors down and realizing just what Mr. Delmar meant when he mentioned a Lila. Without hesitating, Peter shoved the cat into Mr. Delmar’s arms before heading back into the burning building.

“Delilah!” Peter shouted, coughing slightly as the smoke began to creep into his throat. His suit was clearing the building of any other people possibly present when his eyes came upon a figure on the ground. Surging forward, Peter saw her honey-colored hair before he saw her face, and noticed a large shelf covering most of her small figure. He lifted the shelf off of her, barely reading the screen in his suit explaining her head was injured due to another object hitting it, or that she had some kind of injury on her side. Once everything was clear around her, he gently shook her shoulder in an attempt to make sure she wasn’t as gravely hurt as it appeared.

After a few seconds of yelling her name and shaking her shoulder, Lila’s face scrunched up before she let out several coughs. She did her best to roll over onto her back, but she merely groaned in pain. Opening her eyes and blinking rapidly to stop them burning from the smoke, they landed on Peter in surprise. He leaned over her, subconsciously clearing the hair from her face. “Are you okay? Mr. Delmar, he - he told me you were in here. Can you stand up, Miss?”

“Lila,” She corrected, her voice laced with discomfort due to the pain taking over most of her attention. “I can’t - I can’t get up by myself. I need - it hurts.” Peter did his best to gently turn her over before he thrust an arm under her legs and another around her shoulders, carefully lifting her off the ground. It was slightly awkward, for her backpack was still on her back, but Peter managed to ignore it thanks to the multiple whimpers she let out. He tried not to cringe at the pained expression she wore, nor did he try and let the guilt settle in his stomach either. He should’ve been more careful-

“Mr. Delmar-” She started as Peter carried her out, but the man in question was already there, helping Lila stand up as Peter set her down. He stared at her for a few seconds and how she clutched her side while she coughed, but for the most part, she was intact. He stared back over at the bank, seeing the broken glass everywhere, but no sign of any of the bank robbers. Throwing his head back in exasperation, Peter sighed. He turned back around to double-check on Lila and Mr. Delmar, hearing the sirens of police cars creep closer and closer. Knowing that they would be just fine was all Peter needed before he was off, swinging down the street in the opposite direction, already calling Happy Hogan with information on the technology in the weapons used against him.

It did occur to him at some point that saving Lila Landry was the closest Peter had ever come to his two lives intersecting. The thought left him uneasy, and he was grateful to be in and out before anything could come of it. Just another close call for Peter. That is, until he came home, where his best friend found him crawling on the ceiling.

#spider-man #peter parker #spider-man fic #peter parker fic #spider-man x ofc #peter parker x ofc #mcu #mcu x ofc #marvel x ofc #slow burn #mine

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the-master-cylinder · 4 years

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SUMMARY Andrew Norris is the new music teacher at a troubled inner city school. As he arrives on his first day, he meets fellow teacher Terry Corrigan, who is carrying a gun. When Andrew asks about the firearm, Terry assures him he will learn why the protection is necessary. When they enter the school, Andrew is shocked to see everyone scanned by metal detectors and frisked. He spots a student with a knife, but the security guards let the kid go because they are so overworked.

The halls of the school are covered with graffiti. Andrew learns he is expected to patrol the halls as a security guard during his off periods. In his first class, a group of five disruptive students are roughhousing and causing trouble. The leader of the gang is Peter Stegman, the only member of the group who is actually registered in that class. They all eventually walk out, and Andrew discovers the rest of the students actually want to learn, especially Arthur, who plays the trumpet, and Deneen, who plays the clarinet.

As Andrew gets to know the school and the area, he decides that he wants to put together an orchestra with his more advanced students. Peter’s gang sells drugs, run a strip club, and cause all kinds of mayhem. They follow Andrew home and taunt him one night.

At school, Andrew is confronted with more and more evidence of Peter’s crimes. The two grow increasingly at odds. Eventually, after Stegman killed Terry’s animals in his lab, Andrew and Stegman wind up in a bathroom alone together. Peter throws himself into a mirror and beats himself, claiming that Andrew attacked him. Trying to clear things up, Andrew visits Peter’s mother at home. Frustrated when Peter still plays the victim and his mother will not hear Andrew out, he hotwires Peter’s car and drives it into a wall. During lunch, Stegman’s gang start a “food fight” and force their friend Vinnie to stab Arthur, which he does so and causes him to be sent to a hospital. Vinnie is arrested and held in a youth detention center. Terry is driven insane after the incident with the animals in his lab and is killed after crashing his car when trying to kill Stegman and the others.

Andrew’s orchestra is about to give its first concert. As his wife Diane gets ready at home, Peter’s gang breaks into the house and gang rapes her. One of them takes a Polaroid of her being raped and has it delivered to Andrew on the podium, just as he is about to start the concert. Horrified by the photo, he runs off the podium in pursuit of Peter’s gang. Andrew and the gang chase each other through the school. Andrew kills them off one by one, and finally confronts Peter on the roof. Their last scuffle ends with Peter falling through a skylight and getting tangled to his death in the ropes above the stage. His corpse falls into full view of the audience as his neck is broken by one of the ropes. Andrew is never charged because the police could not find a witness to the crime.

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Interview with Director Mark L. Lester

What was the initial inspiration for Class of 1984? Mark L. Lester: I was visiting my old high school, and I noticed there were gangs walking around with no shirts, really tough kids, and the whole school had changed. Then I started to do some investigating, and found that there were some schools, just a couple, that were starting with security and checking for guns. I thought, “Boy, that’d be a good idea for a movie,” and started researching violence in high schools. Over about a year, I came up with the story.

I read that the dialogue the detective (Al Waxman) has is verbatim from interviews you did with cops while researching the film. Mark L. Lester: Yes, I went to a police station and talked to the juvenile officer; I described a case like this and the scenes in the movie—“What would you do?” I just copied his answers down and put them in the script.

Mark L. Lester

Psycho II and Fright Night’s Tom Holland has story and co-screenplay credit; were there significant differences between his draft and what wound up on screen? Mark L. Lester: There was an additional writer [Barry Schneider] who didn’t take credit, but we worked on making it more like A Clockwork Orange, with the dialogue. None of that was in Tom Holland’s script, so we rewrote it to be more like Clockwork Orange, where the gang talked in their own kind of language. And then there was a large punk element added, because that movement was just taking hold in England. I got the costuming and the whole flavor of the punks from that, from British magazines and so forth.

How difficult was it to find a school to shoot in? I imagine a lot of high schools would object to a movie like this filming in their hallways. Mark L. Lester: Well, that was Toronto’s Central High. We shot it during the summertime, so the school was available. We did put graffiti on the walls and it was very hard to get it off, so when the kids came back to school, all the graffiti was still there. It caused quite a stir.

How did you wind up casting Perry King as Andy Norris? Mark L. Lester: I just interviewed him; I had seen him in Bad, the Andy Warhol film. But when it came time to do the scene in the wood shop, it was a mini-revolt. He said, “No, I can’t kill a kid on a table saw! That’s too gruesome, with the blood splattering on my face… That’s beyond anything I could do.” I said, “But Perry, don’t you remember, you boiled that slave alive in Mandingo!” He said, “Oh, that’s rightI guess it’s OK then.”

How about Roddy McDowall? He’s terrific as Corrigan. Mark L. Lester: I just knew him from Planet of the Apes and had always wanted to work with him. So I asked him to do it, and he was fantastic.

McDowall drove the car himself for the scene where Corrigan tries to run Stegman down. Was that his choice? Mark L. Lester: I was gonna use a stuntperson, but he said, “No, no, I want to drive, and I’m gonna drive really crazy.” I got in the back seat to do the sound, and he just took off and started driving insane, right up to the crash point. It was unbelievable; he was swerving all over the road.

So he didn’t have any qualms about the film’s violence? Mark L. Lester: No, he was a real professional. Everyone wanted to be involved in a hip, young movie that was different, and cutting-edge at the time. Even Lalo Schifrin, who was considered a very prestigious composer, wanted to do it, and he brought in Alice Cooper to do the theme song (“I Am the Future”).

That was quite an odd match of musical talents… Mark L. Lester: Yeah… Schifrin brought in a guy named Gary Osborne to write the song with him, and brought Alice Cooper in to perform it, and he did a really good job.

Another musical highlight is when Stegman surprises Andy by playing a piano concerto in his class. According to the credits, Van Patten wrote that piece himself. Mark L. Lester: That’s right. I was going to use another piece of music, and then he said, “No, no, let me use my own.”

How did Van Patten wind up being cast? Mark L. Lester: I saw him on a TV show, The White Shadow. He was playing a bad kidnot like he does in this movie, but he was perfect. This is his best work ever as an actor; he actually directs now. And Michael J. Fox I saw on TV also; it must have been Palmerstown, U.S.A. I hired him based on that, and it was only his second feature film.

Merrie Lynn Ross, who plays Andy’s wife, was also a producer on Class. How did that come about? Mark L. Lester: She put up some money for the film. I had worked with her before; she was in Bobbie Jo and the Outlaw for me.

It’s interesting that she would help with the financing of a movie in which she’s so rudely treated on screen… Mark L. Lester: Yeah, but she never complained. She’s not naked in [the rape scene], she’s fully clothed… Also, the Canadian producer, Arthur Kent, became the “Scud Stud.” During the first Gulf War with George Bush, he was the guy reporting for the TV news on the rooftop [from the war zone), and became known as the “Scud Stud.” Then he protested a dangerous assignment and started picketing the network that was Arthur Kent.

Your stunt coordinator was Terry J. Leonard, who had just done Conan the Barbarian and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Were there any stunt scenes that posed particular challenges? Mark L. Lester: In those days, there was no CGI, so the whole ending on the rooftop was actually a stunt guy crashing through glass and right into the auditorium. We flipped a car in another scene—but the movie revolved a lot more around the thriller aspects than any big stunts, so in that sense, it was different from films today. It didn’t rely on big action gags through the whole movie, it relied on the suspense of the teacher and what was going to happen to him.

Speaking of potentially injurious situations, you’ve said that a lot of extras in the club were real punk kids. Mark L. Lester: Yeah, I actually held auditions for them. They came in and were all handpicked; they had to have certain hairdos and all that, so it was very carefully done. And then they were really slam-dancing hard into people, hurting them, and we had to carry a few people out of there!

As far as the staged mayhem goes, were there concerns about the film’s violent content while you were shooting it? Mark L. Lester: I didn’t have any, but later on it was banned in certain countries, like Switzerland. It was considered too controversial, with the teacher killing the kids like that. But the wood-shop scene became the biggest crowd-pleaser of the movie. When the teacher and the boy go at it with the table saw, the audience just went wild every time that scene played; they couldn’t wait to see him kill that kid.

Class of 1984 was released in the U.S. by United Film Distribution, which had sent out movies like Dawn of the Dead and Mother’s Day unrated. Was there ever talk of releasing Class the same way? Mark L. Lester: No, they wanted to cut down the table-saw scene and a bunch of others, and it ended up getting an R rating. But the funny thing is, by mistake the prints ended up getting struck with the X version; those were the ones that got released, and no one ever questioned it.

The film got widely mixed reviews when it first came out-but surprisingly, one of the raves was from Roger Ebert, who was on a tear against “dead teenager” movies at the time. Mark L. Lester: Yeah, Ebert really kicked things off; he saw it at the Cannes Film Festival and gave it a great review. About half the reviews overall were great, and then some people didn’t like the violence and so forth. Newsweek was a bad review, Time was a good review, the New York papers liked it-and it did huge business.

Did you think that when you made this way back in the day, that it would have reached cult-status, much like it has now? Mark L. Lester: No, I had no idea that it would take off like it did, although until it opened, it was very controversial when it came out. It was in Time Magazine, and Ronald Reagan once had a speech about education, and they put the pictures from the movie into an editorial, and it had such controversial press, so it took off back then, and at the beginning of the film, I’d put a warning to the country that this would happen, the future couldn’t get much worse I don’t have the EXACT wording.

