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agentravensong · 2 years

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The inevitable Employee 432 / Settings Person and Narrator comparison analysis post

Or, a rumination on stagnation versus "progression" and what counts as an ending, feat. a detour to discuss [REDACTED]

Of all the games to include actual, genuine lore, I honestly did not expect TSP: Ultra Deluxe to be one of them. After all, part of the point of the original game is that everything's a contradiction.

But then Ultra Deluxe took Employee 432, a background gag character, and made them a god.

Why?

To serve as a foil to the Narrator.

I. What's 432's deal?

For people who haven't heard the whole lore, this post has the video where Davey Wreden explained it plus a transcript, but to paraphrase:

Employee 432's one job in the company was to sharpen pencils. But they never had any pencils to sharpen. No one would give them any if they asked. They had nothing else on their desk, nothing to their name. Just a single, straightforward goal that the world refused to provide them the means to fulfill.

And all the while, they were being observed, studied, their coworkers writing a room's worth of peer reviews on them. It was all just one big experiment.

It's good to collect data.

Over 3,000 days (nearly 9 years) of this, of this surveillance, of not being able to fulfill their purpose, eventually drove 432 "so psychologically mad that they become the fabric of the universe", with their new purpose being "setting things for you".

Now. There's a lot that could be said about. All That.

I want to focus on the character's perspective and ideology re: The Stanley Parable itself.

432, despite everything they've been through, despite what the Office did to them, does not want to end the story, or to destroy it in some spectacular fashion. No, they want to destroy it another way: by endlessly recycling the game into its own sequels, only changing the title screen.

The Stanley Parable is not sacred, we do not need to protect it. Screw the legacy! Let's keep making Stanley Parable games until the sun explodes! Let's run this franchise into the ground, let's drag it through the mud and back.

How did 432 come to this conclusion? Well, in one of the logs on them new to Ultra Deluxe, we see that, eventually, they started repeating a certain phrase:

I must keep the wheel turning.

Settings Person says the same in the Epilogue, right after saying:

The Stanley Parable cannot end. It can only spiral in on itself, forever.

This wheel and spiral imagery is typical for discussing cycles, yes, but I also think it ties specifically to 432's former job: using the pencil sharpener. Over time, without being able to actually do their job, they became obsessed with the fantasy of it, the idea of sticking a pencil in there and having the machine rotate it (sharpening it). So obsessed that they took it to this more abstract, all-encompassing level, as a fundamental law of the universe (the same as happened to their very being).

The machine must run. The wheel must turn.

But, in this obsession, they forgot the purpose of the pencil sharpener. You're only supposed to sharpen a pencil up to a point. Otherwise, it breaks, or you wear it out until there's nothing left.

And then, how will you be able to say anything at all?

II. The analysis of the Narrator an anon asked me for days ago

By virtue of 432's newfound position as a "god" of the narrative, there is an inevitable comparison to be drawn between them and the Narrator. 432, in fact, draws it themself.

And if people hate it? Who cares! You see, that was the Narrator's problem. He was so obsessed with what people thought of his work. Don't make his mistake. Don't cling to the legacy. Let it burn.

This obsession is a large part of the Narrator's characterization. After all, the Skip Ending happens because he gets so hurt by the negative reviews that he implements a feature they suggested without realizing it goes against everything the Parable is made for, against his very existence.

But it's important to acknowledge that what the Narrator counts as "his work" has changed from the original to Ultra Deluxe. It's not just about his one intended path anymore, with every diversion seen as a backup at best and an entirely unintended blemish at worst. If that were the case, then why would the Memory Zone contain fond memories of any ending other than the Freedom Ending, his original story? No, over time, the Narrator seems to have accepted those other games as being part of the Parable, to have come to an understanding that they are what make the game what it is. They are a part of its legacy. And he's become nostalgic for the whole thing.

The Narrator in Ultra Deluxe is defined by nostalgia and legacy. He only goes about making The Stanley Parable 2 because UD's "new content" is disappointing, just a gimmick tacked on to the original, and he feels compelled to save the game's legacy. And yet, all his attempts to make something new "from the ground up" that genuinely expand on the game end up being just that: little add-ons that are either totally divorced from or actively get in the way of the original content. Is this because the Narrator genuinely doesn't have any other ideas for stories? Or is it because he's too stuck in The Stanley Parable - too afraid of ruining to make any major additions (like a third door that actually leads to new paths), or just creatively burned out by working within the confines of the world of the office for so long?

The figurines are probably the best implemented of the new features in terms of encouraging exploration of the game's content and providing a new goal to work towards without being obtrusive, which may be why the Narrator grows such a fondness for them. The ending you get from collecting them all really drives home the Narrator's nostalgia, and how it's his downfall. The Narrator gives what sounds like genuine lore/backstory about why he created the Parable, or at least Stanley, in the first place, and then resolves that, as much fun as he's had telling the story, it's time for him to shelve it, to take control of his life again, to tell new stories...

After one more go.

So you play again, thinking (if you're me) that this might just be your last run, and you get an ending. And then another. And another.

And you realize that the Narrator, in deciding to give it one more go, has unknowingly passed up the one opportunity he had to move on. Because he doesn't remember as much/well as he thinks he does. He's been at this so long that it all blurs together. There is no "one last time". Or, rather, he doesn't get to be the one who determines that. He'll never get to go out on his own terms.

the end is never the end is never the end is never

So, there's an obvious contrast between the Narrator and 432. The Narrator holds The Stanley Parable as something sacred, as having a legacy worth preserving, whereas 432 wants to tear it down from that high place, to burn the legacy. You could say the moral takeaway is the synthesis of their thesis and antithesis: you should hold some respect for the past, enough to recognize what things from it are worth keeping and learning from, but you also can't hold on to it too tightly or you'll be stuck in it.

However, if you look at it from the right angle, you'll see their positions are remarkably similar:

They are both stuck in stagnation, in a form that's dressed up as progress.

432 is self-aware about this. They are, with our help, creating "sequels" without any actual new content, just slapping a new label on things.

The Narrator is not. He tries to make The Stanley Parable 2, but ends up making The Stanley Parable With A Bucket, Collectibles With No Associated Reward, And A Fancy New Title Screen, which is just + 1 bucket and 6 collectibles from being what 432 does. He can't make anything truly new as long as he's stuck within the framework of The Stanley Parable, as long as he clings to the legacy.

Either way, the game ends up "spiral[ing] in on itself, forever", digging itself an infinitely deep grave.

It only ends when you stop playing. The "canon ending", the end of the story, is wherever you stopped, whether that be after the Freedom ending, or the "Not Stanley" / "Real Person" / "Incorrect" ending, or the Broom Closet "ending", or the Epilogue, or the 8 room.

That's what the Curator was going on about, isn't it? That turning the thing off is the only way to set them both free?

But, of course, neither 432 nor the Narrator want you to stop playing, because... well, they're video game characters, who were created specifically for you. To set the game to your specifications. To tell you a story.

432 seems a bit less needy in this regard, or at least better capable of hiding it. They're fine!

They're fine.

Narrator, on the other hand?

It was the vessel [someone listening] I needed, Stanley. Not the outcomes, not the story, none of that matters anymore. I'll give it all up, I'll give up every branching path, I'll burn my story to the ground!

(i wonder if i bolded that bit because it parallels a line from 432 that i previously bolded. hmm.)

Oh, Narrator. Just listen to him:

If I knew that my life depended on finding something to be driven by other than validation... What would that even be? Heh, it's strange, but the thought of not being driven by external validation is unthinkable. Like, I actually cannot conceive of what that would be like!

...wait, isn't that from-

III. This post is about The Beginner's Guide now

Why? Because why not. I mean, take it from Wreden:

But, more specifically, The Beginner's Guide also features a conflict between stagnation and progression represented by a pair of game makers / storytellers, one who speaks to us and one who we only hear from via text.

Here is where I say, to those who haven't played or watched a playthrough of The Beginner's Guide, that the rest of this post will spoil shit, and this is one of those experiences that you really should go into blind if you can (especially since it's relatively short). I'd put a second "read more", but I don't think tumblr allows that, so, read on at your own risk.

We good? Good. (also, a note: I will be using they/them for Coda because there's some Gender Stuff in the background of TBG that makes their gender not 100% clear.)

Where the Narrator and 432 both represented a combination of stagnation and progress, the dichotomy with Davey and Coda is, at least at first glance, much more clear cut.

Davey is all about progress, specifically toward a destination. He skips you past the maze on the ship, the slow stairs, the multi-hour wait in the prison, and the obstacles of the tower, to get to the bits that he thinks have meaning. He cuts off the cleaning game, because

"You can't stay in the dark space for too long, you just can't, you have to keep moving, it's how you stay alive."

He adds lampposts to mark the endpoint of each of Coda's games (after Down / The Streetwise Fool), making his reasoning very explicit (though he attributes it to Coda):

I think up to this point he's been making really strange and abstract games with no clear purpose, and maybe you can only float around in that headspace for so long. Because now he wants something to hold onto. He wants a reference point, he wants the work to be leading to something. He wants a destination!

Coda, by contrast, seems happy to sit with an idea and not have it lead to anything. They made the cleaning game to be endless, and Davey admits this was a time where they were very happy. "Grossly happy" in his opinion, but still.

Right before that one, they made nearly a dozen prison games back to back, a process Davey describes as "awful to watch, to see a person basically unraveling through their work". He even admits later that this was where he first started suspecting Coda was depressed, but... maybe they just liked making prisons. And though Davey says Coda "doesn't have that voice telling you to stop, that particular mechanism of defense against yourself", they do, eventually. Unlike 432, they find the point, and they stop the machine.

Also, if you actually read the dialogue from the two trios of cubeheads in the Down game, right before finding the first of the lamposts, then... I'll let you read it for yourself.

Coda also parallels 432 in how they don't seem to have any nostalgia for their own games, reportedly throwing them all into their computer's trash bin as soon as they're completed. In fact, you might be able to argue that Coda is afraid of having a legacy. When you're destroying their games in The Machine, you have the option to say either that Coda's work dies here, or that "I’ll make sure you are known forever!”, which positions the two thoughts as equivalent. Allowing Coda's games to be seen and gain notoriety would, to Coda, kill the games.

An attempt to secure legacy only destroying the integrity of what came before... now where I have heard that fear recently?

So, Davey is progress, and Coda is stagnation. Neither mentality is totally healthy on its own. Coda admits to having had frustrating moments of getting stuck while trying to come up with new ideas (even if that didn't mean they were depressed), and there are certainly games of theirs that feel like they build to a certain Point. Meanwhile, Davey's stubborn obsession keeps him from recognizing why Coda actually liked their games, what they got out of game making, and thus all his attempts at analyzing Coda's authorial intent end up twisting the games into something else.

And so then, in Ultra Deluxe, we take this simple dynamic and complicate it by having the Narrator and 432 both represent a kind of stagnation masquerading as progress.

...except, it's not so "simple" in The Beginner's Guide, either. Let me just copy-paste this paragraph from my beginner's guide video script doc* real quick:

Davey derries Coda’s prison games and the cleaning game for being stuck on one idea, being content to repeat the same cycles, instead of progressing. He highly values moving forward, working towards a goal. And yet, Davey’s so hung up on this one goal of fixing (his relationship with) Coda that he’s found himself trapped in such a loop, one that’s actually destructive. He doesn’t let himself really interrogate his feelings, he just replays Coda’s games, repeats the same ideas he’s always had about them. He appears to be moving, but he’s really stagnant.

*No I have not made the video yet. Do you think I'd feel the need to go on this whole diatribe if I had?

In order for Davey to move on, to actually make progress, he has to let go of his relationship with Coda. Of Coda's games. At least for long enough that he can come back to them with a truly open mind.

Coda, meanwhile, has (hopefully) already moved on. Davey says they stopped making games, but remember that a) Coda has cut off contact with Davey, and b) Coda never shared their games with anyone else. So how would Davey know? It's only the end of Coda's game making career from his perspective.

Endings are all a matter of perspective.

All Stanley could think about, all he could talk about, was going back, doing it over again. [...] "This isn't an ending! This is just a hole in the ground!" The bucket sighed. True, it wasn't an ending, but it's where we happened to be. And maybe, possibly, if we accept the reality of things, maybe this will become an ending eventually. It's what the bucket was counting on.

IV. A Kind of Conclusion

There's a lot more I could say here - especially if I went back to Employee 432, aka Settings Person, aka the Time Keeper. I could start rambling about their whole "what is time, anyway?" mentality ties back into the idea of there not being any definitive endings. I could talk more about how tragic it is that they, in their "escape" from the office, have come to perpetuate the very cycle that broke them, and that the best we can do for them is to indulge them in their vengeance, keeping Stanley and the Narrator and everyone else trapped. I could speculate about what their transition from regular office worker to entity above the story could mean for the Narrator's backstory.

I could also say more about the Narrator. About how his perspective, his relationship to us, to Stanley, has changed from the original to Ultra Deluxe. About how fucking sad the Skip Ending is, my god.

I could say a hell of a lot more about The Beginner's Guide, but I'll save that for the theoretical video.

I think it's about time this post came to an end. Thanks to everyone who decided not to nope out of this beast early. I hope you got something from it :)

P.S. - If you guys really wanna feel something, go read the text for Interview, the part of The Beginner's Guide that The Machine would later replace. It's. Something, all right.

#the stanley parable #the stanley parable ultra deluxe #tsp:ud #the beginner's guide #davey wreden #tspud spoilers #narrative nonsense #IT'S DONE!#...what if i made this into a video?#...let's save that question for another day

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jasper-rolls · 20 days

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Media Roundup (March 2024)

i forgot to do this for like the first third of the month oops! life is hard. quite a little list of stuff i consumed

AD:TRANCE 10 - Diverse System

TRANCE MUSIC IS FUCKING BACK, BABY. man this was a real solid compliation, just some excellent stuff throughout. it never quite got beyond the heights of 2, but still a very strong showing.

best tracks: "Warrior", "Visiophanum", "Stella Walker"

X-Men: Days of Future Past

this is that good comic book shit. some really fantastic sequences although it left some stuff on the table - i kept expecting quicksilver to show back up and attach himself to the team and he just...didn't, i guess, despite what seemed like obvious interest. presumably a set up for the sequel

i feel a little disappointed the future stuff was just not at all prominent and the story focused almost entirely on the 70s. not that i'm opposed to the 70s but it felt like something interesting could be done with the future, and i was expecting some weird timeline flashing shit with new future realities being created and wolverine having to jump back again and that...doesn't really happen, he just starts thrashing the table and making hurting kitty for really no reason - they already had the sentinel ticking clock, they didn't need to attack elliot page too. also they keep fucking stiffing beast, he doesn't...really do anything here and his design kinda sucks. please write him good just once, i'm begging you

otherwise it was pretty great. love young erik and charles's dynamic. they really need to kiss about it that would probably fix the timeline for real

The American Dream - Tedrich Lendum

i wasn't expecting much from this, and it starts off feeling a little trite, so perhaps there's only so much to expect when you're chopping and screwing country, but then it ballooned into this nigh on apocalyptic feeling. weird yet cool.

best track: "Down"

Ahsoka

laughable that everyone involved was like "oh, i guess you can see this as rebels season 5, but it's really just its own standalone thing that you can enjoy on its own terms without needing to do homework" and then it was just rebels season 5. just name it rebels season 5, man.

is this what the people want? is this really what we're satisfied by? sabine can do force stuff now even though that was like, never the point of her character. we get no idea of what ezra's life has been like since the end of rebels S4 and his character has changed not one bit from spending literal years in exile on a mudball so, whatever, he gets to go home i guess. did ahsoka change, like at all? she had some clone wars fanservice in the middle there but like. she didn't have an arc, she never stopped doing what she was going to do and she ends the show the same as she started it but she's just in a different part of the galaxy. is this all set up for the mando movie? what is the point of doing any of this when no-one's going to go through any kind of journey? filoni, what happened? you used to be pretty good at this, sometimes even great!

when is andor season 2. good god

Guardians of the Galaxy

heartbreaking: chris pratt is the star of the best MCU movie thus far

i laughed AND i cried. much more enjoyable for feeling largely unshackled from the binding narrative that's starting to wrap around the MCU at this point, where the film can focus on its characters and their journeys. especially immediately after watching something so arc-less as the mandoverse, this feels like a bright star. wonderful stuff. looking forward to more

GioGio's Bizarre Adventure II: GOLDEN HEART/GOLDEN RING

not much to say about it - despite the title it takes place in the middle of vento aureo. still, some cool fights to enjoy. joy division is a fun stand imo.

Skizz - Alan Moore, Jim Baikie

E.T. by way of alan moore seems like it'll be interesting, and the original run is decent, but it doesn't do anything truly groundbreaking, and once baikie takes over writing it becomes pretty dull. still, a neat curiosity

The Bob's Burgers Movie

Crime Hole

just a good fun hour and a half, and also a tear came to my eye when they talked about louise's hat. the villain is kind of obvious but i like how they make his earlier actions make sense. my only real complaints are that gene and tina's subplots just kinda get left by the wayside, only remarked upon occasionally, and the dovetailing of bob and linda's plot with the kids just felt a little too forced to really work. regardless, great music. some genuinely wonderful animation, not just on the dancing, but there's these delightful little actions that are done so fluidly. teddy crying in the alley, felix trying to get the toothpick out of his drink with his tongue. its a joy to watch

Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures

I Love Yoda's Indoctrination Camp For Kids

(it's fine)

American Gangster - Jay-Z

i've always kind of struggled to connect to hip-hop, and this took some close listening, but i think this is where i finally get it. learning that jay does it all off the top of his dome completely changed how i viewed it.

best tracks: "I Know" "Party Life" & "Fallin'"

Fullmetal Alchemist

i think what i liked about this i presumably attribute to the original story. the original story that takes up the back half i think has some genuinely fantastic moments, but it fumbles a lot. this did properly get me into FMA, though

From Hell - Alan Moore & Eddie Campbell

perhaps the deepest, most well researched dive into not only the whitechapel murders, but the entire society that surrounds them, and tying it in beatuifully with a genre transcending exploration of time and evil. moore does it again.

American Idiot - Green Day

the fucking album ever. more lefty than i gave it credit for: this isn't just stupid "ooh bush bad" stuff, this was a mediation on what it means to grow up being told your country stands for freedom, while it does something completely different. salient, even now.

best tracks: "Jesus of Suburbia", "Holiday", "St. Jimmy"

#media roundup

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drewandareview · 3 months

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Terminator II: Judgment Day (1991)

Originally published December 17th, 2012

I finally saw it.

What made me want to see it?

This movie was on my list of four movies I have to see (now three) to consider myself "cultured enough in film." This film was on the list because I just kept hearing about it and how it was such an amazing sequel to the first Terminator.

What did I think of it?

I was criminally underwhelmed. I thought the first Terminator was okay. I found it a surprisingly basic story but it worked for me. The sequel's story was fairly basic too and its premise was clever enough. But.

The Connors are some of the most annoying, agitating, objectionable characters I have ever had to watch on screen. And they were the protagonists. They were people I was supposed to be rooting for. The kid was unrealistically written and the mother was just an unpleasant human. Whoever said there was great character development in this was wrong. Maybe great backstories, but half the main characters were emotionless robots and the other half were vapid, underdeveloped abominations to the human race. I actually slapped myself in the face at least three times at something those assholes did.

Yeah, the T-1000 was really cool. But I don't think he got nearly enough screen time. And honestly, I didn't find him to be very menacing either. In the first movie, The Terminator really did prove himself to be a merciless killing machine. This new villainous terminator didn't do nearly as much to establish himself as a "bad guy."

I might be being too hard on it because I was expecting something with much more depth. It did have depth, but it wasn't a deep movie. Like its predecessor, it was a basic action movie with a solid premise. But even if I was rating it as a basic action movie, John and Sarah Connor really beat this sequel into the ground.

Overall?

Terminator II: Judgment Day incites plenty of judgment with too much focus on poorly-written protagonists and too little focus on a well-written villain.

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rennyji · 3 months

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Remaining Tweets Part II (01/25/2024)

4 youth ofToday, I was a youth when AOL instant messenger was the thing, cable modems were The Thing, spice girls sang, Pokémon came out. I was starting college when Facebook (Used2be just service of wallPosts, directMessages, photos&friending features-bareBones)came out in 2010.

Im a fan of noble (#OptimusPrime) Optimus Prime & #Transformers up until the sequels. Should’ve kept Shia Labeoff and his girl friend, and grew sequels to #Bumblebee being able 2 speak.

When U do same thing everyday, even in eventful atmosphere of University setting (daily chipotles run, ymca, Newman house Church, actual school, Starbucks), & when you’ve been with ur family for 20 years, u know when things r off & people behave differently.

There’s a Biblical saying: where your treasure is, there also your heart will be. Another way of saying what you care about, takes up ur concerns and focus. What is OCD? Does anyone know? Is it someone who has fetish 4 reorganizing same shelf again & again? Is it some1 who washes hands in exact same way all the time? Is it from anxiety, *”or lack of focus on what you do/and a diminished ability 2 recall w/memory what u did?”-

how do U address a delusion? Ex. In trust filled environment, showing that ur imaginary friend is indeed imaginary? Or meds? How do U address OCD? Meds or work arounds like putting 3 locks (as seen in apts w/hangingLock), or having a storm door in addition 2 ur door?-

what I’m getting at is that a mental illness is something that interferes with your functioning on a critical level. Something without workarounds leads to meds. Sometimes meds are about making the inflexible, open enough to listen to their failings. -

theres something wrong w/every1. Some are a little ADD/OCD/bipolar/paranoid-howd this look? Some1 who can’t study w/music (ADD), concerned about finicky aptmt lock (OCD), while tight on cash/protective of stuff in school (paranoid), while splurging on desk accessories (bipolar)

AnneHathaway ( Anne Hathaway ) was stellar in #TheIntern , #Interstellar , #LesMiserables , #GetSmart , #LoveAmdOtherDrugs , #TheDarkNightRises (incredible as Selina Kyle) … she’s an American contribution to elegance .

Two songs on opposite sides of the spectrum that you can drive to while feeling cool: “ All Night ” by

JanetJackson ( Janet Jackson ) or #DrivingWithTheTopDown by #RaminDjawadi

this is bottom of a laptop desk,bought 4 $60. Overall, its quality&best of category. But itHasAn irritating defect. 1 of the legs, that stands the desk, is loose.U carry it/putIt onUr lap/putIt back on a shelf, uHear leg flapping. Flap Flap Flapping.

-annoying&expensive enough 2 want a replacement.

Associated clip: https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1749934567174070647?s=20

now Ive heard “perfect is the enemy of the good.” But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t strive for perfection. If you don’t have the time or the means, yes, settle for good. Otherwise what’s wrong with things being worth your time/effort and the money spent.-

U hear orchestrators mix in “he wants things just so” from what’s echoed in others, or wants everything perfect. It’s something that stems from what filter, in another life, ur using as lens, to see theirs thru. What ur going in with, what ur incentive is, fuels perception,

U mightve heard #LightningStrikes not twice/lightning doesnt strike twice. Its like when some1 says “ur not paranoid if “they” R out to get U. Words 2 live by. When thingsHappen again& again, whatever some1 else says, it’s not a coincidence. Now let that snowball 4 over a decade. America is a fascinating place. It’s a place where underdogs tend to have a chance of the cliche? “Making it” Conversely, there are people who see this place as avenue to get away w/anything.-

Imagine something having a world conspiring around U, ensuring u no that, beating on u 4 talking about it, &then @ 35-40 yrs age, want U 2 go 4 family therapy session? “At this point,”Who cares enough 2 stick around, when they have big plans? #PsychologicalAbuse -

PsychologicalAbuse —treating men as a bully pulpit or as a child waiting 2 grow up w/o power in abusive environment, getting a nationality of people to take advantage of you, medically putting U thru things at risk of side effects…where is the Law, where is law enforcement?!

Take away enough, orchestrators, you out people in a position without much to lose…people like you, people should throw stones at…

I dont see Y #NewHampshirePrimary &others dont use apps/electronic RF signal clickers 2 vote &calculateVotes- medium w/face ID& fingerprint password-in elections&inCongress.-results inBetter voter turnout&time saved. It tookTime,but w/“ #Jackpocket ”, now u can buy lottos in apps

BarbieTheMovie , seems like it’s for those of the last 3 decades. Has fantasy, parallel world, love, female rights, dreams…and actors/actresses, like here, help build the movie…

Anyone else read #CamJansen , #TheZackFiles , #Animorphs , (man, did Tobias have it rough…) #TheBobbsyTwins #CuriousGeorge , #Clifford?

Theres spirit 2 #NewHampshire from #NikkiHaley crowd inParticular but #Trump as well. #NoOneWantsToAdmitfromIowa& #NHPrimary , that realClincher b/w candidates isA #debate. Now looksLike #PartisanPolitics . USA, layDown issues&count whoAddresses more vs. pickingfavorablePersona.

-People look 2 whats tantalizing (tough talk, persona, stereotypical American image) rather than facts. Lay things down, issues or not, & count who handles more.Lay down pros/cons, facts vs opinions, solutions vs talk, legal vs illegal: count.Think if previously, it was a bias.-

Don’t blindly choose a candidate without counting who handles more issues or specifies a solution to issues - #NHPrimary A #debate has to happen before South Carolina. Otherwise it becomes strategy of opposing side as to who will lose 2 Democratic candidate.

If I were to work at #Twitter or #X , I’d implement a group tweets (in collapse -able manner) by a theme or thought. Helps organize twitter and tweets and encourages outputting things in short bursts)

“Heroes come and go, legends never die.” From The Sandlot Legends make a mark with action and make history. Heroes come and go because they’re the latest headline.

On #FoxNews & #CNN ,U hear issues R economy/abortion/immigration/warStatus. 2 paraphrase Van Jones , commonWords rollingAround w/Trump: war/chaos/drama/peace/prosperity. Its believed peace in Trump admin butRhetoric isNegative.-Subjective vs.objective. Again, what R details?-

people asked all day Y they’re pro Trump/Haley. Trump came up numerously as 1 who kept us out of war, & economy allegedly better. Some r pro Haley b/c of Trumps age. But whats the plan? Need debate 4 that.-

Trump hasAttitude ofHaving states mindOwnBusiness, but foreignPolicy not black&white. By notHelping Ukraine, what R consequences? By ignoring decimationOfPalestine, consequences? W/immigration, Biden saidMoney needed 2address.Y notSend diplomats/army 2Venezuela 2help stabilize - to indirectly inhibit asylum seekers?

again, a lot of words just get flung around. Trump=peace/prosperity/uniting country…it may all B true. what does the last mean? -How would I feel United w/country?-

-Seems details irrelevant or people too busy&too preoccupied w/their lives 2 point where atmosphere in country bad enough 4 people 2 resonate w/some1 who has the attitude-from his tone & rhetoric-of go-getter, won’t tolerate nonsense, & restoring America w/a vengeance. #Trump

it’s kinda like what he’s heard as saying: people want attitude of a winner &want “winning.” They’re not concerned and don’t want to be bothered.- From my experience w/people over last decade in talks/emails, people glaze over/skim or get gist of wording. News channels get in2 extensiveAnalysis, but unfortunately, could B tooMuch 4 certainPeople @ certain nonCoffee times ofDay. W/Trump, people hear&feel attitude ofWinning.

NoOneWantsToAdmit people hear a fraction of what U say or write in emails, & rest of their understanding is from gist gotten & whatever personalBias or filter fromTheirLives. InSameWay, U target socialMediaAdvertising, u need 2 target mannerism/rhetoric/tone 2 hone in on focus.

in politics, high level wording gets thrown like Bidenomics allegedly helping- NeedSubstantiveDialogues. Not helping w/grocery costs. High level/non extrapolated concepts thrown around as w/age. Saw panelOfPeople w/80 yr old whos sharp @ 11:30 PM- says cuz wife cooks well.

Associated Link:

https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1750014739193733125?s=20

NoOneWantsToAdmit appearance is nine tenths of the law. Could be physical attributes/strong personality.

perhapsLet religionGuideScience W/ #abortion . been50 yrs/moveOn. nationallyAllow w/limits (asReasons not2B Rigid), like restrictingWhen brainWaves detected/babyGettingOxygen-1st 6weeks-like God giving breathOfLife 2Adam. - #RoeVWade #Roe #ReproductiveRights #ReproductiveFreedom

ArtificialIntelligence ( #AI ) is now doing robo

calls of prominent people like Biden, mimicking his voice, varying tones, and colloquialisms like “Malarky.” People get gist of things and apparently machines care about getting every detail. #SkyNet #Terminator on the rise ?

I like 2use Twitter 2 convey my perspectives/truths. However, “X” posts thoughts, extending beyond 1 tweet, in order ofMost recent post. Results in long thoughts, posting backwards. U tend 2 no 1 tweet is part of something bigger b/c of dashes. Start w/beginning ofDay &scrollUp.

When U walk in2 ur kitchen 2 eat breakfast, &hear, from context, that ur dads on a call 2 a sister he vents 2, &he says something of tune “oh man, I don’t know what to do (2 indicate emotion)…how do you deal w/that (meaning behind words)…then he says there’s that ‘other thing ”…-

it’s hard in mass conspiracy, not 2 wonder if vague wording is about U, when things used 2 be so open, &spelled out, in house. I mean, in my youth b4 “this,” I was like the guy who listened 2 all their grievances…now I’m the guy doors r closed on, while whispering occurs.

News anchors&on-scene reporters haveMost rigorous schedules-early morning 2 standing in night. They go 2 most trying places. I see these guys @ oddLocalHours, whenAbroad, 2 satiate U.S. broadcasting. As testament 2 theirSchedules, can literally see bags underEyes. Hats off2them.

I recall Jake Tapper saying father is a doctor. 2 travel 2 emotionally testing places like Israel @ all hours&report all day-clearly loves what he does vs schedule of Dr…Erin Burnett /Anderson Cooper Kayleigh McEnany have kids & coverPrimaries lateIn2Night.-

Like all journalists, they feel what they do matters and lives/breathes what they do with conviction.

PriyankaChopra ( Priyanka Chopra ) the Desi Girl-has 1 of mostImpressive resumes: from Miss World 2000 to actress/model in greatInflux of BollywoodMovies, 2emigrating 2USA & makingSong: “Exotic” w/ #Pitbull in 2 Hollywood/Prime series like Quantico 2 marrying Jonas brother…wow

Didn’t realize it was #NationalComplimentDay Not a bad idea…how about that, did I just compliment?! #wednesdaythought #WednesdayMotivation #Wednesday #Wednesdayvibe

Blast from the past…in my college suite, back in 2008, John Stewart ( #JohnStewart ) and Steven Colbert ( #StevenColbert ) were daily interests … iconic of a chapter of life …

Whatd #Progress ( Progress ) lookLike in America?Well, onA typicalDay, Id like 2 wakeUp,¬ worry if heat in wholeHouse is going2costFortune, Id like 2buy justSnacks,weekly, w/o it leaving aDent in biweekly average $2000 salary, Id like 2 drive inA wider/safer BronxRiverParkway-

-on prev. #Progress ( Progress ) tweet,I’d like2drive2work, seeingHigher speedLimits thanks2 betterCars, Id like 2stop @ aBetter looking&better run post office, Id like 2 be in a workplace better managing time/organized meetings, Id like 2 B around lessTired/more focused people.-

On prev #Progress ( Progress ) tweet, it already results in opportunities 4 jobs thruBetter infrastructure inRoads/buildings.-A revamp project. Better/cheaper energy. FreeHealthcare like inAustralia…thisIs America after all. Better funded/organized http://education. No income tax likeDubai.