“Class of 1984” is not a great movie but it works with quiet, strong efficiency to achieve more or less what we expect from a movie with such a title. It is violent, funny, scary, contains boldly outlined characters, and gets us involved. It also has a lot of style. One of the reasons for the film’s style may be that it was made by people who knew what they were doing. …It tells a strong, simple story. It is acted well. It is not afraid to be comic at times and, even better, it’s not afraid at the end to pull out all the stops and give us the sort of Grand Guignol conclusion that the slasher movies always botch. You may or may not think it’s any good, but you’ll have to admit that it works. Roger Ebert – CLASS OF 1984 (1982) January 1, 1982

Interview with Actress Lisa Langlois

Class of 1984, you played Patsy the Punk. A completely different character…as rotten-of-an-apple as you can get. Was it fun to be vicious and terrorizing rather than terrorized? Lisa Langlois: Well, it’s so much more interesting. Although understand, they brought me in to play the nice girl, Michael J. Fox’s girlfriend. I went in and they told me they really saw me in that part. I said, “You know what? Would you just let me come back dressed and acting like the other character?” I explained that I grew up with four brothers. I’ve been around a lot of their friends and I’ve seen these kinds of tough people. I know how to do it. So I came back in, did the role and they loved it.

You really stand out in that film. How much of your characterization was in the original script? Lisa Langlois: I’ve gotta tell you…there was really not a lot of dialogue for me in that film. Everything that I did was improv and they kept it in the final cut. That’s what I liked about the director, Mark Lester. He didn’t have an ego about you throwing a line in or some business. He loved it.

What was the experience like for you making Class of 1984? Lisa Langlois: Not good. One was that all the Canadians (not the Americans) got asked to work for scale. They said they would give us a buyout later because they didn’t really have the money to make this film. And then the movie became this big hit and none of us ever got paid any residuals for television or video, etc. The extras really got mistreated. They hardly got paid. They got peanut butter and jam sandwiches. That scene where the girl takes her clothes off in front of the punks…that was really hard to do. It involved real acting for Tim Van Patton and me because she didn’t want to do that scene. She didn’t want to take her clothes off. She was shaking.

It reminded me of what happened to me in Phobia. You get intimidated and you don’t want to make waves. You’re young. You want people to like you. And they make it sound like it’s no big deal. That poor girl was literally shaking. I remember it was so sad, my makeup artist was making her up and I was sitting next to her. She told the girl, “Don’t worry, I’ll make you up so that no one will recognize you.” And I thought, that’s NOT just the issue. It doesn’t matter whether someone can see your face…in front of everybody, you’re taking your clothes off! Right. Timothy and I were talking about how uncomfortable we were with that. He said something to Mark because that guy was a gentleman. I just loved him.

There’s an almost lascivious nature to your character Patsy in that scene with the naked girl…almost lesbianic…? Lisa Langlois: That was an acting choice I made. Like I mentioned, I made the choices with Patsy because in the script she was just…standing there. That was one of my complaints. We had this really terrific stunt coordinator with Terry Leonard, and he never gave me anything to do in the fight scenes. Nothing. I decided I would be this character who’s really perverted in that I got off on sex and violence. What I would do is, when they were beating people up, I would jump up and down, and dance around. And when someone had to take their clothes off, I would get excited.

Tim was generally unhappy on this shoot. At the time, the movie was very violent. To me, it seemed so surreal and over-the-top and exaggerated because where I came from, I could never imagine kids behaving like that in school or having to go through metal detectors to get into class. Again, it was the wild, wild west we talked about earlier. The punk rockers that were hired to be extras…they weren’t really extras, they were real punks.

Did they cause any problems on the set? Lisa Langlois: Well, for me personally, they knew I wasn’t a real punk rocker. I had my hair purple, pink and some other colors. So a) they knew I was an actor and not one of them, and b) they didn’t appreciate me wearing a dress. Several times, I had punk rocker women come up to me and say, “We’re gonna get you…”

That’s awful! Lisa Langlois: Mark really wanted reality. It would have made more sense for me to have a wig than to dye my hair all those colors anyway. It was hell getting my hair to look normal again. But I was terrified. You won’t notice in the movie, but whenever there were big scenes like in a club or whatever, you wouldn’t see me. Because I would literally disappear.

For your own safety… Lisa Langlois: Yes. I was afraid. When they were slamming people, they were actually doing it. It was for real. They were really hitting each other. The punk extras got off on it.

Lester has talked in documentaries about going out and finding these punks for the film. Lisa Langlois: It wasn’t well thought out for the actors. It wasn’t taking care of us. I was afraid because I knew there was no protection on that set.

Did the female punks consider you a poser? Lisa Langlois: I think that would be the term you would use now. They just felt I was a fraud, I guess you would say. We were embarrassed to be in that film and it ended up being this big, big hit.

What did you think when you saw the finished product? Lisa Langlois: I didn’t go see it for a long time. However, I remember my mother saying that it was the quintessential moment for her when she knew I had done a good job as an actress. Because she was in a theater watching it, and when I got killed at the end, the audience got up and cheered. It was a real memorable moment for her.

Great! The audience was so engaged, they cheered. Lisa Langlois: Although, honestly…I don’t think I’m killed. I think I survived.

A car comes crashing down on your head! We’d have to side with the people who think you died. It’s pretty extreme. Lisa Langlois: Yeah, but it IS the movies. And I’m still talking. Which reminds me, I had completely forgotten about the part where the gang members killed Roddy McDowall’s animal in the biology lab. That was horrible. That was really, really horrible. I watched it and just thought, “Oh, wow…” But it was really great to act opposite Roddy in that movie.

The scene where he has the gun pointed at you is quite a good moment. Lisa Langlois: It was one of those things where you’re thinking, “Oh my God, I have this scene with Roddy McDowall…how am I going to do this?”

Do you think Roddy was one of those people who was unhappy making this movie? Lisa Langlois: I don’t know. Because the scene with the gun was really the only one I had with him. When there’s a big scene like that with lots of people, you don’t get any instant one on one time.

We wanted to ask you about one of the most powerful, unnerving scenes in the movie. The sort of Clockwork Orange scene where the gang goes in and rapes Perry King’s wife. Was that difficult? Lisa Langlois: So upsetting. I just saw it. Again, that was my idea to get a Polaroid camera and take a picture of it.

That was a good idea. It’s certainly revolting! Lisa Langlois: It’s really revolting. And then to give the Polaroid of his raped wife to Perry at the event. It was also my idea to put my finger in my mouth…my middle finger…and summon him with it. I came up with the moment when Patsy, like a little juvenile delinquent, takes her finger and pushes it through a hole she makes with her index finger and thumb.

You should be really proud of yourself, Lisa. Lisa Langlois: You know what? I had to find something to do because they never gave me any lines. In fact, before I thought of lines and things to do, my boyfriend suggested I wear a chain that makes noise. So whenever the audience would hear that chain, they would know that character is present. I thought that would never fly because the sound department wouldn’t go for that. We have to say the choices you made are fantastic. We couldn’t take our eyes off you. Even in the scenes in which you aren’t necessarily supposed to be the focus of attention. There was a certain…unpredictability to your character that made us always want to watch you.

Was the “kissy kissy” thing your idea as well? Lisa Langlois: Yes, that too. Ironically, they gave me a Marilyn Monroe shirt to wear. I’m wearing a shirt with her face on it. I also really hated my makeup in Class of 1984 because in my mind, that was so not punk. The makeup artist that I had was this woman who was not a young person. Privately, I thought, “She doesn’t know what punk is.” She kept bringing out all the glitter stuff and everything. It was so not the character.

Interview with Actor Timothy Van Patten

How did you get cast in Class of 1984? Timothy Van Patten: I have to go in the wayback machine; it was 1980 or ’81 when we made it. I think it was just a routine casting call. You know, the part couldn’t have been further, at that point in time, from the person I actually was, which was sort of a health fanatic. The character was a thrasher, a total punk rocker. In order to prepare for the movie, I went up to Toronto and started hanging out in punk clubs, which was a whole new experience for me (laughs).

Did you get into any hairy situations doing that? Timothy Van Patten: I was with some other actors who were sharing the experience. I never got into any major situations.

What was your working relationship with Mark Lester? Timothy Van Patten: Mark was a very good director, very capable. Decisive. He had a vision, and has turned out quite a few memorable films. He absolutely knew what he wanted, and I remember the entire experience going smoothly.

You’ve got that great scene with Michael J. Fox in the bathroom. What do you remember from shooting it? Timothy Van Patten: Michael was the first person I met on the film. We befriended each other immediately and started hanging out. Actually, we went to a pawnshop and each bought a guitar, and in our free time we’d go to the park and play. We became pretty good friends. Man, so much time has passed. Michael was playing the opposite of me, sort of a clean-cut kid. You could tell the guy was really good even then. He made his small part memorable. As the years go on, I appreciate him more and more because of his body of work.

In a interview Lester talked about the scene where you play the piano concerto, which you’re credited with composing yourself. Is that true, or did you work with the film’s composer Lalo Schifrin at all? Timothy Van Patten: You know something, it was totally improvised. I play the piano, but I don’t read music. At the time, it was just some sort of song I was fiddling around with; there was nothing written down for it. I was under the impression that I would play that piece, and they would replace it with different music by Lalo or something. They ended up keeping it, and they paid me a whopping $50 Canadian for it. I don’t think I even cashed the check. I may still have it somewhere.

In those days, was that like $15 American? Timothy Van Patten: Exactly! It’s hysterical. It totally works for the character. It totally works.

It’s clear that you’re really playing—your fingers are hitting those keys and that really adds to the scene. Timothy Van Patten: I haven’t seen the movie in a long time, but I think they left in the production sound. The sort of music-class, banged-up piano sound.

Do you recall the scene where you beat yourself up in the bathroom to get Andy Norris (Perry King) in trouble? Timothy Van Patten: All those scenes, they were all so heightened that for an actor, they were fun. There’s a lot of stuntwork in the movie, which I loved doing when I was that age. Perry was a very experienced actor, and I had just started acting three years before that. I had come off a television series called The White Shadow, and I wasn’t that experienced. Working with a guy like Perry made it easy. The writing was good, and those scenes worked between Perry and I. That bathroom was rigged, but I remember hitting the mirror as hard as I could, and it didn’t break. I said, “F**k it! I’ve got to stay with this!” and slammed my head into the mirror again, and it broke. If you look at the film, I’m a little bit dazed after that first hit.

Did they give you a stunt bump in pay for that? Timothy Van Patten: No! We all sort of did our own stunts in that film. The big fight with the African-American gang under where the highways converge, that was mostly us. The great Terry Leonard was the stunt coordinator. He was a legendary stuntman; he was Harrison Ford’s stunt double in the first Indiana Jones film. This guy has had every bone in his body broken twice, including his back and his neck. That was a thrill for me, working with Terry.

McDowall’s character “Mr. Corrigan” is shown pointing the gun at the class is an alternate poster. Have you seen that one? Timothy Van Patten: No! I’d love a copy of that. I just thought that scene was extraordinary. I remember looking at his copy of the script, spying it when it was on a desk while he was rehearsing. Every page of scenes he was in was covered, front and back, with notes. Small, small handwriting, top to bottom. It just impressed the shit out of me. That guy was a total pro. He and Perry really anchored the movie. All the other actors like Stefan Arngrim, Lisa Langlois, Neil Clifford and those guys—they lifted me up. I was the oddest piece of the puzzle, because I really wasn’t as experienced as all of them. I didn’t relate to the material as much as they did; Stefan Arngrim had some experience in his life in that world. They were all totally invested in their characters, and they carried me along and taught me a lot.)

youtube

CAST/CREW Directed Mark L. Lester

Produced Arthur Kent

Screenplay by Tom Holland Mark Lester John Saxton

Story Tom Holland

Starring Perry King Merrie Lynn Ross Timothy Van Patten Lisa Langlois Stefan Arngrim Michael Fox Roddy McDowall

Music Lalo Schifrin Alice Cooper

CREDITS/REFERENCES/SOURCES/BIBLIOGRAPHY Fangoria#317 Fangoria#318 dreadcentral terrortrap.com

Class of 1984 (1982) Retrospective SUMMARY Andrew Norris is the new music teacher at a troubled inner city school. As he arrives on his first day, he meets fellow teacher Terry Corrigan, who is carrying a gun.

#80sFilms

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kurtty-drabbles · 5 years

Note

“We need to stop meeting like this.” (Amalgam!verse)

@djinmer4 @dannybagpipesarecalling @discordsworld @bamfoftheundead

N/A: Thief Columbina.