Progress ( Progress ) - middle ground w/all news day channels, where AI gives opportunity 2 better hrs 4 anchors, by rewarding them 4 use of their likeness in post midnight hours…not just there, but 4 any mimicking of any work, for better rested employees, all around..

So heard 1 specific as 2 what’s going 2 B done in potential Trump presidency from speech last night: “he’s going to drill, baby, drill…” WRT Alaska. He says itll bring energy costs down. Can further be extrapolated to lower gas prices…but all this seems like a handful of things…-

So I guess that’s covering economy. WhatAbout taxes taking halfWages&increased priceLevels ofOtherThings? Trump has become synonymous w/upheaval of establishment for those wanting a better America. But what’s his plan?-

-HisSpeech lastNight sayingThings like imposterNikki, crookedBiden, “these R evilPeople”, “we won3 times,” dont get angry/get even. He said there are 5 things that R worthy of investigation, targeting Nikki Haley. I'm listening, but Trump backtracked and didn't say what those 5 things are. Why not say it?! Are people hearing 5 things, in a higher/superficial level, and then losing focus/interest? 4 betterOrWorse, people prefer 1 liners vs plans. I guess Trump prefers listing resultsOfPlans:

Associated Link: https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1750224260176437311?s=20

There might be literally/figuratively some loose screws at #Boeing ( Boeing ). Around January 18th, apparently, a Boeing plane burst into flames while coming down from the sky. An anxiety filled world, when people aren’t handling the making of a plane with care - or fuels reasons for anxiety in a less stabile world.

ChineseNewYear #ChineseNewYear reminds me of the scroll like calendars and zodiac animals that restaurants used to give out. Quality calendars. Representing the year of the dragon.

DeepikaPadukone ( Deepika Padukone ) looked quite classy in her airline commercial on the #BBC and was great in #OmShantiOm (classic #reincarnation films like #KaranArjun) and #Pathaan (w/ #ShahRukhKhan & #JohnAbraham - wish I had some Parsi in me).

Hindus ( Hindus ) or a #Hindu ( Hindu ), from #Hinduism, do something explicit, other religions hint at:disciplining mind thru meditation/yoga. Other religions, thru rituals or parables, train mind, ultimately 2 give us focus. If we focus w/o distraction, we can do anything.

Gasoline cars vs electric cars…problem w/latter? Only good 4 short distances. Hybrid makes sense 2 use both fuel sources where each appropriate. I once saw a proposal 4 solar panel roads. Driving on road fuels car. Sounds like opportunity 4 jobs, in paneling America.

Iconic songs decades ago: Avril Lavigne - “Complicated” like Kelly Clarksons (Independent) or Pinks (Party Started.)

So I was watching Brothers Sun on Netflix. The older brother has a thing for freshly made Churros; he finds it heavenly. I feel the same way about some of the snacks available at #HMart, or online Asian groceries like #YamiBuy and #UmamiCart -

my favorite snack/breakfast item from Asian grocery stores? Microwaved Flavored steam buns like the Hokkaido cream roll. But one roll costs $2.19 online or 2 for $5 at HMart- that’s insane for one or two buns. As good as flavored microwaved/warm Belgian waffles-

Associated screenshot in link:

https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1750615630569480460?s=20

-now I heard on news a throwback case, in relation 2 cakes&pastries. A non diversity cake shop (in relation 2 1 subset/life style of people) refused 2 bake a wedding cake 4 same gender couple. I believe it was dismissed, but now person liable “4 not being made 2 make the cake.”-

Y would that couple want cake made from some1 who doesn’t share in their values? Who feels like eating that? Sounds like it resulted in needless shaming of the bakers. But this culture in U.S. can’t let things go. -

-& on flip side, having some1 forced 2 selling something like an airline ticket is 1 thing-Not much effort…politics aside, how do u force some1 to bake an any cake?-

-Now I mentioned cultureOfToday. In back2TheFuture, MartyTellsDoc, “whatiya meanDoc? All the bestStuff is made inJapan” In U.S. highSchool historyClasses, weLearn itsCultural 2do tasks, in community w/1 another, w/care&attention, 2best ofAbility, inJapan-

Associated Link: https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1750619912073044104?s=20

I’ve heard about Michelin stars associated with the French b/c of interests in quality foods. But Japanese and other Asian desserts and their other foods? It’s made w/so much care. Foods, electronics all with care. And on a side note, that roll mentioned comes in other flavors-

Associated screenshot in link: https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1750620505806098796?s=20

now people, like in Middle America, love the notion of American made. but American made doesn’t carry the same weight of community and quality it used to. I think the perception comes from World War II when people came together to build things like planes.-

i think has to do with Americas desire for alcohol and cannabis and other drugs. You want to beat China and Japan? Sharpen ur mind to live in reality, rather than getting high and ignoring reality. -

America needs to learn from what’s commonly known in the north eastern states, as the immigrant work ethic. This an extreme dedication to jobs, to skip meals, so that ur children can rise from education and having book bags like other kids, w/o nightly relief from stiff drink-

I believe if America focused on immediacy, sharpened their minds, got blood flowing, learned from immigrant work ethic, or ethic of these news castors,if they learned from China/Japan, #Boeing planes wouldn’t light on fire mid air or have doors flying off.- now Americans call attention to detail as OCD or need 2 be thorough. I remember seeing an episode of #TheFreshPrinceOfBelAir where #WillSmith ‘s character talks about a massage and pedicure-

-Bored out of my mind, in my situation, I went for a pedicure to see what it was. The woman attended to me, who happened to be a Chinese immigrant, covered every inch/corner of my foot and put all her energy into doing a complete job. #ImmigrantWorkEthic

overcome brain dullness, sharpen ur mind. Reality has much to offer…

I think #HelenSlater ( Helen Slater) was best #Supergirl ( Supergirl ), no offense to the recent actress. A glimpse of innocence, girliness, super powerfulness…I feel females look more girly now than womanly…but then I’m trapped as a victim of circumstance, so what do I know…

Something as simple as a rotating/swivel keyboard tray, or a projecting stacked dual monitor stand (to bring ur desk monitor across from your bed, closer) are forms of #ingenuity. But man, are these things expensive.

Associated screenshot in link: https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1750627262465020027?s=20

A small mp3 player, where U canSkim thruTrack w/finger, is aHardFind. U want that when exercising&want 2 hear chorus. InMyOpinion, #AppleWatch is next bestThing 2 such an mp3 player. But despite bezel & touchscreen, U can’t skimThru MusicApp or #Spotify onWatch. Simple #ingenuity

Trump said in New Hampshire victory speech, there’s 5 interrogation worthy things of Haley. But he does this thing w/his wording, where he kind of goes backward, w/o specifics. Y doesn’t any1 go just 1 step further & ask what those 5 things are? #sensationalism ?

Questions you ask, when a victim of circumstance : #IsItOverNow (Is it over now)?

Americans say country is fractured. Is it b/c of a 50 yr debate over abortion or perspective on illegal immigration? I’m getting irritated b/c 4 jelly donuts cost me $8.99 at ShopRite…& don’t get me started on jelly donuts-never fully surrounding inside- also good when warm…-

Associated screenshot in link: https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1750632104109412448?s=20

when people say country’s fractured, are they saying things 4 sake of saying things? What it like feeling my country is fractured? Is it an all day sensation? No offense, but I’m thinking more that the donut is going to run out and that’s another $10.

when America says “keptUsOutOfWar”, they may B expressing grievance w/handling of Ukraine&Israel. But then theres sealing border issue. U might have 2 go2 war-run places 2 avoid asylum seekers @ border. Issues overlap,& “AmericaFirst” may mean reaching out in Venezuela w/army.

Regarding movies like Dune ( #Dune ) , I’m happy to see #Zendaya w/additional side 2 personality , but the movie just isn’t Star Wars or Star Trek … it’s not fast moving …

DeepikaPadukone ( Deepika Padukone ) looked quite classy in her airline commercial on #BBC & was great in #OmShantiOm (Om Shanti Om is a classic #reincarnation film like #KaranArjun - Karan Arjun) & #Pathaan (w/ #ShahRukhKhan & #JohnAbraham - wish I had some Parsi in me).

Jake Gyllenhaal ’s #SourceCode ( Source Code ) was a mind blowing movie. He’s in alternate reality b/c of essential last thought on death. What if that’s one heaven/hell? Those who die w/peace state of mind transition 2 heaven like place. Those w/much on conscience, maybe h*ll?

how many things will people just dismiss or accept passively…the amount of detail that sounds off with things like the Denver airport? Towards the end, there’s a good quote: “comedy is a method to dismiss horrific reality.”

(Associated clip below: ) https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1744930291586596913?s=20

-attached clip makes good point in audio. video or images are irrelevant. It’s about what he’s saying. But you’d be surprised how little, people listen. People usually get gist of what every1 else is saying. To shun the attentive in society, something condescending is directed.-

Again, here too it’s about the audio that happens to be from the YouTube channel, “The Why Files”, on a conspiracy. Famous saying: “you’re not paranoid if “‘They’ are” out to get you.”

Did you know they replaced actual tin foil with aluminum foil? Wonder why?

Associated picture in tweet below: https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1745678976553472165?s=20

Please bring back actual tin foil…does it actually work? Is that why they put an end to it in the 50s? I hate to sound comical with my very real situation- but wow…conspiracy?

How can you test a tin foil hat, if, mysteriously, and coincidentally with the times, tin foil isn’t easily available? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tin_foil_hat

probably works too certain things just scream: isn’t it obvious?! Like Denver airport w/its mysterious missing buildings, use of gargoyles, a mean looking horse, a runway shaped as a swastika, paintings of coming 2gether around a blonde-people dismiss all of it b/c a gargoyle made 2 say jokes… In the movie, “Independence Day,” the president asks the CIA, “where do you get the funding for this?” The Jewish father replies, “you don’t think they spend…$30,000 on a toilet seat”

Associated clip:

https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1745685837193388483?s=20

I was watching the CNN debate last night, & the idea about the country being trillions of dollars in debt, not being able to afford the migrant crisis and continue funding for education in NY, not being able 2 help Ukraine/Israel, etc. comes up. Money is going 2 a paranoid DoD

then there’s the daily joke happening at the House of Representatives. On one occasion, you have two guys inciting a fight between each other and Bernie Sanders trying to calm the situation. Then you have Hunter Biden being asked, “if he had the balls” to come up…-

U have ex president Trump being evicted from New York & current president’s son being shamed over porn. This is America? U carelessly allow migrants 2 come in the 100s of 1000s while not being able 2 give free healthcare or avoid cutting budgets. Tax dollars go 2 mind control.-

-House of Reps is shameful- Summer&Christmas vacations, long weekends,&if they actually sit down 4 something, its 2 figure how 2go about shaming a president’s son. if daily issues in country arent resolved, govt shuts down, army doesnt get paid, while congress still has salaries-

meanwhile I have deranged lunatics enslaving and directing my life and giving meaning to everything I do. It’s ok for Congress to get into live fist fights, but it’s wrong if I get frustrated over my situation.-

It’s been at least a decade of me being in “this situation” of mine. That too while America watches and opines over my life. At one time, when I first complained to fbi about my situation, I was like Thank God, this is America, I’ll be saved. They’ll sit down and talk with me.-

but now? It’s not Thank God this is America, it’s more “Figures…it’s America…a circus…” It’s been at least a decade of me being in “this situation” of mine. People are in prison for less.-

-in USA, those like DeSantos can fake family history/resumes/experiences & get a jobs in Congress. He doesn’t have college degrees & becomes a rep of people. No 1 checks. I graduated w/ a computer science degree & an MBA &, probably due 2 my“situation,” I can’t get an honest job-

yesterday or the day before, I think within one week, two subway trains got derailed according to the Pix11 News in New York at 10 pm. But again, “figures, it’s America…a circus” -

my situation? Rather than ending an absurdity, they want to show me in a forced loop over purchases and make it about fear of poor quality or used goods. The orchestrators of my situation, at its onset can make me watery eyed, or with a scalp moving up and down by itself-

that’s right, if they can detect waves, they can output waves. If they claim they detect fear, they can instill fear. Then based on the retard kids in this &their narrative of me,they try to connect what transpires.Mind control is real. It’s probably surprise revelation @ end.-

I have zero interest giving my side or perspective on these things. On something unrelated, if I can share some insight I do, but why the h*ll do I care how someone beyond my family sees me? Someone beyond my God?-

one thing people can take from this? Forget your thoughts on mind reading, mind control, stupid cover up notions like predictive analytics, they claim to be able to be able to show memories. If that’s true, then and all of you, then there really is a Day of Judgment.-

It means beliefs about our lives, our good deeds & bad, from start 2 finish, from birth 2 death, are recorded & able 2 be seen at the will of a Higher Intelligence. That then implies, some reward or punishment based on picture our lives paint. That then implies heaven & hell.-

2the orchestrators, rot in h*ll 4 taking yrs from myLife 2 add 2 urs, 2 avoid what couldve been a minor offense yrs ago, which u stupidly snow balled in2 a seriousCrime, frying my brain 4 nothing-4 talking about a real situation U desperately hide as illness over more a decade+

but once again, not “Thank God, it’s America,” but “Figures, it’s America…a circus.” It’s unbelievable what a nation will support amidst the endless misuse of rules, poor management of quality, etc. How many lives have to be ruined for national security or whatever the visible or invisible government plans are (you might not even realize the government is involved), be it with brain mapping or something else?

Associated Link:

https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1746761254889295983?s=20

-But again figures…it’s America…a circus. Because of negligent law makers and drug/alcohol abuse, you have people not properly checking if trains in NYC will derail twice in a week or if plane doors will fly open mid flight,-

or not vetting House Reps resumes to see if lying or if guy copiloting a plane is mentally sound and not on drugs and not putting the flight at gunpoint.-

what all these people have in common? They don’t care about consequences or someone convinces them of a lack of consequences.-

Biblically it’s said, “whoever harms the innocence of these little ones, it’s better they tie a rock around their head and drown themselves.” This little ones are symbolic of an innocent mind. Someone that harms the sanctity of the mind burns in h*ll-

isn’t America about protecting dignity of even 1 American life?! Isn’t justice system about releasing 100 guilty people, over throwing 1 innocent life in trouble/jail? Ive been in my situation longer than others in jail. Y is my innocent life not worth dignity of freedom?-

a follower of Christ said, “Master, let me bury my father, before following You” Christ sharply responds, “Let the dead bury the dead.” The lesson is not to wait, to stop an injustice, especially simply b/c we’re closer to the end than the beginning. Stop injustice now.-

“Justice should be swift and indiscriminate.” 2 pleasure of those responsible 4 my situation, I'm stuck writing my life away w/ hope some1 will give me "proof"(like an actual person or platform others look at), in place of evidence I've gathered, while fortunate others get 2 live their lives…its all a waste of time…

“Justice delayed is justice denied” “…We look upon human rights…as an ability to live peace…” - Jimmy Carter to Oprah

What does U.S. government do, when they’re against accountability 4 their actions? They make U look like a clown, they take away ur credibility, they take away ur say by manipulating justice system against U, despite ur defense. They focus on “prevent, contain, salvage.”-

brain mapping…what if it enabled people to be operated like drones?- like a remote control plane…the project I’m forced into isn’t about curing diabetes. It’s about mapping person X’s consciousness, digitally, to person Y’s consciousness.-

Everything happening is about employing common citizen as a soldier w/a government designed focus. This has been happening directly & indirectly. Indirectly, when U tell some idiot 2 do something & he/she does it. Directly, is when U map controllers consciousness 2 controllee.- When a series of illegal or unethical or immoral things transpire, unchecked, over a decade or more, my situation is what happens: where everyone plays victim and what they have to go through, except me: the real victim.