Her dress

In the Hilton Hotel of New Gotham, an exhibition of great jewellery is in a display to all members of the elite to admire as one does. The chosen room covers an entire floor and has the thematic of scarlet being used and abused here to match with the big necklace made of rubies that are being admired by everyone, especially by a beautiful woman with a cat mask that matches with her black dress.

The woman, with her seductive lips painted with vermilion, a smile formes in her pretty face as she is too admiring the jewellery, except, unlike the others guests she knows the secret behind said shinny and valuable object.

"Is a nice showcase, don´t you think, Kitty Pryde?" Kurt Ryder asked amused with a goblet of champagne in his hand and, of course, his noisy reporter attitude that Kitty is used by now.

"Yes, you've got a good eye for this, Mr noisy reporter. Have you thought in switch jobs?" Kitty asked crossing her arms at the man who is chuckling at this suggestion. Of course, he would.

"No, thank you, I´d think I´m made to be a reporter." and after drinking his champagne and even offer one to Kitty as the waitress was passing by(''no, thank you, I don´t go well with certain drinks'') the man asked what she´s doing here, in a more polite and friendly way, a difference that Kitty loves to point out to him ("be friendly and polite, Ryder, this will do wonders for you in the futures")

"Well, what I can say? I love a good show and rubies are my favourite" she speaks giving a cat-like a smile and Kurt Ryder nods and Kitty does not need to have telepathic powers to know he wants Kitty to stop her plans, but, Kitty does whatever she wants.

"And you, Mr Noisy Repoter Ryder, are you here to admire the show?" Then she frowns and look around "and should I be a concern by one of your ''fangirls'' trying to attack me again?"

Kurt pales at that and shows remorse even if the case was not his fault. "I came here with a friend of mine, Logan Wayne, and no...no fangirls here, and I apologize again for what happened in that day, what that woman did was wrong and really, I can´t say enough to make up for that" Kurt states and Kitty sighs.

"Just promises no more fangirls throwing wine in my face or dress. Because I´ll be very upset if something happened to this dress" she points to her dress for a moment "this one here is rent and is expensive"

Kurt Ryder wants to ask why she rent this dress, but, he didn´t have the time as Kitty Pryde smiles in that way as if she is the only one who understands this imaginary game and speaks again. "By the way, Mr Ryder, do you know the history behind those rubies? Norman Osborn brought this expensive necklace to his new wife, Gwen Stacy, a woman that is 25 years younger than him. A way to purchase her love and other things" Kitty concluded to the bewildered Kurt Ryder. "Oh, you didn´t know? Ryder, you´re my favourite reporter...how could you not notice this one?"

"I...tend to focus more on his corruption schemes and the judgment he´s so desperately is trying to prevent, but, wow I had no idea..." Kurt Ryder looks at the young woman with blonde hair and a fake smile that is with her arm intertwined with Norman Osborn. His eyes focus to Kitty Pryde, who in turn is amused at his expression, and dares to ask something. "How did you know they are married?"

"Easy, I read magazines and I saw Norman calling her my wife" Kitty almost laugh loudly here, but, she controls herself.

Now, Kurt Ryder has a more seductive tone in his voice. "You seem to know a lot more than I, do you want to talk?"

"I love euphemisms, Kurt, and I would love to ''talk'' with you, but, tonight, I´m working and like you...I don´t mix pleasure and work" Kitty said to a pouting Kurt Ryder, then she did kiss his check leaving the mark of her lipstick there. "Ask me again when I´m free, and Kurt Ryder" now she susurrate in his era gentle. "behave yourself tonight, ok?"

And with this exchange, the woman leaves and Kurt Ryder still smiles at this ghostly touching the lipstick.

______________________________________________________________________

Say what you´ll about Norman Osborne, but, the man knows how to install a security system. Kitty, with her uniform(she admits the leather material is a tad bit fetishist on her part), looks at the system in a safer spot. Security cameras, lasers and 3 floors to a subsoil where the real necklace is.

"Well, you´re still a piece of shit," said Kitty and using her gymnastic abilities and her phasing ability turns easy to find the first camera and put her device to make the cameras record something that happened yesterday.

No one needs to lose their jobs in a nice party like this one. Now, with the cameras showing only the past, Kitty moves to the next obstacle, the lasers.

"Please, this is so 2000" shakes her head at this, well, this would keep others criminal at bay, but, Columbina is no mere thief. She´s the thief. Using her powers she phasing through the lasers and was in the mood to even do ballet and flip the bird as well.

Now she is phasing through the last floor without a problem. The real necklace is suspended in the air, thanks to technology, and works with a weight system...if something weight less or more than the necklace than...well, no survivors are left.

"Really? stupid white rich people" Kitty shakes her head and without any shame, as she is humming the theme song of Indiana Jones and takes with her a fake replica of the necklace with the words ''sucker'' written there.

Enacting an old and iconic scene of Indiana Jones, Kitty replace the real necklace with the fake one, of course, there´s the time limit, but, Kitty is not worried and the trade is made perfectly.

"Oh, time to go home, sweetie," she said looking at the rubies. Now, she is flying to the rood intangible. No one at the view and Columbina smiles at the rubies one last time. "At least we´re alone"

"Ah, I´m glad you think so" A maniacal laughter follows that statement and Columbina sighs as she almost forgets Creepy would be here. "I missed you, Columbina, and it seems my dear Columbina is being naughty again" the green lunatic states with that big smile on his face.

"Oh, Creepy!" Columbina said pouting "We have to stop meeting this way, is not sane, if you want to ask a girl out wait until she´s free."

"But, you´re being naughty again, Columbina, should I let you go or should I hand you to the police?" Creepy asked more to himself and Columbina can play Ryder´s game.

"Well, I´m free of my work, Mr Creepy, and sure we can have a date now, in fact, why we don´t go watch ''you´re wrong'' reruns? I like Kurt Jack Ryder. He´s a good reporter"

"Psh, he didn´t even know about Norman and Gwen marriage"

Again, Columbina almost laughs here, almost. "Yes, but, he knows other details that I didn´t know, besides" Columbina kissed his cheek, the other side where Kitty previous kissed Kurt Ryder. "If I have to be punished, I rather to be you, Mr Creepy"

And that smile indicates that Creepy won´t bother with rubies right now, and well, Columbina is free of her work and has all the time to indulge herself and Creepy.

____________________________________________________________________

Kitty Pryde is in her house, well, apartment, when she goes to Kurt Ryder´s door, the two are neighbours and is Kitty often likes to catch up with the noisy reporter.

"Hello, Kurt Ryder," Kitty said hiding the smile and the love bite Creepy left on her neck. Kurt Ryder looks naturally handsome with his hair dishevelled like that. Is something Kitty takes a secret joy.

"Hello, Kitty, is everything alright?" Kurt asked trying to sound nonchalant as if he wasn´t the reason for the love bites and much more. Maybe the man should have been an actor.

"Yes, is just...I was wondering if you have time to drink something, my work is free and well, I think you´re owning me a nice free fangirl evening, right, Kurt?"

"Right, then we have a date"

"We do, Mr noisy reporter," she said amused and without caring if is appropriate or not she touches his hair, Kurt is not minding. "I like your hair a la natural combines with you"

"I look like a lunatic" Kurt complains and Kity chuckles and shakes her head.

"Nah, you look handsome and not a bit creepy"

"If you said so"

#amalgverse #Kurt Ryder #Kitty Pryde #kurtty #thief Columbina

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yconic · 5 years

Text

( I loved the single dad tony au so much i decided to write a part two!)

"Every time you flap your lips another one of my brain cells dies and I crave for death, you absolute disaster."

Two months have passed since what the kids called 'the Steve incident'-- thought, Pietro insisted they referred to him as 'the creepy customer who wants to get into our dad's pants'--, and currently, Wanda was restraining herself from stabbing her eardrums with a toothpick as she was eating a brownie while listening to her brother's immature shenanigans.

Pietro rolled his eyes, laying out a piece of paper on the table. The blank page was filled with scribbled drabbles of Steve in dangerous or life-threatening situations, grace to Peter's artistic skills. Pietro had to bribe him with candy in exchange for the art, but the teen needed to feel like at least ONE sibling was on his side.

"Then perish, " Pietro scoffed, taking a seat next to her, stealing away the brownie as he took Peter into his arms, settling his baby brother on his lap, ignoring the drool spilling on his arm. "Come on sis, contribute! Come up with ideas! Help me! Do something! You're the brain of this operation!"

"No. Steve is just a sweet guy who likes our dad, that's it. Just leave it alone!"

Pietro scuffed, continuing his aggressive scribbling "I changed my mind, you're the ass of this operation."

"There is no operation. There's just you fearing dad will finally have someone again and you want to ruin it because you're paranoid and scared of change."

"Never gonna happen. Ever." Confidently said Pietro, arms crossed over his chest. He's pretty sure Steve won't stick around anyway once he gets bored, or fed up when he realizes Tony won't pick him over them, which will inevitably happen. He's seen this before and already knows the ending.

Only if he knew how bad he was going to eat his words.

Hand landing harshly on Steve's shoulder, Pietro's smile was forced and painful on his face as he turned to his science teacher whom he HAD to piss off that day with one of his usual acting up sessions, as he liked to call every time Pietro pulled his daily shenanigans.

"Mr. Stone, this is my father, Steve," Pietro pushed every word out with difficulty through his gritted teeth, forcing himself not to sneer every letter. Steve's knowing face didn't help the situation by any means, only increased Pietro's desire to wipe that infuriating smug smirk off his face. With his fists, preferably.

He called Steve and asked for his help after Stone caught him having a fight with Thomspon in the cafeteria. After a scolding that bored the teen out of his mind, Stone ordered him to call his parents, which made Pietro pause slightly.

If he called Tony, he'll get grounded for sure. After countless times his adoptive father had to leave his workplace because of Pietro's mischievousness, Tony firmly warned him that if he received one more call from the school, Pietro will be stuck at home babysitting Peter and do chores for a whole month.

He couldn't afford being grounded as he was invited to Harry Osborn's party which everyone will attend and he knew for a fact not a single person will shrug off his absence. If he missed this event, Pietro was going to be the main gossip material for who knows how long. Normally, he wouldn't mind a bit of attention here and there, but Pietro just knew he was going to be more annoyed by their whispers as time went by, and he didn't want to deal with it.

So he swallowed his pride and requested Steve's help, who much to his dismay, agreed to play along if Pietro'd put a good word for him to Tony. Grumbling, he accepted the offer and now here he was, in Stone's classroom, pretending to be the son of the one person he hated most.

In his luck, Stone was new to the school, replacing the former science teacher who thought was a good idea to keep some girls after class for 'supplementary lessons' and forgot about the security cameras that spied every classroom, so he easily believed Pietro's lie.

He also seemed pleased by Steve's perfectly tailored suit. Pietro had no doubt the outfit costed more than his entire tuition. "It's good to know at least one of you has decent taste in clothing, " Stone gestured to one of the chairs. "Please, take a seat, Mr. Maximoff. There is a lot we must discuss your son and his atrocious behavior."

"Don't mind if I do, sir," Steve smiled, sitting on a chair while Pietro remained on his feet, hands in the pockets of his hoodie as he waited for the whole charade to be over. "I know my son can be quite the rascal sometimes, but he means no harm, I assure you. What did he do this time?"

"I regret to say that your son has quite the record, Mr. Maximoff, " with a disapproving shake of head, Stone glared in his direction and Pietro had to hold himself back from rolling his eyes so hard they'd pop out of his head.

"Verbal altercations with the school's faculty, various acts of obnoxious farces that disturb classes, and worst of all, he engages in physical fights with other students like some sort of savage! This behavior is unacceptable and must be corrected immediately."

Fists clenched, Pietro sat in silence, knowing he won't help his situation if he'd open his mouth. Stone wasn't exactly the type to listen to the other side of the story that differs to his.

"Why did they fight?"

Taken back by the question, Stone blinked in confusion, as did Pietro. "Um, well--"

"Because there has to be a reason," Steve interrupted Stone with an unshakable firmity. "Pietro wouldn't start an argument just because. He knows he'd disappoint To--Me, if he did, " not giving the teacher a chance to reply, Steve turned his attention to Pietro and asked: "tell me what happened. The whole thing."

"Mr. Maxmimoff, I don't think--,"

"Stone, I'm speaking to my son. Don't interrupt me again." Steve's glare was enough to make Stone snap his mouth shut, not daring to mutter another thing. "Also if I may, using the term 'savage' to describe another student is incredibly disrespectful, not to mention inappropriate, and I'll make sure Ms. Hill will hear about it."

He couldn't lie, watching Steve rip Stone a new one was entertaining and he didn't want to stop it by any means. Holding back a smile, Pietro began to explain the whole incident. And even now he wants to kick Flash's ass for what he said about his father.

Steve looked like he had the same idea. Turning to Stone, he raised an eyebrow. " And I assume you already knew all of this before you brought my son here and called me. I am sure you were a rational person and heard him out instead of ignoring what he had to say thinking that you know better.

"I, well, he didn't say--"

" I also assume you will call Eugene's father and let him know about what happened. Needless to say his son will get punished just like Pietro, yes? It wouldn't be fair to just punish one student when both of them were involved, would it?"

"Mr. Maximoff, I'm afraid that it'd taint Flash's record if we involve him in this incident and Mr. Thompson wouldn't be pleased with that--, "

Stone's sentence was interrupted by the snort coming from Steve, but judging by the way his jaw tightened Steven was everything but amused.

"And we wouldn't want our main sponsor to stop throwing money to us because we hold his spoiled asshole of a son responsible for once, right? Why does it matter if we're being unfair to the other kids? If we're not treating them equally like we do more 'important' students? I mean, it's not like they can actually DO something or speak up since we will side with money anyway, isn't it?"

"Steve, that is NOT appropriate and I find your tone very aggressive!" Stone huffed indignantly, eyeing Steve as though he was a maniac. Rolling his eyes, Steve stood up, placing a hand on Pietro's shoulder, leading him out of the classroom.

"You ain't seen aggressive yet. And trust me when I say you don't want to," spoke lowly Steve, fixating Stone with a stare so cold and dark it made the teacher take a step and cause Pietro to stop in his tracks. He never heard that tone from him before. "And it's Mr. Maximoff to you."

Once they stepped outside the school, Pietro didn't peep at all, which worried Steve a great deal but didn't press onto the issue. They took a cab filled with awkward silence to the apartment building Pietro and his family lived in. Steve had to admit, the neighborhood wasn't the best. He'll have to talk with Tony about it sometime.

The cab stopped, making Steve finally break the ice "So, uh," he shrugged helplessly, as he gestured to the building. "This is us, I guess. Pleasure masking business with you, kid."

After a pregnant pause, Steve found himself surprised when Pietro asked him if he wanted to have dinner with them. There was no mockery or cutting hostility in his tone like there usually was. Steve would lie if he'd say the invitation didn't caught him by surprise, even made him worry further a bit, but nevertheless, he said:

"I am 100℅ sure you're gonna poison me," he said drily, finally making Pietro snort. ", but I'll take the risk. Lead the way, kiddo."

"Hope you like Cyanide in your lasagna." Pietro joked, jogging to his apartment.

Running after him with a laugh, Steve replied with " As long as you're eating it with me we won't have a problem!"

"Fuck you, Rogers."

"Right back at you, P."

#pietro maximoff #quicksilver #scarlet witch #wanda maximoff #tony stark #iron man #steve rogers #captain america #stony #stony fic #peter parker #spiderman #irondad #fluff #otp #my writing #my aus #oof finally

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the-desolated-quill · 5 years

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Arachnids In The UK - Doctor Who blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this episode yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Spiders. It had to be fucking spiders, didn’t it?

Normally I watch each episode multiple times before writing a review in order to pick up on every nuance and detail. With Arachnids In The UK however, I just about managed two viewings and that was a Herculean effort I can tell you because... you know... fucking spiders. So apologies if this review isn’t as detailed as previous ones. Frankly you should be grateful you’re even getting a review of this at all because... you know... FUCKING SPIDERS!

So then. Let’s talk about the fucking spiders. The fear factor of this episode will depend on how you feel about spiders in general. If you’re one of those weirdos who keep tarantulas as pets (seriously, what’s wrong with a dog or a gerbil or something? Can’t you just be normal?), then you probably found this quite quaint. If however you’re like me, a confirmed arachnophobic and colossal wuss, Arachnids In The UK most likely terrified the fucking life out of you.

But wait. It gets worse. I would have been shitting myself if the spiders were regular sized, but that’s not enough for Chris Chibnall. Oh no. These spiders are ever so slightly bigger than that. How big, I hear you ask? Think Aragog from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

Yeah. That big.

At this point I’d like to extend a massive fuck you to Doctor Who’s special effects department for really putting in an almost criminal amount of time and effort into making these giant, eight legged demons from hell look as photo realistic as possible. Each individual, computer generated hair rendered with absolute care and attention to detail, making the spiders that much more skin crawling to look at. I mean it wasn’t as if I was planning to sleep that night anyway.

I also have to begrudgingly commend Sallie Aprahamian for her direction. The lighting, camera angles and use of sound really help create a creepy atmosphere and build tension effectively. Because spiders, even massive spiders, aren’t the type of monsters to jump out and attack you directly. No, the little fuckers like to sneak up on you and catch you unawares, and that’s what this episode really takes advantage of.

So what reason did Chris Chibnall come up with for giant fucking spiders to exist? Genetic experiments and toxic waste. Stupid? Yes, but so is the idea of a wooden blue box travelling through time and space, so let’s not get too critical. Just pretend that scientist works for Norman Osborn from the Marvel Comics and go with it.

Let’s move away from the spiders (quickly please) and talk about the characters because they’re, once again, the strongest part of the show. The Doctor is still just as delightful as ever with Jodie Whittaker switching from comedy to drama effortlessly. I especially liked at the beginning of the episode where she’s noticeably sad to be saying goodbye to her new friends only for her face to light up again when Yasmin invites her for tea. After Steven Moffat’s ‘the Doctor lies’ bullshit and Twelve acting all brooding and stoic, it’s refreshing to see a Doctor who displays their emotions openly. I also liked the way she interacted with the spiders. While everyone else is understandably shitting themselves, the Doctor is the only one who tries to give the spiders any kind of dignity, even going so far as to comfort the giant mummy spider at the end as it dies. She doesn’t view them as disgusting or frightening. They’re living creatures like her and deserve the same kindness she would give to a human.

Of course the main purpose of Arachnids In The UK is to get the companions to sign up for more adventures and I really like how this is done for the most part. Ryan is very quickly becoming my favourite companion and Tosin Cole is clearly having a lot of fun in the role. My favourite scene in the whole episode was him using grime music to lure spiders into the panic room. That got such a big laugh out of me. He’s just a really likeable character and I love how he’s growing and developing. He’s come a long way since The Woman Who Fell To Earth. He’s become a lot more confident and I think it’s because he feels he can achieve great things with the Doctor. He likes that he feels valued by her and that’s nice to see. And he clearly still has a lot more room to grow as shown by his scenes with Graham, which are easily the highlight of the episode. His negligent father wants Ryan to move back in with him, calling himself his ‘proper family,’ which irks Ryan. Over the course of these four episodes, Ryan and Graham have grown so much closer as Ryan slowly starts to let Graham in. I love their camaraderie and the understated love between them and I can’t wait for the episode where Ryan finally calls Graham ‘grandad’.

Graham too is brilliant. We see him return to his home and start properly coming to terms with a life without Grace and I love how it’s portrayed. New Who has an unfortunate tendency to really overegg the pudding when it wants to elicit an emotional reaction from the audience (see the Tenth Doctor’s farewell tour or the Eleventh and Twelfth Doctor’s ghastly final monologues). Chris Chibnall so far really seems to understand that less is more and the same is true here. There’s no obnoxiously loud sad music or sappy monologues. In fact the imaginary conversations Graham has with Grace are actually quite mundane, talking about when to put the bins out and things like that. What makes these scenes so powerful is Bradley Walsh. His performance, his facial expressions, everything he does sells the pain and heartbreak Graham is going through. It’s truly an acting masterclass that puts the previous showrunners attempts to tug at the heartstrings to shame.

I’m very curious to see what happens to Graham going forward. Him wanting to travel with the Doctor in order to cope with his grief and avoid knocking around an empty house is quite a compelling reason to become a companion. Haven’t really seen that done before. And... is it just me, but is this coming across as a bit... death wish-y? What with this and his cancer recovery as well, I’m deeply worried something bad is going to happen to him come the end of the series. I really hope not. I would be devastated.

Finally there’s Yasmin and... yeah, I’ve mentioned before how I’m not exactly warming to her. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t hate her. Mandip Gill is doing a great job with the material she’s being given and Yasmin is a nice enough person, but as I’ve said in previous reviews, she comes off as a bit superfluous. Even the introduction of her family doesn’t really do much to establish her as a key member of Team TARDIS. In fact she’s coming across as an amalgamation of Rose Tyler and Martha Jones. Rose because of her desire to find something more in her life and Martha because she wants to get away from her boring and annoying one dimensional family. She doesn’t really stand out as her own character and I put it down mostly to the ensemble cast. It’s the classic case of ‘two is company, but three is a crowd.’ It’s the same reason why Susan and Adric got sidelined in the classic series (as well as the fact that Adric was an irritating little shit that deserved to be smacked upside the head) and she just pales in comparison to Ryan and Graham, whose characters and storylines are much stronger and more interesting. I really hope she gets a chance to shine soon because so far I honestly couldn’t care less about her, and considering she’s the first ever Muslim companion, that’s really disappointing.

Since we’ve shifted to criticism, lets talk about the supporting cast. Yasmin’s family, as I said, are quite boring. They’re just your typical family with the typical overbearing mum (maybe it’s time for New Who to consider stopping all the family stuff now). The scientist... exists, doing nothing other than to introduce the spiders as a plot device and occasionally give exposition on spider ecosystems. Finally there’s the hotel guy, played by Chris Noth who tries to wring every last drop of comedy out of the part and is actually quite amusing on occasion, but sadly doesn’t have an actual character as such other than being a painfully on the nose parody of Donald Trump. Not only is this futile in and of itself because some could argue that Trump is so extreme that he’s practically impossible to satirise, but also nothing ever really comes of it. He’s a prick at the beginning, he’s a prick at the end, and there’s no real payoff or satisfying closure. Not only does he not learn his lesson, I actually found myself agreeing with him a few times. Like what’s the difference between shooting the spiders and locking them in a panic room so they can eventually starve to death? And what was the Doctor planning to do once she herded the giant mummy spider out of the ballroom? Set it up in a nice cozy bedsit? And if it’s suffocating to death anyway because its lungs have grown too big and can’t absorb enough oxygen, wouldn’t shooting it be the kindest thing to do at that point?

While I’m on the subject of guns, how the fuck is his bodyguard able to get away with carrying a gun in Sheffield? You’re not in America now, sunshine. And how come Yasmin, the police officer, doesn’t do anything about it or the fact that her mother was wrongfully dismissed? (at gunpoint. I need to keep pointing that out. Her mum was fired from her job at gunpoint in Sheffield). Come on Chibnall!

Arachnids In The UK has flaws to be sure, but its excellent execution of the main plot and threat as well as its genuinely touching and heartwarming moments between the main characters that help it stand out. The weakest episode so far, but still very enjoyable.

#arachnids in the uk #chris chibnall #doctor who #thirteenth doctor #jodie whittaker #graham o'brien #yasmin khan #mandip gill #ryan sinclair #tosin cole #bbc #review #spoilers

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elizabeth-234 · 3 years

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The Supplejack

Previous Chapter Seventeen: Reflections and Realizations

Enjoy!

Chapter Eighteen: Existing

“We come to you live, this morning, from the new Oscorp building here in New York City. Joining us now is the man himself. Would you like to say a few words, Mr. Osborn? Why a new building? What’s its purpose?”

Mr. Osborn walked toward the camera, blocking the news anchor from frame. He smiled without blinking; seemed gaze straight into the viewers’ eyes while gathering his thoughts. Peter couldn’t help but shiver.

“Oscorp is at an exciting stage of expansion. Our new projects, headed by some very talented young people, deserved more space and more funding. When you think of brilliance I want you to think Oscorp. You will think of the brilliant future. And you will think of power. This building is just one of the first stages of that future.”