2 pleasure of those responsible 4 my situation, I'm stuck writing my life away w/ hope some1 will give me "proof"(like an actual person or platform others look at), in place of evidence I've gathered, while fortunate others get 2 live their lives…its all a waste of time…

If I no about situation-plus or minus somethings -continuing 2 conceal it has no benefit 2 overall project/program. Orchestrators clearly just like dominance & control over some1 who outwits them. All this said yrs ago, like broken record.

These predators like fear of their kill. I always pictured self as one trying 2 get thru school or some present hurdle is, so that I could pave way 2 living/enjoying life I.e. minding own business. But who does “the government” target?- those in solitude, without much family/friends or some1 wholl disclose info 2 them. So from conspiratorial topics like project blue beam, what can we notice from my situation & times we’re in?

Associated clip in link below:

https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1748476549861360024?s=20

-1st, from prev. clip, is “induced audio.”Familiar?-whatever Im hearing/ur hearing w/o me. Next? Loyalty 2 state vs family-Evident in USA w/trendy admiration 4 flag/army. Next: how religion get erased/replaced w/psychiatry.Then allegedRandom earthquakes in Japan/Haiti. Created?!-

in all these fringe &/or conspiratorial & sometimes ridiculous things, there’s some puzzle pieces 2 a bigger truth. What does clip, 2 tweets before, say towards end? How do U engage in instilling a mass conspiracy? With every1 blindly following instruction around a focus. Me.-

This gets in2 “waves” & what they can (WRT possibilities) do 2 the mind & tech. Leads 2 hacking. U say “wireless waves” 2 some1, U risk a depiction of crazy. It’s a taboo. But mind reading/control/conditioning from “thought injection”,/ thru technology “can” happen w/waves.

Associated clip:

https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1748501802020938056?s=20

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art of conversation between those in my life and me...really off...

https://www.tumblr.com/rennyji/740974704732569600/the-art-of-conversation-random-dark-side-of?source=share

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All Churches should include grape juice pod cups in the Sacrament of Communion. The wafer is only half of the Sacrament. My extended thought on this, is in below tumblr link:

https://www.tumblr.com/rennyji/740713445428723712/the-vine-to-the-branch-grape-juice-pod-cups-for?source=share

Law becomes about words and meaning of words and how the meaning of words can be interpreted for situations and set a precedent for future cases. Is insurrection the same as a riot? Regarding border crisis, is it an invasion or just closing the door?-

- on closing the border, there’s a saying: “ Before you remove the splinter in your neighbors eye, remove the log from your own eye” so that u can see clearly.-

- Connecting it w/border crisis, if you can’t satisfy the people already in America, if there isn’t enough resources 4 them, you can’t bring in the responsibilities of other countries. They ARE the responsibilities of their native countries.-

- America and the United Nations needs to send assistance thru army or diplomats to make things better for asylum seekers in their native countries.

#Jawan was great. Hope #Fighter in New York theaters, or at least #AmazonPrimeVideo or #Netflix - can’t remember last time I saw great dancer #Hrithik (#HrithikRoshan - Hrithik Roshan) in a movie-seems like #Bollywood , Brit&EastAsian more on streaming services than #Hollywood…

When U see something like shape of earth, its orbit, the sounds from the earth and its frequencies, or even how the moon is at the right distance to eclipse the sun and earth of different sizes, the Big Bang Theory-a chaotic event producing exactness-becomes mind boggling.

There should be a compartment to remove and attach laptop/phone batteries and wireless cards. Like from what I remember of Samsung phones. Apple products are sleek, but so sleek that you don’t have a lot of work around.

On Thursday of this week, a man was executed with nitrogen gas, used to put him thru a 30 min ordeal of gagging/suffocating. As today, Saturday, is Holocaust Remembrance Day, probably shouldn't aim for something similar to gas chambers.

Regardless of questionable staffers on the Palestine front, probably shouldn't use that as an excuse to cut off funding for aid in a decimated area lacking likely food, shelter, electricity ...

Our emotions and feelings are not things to be suppressed with drugs (legal/illegal) or even alcohol (if suppression is ur purpose), but signs, that whatever contributing to them, needs to be addressed. Let it fuel you, rather than bring you down.

We hear, "I'll be thinkingOf U..." or aSibling asking theirSibling, "when U goOff 2college, will U remember me?"-A prayer can be a wishfulThought or dailyMemory of The Divine. Im sure Whoever put U on thisPlanet, isWondering,when he/she goes about theirDay, willThey remember Me?!

FYI, if U try 2 use twitter search, 2 search thru my tweets (not my name or username) for text or word "Tumblr", the results show tweets from 6 days ago, but not necessarily from last 2 days. I guess it takes time 4 twitter 2 index current/consecutive tweets or add it 2 results.

I useTwitter 4 my views/truths. However, “X” posts thoughts-extendingBeyond 1 tweet-inOrder ofMostRecentPost.Results in longThoughts, postingBackwards.Backed up in Tumblr links/also tweeted.U no if 1 tweet partOf somethingBigger b/c of "dashes." Start w/beginning ofDay &scrollUp.

U want 2 no trademark move of American government/military? When some1 figures out a secret or comes up w/a world changing tech (like free unlimited energy associated w/Nikola Tesla), they disappear or just die b/c it goes against grand plan in big scheme of things-it’s true.-

Associated Link:

https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1748521291550703780?s=20

now if you’ve been reading my stuff, like my tumblr links (which are my tweets, but organized), you know I mentioned a professor who’d let certain things slip in my vicinity, died of a brain aneurism. How do these happen, if unnaturally or when coinciding with a secret? -

the clip, 2 tweets ago, says, “when R we going 2 stand up & do something about these mother f*ers? Is it right 4 some elite people in government 2 hog all good ideas, even w/o a warning & disclosure? My situation might make all of U think, nothing can bad can happen.-

but here’s the thing. In my situation, government/military/law enforcement sees opportunity. These guys are so cocky, they’ll find a way 2 get their way, w/every1 watching. They know I’m alone. They expect no1 to tell me or show me, my situation. -

the government/military/law enforcement know that eventually the ball will be in my court or that my situation will end and I’ll have proof about it.-

The government operates on “prevent, contain, salvage.” They couldn’t prevent from this being as viewed entertainment. They’re containing my situation by trusting no2 is noble enough to tell me about it and form a friendship. But they’re bordering “salvage.” -

if the ball will come back to my court, I get freedom/control to my life, and I’m a famous public figure from being in my situation, what will a cocky government to do to regain control of proof of military tech for DOD purposes?-

They’ll salvage in a way where I’m alive & seen publicly. They’ll probably try 2 map a soldiers consciousness 2 mine. They studied me, have my memories, know I’m alone, know my family. how would U know if person ur seeing, on the inside is not me? People can be cruel.-

-a government event is happening. They’re hiding in broad daylight, behind something like a show/school/college age youth, doing their will. They won the lotto with context or back story of situation or the conflicting personalities of college youth voices and me-

-YouthVoices of “Have good time/party/TGIF, gotIt bad, going w/flow, teenage-probs-4ever”mindset.- Against my “u arrogant fs screw me w/govt, thru cute crp” idea of‘em &my nature ofMarriage/runningCompany-not b/c “ofSituation-extending”mindset U dont have 2 marryByCertainAge.

A clip from 2023 Hulu movie, “Assassin.” Gets into perils of brain mapping: that is, This is someone brain mapping their mind to, perhaps, yours, and as a result, control you, with or without a lapse in your memory.-could’ve already happened. #mindcontrol #mind #Awareness

Associated clip below:

https://x.com/RennyJi/status/1748532128898285642?s=20

There’s this growing theme about the multiverse or transcendentalism in movies and tv shows. But what about themes like in the book 1984 and the thought police? & Did you know about people who are remote viewers for information gathering? Check out: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargate_Project

so I tweeted a number of tweets on my X/twitter username: “rennyji”. they were all sent thru a device that wasn’t my phone. Will people see it? R they seeing this from my phone now? R they seeing my original twitter page or some1 else’s platform proxying b/w me &others?-

Google “stargate project” and checkout the Wikipedia page. Google “remote viewing and Miami herald” and see the webpage from the newspaper. The newspaper article is dated as 2017- that’s while I’m in my mind reading situation.- an interesting link:

----

a little ominous when doctors take initiative "to ask me" if you think someone is reading your head, but not "controlling mind..." Control-very real.

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sins-of-the-sea · 2 years

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I've been avoiding giving Giovanni's mother a name for the longest time, as giving names is a way to humanize monstrous people. But I guess it's inevitable she finally obtains one. Not only because I am a firm believer that vile human beings are still human beings, but if I am to interact with the Assassins' Creed verse, especially AC2, hearing or meeting with her will be VERY inevitable. Of the entire Venetian Vespucci family, she is the most power hungry, ambitious, and naturally, the greediest.

But now this got me thinking.... were the Vespucci family in AC2 ever involved with the Assassins/Templar conflict?? We know the Borgias are Templars. What reading I can get from Cristina Vespucci, her father, and Amerigo doesn't say much. I can possibly ride on them being neutral or oblivious. But with that said.....

Mariana isn't born a Vespucci--she married into the family as an outsider. Very likely she came from a native Venetian noble house, but ones that couldn't kiss up to the Venetian Council or the Doge. The Vespucci disgrace perhaps took place early in her marriage with Antonio, and thus, begins her ruthless attempts at power grabbing on HER terms. And honestly? Calling it right now.

She's a Templar. She's a fucking Templar. She's training her sons to be Templars but little Giovanni is too "broken" to be an effective one, and the enforced imprisonment/isolation is to keep him from interfering from their affairs.

From what I'm reading, the Spanish Inquisition in Spain was run by the Spanish Crown, but it has Templars among them. Perhaps Carles' death was an encounter with a Templar as he was undergoing secret Assassins training. Perhaps he's getting insights on Templars creeping into HIS family. Who knows? This is worth developing on. But GOD, I am living it.

For the sake of the Assassins' Creed Verse ONLY, I may keep Carles and Mariana alive, as the circumstances in the setting can make use of them more alive than dead. So this will REALLY change up the Frances-Vespucci family dynamics, as the heroic firstborn son Carles would be around to be the stable shining star of Josep's dark life, and in opposition the dark looming force of avarice and cruelty in Mariana over her husband and sons, especially the very young Giovanni.

.......

Fuck, I have to give Carles and Mariana faces too now, will I?

#[Verse: Assassin's Creed II]#keeping this one separate from Black Flag or 1 if I ever get to them #but I want to focus on II and its sequels for now #[About Frascona]#[About Giovanni]#[Ira et Avaritia]#[Avaritia et Ira]

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598-inspiration · 3 years

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Answers from the writers Part 2: What comes next? Parallels between LN and LN2

You can find Part 1 here, it mainly deals with character motivation.

In this part I mainly want to address a miscellaneous question from the previous interviews as well as a video interview with senior narrative designer David Mervik, which you can watch on YouTube.

The first question deals with regards to the ending in both games:

It may sound crazy to think that the endings are not so different, but they aren’t:

-Both Six and Mono gain an immense amount of power by the end

-They are both chained down by those powers: Six’s hunger, the tower and Mono still exist

-They are both alone and still trapped by that world

The way I personally look at this, is that both Mono and Six in a way wound up cursing each other. Thin man (Mono) forcibly ripping Six’s soul is what caused her hunger, likewise Six dropping Mono in the tower is what caused him to be trapped by it.

Little Nightmares: Deals with Six’s character

Little Nightmares II: Deals with Mono’s character

My prediction for Little Nightmares 3 is that it will bring this whole situation dealing with both characters as the main focus, and resolve their storylines. To quote the achievement when you complete the DLC, which as it turns out, was never talking about the Runaway Kid, but someone else (Mono):

And sure enough in that post credit scene, we see a familiar view

If you listen closely, you can hear the sound of Seagulls at the end of both post credit scenes for the first game, which is now officially confirmed to be a sequel to LN2. They will meet again indeed.

Now to move on to the video interview, you can find it on YouTube:

I feel like this particular interview, doesn’t get enough attention. But it does bring up some important points regarding the lore, as well as ease worries for those that think another studio working on the next installment may ruin LN. Some notable points:

- LN2 development started a bit after LN DLC finished for a short break, but the lore kept developing over the entire time.

-Mervick wrote 150-200 pages of lore by the time they started LN2 dev, there may be more by now. -It is mostly a biography for all the LN characters, such as the resident. What drives them, their backstory, etc.

-”You guys think you will ever release the book?” -Mervick: “That's up to Bandai, they own the IP. Maybe if its the right time, to give the people something definitive.” -"We didn't want to tell people too much, like where they were born. You didn't really get to play it yourself in that case."

- "All the children come from [pause] They don't belong in this world" -"What kind of pattern shaped their life, and what brought them here?"

- "The continuation of their journey" -"They (the children) are here for a reason" -"Something that happened before in their lives that made them a good "fit" for Little Nightmares"

- "That's about as much as I should probably say"

- First game came out of nowhere while the sequel got to build off of a familiar name -People are completely starved for new horror games so when one actually comes out and streamers latch onto it word-of-mouth spreads faster -The sequel's dynamic of actually traveling/caring about another characters adds another level of emotional investment that spawns more discussion and fan art.

- They didn't want dialogue, but rather wanted the player to piece it together on their own.

- "The comics are a good way to give the players more, about things they may never encounter in the actual game"

- In a lot of corporate words and stuff,, the writer basically says that Bandai really liked LN, kept it in its original state, and bought into it as it was.

-Inspiration for LN are: Novels by Roald Dahl, specifically how things actually seemed to happen to kids in the books. Also the book Momo (The grey gentlemen) by Michael Ende

News about the TV Show:

-Interviewer: A while ago, it was announced that Henry Selick (Coraline, Nightmare before christmas director) would be working Little Nightmares project. Could you say anything about that (25:40)

-Writer: I have no idea, since I'm not present at the discussions for that. If anything is released or needs to be announced, its gonna come from Bandai.

So TV show is still up the air. Hasn't been canceled yet as far as they know, but still no news yet.

#little nightmares #little nightmares 2 #Little Nightmares II

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theawkwardterrier · 3 years

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Blossoms Every Day

Summary: When you work at a flower shop requests for elaborate bouquets are just part of the job. Requests for bouquets this specific, on the other hand...

The other of my rejected Steggy Secret Santa stories. I was looking for AU tropes to play around with, thought of flower shop...and immediately began to write it in the weirdest way possible.

Read on AO3

After three years of being the only employee of Asters to Zinnias other than Michaela, the owner, you are fairly familiar with the peaks and valleys of the business. Valentine’s Day is big, of course (and the day or two afterward are even bigger for more elaborate apology arrangements) but considering the shop’s proximity to the university campus, there’s also an uptick in sales around graduation time and about a month after the fall semester starts each year, when the kids who’d met and fallen for each other at orientation have their first tiny anniversary.

Summer and winter breaks, though, are generally...well, you don’t want to call them dry spells because it would give Michaela an onset of migraine face, but they’re certainly less busy. That’s why on a drizzly Wednesday morning at the beginning of January, you feel certain enough about having the shop to yourself that, while you dust the vases behind the counter, you have your earbuds in playing an episode of the soothingly-voiced serial murder podcast you love.