Mr. Osborn’s lips curled into another smile. The news anchor cleared their throat and, after holding the smile for a second longer, Mr. Osborn stepped back. They shook hands before moving onto the next segment.

The whole interview was over in less than five minutes. It was completely normal but still it was … unsettling. There was something in the way Osborn said the word power. The slight pause, no longer than a breath but holding a weighted touch, before saying the word slow and strong. Power was what he wanted. It didn’t matter the cost to a man like that. Something as insignificant as stealing a child’s idea or intimidating those around you. All for the sake of a ‘brilliant future,’ for the sake of power. What other acts had the man done in name of those ideals? What was he willing to do next?

Peter’s spine was stiff. Tension coiled in his muscles keeping him still. Anger surged in him for a moment. The back of his throat itched and all he wanted to do was throw the phone at the nearest wall. Instead, he took a breath, pulled the headphone from his ear, and handed Flash’s phone back to him.

He couldn’t do anything. The sentiment earlier had been a lifeline, a fact. Now, he was starting to hate it.

“If you would just listen to us, Peter.” Flash said.

“I thought I said no.”

“You said it months ago but we all thought that, if we gave you space-”

“Which we did.” Julia interrupted.

“-that you would come back to the logical choice. It’s called copyright laws… or something like that.” Julia crossed her arms in front of her chest as she stared at Flash. A hint of amusement hidden under the exasperation. “Well, I’m pretty sure that’s not the legal word for it but he’s got the right idea.”

Peter shrugged. His fingers played with the napkin in front of him, folding and unfolding it while Flash and Julia bickered over what they wanted. It made something warm in his chest to know that still, after all this time, his friends were trying to help.

He watched as Flash scooted closer to Julia as she began pouring over their notes. Their foreheads were almost touching, though their voices were loud enough for the table behind them to hear.

The napkin ripped at the edges. He balled it up and stuffed it under his thigh. They were friends. His friends. Two years ago, it would’ve seemed like an impossibility to be sitting here across from these two people.

Julia was writing something down, fast and neat like always. Her eyes are almost crossed with how hard she’s concentrating. Flash sat next to her. Although he was leaning away, his lips are thinned in concentration and he kept asking questions to her, clarifying and adding ideas to their ever-growing notes.

These two people, one a former bully, and the other a stranger only a few months ago were his friends. A strong support system. He could remember the tears of Flash’s face on that stairwell, the way he had screamed at Peter, antagonizing him every step of the way, when he was also in pain. It seemed like he had so many friends; was popular at Midtown. But Peter realized they were similar in some ways. Whereas Peter was alone in his pain, Flash was surrounded. He was mean and hurtful to gain their conditional acceptance. Peter can only imagine how isolating that would be both from the others and yourself. Now here Flash was, working outside school to help Peter.

Julia’s friendship was no less surprising, yet sweeter all the same. Her hesitant, introverted nature at the beginning was all to similar to how he felt. She was withheld but never curt. Her eagerness endeared her to their whole team in a short time. Julia was also more than that. She didn’t need to overcome any of those traits to be a strong person like Peter thought. Like what people always told Peter. (Smile more, speak louder, be more) Those words followed him around until they didn’t hurt anymore.

Julia surely faced similar sentiments but it felt like she never took them to heart. Instead, she used them to her strengths. Their team was silently bolstered by her calm confidence. The tense atmosphere between Frank and Monica turned into nothing more than a minor blip in their project because Julia talked to both of them, encouraged them and worked to appease both with compromise.

It was the quiet moments with Julia. The snacks she brought with her to share, the sincere way she communicated, and above all just the effervescent care for everyone around her.

Here they were sitting across from him, trying to convince him to fight for himself. How could they want to help him after everything? This wasn’t even the first plan they had come up with, just the most recent. Every time he could see this gleam in their eyes, hesitant but stubborn. Every time he shot them down the hesitation receded but the stubbornness grew.

Peter sighed and wondered if his eyes were as weighed down as he felt.

“Look, it just doesn’t matter.”

It’s dangerous.

Mr. Stark said that.

The gleam in Mr. Osborn’s eyes only held the promise of that.

For a moment, Peter allowed himself to think of the Tower. What would Friday or Mr. Stark do? How would they proceed? The team of lawyers on call would certainly help. He would like to think that there would be indignation and vitriol. He wanted to hear their words of comfort.

And if that wasn’t just the most ungrateful thought he’d ever had.

Peter clenched his hands.

None of it mattered. Why didn’t they understand? He didn’t want anyone to get hurt. He, the rabbit’s cries echoed in his mind, had to prevent anything from happening. If that meant not getting involved then that’s what he would insist on. Peter was serious but none of his friends understood.

Their reunions happened about once a month, schedules permitting. Frank couldn’t make most of them, though Zoom had turned into a life saver. Monica was as busy as ever but her time management skills allowed for her presence more often. This week it was just their trio.

The two of them continued to talk. Peter pulled the napkin from under his thigh and resumed folding it along the frayed lines. Their words floated over him and he was almost tempted to leave instead of bearing their disappointed faces.

This meeting started off nice, normal. Flash ordered a flat white while Julia got an iced black coffee. Peter, who still had nightmares about Cindy, ordered tea. Monica didn’t answer their call so they settled in the corner and began talking about school and some new exhibit at the Hive.

It was quiet but normal. Peter appreciated them.

He assumed they would leave it alone until Flash took out the notebook. Peter balled napkin up and threw it into his empty cup. A brief flare of some ugly bitterness bubbled up into his throat.

“So, are you dating now?”

He wanted to take it back the moment he said it – the way he said it. They stared at him with mimicked wide-eyed and jaw dropped expressions. Their eyes darted from him to the side at each other. Flash scooted away from Julia, Peter noticed.

Why had he said anything?

“Peter!” Julia said, leaning forward over the table.

“I’m, I’m sorry! I just… I didn’t mean… Of course, it’s okay if you are or aren’t and I shouldn’t have pried into your business. It was rude and I’m…”  

“Sorry, we know.” Flash said in a curt tone. He sighed. “It’s okay, though. You’re our friend, right?”

Peter nodded. His frustration gone with the hastily spoken words. All he wanted to do was direct the attention off of himself; to talk about something normal for once. Maybe subconsciously all he wanted to do was make someone else as uncomfortable as he was. The thought made the back of his throat itch. May would be disappointed.

“It’s really none of my business.” He said again noticing how Julia couldn’t bring herself to look up from their notes.

“It’s okay, we just haven’t talked about it yet.”

Peter nodded, watching the way his friends’ eyes met for a moment. How they lingered and Flash, moved back to his original spot in subtle, slow movements.

Peter saw those looks or something similar on people in the older grades. The slight gleam someone can light in another person’s eye. He can’t remember if his parents had it but he knows that May and Ben each held a sparkle for the other. A precious feeling, Ben told him.

He’d never thought about dating before. The small interactions with other people in his life were enough of a worry that adding love into the mixture seemed like a bad combination. It never really occurred to him he wasn’t experiencing things like the others around him. Mike and Midge had talked about their crushes before, Ned had too at one point, and Peter just listened.

Flash broke the silence that followed.

“Monica and Estee are official though. Monica said that’s one of the reasons she’s not here today. Estee’s visiting her campus.”

“That’s just lovely.” Julia said while Peter nodded.

Contrary their tension filled meeting, Monica and Estee had connected instantly. The way they leaned into each other at the beach spoke at how close they were.

One positive thing came of that day, Peter thought. One good memory that Estee and Monica, really their whole group could hang onto.

The rest of their lunch was filled with lighter subjects. Peter continued to reprimand himself, and ignore the flush to his cheeks, but the stories of baby Al and his newfound love for Julia left smiles on everyone’s faces.

“He’s a mini-me, I swear; likes to tinker away with all of my stuff. It’s annoying sometimes but then he stares at me with those baby eyes and I can’t say no.”

The subway hummed around him but the voices of the other passengers were muffled by his earbuds. He pulled his sleeves down over his hands, rolling the fabric between his fingers.

Despite his various refusals, his friends hadn’t stopped digging into the Oscorp incident. Over the course of the summer, their attempts had become more complex. They couldn’t forget, they said. And in contrast to what Peter kept saying, he couldn’t forget either.

Months of work, hypothesizing and testing mixtures and compounds only to redo everything once again. All to make sure the formula worked. It wasn’t perfect, he wasn’t finished with it, but all his papers sat at the back of his desk, waiting to be finished; to be tweaked into something better.

The Oscorp incident left too many questions that barred the way to finishing it. Made his tongue go sour when he thought of picking up the notes again.

The question was how did Seymour and Mr. Osborn get the formula? His notes from home were mostly hand written, the only other copies were the rough drafts he sent over to Julia and the ones on file at Stark Tower.

The first question was why take The Weaver in the first place? He was too young to be notable to anyone of worth and the actual application of it was not in line with what Oscorp worked with till present. What were they going to use it for? He could think of a handful of the other interns’ projects that would work better.

The next question was what they did to the formula. Objectively, he was impressed with how far they got with it, Peter couldn’t suppress a shudder as he thought of the rabbit. Something was wrong with their formula. He didn’t know if it was because they were trying to find Peter’s original one or if they were trying to change it.

It’s dangerous, Mr. Stark said.

Mr. Stark was the last question on Peter’s mind. A pressure pushed into his chest but he made himself think it through.

Somehow, Mr. Stark knew about what they were doing. The man’s actions that day were so out of character that at first Peter hadn’t even considered it a possibility. But with those words it was clear the man was aware of what happened and had done nothing to prevent it.

Peter wanted, no needed, to believe there must be a good reason. Maybe it was one Peter didn’t know about, wasn’t privy too and might never be filled in on. He could live with that possibility. Mr. Stark never did anything without a reason and, contrary to what people believed, those reasons normally were with the consideration of everyone besides the man himself. Every one of their interactions spoke of that careful kindness, one that was shielded from an outside view if you didn’t want to look deeper. It was there in everything besides their parting and all Peter could hypothesize was that Mr. Stark was scared.

Iron Man, the great and legendary man himself, was scared and for now Peter needed to follow his lead. The hairs on the back of his neck straightened on end. He felt like he was standing on the edge of a great tower, looking down at the monolithic fall below him.

The man was scared of something to do with Oscorp and if not and it was all an act, then Peter fell for it too. He wasn’t sure what he would do then.

Too many people had come in and back out of his life. Mr. Stark was just the most recent on the list no matter the cause.

Peter suddenly wished The Weaver worked on whatever was tearing his chest into pieces. But no matter how much he twisted and tested the formula there was no possible way it could cure the wounds of the heart and mind.

The subway continued on and with a practiced ease, Peter pretended it was six months ago and his only worry were Friday’s updates and if he should sit at lunch with Ned.

Chapter Nineteen: A Phone Call

#peter parker #tony stark #spiderman fic #fanfic #ao3 #the supplejack

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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The Handmaid’s Tale Season 4 Episode 6 Review: Guilt, Sacrifice, and a New Chapter for June?

https://ift.tt/3v5dv50

This The Handmaid’s Tale review contains spoilers.

There’s really no such thing as understatement on this season of The Handmaid’s Tale, is there? This episode, and the ones preceding it, have played out at a deafeningly high emotional volume. Every speech is emphatic, every exchange is urgent and tear-filled, every decision is literally life or death. It’s a good job that Elisabeth Moss, Samira Wiley and the others are able to pull off this level of sustained intensity, because with a lesser cast or less controlled direction, the high drama could easily turn into melodrama.

If not for the judicious use of pre-Gilead flashbacks as tension-releasing valves, this episode’s force might have been too much to take. That’s always been this show’s natural habitat: teetering on the edge of too-much-to-take, but generally keeping its balance. The scenes of June, Moira and Luke as twenty-somethings negotiating the changes imposed by Luke and June’s impending marriage, provided that balance. They offered respite in an otherwise heightened episode, and underscored June’s present-day anguish over escaping Gilead without Hannah, with her past fear about letting Luke down.