The volume is turned up pretty loud, so you don’t hear the bell over the door (don’t tell Michaela) or the approaching customer’s footsteps, or your own shocked squeak when you turn to water the spider plant on the counter and find someone standing there.

“Sorry,” you gasp, pausing mid-murder description and hastily shoving your earbuds into your pocket. “How can I help you?”

There’s something of a stunned look on the man’s face, and he stares for a moment as if he doesn’t quite know how to answer the question and would have preferred you stay oblivious to him for another few moments while he gathered his thoughts.

Finally he says, “I—I think I need a recommendation. Can you think of what flowers would say ‘welcome to campus’ to a really smart visiting professor in the history department who specializes in European women's and gender history in the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries?” And then, as if he wants to make sure you have every bit of information which might be helpful, he adds, “Her last book was an amazing collection of oral histories about women in the UK during World War II.”

You’ve picked out plenty of arrangements for people who didn’t know daffodil from a delphinium, for students who’ve walked in asking simply for “something pretty,” and you consider yourself pretty quick on your feet at this point. After a moment of staring, you offer weakly, “A nice plant always brightens up a new office. Maybe bamboo, for good luck?”

He walks out with his potted bamboo twenty minutes later. You spent two minutes wrapping the pot. He spent eighteen writing and rewriting cards. Hopefully the professor really likes bamboo.

Two days later, a woman walks in, comes right over to where you’re finishing up a new baby bouquet to send over to the hospital, and asks for “something to show gratitude for making me feel welcome. An arrangement expressing appreciation for brightening up my office.”

“Oh,” she adds, “and his eyes are a lovely shade of blue, if you have something that might suit.”

Holding back a groan, you start to offer some options. Apparently she liked the bamboo well enough.

You don’t see either of them for three weeks, long enough for you to have told the story to Michaela then to a couple of friends over beers, long enough that the pair of them are fading into a slightly amusing anecdote.

The man shows up just after you’ve come back from lunch break. You’re still wiping a few tricky crumbs off your sweater as he tells you that he’s looking for something that says “sorry about that horrible meeting, and here’s hoping for less exposure to jerks in the future - although since too many of them are tenured, I wouldn’t count on it.”

“Sunflowers are cheerful?” you suggest. “Maybe mixed with some tulips or snapdragons, plus white poppies - they symbolize consolation - and some greenery?”

He’s pretty young, probably too young for tenure or a significant salary, and you can see that his dark, tidy dress pants are getting a bit soft around the hems, but he doesn’t back down when you quote the price.

That evening, when it’s dark and the wind is blowing chill outside and you sit at the counter with your face in your hand dreaming of getting out of here and going home to hot soup and a blanket wrapped around your shoulders like a cloak, there’s a call on the store’s phone. You hadn’t talked to the woman long enough in person for her voice to be familiar, but you have no doubt as to the identity of the person requesting a “thank you for speaking up to our terrible colleagues” bouquet.

The thing is that they never seem to show up or call when Michaela or any of the regular customers are around, or when any of the neighboring shopkeepers are popping in for a break and to share some gossip. You’re the only one who ever sees or speaks with them. Every month that the receipts tally with the inventory, you have a flash of relief at this small proof that they actually exist.

But this means that it’s up to you to suggest red tulips to represent “those journal reviewers were idiots to turn your paper down” and yellow poppies for “congratulations on the high average on your students’ last exam.” You’re the one charged with making arrangements in honor of “I had a great time at trivia last night,” and “best wishes on your sports team making the championship, even though I’m sorry you can’t be at the game,” and “you looked like you were a bit down yesterday,” and “that book you recommended was so great that I’ve already started on the sequel,” and “sorry I was short with you in the hall this morning, my neighbors threw a raging party last night even though it was 2:30 on a Wednesday.” In April, you help choose the three most perfect crimson roses in the shop to add to a birthday bouquet of calla lilies and orchids, and you don’t say anything about how the shade reminds you of a certain hue of lipstick or about what everyone knows red roses mean.

You’ve kept up with your schoolwork through it all, acquitted yourself nicely. Graduation day is approaching quickly now. But somehow, between helping Michaela find your replacement among the newer students and saying a slow goodbye to all your campus haunts, you can’t help but wonder how things will end for your two most politely irritating regular customers. Visiting professors aren’t meant to stay, after all.

The arrangement you put together in early May, tiger lilies and sweet peas and irises, is the largest yet. You’ve been told that it’s meant to say “I’m sorry that you can’t stay, but I know that there’s something amazing waiting for you,” although the sadness is obvious in his eyes as you hand it over. Nevertheless, he thanks you sincerely for all your help.

“I’m sure you’re glad not to have to see me anymore,” he jokes. You shake your head. Once, maybe, you would have secretly agreed, but in a certain way you’ve come to look forward to the challenge that only these two seem to give you. More than that, you’ve enjoyed seeing two people so eager to demonstrate their affection for each other. They seem to have said more with flowers over these last months than most people say with words in a lifetime; sometimes you wonder if they even have to speak when they encounter each other.

With a last smile, he turns to go, just as the bell above the door jingles, and she steps through.

“Peggy,” comes the surprised exhalation. You can’t see his face, although you can imagine the widened eyes, the parting of his mouth. “I didn’t expect to see you here.” The enormous bouquet in its vase lowers just a bit, so they can look each other in the face over your handiwork.

“Steve. Hello,” she says, surprised too but covering it better. “I suppose it was only a matter of time before our schedules overlapped here.”

You’ve seen people grin and shriek and tear up when presented with flowers before, but there’s something entirely new about the particular quiet tenderness with which they are regarding each other. It sort of makes you want to just stand quietly and perhaps hold the hand of someone you love.

“Your order is ready,” you say instead, hefting her vase forward onto the counter, filled with primroses, violets, and camellias. And before you can think better of it, before you can imagine what Michaela would say, you add, “One ‘Thank you for everything. If you ask me, I’ll find a way to stay’ bouquet, as requested.”

For a minute, nothing moves, and in the drowning silence you wonder if your last memory of this job is going to be filled with shouting and humiliation and demands to speak to your manager. But instead their eyes seem to shift into deeper focus on each other, as if you aren’t even there.

“Do you really—” he swallows, voice somehow even softer as he continues. “You don’t usually say things you don’t mean.”

“No,” she responds. “And I’m not now. They offered to have me stay on, if I want to.”

“But Cambridge—You can’t just tell Cambridge to go screw themselves.” The vase in his hands seems to be preventing him from gesturing the way he wants to, but he holds himself very still and her eyes don’t leave his.

She laughs a bit. “Of course not, but I can tell them that there are greater opportunities available to me here.” She places a hand on his arm. “And Steve? To be clear, I don’t simply mean academic ones.”

And suddenly the spotlight turns back onto you as he turns abruptly and says, “Can you send these over to the hospital instead? I don’t know that I need them anymore.” As you give a quick nod, somewhat shocked by the rapid turn of events, he strides over to set the vase gently back onto the counter beside hers.

“You can deliver mine there as well,” she tells you. “I think this is the sort of conversation you have in words rather than plants.” She steps forward and extends her hand. He glances at it, at her face, then intertwines his fingers with hers. The bell jingles behind them as they step out the door together.

A year later, you’re waiting for your lunch order at the specialty salad place near your new job when your phone vibrates with a text. You’d given your number to your replacement just in case you were needed to shed light on the location of the fancy twine or what to get Michaela at Starbucks when she was groaning over the January billing, after the holiday sales had dropped off and before the Valentine’s orders had started coming in. This is the first time it’s been used.

What in the world do I put in a proposal bouquet that’s meant to symbolize “You are the best, most brilliant woman in the world, someone who knows herself better than anyone I’ve ever met. I can’t fully describe when you are to me and I’d wait for you forever, but if you’re ready, I would love to be married to you”???????

You give a shout of a laugh, right there in the crowd, not caring about the glances thrown your way or the call of your name at the pickup area. You’re too busy typing back: Okay, you’re going to want to have orange blossoms in there…

#Steggy fic #Steggy #Steve Rogers #Peggy Carter #why am I like this???

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letterboxd · 3 years

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In Focus: The Truman Show.

Inspired by Letterboxd data that revealed it to be a lockdown favorite, editor-at-large Dominic Corry looks at the ever-evolving importance of contemporary masterpiece The Truman Show.

It has long been apparent that The Truman Show is an unnervingly prescient film. The story of a man who becomes aware that his superficially idyllic life is, in fact, a live-streamed television show has gone from being high-concept to every-day.

Thanks to the three Ps—the prevalence of mass urban surveillance, the proliferation of reality television and the pervasiveness of video in social media—the notion of cameras filming our every move is no longer a paranoid fantasy, but real life. The twist being that, for the most part, we all willingly signed up for it, and did all the filming ourselves. As Yi Jian saliently observes in his review: “Not to get all ‘we live in a society’ on Letterboxd but I know a person or two in real life that would actually give anything to trade lives with Truman, it do be like that sometimes”. It indeed do, Yi Jian.

So it’s something of a cliché at this stage to point out how we are all living in some version of the The Truman Show, and you don’t have to be a member of the royal family to feel that way. Yet, somehow, the film has become even more pertinent over the last eighteen months. And it’s a pertinence reflected in the massive uptick in viewership for the film as seen in Letterboxd activity.

During the month of February 2020, the last moment of the Before Times, The Truman Show had a modest 1,235 diary entries. That number tripled in April of that year, by which time the seriousness of the pandemic had become clear. And by July, deep in the worst of the pandemic, Truman fervor peaked, with a further 178 percent leap over April’s numbers, firmly placing it in the top 200 films watched by our members in a year of lockdown. (By the way, ‘diary entries’ mean activity where the member has added a watched date; many thousands more also marked Truman as ‘watched’ in those dark months, but didn’t specify a date.)

It’s not difficult to imagine why we might become more interested in revisiting this eminently re-visitable film. During lockdown, social media—including Letterboxd—took on a greater presence in terms of how we communicated with each other. We got used to seeing footage of faces more than actual faces. We were all the stars of our own ‘Truman Show’, and simultaneously the audience of everyone else’s ‘Truman Show’.

Christian Torres boiled it down effectively when he wrote: “Now every movie I see seems to be related to my life in quarantine. I am Truman and I want to escape.” And Sonya Sandra eloquently captured the film’s increased contemporary significance in her review: “This is a real-life daylight horror film. The best kind. Even more relevant in 2021 than ever. We are all Truman, we all want to find what is real in our fake lives filled with media, capitalism and ideology. And it’s our job to fight the storm and get to the truth of it all. Nothing is real, everything is for profit, and everyone is selfish. Go out and find what is real, because it’s definitely not here.”

With its deft, dazzling blending of the profound and the humorous, the optimistic and the cynical, it’s difficult to think of anything released since The Truman Show that comes as close as it does to being a modern-day Frank Capra movie. It’s hopeful, but has its eyes wide open. There’s a darkness in the themes of the film that is never replicated in the colors on display.

While everyone involved delivers career-best work, we must principally credit the triumvirate of talent at the center of the film: director Peter Weir, screenwriter Andrew Niccol and star Jim Carrey.

Star Jim Carrey and director Peter Weir on the set of ‘The Truman Show’ (1998).

Weir is a director who inspires much online love whenever his name is mentioned, but he isn’t really mentioned all that often. Or at least as often as he should be. The Australian filmmaker has delivered masterpieces across multiple genres, and it’s extremely sad that he hasn’t directed a movie since 2010’s not-quite-true World War II drama The Way Back, arguably one of his lesser works. That’s also, insanely, one of only two movies he’s made since Truman, the other being Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, the wide and rabid affection for which regularly kicks up on Twitter (not to mention demand for a sequel).

Weir doesn’t do many interviews, and while this 2018 Vanity Fair article marking Truman’s twentieth anniversary has many quotes about the film’s modern relevance, Weir doesn’t offer any commentary to that effect, presumably preferring to let the work speak for itself—though in this 1998 interview he did talk about the relationship between the media, the general public and the people we become fascinated with, as a “complex situation”.

The Vanity Fair article does, however, reveal a fascinating ‘what if’ scenario relating to Christof, the god-like director of the in-movie TV show played by Ed Harris, who offers up a pile of pretentious auteur clichés: mononymous, beret, etc. (beyond the whole god thing, that is). When Dennis Hopper, originally cast in the role, wasn’t working out, Weir considered playing the role himself, which would’ve added yet another meta layer. It brings to mind how George Miller styled Immortan Joe (played by Hugh Keays-Byrne) after himself in Mad Max: Fury Road, or how Christopher Nolan’s haircut shows up in most of his films.

Ed Harris as Christof in ‘The Truman Show’ (1998).

And, at one point, it could have gone mega-meta. Weir, in the 1998 interview, talked about a “crazy idea” he had, a technical impossibility back then but easily achievable with live-streaming now. “I would have loved to have had a video camera installed in every theater the film was to be seen [in]. At one point, the projectionist would … cut to the viewers in the cinema and then back to the movie. But I thought it was best to leave that idea untested.” Imagine.

Weir also played a role in helping to shape the originally much more overtly dark screenplay into the cheerier (on the surface at least) shooting script, which is solely credited to fellow antipodean, New Zealand-born Niccol, also a producer on the film. Both men have done the majority of their work in America, but it’s tempting to credit the film’s tone-perfect sense of heightened Americana to the degree of separation offered by their foreign provenance. In any case, it’s clear that open-air mall designers were paying attention.

Niccol’s original screenplay made his name in Hollywood, and revealed a storyteller excited by big ideas. He moved into directing with the smaller-scale Gattaca, released a year prior to Truman (itself delayed to meet Carrey’s availability). Niccol’s subsequent filmography includes several legit bangers (Lord of War hive step up!), and his endearing dedication to lofty allegories in a genre setting makes him an increasingly rare breed in Hollywood.

Like Weir, he is not the greatest fan of giving interviews, but the Vanity Fair piece quotes him making an interesting point: “When you know there is a camera, there is no reality,” thereby making Truman “the only genuine reality star.”

It’s a sentiment echoed by MusicMoviesMe, who writes that “‘Truman Show’ beats all other reality shows out there like Bachelors, Survivors and Kardashians. Come on, when you know there’s a camera at your tail, there’s no reality. So yes, Truman beats all reality shows out there bar none!”

The role was perfectly suited to Jim Carrey’s affected mannerisms, and his status as one of the world’s biggest stars meant he could relate to Truman more than most people. Then, at least. Nowadays, of course, we are all Truman.

“It is always incredible to see how far The Truman Show was ahead of [its] time,” observes The Closer79. “In a world where celebs are monitored 24/7 and we are showered with unnecessary private information on the web, where talent-free wannabes become famous and where you sometimes [wonder] what kind of surreal show society you are in—Truman and his fake show life cleverly have anticipated all of this. Only Truman knew nothing of his luck and he was granted an escape from his glass prison. We don’t really have this possibility… Aren’t we all Truman? Sometimes even voluntarily…”

Austin Burke concurs: “I have always known that I really enjoyed this film, but I had no clue that it would hold up so well years later… Could this be because the strange world that he finds himself in is far more similar to our world today? Possibly, but the idea and themes are so much more relevant now compared to when this originally released.” And while DallasFrance is conscious of piling on about the film’s prescience, his review highlights how there really is no limit to the film’s meta qualities:

“Instead of writing a review about how this film predicted social media, or how we’re all Truman, or yadda yadda yadda, I’ll instead fixate on the miraculous fact that two absolute legends were cast as primary viewers of the Truman Show:

1. The old lady from The Running Man who starts betting on Ben Richards (Arnold Schwarzenegger). ‘He’s one bad motherf*cker!’