The flashbacks also served to intensify June and Luke’s reunion by reminding us how their relationship used to be (find a more perfect rom-com line than writer Dorothy Fortenberry’s: “What if I’m not who you think I am?” / “Then I’ll just love whoever you turn out to be”). Often, a flashback in The Handmaid’s Tale is there to contrast with the present day and illustrate the chasm between the past and now. Revisiting Luke and June’s early infatuation did the opposite. Seeing June glow at getting a phone call from (presumably) Luke, or his jubilation when they found out they were having a baby, shored up our sense of the couple we saw melt into each other on that ship. The silent conversation Moss and O.T. Fagbenle had with their eyes when Luke walked in was beautifully done.

The aid ship was another new backdrop in a season that’s offered plenty of location variety, the show having long broken out of Gilead’s symmetrical repetition. Like the prison facility in episode three ‘The Crossing’, almost the entire episode was contained on board, which condensed the emotion and tension further, especially once night had fallen and scenes were filmed in almost total darkness. After the authentic-feeling refugee chaos at the port, the ship signified safety… for about 30 seconds (roughly as long as The Handmaid’s Tale ever lets viewers breathe out and relax). Then the Guardian inspection was announced, and the next ticking clock began.

Is Janine Dead in The Handmaid’s Tale Season 4? Madeline Brewer Answers

By Louisa Mellor

The Handmaid’s Tale Season 4 Episode Release Guide

By Louisa Mellor

That was the second obstacle, after Oona (Zawe Ashton) told Moira that she wasn’t allowed to take June with them. What a winding blow that was. We’ve waited for June and Moira’s reunion for so long that when it finally happened at the end of ‘Chicago’, it felt like an ending in itself. The idea that international law and bureaucracy might stop it in its tracks felt grossly unfair. The actual gross unfairness though, as this episode was keen to make clear, was June being rescued.

‘Vows’ staged The Handmaid’s Tale’s version of The Trolley Problem, that old ethics thought experiment debating whether one life is worth more than several. In one corner: Moira and the audience, who’ve both invested so much in June Osborne, we couldn’t stand to let her go. In the other corner: Oona and her colleague, who know that saving Gilead’s public enemy number one would put the organisation in contravention of the law, and threaten both diplomatic relations and future aid missions. Traumatised June was unexpectedly on the latter’s side. At first, June offering to turn herself in because her life “isn’t worth more than anyone else’s” felt too perfectly heroic and unselfish, making a paragon of our lead character. And then we were shown what was underneath her act of self-sacrifice: not holiness, but guilt.

June didn’t feel worthy of rescue because of the guilt she feels over her failure to rescue Hannah and the still-missing-presumed-dead Janine. When faced with the prospect of reaching Canada and reuniting with Luke, June spiralled. How could she face him? How could he ever forgive her? Not just for Hannah, but also for falling in love with another man and leaving Luke with his baby to raise in Nichole? The last time Luke heard from June was through the cassette tape in which she explained about her loving relationship with Nick.

Guilt was the emotional driving force of this episode, and perhaps of this entire season. June feels that she’s failed as a mother, telling Moira that everything that she’s responsible for everything that’s happened to Hannah. Moira’s survivor guilt over getting out while June was left in Gilead drove her to sacrifice her relationship with Oona to get June home. The “your fault, your fault” buck of guilt passed between June and Aunt Lydia in ‘The Crossing’ echoed across this episode, as Gilead’s victims turned their blame inwards, as survivors so often do.

This intense episode ended on the long-awaited emotional climax of June stepping foot on Canadian soil, an occasion marked by director Richard Shepard breaking out June Osborne’s signature shot: dead centre of frame, facing the camera. Usually in such shots, June’s eyes are fixed on the viewer as a promise of resistance to some abject horror. This time, they looked out onto a complicated homecoming. Finally out of Gilead, is this the end of June’s fight?

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The Handmaid’s Tale season four streams weekly on Hulu in the US and will air on Channel 4 in the UK at a later date.

The post The Handmaid’s Tale Season 4 Episode 6 Review: Guilt, Sacrifice, and a New Chapter for June? appeared first on Den of Geek.

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tinymixtapes · 6 years

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Interview: Seth Graham

The music published by Orange Milk, an underground behemoth of experimental music and cassette culture co-founded by Seth Graham and Keith Rankin (a.k.a. Giant Claw), feels like multiple authors contributing their stories to one sprawling space opera. The label has been lauded by a wide spectrum of listeners and critics, and is instantly recognized through a delightful, kaleidoscopic approach to color, sound, and aesthetic identity. Themes and approaches in the collective Orange Milk output seem impossible to define coherently. There are oozing, primordial cultures of bacterial sound, moments of pure, demented bliss; Seth Graham’s own music, especially on his latest album Gasp, refines these abstract elements while rocketing them farther into space. It is intrepid music that deliberately hovers on the edge of order, a space that the composer challenges himself to explore. We caught up with Seth Graham over the phone to talk about Herbie Hancock, the various MIDI instruments he chose to explore on Gasp, and the experiences in his life that brought the album to bear. The album is available to pre-order here (LP) and here (CD), but you can also listen to the full release below before its March 23 release. --- Gasp contains a wide variety of sounds, but it’s very focused too. Some of them appear multiple times, like the woodwind, the voices. Did you have a clear idea of what instruments you wanted to appear, and when? I definitely had a very specific idea… like that composer Gerard Grisey, he has pieces where he records the cello super close to the mic. You can almost hear the rustling, and it’s high-res. It almost sounds like, I don’t wanna say explosion, but it’s a bigger, weirder experience. With classical, when they record it, you hear that typical Tchaikovsky crap; it almost sounds generic. Grisey changed it and put it in your face, and I love that so much. So what I did with the record is any of the instruments that had a really close mic sample [in the VST], I kind of only used those because I liked how they sounded, and I liked how much you could manipulate it. Like for example in the track “Kimochi,” which just means emotion in Japanese, that track starts off with this voice that says one syllable, and that goes into almost sheer metal grinding, and that’s actually just a shit-ton of manipulation of different acoustic instruments with a certain synth. I love to do that and contrast it with that close-mic’d sound. With the flute, you can hear the wind of the person playing. I was obsessed with that. It ended up being a lot of flute, clarinet, cello, and that was kind of it. I think I used some trombone — there’s certain things you can do with the VST where you can hear the whole sample play out, and you can hear the clicking, and I would use that too, people clicking the wind instruments. I was thinking I should just hire people and record it my fucking self. That was something I wanted to ask you about — whether you had plans — or already did — record live instruments and manipulate that? I actually sort of did that already. A record is supposed to come out; it’s pieces from Gasp and a couple of unreleased pieces that this ensemble in Russia asked me to write for a tribute to Philip Glass that they were doing. They asked me and Sean McCann and Sarah Davachi, and I was really honest, like, I’ve never written a classical piece before, I just write MIDI data and mess with it. I just kind of read up on how to write for an ensemble, looked up the instruments they use, re-wrote it all in MIDI. I basically converted that to notation and sent four pieces to them that are pieces from Gasp, but real people. And they did it! They played it at the Museum of Multimedia and Arts in Moscow, and then they played it in a studio, and they were supposed to send us the stems for us to mix and Sean to put out on his label, Recital… and I don’t know, I’m waiting for it. It should be here. But to answer your question, I’ve been trying to think of ways for a new record where I hire people and I write out pieces, and they play it-slash-sing it, because I want really weird things to happen that I can’t make software do. I go to school with someone who’s a trained opera singer, and I want to pay her to sing what I have all notated, her to sing in this key, but then go “Bleahghghg.” I would love to hear that happen, a magnificent operatic voice just shit the bed. That would be awesome. I’ve been trying to think of ways for a new record where I hire people and I write out pieces, and they play it-slash-sing it, because I want really weird things to happen that I can’t make software do. I go to school with someone who’s a trained opera singer, and I want to pay her to sing what I have all notated, her to sing in this key, but then go “Bleahghghg.” Your use of “real instruments” stands apart from other kind of abstract electronic music, like PC Music, where they’re deliberately trying to sound as synthetic as they can. I’m really influenced by a lot of the modern computer music, like Halcyon Veil, or Jesse Osborne-Lanthier, or Rabit, or Chino Amobi… I like all that stuff, but I have a weird aversion to reverb. I feel like reverb makes things cloudy, and in the listening experience, it kind of masks nothing. It could be an art in itself, but I really tried to stay away from it but still be influenced by their aesthetic. That’s interesting you mention that, because Gasp contains lots of open, bare spaces, which really struck me when I heard it. Yeah, and I interpret that as straight-up vulnerability. Just let myself be vulnerable. Vulnerability is such a strength that I admire in people, people who can just admit things and let it be. There’s not even close to enough of that in our world. Even myself I don’t let myself be vulnerable enough, but I think it’s such a beautiful thing, and if the music is kind of awkward and there’s that space, I think it conveys vulnerability. It conveys a sense of drama, too. It does, doesn’t it? I am dramatic, I guess. Ha! Going back to that idea of fate you mentioned earlier, I’m curious as to what the events were that would construct that fate. Like what events took place in your life to form your influences? Well, I had a really crazy life. I grew up in Japan; my parents were missionaries. I went there when I was six, my mom got really sick — I don’t know why to this day, my parents are, uh, really weird. I was kind of shoved into a public school at six; my dad was studying Japanese at a language school. The language school was across the street from a tennis court. The city is Kadiza, in Nagano-ken — it’s kind of considered the Aspen of Japan — is very ritzy and beautiful. And one day I’m at the language school waiting for my dad, and I was just starting to learn Japanese. I was immersed in it because nobody spoke English, and I couldn’t understand anything. And literally, one day I understood everything everyone was saying. It was about seven months in and it was so surreal. I remember thinking “What is my life? This is not normal…” And I knew it, but I didn’t even know how to think of it as a six-, seven-year-old. I’m sitting there, and I’m watching all these people playing tennis, and there are cameras there, but I’m just watching with my face against the fence. Someone comes up to me and says, “That’s the emperor of Japan.” I always remembered that. There was a lot of shit that happened there. I started to be a teenager in Japan, and we moved back when I was 15… So you spent your formative years there? Yeah, my formative years were spent in Japan. I started skateboarding in Japan, became a really avid skateboarder, and we even were responsible for finding a really famous skate spot. We came back to the US when I was 15. I was really into Japanese punk-rock; I remember the day Kurt Cobain died — I was really into Nirvana. The real formative thing was when I came back to the US. My parents were really conservative… like I can’t overstate it enough. So I came back from Japan, skateboarding, and punk rock, to rural Ohio, where everyone played football. My parents didn’t want me to go to school because they thought I would become a corrupt atheist, so I didn’t. I was homeschooled and worked at a movie theater from 15 to 18, and I would pretend to do my homework and finish by 11, and then go work the matinee shift with this old woman named Phyllis. The reason I tell you all this is that the shock of cultural difference put my brain into a spin. Everything became very existential to me at a very young age. I was like, “Nothing means anything.” I realized in 6th grade that the Japanese didn’t like America — I went to Hiroshima on a field trip and they were all like, fuck America — but all my life I had heard about how great America was, so you start to see the dissonance at a young age. Which is true? So when I was really young I started to throw it all out the window, like all of it was a joke to me, but not as a rebellious teenager, it was a true existential crisis to me. I started to notice the deep contrast in everything, and I started to notice all the little things instead of the big things. That changed how I perceived everything, I think. And I think that’s what helps me be creative, if I am even creative. That was the most colossal thing, that upbringing and those events. Goop by Seth Graham You and [ex-TMT contributor] Keith Rankin knew each other in Ohio when you both started Orange Milk around 2010. Could you explain the environment you were in and your ideas of what the label was going to be like? People want like a glorious answer when they ask that, but there isn’t one. It was honestly Keith and I were making music ourselves, and we both kept getting rejected by labels… Probably for good reasons. We were like, “Aw, fuck that, let’s start our own label to release our own stuff.” It was kind of a hybrid between there being certain artists who were only on tape who we thought should come out on LP. One of them was an album called Crowded Out Memory by this band called Caboladies. This band Talkies. That was kind of the Robert Beatty crew, like Eric Lampan and Christopher Bush; they had this band that were kind of spastic, fun electronica. We loved it, and that album in particular came on a really limited CD-R, and we were like, “That should be on LP!” It was like when all that rage with Emeralds was happening in our little pocket scene. And not that it was a competition, but we thought Caboladies was far more interesting, and we wanted to bolster it for that reason. We were just like… I don’t want to hear synth drone. We would send each other clips by a really wide variety of artists. We were imaging things we wanted to hear together, in some weird way. Like the Herbie Hancock Raindance record. All kinds of little clips, like, “This album, but only these parts.” We did have a very conscious conversation to decide where we wanted to go, and then we just started digging it up. We just started searching for things that we liked on SoundCloud. Would you consider that your contribution to music or to your pocket of the music world? Is establishing that family your driving force? I think Keith and I really wanted to be in the music world, and we kind of constantly got rejected a lot. We wanted to find our own. And we were, I wouldn’t say critical, but we were really into this idea of experimental music being really joyous and really accessible. Like folk music or something. And we really consciously saw it that way. We would sit down and listen to Herbie Hancock — I think I’ve mentioned him a few times, but we’re obsessed — and we would listen to his records and say, “This part is pure joy, but it sounds insane.” We want to make that, and we want to hear that, and have a label go full-tilt on making that. It’s one of my favorite things about Hancock. His music is chill and inviting and so weird at times. I just love that. It feels like you can let go — it can be contemplative, it can be deep, it can be all that Tiny Mix Tapes stuff, or it can just be pure fun! I think we both find it really refreshing. And we like releasing our own stuff because it just gives us control and makes it less bureaucratic or political. It’s less about hustling. I don’t have to worry about being judged. That freedom is nice as an artist. You’ve mentioned joy a few times as an important theme in your music… I feel joy a lot, so I was just trying to convey that as much as I could. Vulnerability is such a strength that I admire in people, people who can just admit things and let it be. There’s not even close to enough of that in our world. Even myself I don’t let myself be vulnerable enough, but I think it’s such a beautiful thing, and if the music is kind of awkward and there’s that space, I think it conveys vulnerability. What about the process of making music? Does that bring joy? Your music sounds very playful, so I’m wondering to what degree your process involves discovery or “play,” in the kind of childlike way of working things out? Ha! Making the music is torture. I feel like Keith and I have high standards with each other. If I make a track and send it to him, he’s going to kind of rip it apart. It’s kind of like a professor reviewing your work. We both treat it as a helpful device, we’re not trying to shit on each other, we both really love each other so there’s that trust. It’s a rare thing. But in that sense, my record felt like a master’s thesis. It was so much work, and so much time, and agony. But I still love doing it. To answer your question, I was trying to be super-direct — this is how I feel, a lot of the time. It’s kind of funny, joyous, kind of awkward at times. I wanted those elements to be in there, and I have this kind of aversion to authority. I associate it with pretension. I’m not saying it’s objective, but pretension and authority to me are the same thing. It’s about controlling you, or controlling how you will experience something. And if you let that go, you can make with it what you will, know what I mean? That might sound like pretentious nonsense, I don’t know. Was the record heavily composed our conceptually wrought before you began to work on it? It was a mixture of everything. After talking to people who are actually trained classically, I get the vibe that everybody has a similar method. Some things are conceptually thought out, like I want this sound or that sound, and then you build a structure to execute that sound. I would write MIDI parts that were like, a cello pizzicato, and I would write it until I really liked it, and then let it sit. And I would play with Serum [VST], and be like, I like this sound that sounds like metal is coming out of my eyeball, how can I fixate on this thing? It’s almost like assembling a painting — I like this shape, this color, and then you just edit it and fit it in. OK, now I’m going to add clarinet, like right here. You mess with that sequence forever. That’s what I did, but with Gasp, I tried to take it as far as I could. In that once I had a structure I really liked, I would hate the song. Even though I liked all the parts, I would then edit it down — like how fucked up could I make this? — until it feels barely cohesive. So did this process yield tons of material? How did you decide what would make the final cut? At one point when I was making it, I got so tired that I just wanted to put it up on Bandcamp and never think about it again. I basically revised like 70% of it, and that was like a year in. But I just knew it wasn’t done. So you just keep going with the record. There were moments when I was just completely improvising. I would take Push 2 [the Ableton Live controller/sequencer], just randomly play it, hit things, turn things. I don’t come up with much that way, but every once in a while when I get really frustrated, I’ll just improvise and see what happens. It usually yields like three hours of dicking around. But I always end up in what seems like a final crescendo, where I think back through so many times, you have to do, over and over, tedious. Sometimes you have to delete everything, and you go over it again and half of it is good. And once you’re 80% done, you can’t stand the other 20%, but you’re so sick and tired of it, it’s torture. That’s what it felt like. But I love it, and now I’m all ready to do another one. It’s kind of all I can think about. http://j.mp/2u69i63

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81scorp · 4 years

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Constructive criticism: Spider-Man 3 (2007)

(Originally posted as an editorial on Deviantart Dec 7, 2016)

Ah yes... Spider-Man, one of my favourite marvel superheroes.I remember that there was talk about making a live action Spider-Man in the early nineties and James Cameron was gonna direct it. Some time later in the early twothousands I started to get confirmation that a live action Spider-Man movie was indeed in production. (Directed by Sam Raimi though, but he directed Darkman, which I liked, so he seemed like a good pick.) Before this there had been mostly DC in the cinema when it came to comicbook superhero movies, and pretty much only of two of the most wellknown heroes DC had, Superman and Batman. And it was mostly Batman. In both cases the franchises started good but got dumber and worse with every sequel. It seemed like Hollywood just couldn`t make good superhero movies. Then an X-Men movie came out. Maybe not perfect but at least it understood the sourcematerial. Then came the Spider-Man movies. After waiting for ten years was it everything I hoped it would be? Not quite to be honest, but don`t get me wrong, I did like it and it was good. It had all the basic things that Spider-Man should have; webswinging, a colourful supervillain (both metaphorically AND literally), Mary Jane, Aunt May, Uncle Ben, fights, people being saved, badassery and great powers followed by great responsibility. I would have preferred a different look for Green Goblin though. Give him a costume closer to the comics, but with pants instead of bare legs.Then came the sequel and I liked it even more, it felt like the logical next step for the characters of the first movie to take. Then came the third movie... maybe not bad per se but it felt like a step down from the second movie. If you like it I can understand, it has some redeeming qualities but still... it had more subplots and characters than it knew what to do with. It seemed like Hollywood, once again, just couldn`t make good superhero movies. Anyway, it`s here now on my constructive criticisms. So let us see, in my very subjective editorial, how I would have done it differently.

With great power comes great SPOILERS Sandman, Gwen Stacy and the butler Lose them. As much as I like Gwen, she wasn`t necessary for the story. She was only there so that MJ could get jealous, and it just feels like a step down from how MJ was written in Spider-Man 2.I do like the moment where Flint Marko has been turned into sand for the first time. You can tell by his body language that he`s thinking: "Dear god. What have I become?" But his story takes time and focus from the symbiote plot-line that, in many ways, is the spine of the movie.The butler wasn`t in the first two movies, not noticably anyway, but that`s not the problem. If he knew that Spidey didn`t kill Norman why didn`t he tell Harry that sooner? On the fence: Topher Grace A part of me thinks that Topher Grace was a bad choice for playing Eddie Brock. I would have prefered a little older actor because I think that the idea of Eddie competing against Peter, a much younger and more successful photographer, would only add more fuel to his inferiority complex that would drive him to become Venom. On the other hand: Maybe Topher Grace would have been better as Eddie if the script had been better. So: either keep Topher Grace or replace him with (and this is just some of my personal picks) Jeremy Renner or Nathan Fillion.

Story: The beginning is pretty close to the beginning of the movie that we got: things are going well for Peter and he goes to see MJ perform on stage. In my version however her performance isn`t singing but acting. She performs in a stage version of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (she plays a supporting role, but it`s a wellwritten and important role). After the show is over Pete congratulates MJ and meets Harry Osborn who he tries to reason with but Harry is still hellbent on revenge. Before Pete meets Aunt May to tell her that he plans to propose to MJ he bumps in to Eddie Brock who is in a hurry and doesn`t have time to chat with him because he`s "chasing a big scoop". A masked terrorist named Sin-Eater is mentioned a few times on newspaper headlines, he`s kinda like the unabomber in this universe. (Yes, Sin-Eater is gonna be in this one, but he doesn`t play a big part.) Pete gets attacked by Harry Osborn and they fight, but instead of Harry knocking himself out and losing his memory he chases Pete into an abandoned old building that he demolishes with lots of grenades. There`s no sign of Pete in what`s left of the building but Harry knows that he must`ve escaped. Since Harry knows Pete`s secret identity Pete knows that Harry might use his loved ones to get to him, so he tells MJ to get out of town with Aunt May. MJ reluctantly agrees to this and tells Aunt May that she thinks it would be good for them to get a little time of their own for a little female bonding. They leave early the next morning. Pete does his usual shtick, superheroing as Spider-Man and selling his photos to Jameson but all the time doing so while looking over his shoulder, fully aware that Harry is out there. (Yes, I know that he has spider-sense that warns him, but still.) When Pete`s at the Bugle he bumps into Brock who has just finished talking to his dad on the phone, or rather, his dad`s answering machine. Here`s where we get a little human moment from Brock where he tells Pete that he and his dad hasn`t talked to eachother for some time. He then runs away to "chase his big scoop". We get one scene where Harry visits Aunt May`s house to find that no one is home (thus validating Pete`s paranoia). He smiles confidently and shakes his head. "You`re a clever boy Pete, you knew what I was gonna do." Meanwhile at Aunt May and MJ`s hide out: May realises that there`s something odd about this very sudden "female bonding" trip that MJ practically forced her to join and wonders if there`s someting going on that MJ doesn`t want her to know. Is it about Peter? Is he in trouble? MJ tries to calm her down and says that there is nothing of that kind going on. Aunt May pretends to accept MJ`s explanation but senses that she`s lying, MJ herself feels awful for lying to May. Later that evening at Pete`s apartment: Peter collpapses on his bed after a long day. The black goo that attached itself to his moped on his date with MJ (Yes, I`m going with the movie`s version of how that happened.) comes out of the shadows and devours Pete. Spidey wakes up hanging upsidedown outside a building, looking at his reflection in the window. He feels more confident and powerful. He goes out swinging and finds a masked terrorist who`s about to blow up a mall. Spidey beats him up and uses more violence than necessary. He stops himself from killing the terrorist, webs him up and leaves him outside a police station. Pete doesn`t like what he just did, he almost killed that man. Criminal or not, that`s just something that he shouldn`t do. Could it be the suit? Is it making him more aggressive? But then the suit clouds his judgement and he tells himself that he has everything under control, what happened was just a one-time thing. The next day the police arrests the terrorist who turns out to be that Sin-Eater that has been mentioned in the news. Since Sin-Eater has been caught Brock reveals to Jonah what "the big scoop" that he chased earlier was. All this time Brock had been telephone-interviewing Sin-Eater who had told him a lot about his life-philosophy and about how "decadent he thinks our secular society is". Jonah likes it, it`s extremely in depth. Brock could win the Pulitzer prize for it. Hearing this makes Brock beam with pride. That same evening Spidey is out webswinging and runs into Harry. They fight. At one point Harry uses a sonic grenade and here`s where we learn that the black suit is vulnerable to loud noises. Spidey gets the upper hand, goes really violent and almost beats Harry to death. Harry manages to escape and all of this has been caught by a guy with a video camera. It later ends up on the late news and is seen by MJ. Once again Pete feels bad for going too far and once again the suit makes him think that it wasn`t a big deal.The next day Brock`s interview is published in the Bugle. Jonah congratulates him in his office when Brock`s phone suddenly rings. It`s Sin-Eater! But wait a sec, isn`t he in jail? Maybe he used his one phone call to call Brock? But then Brock (and Jonah) finds out that the man calling doesn`t know that Sin-Eater is in jail, the man calling isn`t even Sin-Eater! All this time Brock was interviewing a mentally ill man who pretended to be Sin-Eater. (The man also has no TV or easy access to the news paper, that`s why he didn`t knew that the real S-E was behind bars.) This is bad! Todays newspaper has already been printed! Jonah fires a distraught Eddie Brock. Later that day MJ comes to Peter`s apartment. (Yes, Pete told her and May to stay out of the city to be safe from Harry, but right now Harry`s not much of a threat compared to Pete.) She saw Spidey`s and Harry`s fight on the news and thinks that he went too far. They start to argue and Peter pushes MJ into the wall... just as Aunt May walks in and sees it. Pete realizes what he`s done and runs out of his apartment to be alone. He sits on top of a building to think, sees a church and gets an idea. He uses the loud noise from the churchbells to rid himself of the alien suit. Eddie Brock happens to be in the same church at the time. After the suit has been separated from Pete it looks for a new host and finds Eddie... who turns into Venom. Pete returns home to his apartment (with clothes that he has taken from some church-charity thing) where May and MJ are waiting. (It`s his apartment after all and they don`t have the key, so they can`t leave it unlocked.) After some talking MJ forgives Pete and a few minutes later May does the same. After this Pete (as Spidey) swings over to Harry to patch things over with him as well. (He is of course smart enough to realize that it`s not gonna be a walk in the park.) When they meet we see that Harry`s face has been damaged from their latest fight and he doesn`t want to reconcile with him. He doesn`t want to fight him either but he wants him to get the hell away from his property. Somewhere else: Venom kidnaps Jonah, takes him to a construction site and soon gets Pete`s attention thanks to the news. Spidey suits up, swings to the site and tries to reason with Eddie, but Eddie won`t listen. He says that he and the suit has a "symbiotic relationship" and after that he starts to refer to himself in plural ("we" and "us"). He knows that Spider-Man is Peter because the suit told him that. Spidey and Venom fight. After a few blows have been delivered Eddie says to Spidey: "Can`t sense when I`m coming, can you? That`s right! The suit knows all about your little extra warning sense! And it knows how to not trigger it!" Harry sees their fight on the news. Spidey manages to incapacitate Venom long enough to break away from the fight and rescue Jonah. But then Venom gets the upper hand and knocks Spidey out. He`s about to kill Spidey when... Harry comes to the rescue! Harry and Venom fight, Spidey manges to regain consciousness just in time to see... Venom stabbing Harry with his own hoverboard! Spidey fights Venom and defeats him (or "them) the same way he did it in the movie. (Harry is strong enough to still be alive, he pulls out a grenade that he throws to Spidey that Spidey throws at the symbiote.) Eddie isn`t desintegrated by the blast, just knocked unconscious by it. Pete and Harry say their good byes and Harry dies with peace in his heart. The next day Peter visits Aunt May, gives her the ring back and says that he`s not ready to marry MJ yet, maybe some day but not in a near future. The next day Pete, MJ and Aunt May go to Harry`s funeral. Next we see MJ and Pete (in Spider-Man costume but without the mask on) on the roof of a tall building staring at the sunset.