2. The villain from The Karate Kid Part II:

‘Live or die, man?!’ ‘Die!’ ‘Wrong!’ *hooooonnnkkk*

I’ve never seen either of these actors in any other roles. With the second one, I felt like I was watching a character from my childhood watch a character from his childhood come to realizations about the characters in his childhood. So actually… the movie’s really about me.”

Never change, LB membership.

We are all generally pretty aware of how ahead of its time The Truman Show was, but that doesn’t lessen its impact. Maddie’s review shows that there’s always some new angle to consider: “Imagine being an extra in this movie… You would be an extra, playing an actor, playing an extra. Think about that long enough and tell me that doesn’t make you want to walk into the ocean.”

Kev goes even further: “Watching other people watch somebody else while also watching that person while also watching the person watching over that person is a great reminder that watching is weird, and to be watched is to not own yourself. Don’t watch, don’t try to be watched. Just live.”

Or perhaps Will encapsulates the film’s ability to present an ever-evolving message best, writing that, “clearly, this is video proof that we live in a simulation.” Beyond mere prescience, The Truman Show is a telling mirror to whatever era it is viewed in. Its message will continue to evolve.

Now that we’re finally (touch wood) emerging from the pandemic, it will be fascinating to see what The Truman Show has to say about its audience and the world they live in, in years to come. Rest assured, it will be well-documented by you, the Letterboxd audience.

Also: can Peter Weir please make another movie? Like, seriously.

Related content

A Meta-Reality: Robert’s list of layers of film in life and life in film

Follow Dom on Letterboxd

#the truman show #truman #peter weir #jim carrey #andrew niccol #letterboxd #lockdown #quarantine #coronavirus #pandemic #movies #comfort films #comedy #truman show

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jimintomystery · 2 years

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Star Trek: First Contact

A Borg vessel travels back in time to attack Earth in the year 2063. The Enterprise destroys the enemy ship, and sends an away team to help repair the damage so that Zefram Cochrane can launch a spaceflight that eventually leads to the founding of the Federation. But some Borg managed to transport to the Enterprise, where they quickly assimilate half the ship and capture Lt. Commander Data.

In some ways the second Star Trek: The Next Generation movie felt like a second “first.” For the first time, none of the old gang from the Captain Kirk era appear. It’s also the first movie to feature the new Enterprise (NCC-1701-E), allowing Captain Picard’s crew to finally get a update to the old 1987 sets, much as 1979′s Star Trek: The Motion Picture was a clean break from the 1960s ship.

Amusingly, I can’t say this is the first Star Trek movie without any character from the original TV series. The idea of Zefram Cochrane as the most celebrated historical figure of the future, the man who invented warp drive, was first presented in the 1967 episode “Metamorphosis.” Kirk discovers him alive and well, living in a strangely idyllic realm long after he was presumed dead. I’m not sure I knew about that episode in 1996, so the multiple layers of irony and coincidence among, Kirk, Picard, and Cochrane went over my head at the time. Thanks to time travel, each of these legendary figures meets the other two, but each of them is unaware that the other two crossed paths.

When this came out in 1996, Star Trek felt like an invincible juggernaut of a franchise. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine had really hit its stride. (Lt. Commander Worf had joined the cast of that show, and reunites with the Enterprise crew through a convenient plot development.) I hadn’t yet realized that Star Trek: Voyager wasn’t going to be all that good. (An instance of that show’s Emergency Medical Hologram has a brief but fun scene here.) And on top of that, the Star Trek: The Next Generation cast was going to be doing at least eight or nine big movies like this one, or so I assumed. Little did I realize that the franchise kind of peaked here, and wouldn’t come close to recovering until at least 2009.

The problems with the Picard-led Star Trek movies become clear with this entry. I always felt the Kirk-era movies overemphasized Kirk and Spock, minimized the rest of the cast, and failed to groom a new generation of younger officers to round out the crew. First Contact is the second (of four) movies to focus almost entirely on Picard and Data, the others don’t get all that much to do, and any new crewmembers of any note end up dead. I considered this one minor flaw in an otherwise good movie, and I hoped it would be addressed in subsequent sequels. It was not.

Since “I Borg” only featured a couple of Borg scout ships, and the “Descent” two-parter involved a breakaway faction, this is the first time we’ve truly seen the Borg in full force since they assimilated Captain Picard in the two-part “The Best of Both Worlds.” The filmmakers clearly wanted to show that the Borg Collective has been evolving since we last saw them, introducing an updated design and the whole “instant assimilation by shooting tubules into your neck” gimmick.

The Borg’s original plan, as far as I can determine, is to penetrate Federation defenses to get to Earth, launch a time-travelling sphere, and bomb Cochrane’s launch site from orbit. I'm not sure why they wouldn’t prefer to beam some drones down to Montana, much like they sent some to the Enterprise. Considering how quickly they overran a state-of-the-art starship from 2373, it wouldn’t take many of them to conquer post-apocalyptic Earth in 2063.

In and of itself, the Borg’s decision to change human history is curious. At first they were only interested how they could utilize Federation’s technology (”Q Who”), and then it was all about incorporating other cultures into their own (”The Best of Both Worlds, Part II”). But now they seem to have decided humanity (or the Federation that formed around humanity, take your pick) is so resistant to their agenda that they’re willing to erase 310 years of the biological and technological distinctiveness they’re always talking about. If not for the Enterprise, they would have conquered the planet and the species, but without any of the advancements that got them interested in humanity in the first place.

The introduction of the Borg Queen confounded me when this originally came out. I gather the writers felt the story needed a single person as the antagonist, rather than the Borg’s usual chorus of voices coming from nowhere in particular. But to me, the whole point of the Borg is that they have no leaders or hierarchy. It’s cute to liken them to bees, but a literal queen (with a “crown” of cables, no less) was going too far, I felt. Now, though, I choose to interpret the Queen not as a leader but just another automaton with a highly specialized role in the collective, not unlike a real queen bee. I’ve also come to embrace the idea that the Borg Queen just...doesn’t make a lot of sense, and probably shouldn’t make sense to us mere mortals since she’s the avatar of a advanced transhumanist society.

At the time, this movie was as close as we’d come to getting to see the apocalyptic horrors that Star Trek described between the 1990s and the 2120s. Up to this point, the franchise always played fast-and-loose with the idea of a war (or two) devastating Earth and (eventually) leading to a golden age of peace and harmony. So the 21st century is a bit of a blindspot in the Star Trek timeline, and it was a rare treat to see our heroes explore that era. In particular, it’s interesting that Cochrane and his associate Lily Sloane basically talk and act like regular people from our time, and not like idealized sci-fi characters from the future. (In comparison, the depiction of humans from 2079 in “Encounter at Farpoint” was far more over the top.) This helps to inform the 2001 series Star Trek: Enterprise, set in the 2150s, which sought to bridge the gap between Cochrane’s era and Captain Kirk’s.

#star trek #star trek: the next generation #star trek: first contact #welcome to the 24th century #tng movies

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keanuquotes · 2 years

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The Matrix Resurrections brings an intense dive bomb finale that introduces the most violent sequence in the sci-fi movie. However, writer/director Lana Wachowski’s big finale took inspiration from another iconic moment in cinema history. The Matrix Resurrections VFX supervisor Dan Glass talked about the Paul Thomas Anderson film that visually inspired that climax.

‘The Matrix Resurrections’ finds Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Anne Moss riding on a motorcycle in the climax.

Wachowski returns to The Matrix for the first time since 2003’s third installment. The Matrix Resurrections finds Neo (Keanu Reeves) living under the name Thomas A. Anderson. He works as a game designer in the same city as Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), who now is called Tiffany. They don’t know each other, but Morpheus (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) returned to open Neo’s mind.

The Matrix Resurrections finds Neo risking it all to save Trinity. This journey takes them to the motorcycle-riding climax, which is the movie’s biggest scene. The Analyst (Neil Patrick Harris) is willing to do anything to stop them from succeeding at their mission. As a result, The Matrix Resurrections finds him making humans dive out of the surrounding buildings to dive-bomb into Neo and Trinity.

VFX supervisor Dan Glass said that Paul Thomas Anderson’s ‘Magnolia’ inspired the ‘nasty’ dive bomb finale

The Gamer interviewed Glass to talk about his experience working as the VFX supervisor on The Matrix Resurrections. He explained how it took some time to get the feeling of the scene right. As a result, The Matrix Resurrections took inspiration from Anderson’s movie Magnolia for how he wanted to approach this big, climactic sequence involving human dive-bombs.

“The first animation test that came to us, I felt the animators were rather restrained,” Glass said. “They had them falling a bit slowly. And then instead of doing dive bombs, it had a fun tone, but I was like, ‘No, this needs to feel nasty.’ So we started to give them that ‘head down’ focus. But even then, what our initial tests were doing is they would hit and bounce.”

Glass continued: “I actually pointed the team to Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia, with the frog rain, which is almost more humorous because it’s frogs there, but if you apply that to human beings, it becomes very horrific quickly.”

However, Glass knew that he needed to keep The Matrix Resurrections dive bomb from being excessive. “Then to try to keep it from being too dark, the splats of blood were visible code evidence, which helps to sell it as something that is clearly not real,” Glass said. “We went pretty dark on it knowing that we had to escalate threat against him.”

‘The Matrix Resurrections’ is the last franchise installment for now

The Matrix Resurrections takes a meta approach to its existence. However, it concludes in a way that could lead the way to more sequels. As a result, The Matrix fans continue to wonder: will there be another movie? Wachowski and co. don’t have an interest in returning to make another installment at this time, but that doesn’t mean that it will never happen.

Additionally, Warner Bros. wanted to return to The Matrix for years. It wouldn’t be very surprising to see the studio wanting to tap back into the franchise. However, audiences shouldn’t hold their breath for that to happen anytime in the immediate future with the current team. Nevertheless, The Matrix Resurrections dive-bomb sequence will live on.

#keanu reeves #The Matrix Resurrections #movie making

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themosleyreview · 3 years

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The Mosley Review: Candyman (2021)

When I write my reviews I pride myself on always giving my honest and true thoughts on the film I see. In February 2020, I saw a well paced, eerie and brutal film that was true to its namesake. It had almost all the elements to be a worthy requel to a horror classic. It built upon and established a new lore for the franchise while still maintaining its own style and message. Like the audience in attendance, I had some constructive suggestions and criticism and it was great to see those notes taken into consideration. I was one of the lucky few to see Candyman months in advance. Like I said it wasn't perfect, but it was truly a love letter to the original film. Now more than a year has passed and the finished version of the film is here. I will NOT continue in this review to point out what was put in or taken out, but I will give my honest review of what I thought of the final film. That being said, this was a prime example of what happens when you have something special that gets ruined by over editing and straying away from made it so unique.

This franchise has haunted the nightmares of a certain generation and made mirrors creepy to look at. Candyman was an entity that scared me more than the Bloody Mary folktale and I never dared to utter his name in fear of a gruesome death. Now it has gotten the sequel/mid franchise reboot treatment and for the most part it was alright. It picks up more than a decade from the original film and I liked how connected it was. There were some beautifully gruesome moments and I liked that the themes of racial injustice, violence and societal stereotypes stayed true to the basis of the franchise. Where I felt the film excelled in themes, it lacked subtlety in the building of the eerie atmosphere. It felt like I was being shown a lot of images, then some violence, then a subplot that doesn't get a fair payoff and then I was rushed out the door. The film really had so many inconsistencies in tone, visuals and just the overall arc. I wanted to feel the world collapsing around the lead characters and not have it dropped in my lap with choppy editing. Luckily, the characters in the film keep you invested enough to see this new tale to the end.

Yahya Abdul-Mateen II was great and charismatic as Anthony McCoy. I liked seeing his pride and curiosity lead him down a path into madness. I did like how his art began to portray what is happening to him psychologically. Teyonah Parris as his girlfriend Brianna Cartwright, was great and I loved her chemistry with Anthony. Her story was interesting because of her traumatic life event, but it tragically was cut short and under developed. Nathan Stewart-Jarrett was the perfect as her brother Troy. He was the fun comic relief and voice of reason needed for a tonal reprieve. Rebecca Spence was perfectly stuck up and crass as the art critic Finley Stephens. Her conversations with Anthony pushes the constant message of gentrification and racial insensitivities into the forefront. Colman Domingo is one an actor that can deliver any dialogue and make it sound wise and seductive. As the laundromat owner, William Burke, he delivers a fantastic performance. He clearly was the historian of the Candyman lore and I felt the pain of the past victims in his delivery and voice. Vanessa Williams returns as Anne-Marie McCoy and she was outstanding as Anthony’s estranged mother.

The score by Robert A. A. Lowe was fantastically eerie, haunting and sometimes quite unsettling. I loved that the original theme returned and it set the tone perfectly. I just wish more scenes had time to breath without his score and THEN it would creep in. Some horror films suffer from too much music and not enough ambient noise. The fact that you can hear every bit sound makes you focus more and the sound design was great when the score wasn't present. I loved the storytelling of the past Candymen in the puppet sequences. It was heartbreaking, creative, graphic and beautiful. What I truly didn't like about this film is that it tried so hard to tie into the original film and didn't try to stand on its own. The editing in the film was off in a number of scenes as it creates a great deal of continuity errors in tone. A perfect example is when Anthony's skin is starting to decay, its rapid approaching the final stage of decomposition and then in the next shot its back to stage 2. As a whole, this was a decent horror thriller that became too indulgent on the creep factor and just about missed everything about what made the original so special. Like I said before, I saw a excellent follow up to the original 1992 classic but sadly, that was over a year ago. Let me know what you thought of the film or my review in the comments below. Thanks for reading!

#candyman #yahya abdul-mateen ii #teyonah parris #colman domingo #vanessa willams #rebecca spence #nia dacosta #tony todd

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ariainstars · 3 years

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Congratulations, We Fell for Another Love Bombing or Thank You, Disney, You Did It Again

Sigh. Luke Skywalker is back. And Din Djarin and his child had to say goodbye. I never thought I would curse and say “Oh no!” when Luke appeared in that fateful corridor.

I wonder why the Disney studios are doing this - trying to "make up” for the oh-so criticized sequels, I suppose?

The Jedi have made their time. It was shown and proven over and over again that their attitude is wrong and needs to change, and Luke was the last of the old school Jedi. Again, a Force-sensitive child is all but kidnapped by a Jedi: he obviously did not like to go. Mando is no longer the hero of the story, he was stripped of his agency and all of his personal choices were questioned and valued for null and void. But the Dark Saber is in his hands now, so he’s the heir to the throne of Mandalore I guess. Like he ever wanted that.

This show, which grew to be so well-beloved in only a few episodes, now is not “The Mandalorian” any more. Its new title is “Luke’s Skywalker’s Comeback”. Hardcore fans may be out of their minds with joy, but for us, who admired Mando both as a badass hero and as a father figure and loved the dynamics between him and Grogu, the whole purpose of the show is destroyed. And here I naively had thought The Rise of Skywalker was bad enough to teach the studios not to repeat its mistakes.

~~~ more under the cut ~~~

Star Wars ought to be a fairy tale. It is and always was one. I can understand that the prequels had to end in a tragedy, we all knew that from the start, but why the sequels? And now, why must this generally acclaimed and beloved tv show again appease hardcore fans of old with Luke coming to save the day, cancelling in a matter of minutes what the story had built up within two entire seasons - the relationship of the two protagonists, heart and core of the narrative, as it had been with Rey and Ben Solo? And when both of them had their relationship just getting started - Rey and Ben kissing, Din calling Grogu by his name and the latter seeing him and touching his face? Why make Rey a queen without her king, and Din a father without a son?

Again, a Force-user is denied having a home: „Jedi training” matters more. By Luke of all people, the guy who never was trained in the first place (only very briefly), who except for a few lessons with Obi-Wan and Yoda was self-taught in the Force, and never understood that his strength lay with his compassion and his connection with other people, not with his alleged „superpowers”.

Think back to how Anakin, Luke and Rey were before they met the Jedi: unaware of their powers, compassionate, idealistic, brave. The Jedi mindset tainted their characters and lives, making them believing that they are (or have to be) untouchable and invincible, compelling them to live for duty instead of love, condemning them to a lifetime of loneliness. Will the Jedi never learn?

Though I practically grew up with the classic movies, I loved The Last Jedi; I can accept that Luke failed, and also that Han and Leia did. Nobody is perfect, and the Jedi mindset as well as the universally accepted idea that „Jedi” is a synonym for infallible saint-like hero was wrong in the first place, else the Empire never would have risen. Making Luke not the cavalry who came to save the day - until the battle on Crait, that is - but a man who failed and picked himself up again was much more meaningful, and I know not a few fans who felt inspired by this. Luke had saved his father choosing love over power, not the contrary. Some fans just never get it. To appease them, why not simply give him a new storyline of his own, instead of making him intrude in other Star Wars related shows? Why stop the new stories in their tracks just to bring him back?

Instead of seeing Luke as the grand kickass hero in a tv show that never had anything to do with him until now, it would have been more to the purpose to finally shed light on the thirty years between his father’s and his nephew’s death, to explain us where the Jedi and the Skywalker-Organa-Solo family failed to make such an outcome possible - the granddaughter of Palpatine taking over with their own blessing. There must have been a huge build-up between the end of the original saga and the fateful night at the temple when Luke briefly panicked looking into his nephew’s mind. Many fans still are convinced that „Kylo Ren just chose to be bad” because we hardly know how the relationship between these two was in the first place. (A very easy plot twist would e.g. have been Snoke warning Ben that his uncle sooner or later would turn on him, frightened by his power. The fulfilment of that prophecy would have made the night at the temple much more impactful.)

I understand that the studios want to tease us, to make us watch the other shows, too. But honestly, I’m getting tired of feeling duped. Tired of getting attached to new heroes to have their purpose smashed just so the Star Wars dudebro fans can sleep quietly at night because „some Jedi will take care of it”. First the characters from the sequels, now the ones from The Mandalorian. You get to love the new characters, you root for them to find happiness or at least some closure, and then, at the last moment, poof!, the hero of old comes back and the story development stops right there.

It is not right and it never was for the Jedi to take Force-sensitive children away from home, to enforce „you have to become a Jedi, like it or not” on them, to teach them not to have attachments, to make them focus on the Light Side thereby bringing the Force out of its much-needed balance. While Ahsoka saw that Grogu has formed a strong attachment to Din Djarin, Luke obviously did not, or he did not care. The irony is that he always wanted a father, and knows the pain of losing a father you’ve just found.

The Mandalorian felt like a consolation after Episode IX, a blessing for the fans for whom heart and soul are more interesting than nostalgia and „Jedi superheroes”. Now it’s just another kick in the guts. It’s painful and embarrassing to get to love characters so much, to get invested in their story so deeply, and then to realize again that they seem to mean nothing in the shade of the heroes of old. Ben Solo died young and miserable and Din Djarin and Grogu can now, I suppose, be miserable too. Can someone please explain to me why after the classics, no Star Wars film or show had an uplifting ending any more? With the possible exception of Solo, which was a nice filler but not a really important storyline. (I do not count Episodes I and II, they officially had a happy ending but it was tainted by the knowledge of what was to come.)

Fans are not blind. We saw the parallels between Darth Vader and Din Djarin as well as the differences - both being cool and tough but the latter not disdaining to be a caring father at the same time. The entire show lived from the dynamics between the gruff but kind bounty hunter and the innocent-looking powerful child, ever from the first episode. Two years of build-up for nothing, as it was with the four years of the sequels. Mando has to relinquish Grogu, Rey loses Ben. What was all that for? Both Mando and Rey are fighters, they have done nothing else their entire lives. What is to become of them now that they have nothing to fight for any more, nor anyone to live for? Except staying on a planet that is foreign to them and, for all they know, inhabitable or at least inhospitable?

With Rey and Ben Solo, the situation was different: she had proven good intentions but bad attitude (arrogance, violence, judgement) over and over, unable to deny her heritage, and even impaled her „antagonist” once while he was only defending himself. He had been the head of a criminal organization for years, and had committed patricide. Of course there are nuances to these characters and I still believe that they would have deserved another chance; I understand however that would have been unfitting to let the sequels end giving them a happy ending.

But in the case of Din Djarin, a man of honor, who has made friends and brought peace wherever he went throughout the galaxy? Grogu, the last surviving padawan of the old Jedi temple, who saved both his and Greef Karga’s life despite the danger for himself? What did they do to deserve being ripped apart like that?

So, all I can say: thank you, you did it again. And, once more, just before Christmas. I wish at least these depressing endings would be released at some other time.

I would dearly want to see a galaxy that finally learned from its faults, where family and attachments and Balance and free choice are not contrary to being a Jedi. I am in my late forties and I’m beginning to give up hope that I will live to see it. By now I am wondering whether George Lucas himself will live to see it.

I always loved Luke. He is one of my favorite heroes. But now he’s become an insensitive know-it-all who suffered from his own daddy issues to the point that he almost died crying out to his father for help, yet did not learn not to separate fathers from children and vice versa and, on the contrary, is doing it over and over again. He did not even tell Mando his name, or where he could reach him. We don’t have a clue as to if, when and how the Clan of Two will meet again.

I get it that since this show is set five years Return of the Jedi, it would have been difficult to ignore Luke’s existence altogether. And of course, we can rest assured that Luke will do his best for Grogu. But still: he has made his time. I wanted to see the new heroes going their own way, not hanging on the sleeves of the former generation. Mando is a man of honor, he had promised to bring Grogu to his own kind and he relinquished him despite his own wishes. (Not to mention that technically, since he identifies as a Mandalorian, by being a Jedi Luke is his enemy.) Why did Luke have to take the child away? His greatest strength always was that he was first and foremost himself and only in the second place a Jedi. What became of his trademark compassion?

Before The Mandalorian, we have never seen a healthy and working father-son relationship in the saga. It was incredibly refreshing and heart-warming to see these two traveling through the galaxy and living through adventures together; also, contrarily to Yoda, Grogu saw a lot of the bad things happening in the galaxy with his own eyes, which certainly was good for his character development.

But in the end, both he and his „father” did not go anywhere. Like Rey in Episode IX, they found a) power and b) a surrogate place, but neither got what was actually his heart’s wish - a home. I can’t understand why. Deliberate cruelty? We never knew whether Han and Leia and Ben felt how painful it was to break up their little family for the sake of „Jedi training”. You bet Din and Grogu did feel that pain and loss.

Both as a person with a heart and a brain and an almost lifelong Star Wars fan I am sickened by the readiness of the studios to end all that this well-made show had built up, for the appeasement of Jedi worshippers who just don’t want to see that the Jedi mindset needs urgently to change. It can’t be that difficult to renew them for the better; there is no necessity to erase the Jedi completely and there is nothing bad with making them grow wiser and stronger by finally understanding and accepting the importance of attachments and family ties. Yes, I realize that being a father also means learning how to let go; but here we are speaking of a literal child, not of a young adult who chose his own way in life.

I thought that George Lucas knew why he sold his franchise to the Disney studios, given their tradition in telling stories about family and friendship. This development is not a triumph, it is unworthy both of the studios and of the entire Star Wars saga. I’m tired of producers bowing down before fans who see every shred of the saga through „Jedi are always right”-tinted glasses respectively who value coolness over compassion even though it always was the saga’s central message.

Whatever happens in Season 3, countless fans will only be watching it asking, „Where’s Luke?” If Grogu should choose to join Mando again, everybody will be like, „But how can he want to leave Luke Skywalker of all people?” Some already see Grogu die prematurely, killed by the oh-so-bad guy Kylo Ren, for no other reason than to just to further prove how evil he is. In which case both Ben Solo and Grogu will have lived and died for nothing except for leaving a lot of heartbreak behind.

There must be another and better way to honor the legacy of both Luke Skywalker and the original trilogy than to think up new heroes and then destroy their purpose for the sake of old times’ glory. Lucas himself had said that Star Wars is basically for twelve-year-olds. It seems not: it’s for the fans who were twelve years old forty years ago, when the first movies hit theatres.

There are enough voices crying out for the sequels to be erased from canon. Who knows? This may be the next step into the past instead of the future. The sequels were hinting at a better future (Balance), Grogu was, too (family). But the grand past is so reassuring. The sequels tried to tell the audience to grow up and learn to do without their heroes, to see that even they were flawed and that the new heroes could grow beyond them. Fie on them, said the hardcore fans. Now it’s the turn of the younger generation, who got to know and love the saga with the sequels or The Mandalorian, to be like „WTF”.

Rogue One also had been a huge disappointment to me. Not that I found it badly made, but I went into a depressive mood for three days for the same reason: I did not like that I had grown so attached to all of these characters only to see all of them die. The infamous Darth Vader scenes and the design with the huge hints at the classic movies were no consolation. Nostalgia does not make me happy. Heart does. Rogue One, the sequels and The Mandalorian were all, in the end, deprived of all human feeling except loss and regret and many, many thoughts about what might have been.

The Mandalorian was an excellent story on its own. It did not need Luke Skywalker. It is and ought to be Din Djarin’s story, who lost or gave up everything because he was afraid to lose the child: and now he did. It’s not comforting that he lost him to the alleged Good Guy. Luke of course won’t turn a hair on Grogu’s head, but he can’t offer him a home, we already know that. Ahsoka saw the attachment between the two and she knows the dangers of it; Luke does not know what drove his father to his terrible fate. If the sequels remain canon, then we already know that Luke will not allow his pupils having and keeping healthy attachments. And that does not promise well for the child’s future.

Unless the studios commit the madness of officially erasing the sequels and starting the saga anew, we can only hope that the child will not stay with Luke for long since it’s a good five years before he will start his own Jedi temple. Maybe he will die of a broken heart, poor little guy. And Din Djarin might become the new ruler of Mandalore, though sad and alone. But who cares: Luke is back. Please: I did not subscribe to Disney+ wanting to see Schwarzenegger movies. The lonesome hero can ride into the sunset for all I care, out of sight and of mind. Star Wars’ greatest strength always was its heart.

My own take was that Grogu is meant to be a healer, and since Luke is not, there is no way he can teach him this particular skill in the Force. Anakin was a pilot and a mechanic, Luke and Ben also were pilots. None of them were Jedi by choice. Grogu is older than Luke and he was already trained at the old Jedi temple: he’s more likely to be a teacher to Luke than the other way around. Grogu as the first Force-user who values attachment and family over power and Jedi training, that would indeed have been a new hope. This backpedaling is shallow and useless. Even if Luke sends Grogu back to Din Djarin, this won’t teach him not to take a child away from its home, since only a few years later he will do the same thing to his nephew. (Although it would admittedly be an interesting plot point to see a small Ben Solo interacting with Grogu for a while.)

Please give us back The Mandalorian the way it was, with its characters and dynamics. The themes and messages of The Last Jedi already were almost all aborted in The Rise of Skywalker; we didn’t sign up on Disney+ to see the exact same thing happen with The Mandalorian. I for my part am fed up with this kind of love bombing followed by a quick and coldblooded let-down. Star Wars may be a cult, but it need not be the kind of cult where you get hooked and then unwittingly follow a carrot hanging before your eyes. I thought the exaggerated Jedi cult was mostly made by the fans: the studios did not need to jump on this ship. This is not the Way.

Now everything I feared is flaring up again - fans jubilating because “the Jedi are taking matters in hand” instead of accepting the failure of the Jedi mindset at last; and even insisting that since things are going so well, all Disney needs to do is to cancel the sequels from canon and everybody can be happy again.

Please, please, give this tormented galaxy a chance to heal at last. We don’t need Luke Skywalker to save the day by killing all the bad guys. We don’t need the oh-so-powerful and perfect Jedi. We need faith in the Force. We need a home. Don’t take it away from us again. Thank you.

P.S. If we see Luke again in Season 3, at least give the role to a live actor. That digital “rejuvenation” made him look wooden. Luke’s best trait, apart from his compassion, always was his smile.

P.P.S. What’s with Boba Fett claiming Jabba’s throne? I thought Jabba had a son. What in the galaxy happened to him?

P.P.P.S. I don’t mind kickass women, but honestly, I’m getting somehow tired of them. What became of the ladies of Star Wars, the diplomats, the good queens, the loving mothers, the accurate librarians, who contribute to the galaxy without killing (or hurting) anyone? I’m feeling kind of underrepresented here...

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violethowler · 4 years

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The Heroine’s Journey of Sora

I’ve spent the last couple of weeks writing out my thoughts on Kingdom Hearts and the way the series follows the framework of the Heroine’s Journey. Rather than a bunch of drabbles or a single long-winded post, I’ve decided to break up my explanations of the Heroine’s Journey and the way Kingdom Hearts fits into it as a series of ten essays posted weekly. I will put up a masterpost once all of them are finished, and in the meantime I will have all of them on my blog under the tag ‘Kingdom Hearts and the Heroine’s Journey.’

Due to the length of this essay, I will be putting the full thing under a cut.

What many Kingdom Hearts fans do not realize is that while Tetsuya Nomura does sometimes make up the details as he goes when it comes to the writing of Kingdom Hearts, he does do things with a plan.

In the KH3 Ultimania [1], he talked about how he’d had the conclusion of the Dark Seeker Saga outlined by the end of Kingdom Hearts II’s development. In an April 2012 interview [2] with Nintendo President Satoru Iwata, he indicated that he’d had a general framework up to Kingdom Hearts II planned out when the original game was first announced. And in a 2004 interview after the original Chain of Memories was released on GameBoy Advance, he mentioned that he’d already come up with the “last scene” that would serve as the definitive ending of the entire series[3].

So while some details may be hard to predict because Nomura comes up with lore and backstory details as he goes, he does have a plan in mind where the overall story is going. And the central arc of the series is entirely predictable once you understand the framework that the story fits into.

Since the late 1800s, scholars have been studying the common patterns that repeat in stories, legends, and myths across different cultures around the world. One of the most well known templates developed from such research is the Hero’s Journey. In his 1949 book The Hero with a Thousand Faces, literature professor Joseph Campbell published a 17 step formula of storytelling. Campbell held up this framework as the monomyth, an ultimate narrative archetype from which all other stories are derived, and in discussion of his work expressed his view of The Hero’s Journey as a universal framework that showed how people grow from youth into adulthood.

However in the 1980s, Maureen Murdock began work on her own narrative framework. Believing that Campbell’s view on the universality of the Hero’s Journey did not encompass the experiences of every identity like he claimed, Murdock developed what she called The Heroine’s Journey as a critique and response to Campbell’s monomyth. Other authors have shared their own variations of the Heroine’s Journey, but for the purposes of this analysis, I will be focusing on Murdock’s model. Hers is both the oldest one I know of, and the one that I personally have the most familiarity with. Though originally conceived as a therapy tool, the core concepts of Murdock’s template have resulted in its use in storytelling for narratives about protagonists overcoming the ingrained biases and preconceptions of society.

Some notable examples of stories that follow the Heroine’s Journey template, albeit most with different formulas, include

Beauty and the Beast

The Hunger Games trilogy