The End Mid credit scene: Eddie is in the hospital in a coma. We get a re-play of the moment when the explosion killed the symbiote and knocked him out. A close up shows that a small piece of the symbiote managed to escape. Back to Eddie in the hospital: the symbiote is outside his window, it sneaks in and devours him. We get a close up of one of his eyes as he wakes up from the coma. Yes, I know, my version is not much better than the official version. Even in this one Venom doesn`t appear until the third act. But with Sandman and other distractions gone we at least get more time to explore Eddie and understand his goals and motivations. When I first came up with this I was originally not going to have Venom in it. I was gonna use Lizard since he had already been mentioned and shown in the first two movies and it felt like a waste to not use him.

And no: I`m not gonna do a CC of the The Amazing Spider-Man movies. Because A: I don`t want my gallery to be filled with thousands of editorials. I want my visual art to outnumber (or atleast be in equal quantity to) my written stuff. B: Spider-Man 3 has been on my CC list for a couple of months while TASM 1&2 haven`t been on the list at all. (Not that they don`t have a few things in them that I would like to change though.) If I were to give them the CC treatment I would sum it up like this: a: Don`t reboot them, make them sequels. It is possible to make sequels with a new director and a new cast. Just saying. Or b: Just stop after Spider-Man 3 and let the rights revert back to Marvel.

#81scorp #spider-man #marvel #constructive #criticism #sam raimi

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ravetaper · 4 years

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Svdden Death Live Set - February 2020 at the Hollywood Palladium (Full Set)

Svdden Death live set recorded February 14, 2020, at the Hollywood Palladium. 90-minute audio recording. The set began at 12:30 am the following morning (Feb. 15).

Every year, someone puts together a spreadsheet of all the artists performing at EDC, with links to various live sets. In the weeks leading up to the event, I do my due diligence and try to preview as many of those live sets as possible, to discover new artists and decide which sets I want to hit. Svdden Death was on last year's list (EDC Las Vegas 2019). I scanned his live recordings and thought they sounded good – I would try to make his set. And since he would be playing the Basspod stage immediately before Snails – who I wasn't going to miss – the plan made perfect sense.

The only question was if I could get to the Basspod on time. I had only 15 minutes to get there after Chris Lake's set ended at Cosmic Meadow. I would have to circumnavigate thousands of bodies and literally jog across the Speedway to catch the beginning of Svdden Death's set.

Unfortunately, I encountered a problem. I thought I dropped the battery cover for one of my cameras, and I felt compelled to retrace my steps and search the ground for it. Of course I didn't find it. I forgot I had slipped it into a small pocket in my backpack – which I only discovered once I was back home. That delay would cause me to miss the beginning of Svdden Death.

When I finally reached Basspod and moved into position, I realize how bad I screwed up. Svdden Death was playing some really heavy tracks, and I instantly regretted I wasn't recording. But I wasn't only moved by the music. I was struck by the unusual visuals displayed on the huge LED panels.

The imagery included computer generated skulls, skeletons, demonic-looking warriors, pagan symbols, horned figures. Quite frankly, a lot of the imagery looked satanic in nature! I was intrigued. Not because I'm attracted to Satanism – I'm definitely not – but because the whole production was a novel approach I hadn't seen before, at least not in any genres of dance music. Such imagery had been used by several hard rock and heavy metal bands – Ozzy Osborn and Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, and Metallica, to name a few, and helped create many memorable – and financially successful – brands. Furthermore, this was the imagery of Dungeons & Dragons – one of my childhood passions! To be sure, videos of demons and devils and skulls contradicted the PLUR vibe that characterizes EDC, but that was one of the reasons I found it so endearing. It was so different, and so unusual in that context.

Of course, video alone doesn't make a great set. But Svdden Death was dropping tunes that were extraordinary, hard riddim and dubstep that perfectly complimented the eerie visuals. The whole experience really left a positive impression on me. To me, it was the most unique set of the weekend.

Indeed, not recording Svdden Death's set was my biggest regret from EDC 2019. I vowed to catch him again, as soon as possible.

So I was elated when I saw that Bassrush would bring him to the Palladium in Hollywood. Tickets were a bargain - $40 for GA if I recall correctly. This was a no-brainer. I secured my ticket and waited for the days to pass.

Originally, I hadn't planned on recording. I figured trying to sneak in some kind of gear would be a hassle and cause unnecessary stress. I thought I would just go to the show and enjoy the music.

But my compulsion to record got the best of me!

I can't stand the idea of missing an opportunity to record really good music! Going to a show and enjoying the moment, living in the present, sounds reasonable – I get it. But there is something in my DNA that makes me want to document things. I just love capturing the good moments of my life and having the freedom to enjoy them again and again.

So with only a few hours before show time, I decided I would go for it. But I wasn't sure what gear I would use. I could try to bring in one of my Zoom cameras. At the security checkpoint I would have to put it in the tray along with my cell phone, wallet, and keys, and hope the security guard didn't think it was a "professional" recorder, which is prohibited by the house rules. In reality, the Zoom cameras do not qualify as pro gear – they are designed for armature use. But, I didn't want to risk getting denied and having to do the walk of shame back to my car.

I had another option. I had an old Tascam mic that attaches to older iPhones. I would have to use an awkward Lightening adapter and find an app that worked with the mic – the original Tascam app was no longer supported. After searching Google, I found an app that supposedly was compatible with the mic. I downloaded, tested it...and it worked! I quickly freed a few gigs of memory on my phone and headed out the door.

I arrived at the Hollywood Palladium not long after the doors opened. Suffice to say, I got the mic through security – I was in the clear!

There were several opening acts: AHZ, Neonix, Aweminus, Phiso, and Marauda. AHZ was cool live band that played dubstep. Neonix and Phiso were good. I decided I would get into position and do a test run of the app by recording Marauda's set. The app seemed to work, no crashes or any other issues. Marauda's set was pretty good, too.

Finally, it was time for Svdden Death!

The set started strong, the music was like what I heard at EDC – deep, dark, and powerful. Sure enough, the massive screens showed images of red and white skulls, barbed wire, and ominous figures. YES!

Let me take a moment to describe how I capture the audio in situations like this. Selfie sticks are not allowed, so I have to literally hold up my arm high enough above the crowd to get a clear line of sight between the mic and the speakers. Every few minutes, as one arm gets tired, I have to switch hands. Now, if I was doing this at a nice classical music concert, that would be easy. But this is the opposite that! I am positioned in a sea of tightly-packed bodies dancing and jumping to the music. And of course, there's another interesting phenomenon seen at many dubstep shows: the mosh pit.

Every few songs, a pit opens up and the sweaty bros (and a few brave gals) do their thing – pushing, flailing, and bouncing off each other as if they were human pinballs. I myself am not into mosh pits, but I can tolerate them. If others enjoy moshing, good for them – have at it! The problem for me is that I'm standing in the middle of the floor, with my arm up in the air, trying to make a recording. More than a few times there were two pits happening, one in front of me and one in back. I'm a pretty sturdy guy, so I can usually keep my balance and stay stable. But a few times a mass of bodies slam into my area causing me to stumble. You'll be able to hear it a couple times on the recording. Luckily, I didn't get hurt, and the recording never stopped. And a few times a few observant fellows noticed what I was trying to do, leaned in and told me they "had my back", and made sure no one came crashing into me.

By the end of the night, I was covered in sweat...other people's sweat! LOL.

I guess I just want my followers to know what I have to go through to get some of these recordings – it can get pretty extreme at times. But I wouldn't have it any other way. Despite the fact that I'm twice the age of most of the audience, I love getting down there into the mass of bodies and fully experiencing the energy of the event. At least once in a while. ;)

About 45 minutes into Svdden Death's 90-minute set, there was a noticeable change. Whereas the first half incorporated some uplifting tunes by Marshmellow and other "poppy" artists, the second half had a darker and more underground sound.

And then, it happened...

For a moment, Svdden Death disappeared behind the table. Then, he reappeared...wearing a sinister-looking mask! I guess it's an elk's skull complete with horns! Seriously, it looked like something out of a Netflix horror series. It was freaky, but somehow completely appropriate. Think about all the artists that use some kind of headgear – Deadmau5, Marshmellow, and of course the dance music robots, Daft Punk. So for Svdden Death, a satanic-looking animal skull worked perfectly.

A few minutes later, I was in the throes of a particularly intense mosh pit. I had to fully concentrate just to stay upright while keeping the phone in the air. Then, I looked up and had to do a double-take.

There he was, with the animal head mask on, floating 20 feet above the DJ table, looking like the incarnation of some kind of pagan deity. He had hooked into a high wire rig and was hoisted into the air. With the lights and lasers running full blast, the sight was surreal and amazing! This was a fantastic show!

Again, I take such imagery with a grain of salt. Is Svdden Death really caught up in the world of Satanism or pagan rituals? I have no clue and I really don't care. And I doubt he is. I think it's just brilliant marketing, and it makes for a very entertaining experience.

During this second half of the show, another logo was broadcast on the screens that I didn't recognize. The text wasn't easily legible – the font looked like a mess of tangled tree roots. It wasn't until I got home that I learned about Voyd, Svdden Death's alter ego who wears the mask and plays darker variations of riddim and dubstep. So this show featured both sides of Svdden Death, and it was a perfect mix.

I consider myself very lucky. I was there that night in Hollywood, when Svdden Death sold out the Palladium. I got to see a "regular" set and a Voyd set. And I predict that Svdden Death's career is just beginning. Wait and see how he gets better timeslots at EDC and other festivals. But I was there is the early days, when he was still young up-and-coming. I was lucky.

Fortunately, the recording came out pretty good. The raw file sounded rather flat, but with a bit of tweaking and massaging, the final product sounds decent. In fact it sounds really solid. I'm listening back to it right on now on headphones, and it brings me right back to that special night. My obsession for recording live events has paid off big this time. I hope you enjoy this one as much as I do.

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