The Princess and the Frog

Tangled

Howl’s Moving Castle

Labyrinth

Star Wars Sequel Trilogy*

Voltron: Legendary Defender*

*Note: Voltron: Legendary Defender and the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy are examples of 3-act narratives that followed the Heroine’s Journey framework in the first 2 acts only for behind-the-scenes conflicts to result in the formula being abandoned in the final act.

Despite the name, it is possible in theory to have a male protagonist follow the Heroine’s Journey, much like how you can have a female protagonist in a Hero’s Journey. While nearly every story I know that follows the Heroine’s Journey template has a female protagonist in the lead role, Kingdom Hearts is the first example that I’ve discovered of a male protagonist following this formula. Sora’s arc across the series follows Murdock’s framework so precisely that I was able to correctly predict the broad strokes of how Re:Mind would go three months before the DLC was released.

Part I: The Beginning

While the Heroine’s Journey mimics the Hero’s Journey in its early stages, it ultimately goes in its own direction. I plan to go into further detail about the differences between the two in a later essay, but for now I will say that while Campbell’s monomyth describes physical plot points and the themes they represent, the Heroine’s Journey formula focuses on the emotional conflict of the narrative and the psychological development of its main characters. The pattern of the Hero’s Journey is fluid and doesn’t have a fixed central theme, while the core element of the Heroine’s Journey is a protagonist coming of age in a society that consciously or not regards them as lesser because they do not fit in with the expectations of the dominant social group.

I know that some people who decide to read further will be put off by the fact that the names and descriptions of the Heroine’s Journey feature gendered language and focus on discussions of masculinity and femininity, so allow me to explain. The reason for this is that in a Heroine’s Journey, the protagonist is attempting to conform to a set of traits that the audience’s culture values. In pursuing this external validation, the main character has to suppress a vital part of who they are, cutting themselves off from achieving their full potential. The traits they are suppressing are the ones which are often regarded as feminine, while the ones they are trying to conform to are typically associated with masculinity. We see this pattern frequently in movies where the female lead tries to succeed in a male-dominated career field, only to feel lonely and unfulfilled when she finally gets what she wants because she sacrificed the parts of herself that made her who she is along the way.

Now that I’ve given you a relatively brief summary of the Heroine’s Journey, I can get down to business and walk people through the steps to this template and how it fits with the story of Kingdom Hearts. Note that this is only a basic rundown of the steps of the Heroine’s Journey and how it relates to these games, and I will be posting additional essays shortly which go into greater detail on the themes, character archetypes, and other different layers of the framework that are present in the series.

Murdock’s version of the Heroine’s Journey begins with the “Separation from the Feminine”. This is the stage where, as mentioned, the protagonist suppresses a core part of themselves in pursuit of external validation. It often takes the form of the protagonist sacrificing their emotional strengths and focuses exclusively on proving themselves in the physical sphere. Sora has demonstrated again and again that his greatest strength is his empathy and his willingness to make connections with others. It makes him a strong unifying force because of how well it complements the people around him. But because this isn’t something tangible in the same way that physical strength is, he doesn’t see the value of it, believing that without the strength of his friends he’s nothing.

From the way the other kids on Destiny Islands talk about their competitions, Sora’s focus is on trying to prove that he’s just as strong and capable as Riku is. But he’s so focused on proving himself in physical challenges that he doesn’t notice the signs of Riku’s jealousy that lead his friend into the arms of Maleficent. And we see through Anti Form and Rage Form that Sora is still repressing his own negative emotions in Kingdom Hearts III. His narrow focus on external skills has cut him off from achieving the full potential of his internal ones.

When Sora awakens in Traverse Town after the destruction of Destiny Islands, we come to the second stage of the Heroine’s Journey, “Identification with the Masculine and Gathering of Allies”. This is where the main character chooses to align with the traits and roles that the dominant social group sees as desirable in order to achieve their goal, and where they acquire the allies who will help them in their quest. With the adults around him focusing on his ability to destroy the Heartless, Sora latches onto the Chosen One status that implicitly comes with having a Keyblade. His interactions with Phil and his disappointment with the status of Junior Hero in subsequent games paint Sora as being focused on heroism in the sense of overcoming obstacles with force. Even Donald and Goofy, in the beginning, are focused on Sora’s value as a Keyblade Wielder in terms of how their fight against the Heartless can lead them to King Mickey’s location.

By setting off with Donald, and Goofy, Sora embarks on the “Road of Trials” stage of the Heroine’s Journey. This is one of the few points of similarity between the Heroine’s Journey and the Hero’s, corresponding to Campbell’s “Tests, Allies, and Enemies” stage. This is where the main character faces the initial obstacles and challenges of their quest. In the first few Kingdom Hearts games we have Sora face off against Maleficent, Ansem, and the Organization, before reuniting with Riku and Kairi in The World That Never Was. The final stages of Kingdom Hearts II correspond to the “Finding the Boon of Success” stage of both the Hero and Heroine’s Journeys.

Part II: Interlude

In a Hero’s Journey, the Boon of Success is the end of the story. They slay the dragon, save the princess, and go home to live happily ever after. I suspect this is one reason why a lot of gamers in the KH fanbase tend to think of Kingdom Hearts 2 as the best game of the series - because in their minds Sora’s quest had been completed now that he had found Riku and Kairi like he set out to do in the first game. His journey, as far as they were concerned, was done.

(This may also have an affect on how some fans reacted to Kingdom Hearts III, expecting it to be a grand epic finale that wrapped everything up with a bow and left a completely blank slate for the future of the series)

But in a Heroine’s Journey, the Boon of Success is not the end of the main character’s story. They have achieved their external goal, but they have not addressed their internal motivations for seeking that goal in the first place. And as their story continues, they find themselves facing challenges that their attitude thus far has failed to prepare them for. Finding The Boon of Success typically occurs early during the second act of the story. Usually it is achieved in the second half of Act II, but can sometimes happen as early as the end of the first act. For Sora, this was of course finding Riku and Kairi so that they could all go home to the Destiny Islands together.

But because the protagonist of a Heroine’s Journey has not addressed the underlying insecurities which set them on their current path, they “Awaken to Feelings of Spiritual Aridity”.

They begin to learn that the conflict they find themselves involved in is not as clear cut as they previously believed, and the challenges that come with this new knowledge are ones that their current way of doing things has failed to prepare them for. They may have found their boon of success, but things quickly begin to go wrong until they are ultimately forced to sacrifice their reward.

The first game already showed through Riku and Mickey that Sora was not the only person able to wield a Keyblade, but because of his heroic deeds the story still framed him as the Keyblade Master and treated him as having a more significant role to play in important events than anyone else. It’s only after he hears from Mickey of the Keyblade Wielders who came before him that it begins to sink in for him that being a Keyblade Master is not a special Chosen One status. He thinks that because of all that he’s accomplished, he doesn’t need the recognition that comes with the official title, and because of that he’s careless and almost gets himself Norted at the end of DDD.

His failure in the exam is a blow to his self confidence and shows that despite what he had said at the start of the test, deep down he really does want that kind of external validation. His insecurities and doubts continue to eat at him over the course of KH3, culminating in his breakdown at the Keyblade Graveyard. Outside of battle, we see him bottle up his doubts and other negative emotions because his friends (Except for Riku. More on him later) brush his concerns and problems aside. It is very much like Joy from Inside Out doing everything to keep Rylee happy and refusing to let Sadness take the controls.

When their current way of doing things ultimately costs them their boon, the protagonist tries to go back to the way things used to be. To return to a simpler time and avoid the pain of the present. When literally going back to where their journey began isn’t possible, a Heroine’s Journey story will use this stage symbolically. The main character will cling to a person, object, or relationship that they associate with a simpler time. But as comfortable as the sense of familiarity they get from that is, it ultimately cannot truly address their inner pain in the long run.

This is reflected in the Re:Mind DLC, where Sora goes back in time in order to find the pieces of Kairi’s heart and bring her back. One of Kairi’s most consistent character traits is her fear of change and desire for things to remain the way they were.

At the end of the DLC, Sora compares his connection with Kairi to the bond between Ventus and Chirithy, a friendship explicitly strained by distance, time, and Ven’s amnesia. In an interview at E3 2018 [4], Nomura commented about Kingdom Hearts III tying into a theme of childhood friendships changing as one gets older, a plotline that Merlin calls attention to after Sora’s visit to the 100 Acre Wood. And in a 2006 book titled Character’s Report Vol. 1, Nomura specifically calls attention to Kairi’s anxiety about growing apart from Sora and Riku as they get older. [5] All of these details combined frame Sora’s quest to save Kairi as an attempt to symbolically recover the innocence he lost when he began his journey.

But while he is able to find a way to renew his connection to Kairi, it can never be the same as it was before, and attempting to go back to how things used to be is ultimately doomed to failure. By the time he brings her to The Final World at the end of Re:Mind, Sora has realized that he and Kairi cannot stay on the same plan of existence anymore as a consequence of his actions. So he takes her on a tour of the worlds to re-establish their connection before fading away at the end of KH3. Thus, we come to the final act of the Kingdom Hearts narrative.

Part III: The Future Story

It is at this point that the protagonist of a Heroine’s Journey begins the “Initiation and Descent to the Goddess” stage. Having failed to achieve meaningful success through their old way of doing things, they must look inward and examine the cause of their insecurities and accept that in order to move forward they need to heal themselves. In this step, the main character travels to either a dream world or a physical location that is closed off and forbidden to them, like the West Wing of Beast’s Castle in Beauty and the Beast. In Jungian psychology, this metaphorical dark cave represents the main character’s subconscious, and entering it triggers a dark night of the soul for our protagonist as they are forced to confront the parts of themselves they’ve been keeping locked away.

While Sora knows in his head that darkness is not inherently bad, he continues to rely entirely exclusively on light, on his connections to others, and has not properly accepted it in his heart. In order to truly finish his coming of age narrative, Sora must learn to balance his inner light and darkness the same way that Riku has. And to do that, he needs to look inside himself and figure out why he feels so badly that he needs his connections to others in order to be strong. And in order to achieve that level of understanding of himself, he needs to understand his Animus.

Derived from the psychological theories of Carl Jung, the Animus in a Heroine’s Journey is an external representation of the protagonist’s masculine-coded traits in physical form. While not every Heroine’s Journey features an Animus, many of the stories I’ve seen that follow the formula do. Usually the Animus appears in the form of a deuteragonist who often functions as the protagonist’s Shadow, an archetypal character that embodies the aspects of the main character’s personality that due to their immaturity they either aren’t aware or don’t want to acknowledge that they have.

In order to complete their character arc, the protagonist must symbolically integrate with their Shadow by learning to embrace the parts of their psyche that the Shadow represents. In many stories the protagonist has more than one Shadow figure, all of whom challenge the protagonist by forcing them to become faster or smarter to stay one step ahead, giving their interactions with the main character a push-and-pull dynamic as they drive the main character to grow. Shadow figures who fill the role of the Animus also challenge the protagonist to look inside themselves and examine their own emotional needs. With an Animus, the push to grow runs in both directions, with the main character motivating their Animus’ growth just as much as the other way around.

In these types of stories, every aspect of the character is tailored to make the Animus and the protagonist fit together like Yin and Yang. In visual stories such as film, television, and video games, the Animus’ entire look is designed to complement the main character and they are framed in the narrative as the protagonist’s equal physically, intellectually, and spiritually. This serves to emphasize that despite their surface differences, much of the conflict between the protagonist and their Animus comes from the ways in which they are fundamentally similar. While their circumstances may have led them to drastically different lives, the characters are ultimately two sides of the same coin, and their character development is driven by learning to balance their contrasting traits.

And within the structure of the Kingdom Hearts series, there is only one character who fulfills all of these qualities in relation to Sora’s journey.

The same character who Testuya Nomura said in the KH1 Ultimania was designed to balance Sora; [6]

Who series producer Shinji Hasimoto said was part of the core of the series alongside Sora [7], as has been repeatedly emphasized by the number of games where he is given a major focus and is a playable character alongside Sora.

[Image Description: Riku walking towards a door to light in the opening of Kingdom Hearts III. End Description]

While Sora and Riku have addressed some of the latter’s behavior in the first game during their conversation on the dark beach at the end of Kingdom Hearts II, they have yet to truly dig deep into why Riku felt the way he did in the first game. Riku has not told Sora about how he felt like he was being left behind and forgotten. And since that conversation, Riku has gone to the opposite extreme, dealing with his emotional problems on his own instead of lashing out at others like he had done at the start. Likewise while Sora has accepted that darkness is not inherently evil he has yet to apply this to his own negative emotions, as seen in Kingdom Hearts III. Neither character has truly achieved an ideal balance yet, and they cannot until Sora completes his journey.

After the protagonist returns from their spiritual journey, they experience an “Urgent Yearning to Reconnect with the Feminine.” As the main character recovers from their period of soul searching, they embrace the parts of themselves that they had neglected in their pursuit of outside approval. Their Descent allowed them to recognize their value as a person and an individual outside of their ability to fulfill the role that they were expected to fill. Following this realization, they go about “Healing the Mother/Daughter split”. Reclaiming the aspects of their personality they’ve been repressing gives the protagonist the clarity necessary to gain a different perspective on their old way of thinking. This new understanding is what will allow them to find the inner balance needed to truly complete their journey.

The Japanese version of the “My friends are my power” mantra often repeated across the series is “Connected hearts are my power.” For Sora, who has long relied on his connections to others as a source of strength, he should come to realize that these connections go both ways: that his friends draw strength from him just as much as he draws strength from them. This should help him come to accept that he is still strong and worthy all by himself. Ven’s version of the mantra from the English version of BBS summarizes it best: “My friends are my power. And I am theirs.” After he accepts this, Sora will finally be able to use the full extent of his emotional abilities.

After achieving that new perspective, the protagonist’s next step is “Healing the Wounded Masculine Within”. This is the stage of the Heroine’s Journey where the main character, having come to understand themselves, reconciles with their Animus, thereby symbolically integrating the aspects of their psyche that the Animus represents and permanently healing the rift between the two characters. This will be where Sora and Riku need to have a longer, more in-depth conversation than the one they had on the Dark Magin at the end of KH2. Where they talk about why Riku acted the way he did and finally address the underlying reason for why he was so jealous of Sora in the original game.

The final stage of the Heroine’s Journey is the “Integration of Masculine and Feminine”. This is the point at which the main character and their Animus finally achieve a perfect balance between them. They are united both internally and externally. There are no more secrets between them, and they are now free to move forward and overcome the main antagonist together.

Part IV: Conclusion:

While there’s too many different possibilities to completely predict every twist and turn of the series’ lore in future games, once you understand how Kingdom Hearts fits into the framework of the Heroine’s Journey, the broad strokes of how the story will go in terms of Sora’s growth and character development are entirely predictable. When Re:Mind first released and the rest of the fandom was reacting on Twitter, I was sitting back with a smug smile on my face thinking:

[Image Description: Emperor Palpatine in Star Wars: Episode VI: Return of the Jedi sitting aboard the Death Star II with the caption ‘Good, Good. Everything is going according to plan.’ End Description.]

While I didn’t expect the precise mechanics of how Sora went about saving Kairi, Re:Mind was exactly what I expected it to be in terms of themes and its place in the Heroine’s Journey framework, and then the Secret Episode came along to reinforce that the next game is going to be Sora’s Descent.

While there isn’t a complete guarantee that the series will continue to follow the formula, I find it extremely unlikely that it won’t. Kingdom Hearts follows the stages of this framework too precisely for me to ever believe it happened by accident. So as long as there is no corporate interference from Disney like what happened to Voltron, I’m confident that Nomura’s plan for the finale of the series will be exactly what the Heroine’s Journey predicts it should be, no matter how unexpected future additions to the lore may be.

Special thanks to @dragonofyang and the rest of Team Purple Lion for everything I know about the Heroine’s Journey. I wouldn’t be as enthusiastic about analyzing the story of Kingdom Hearts if they hadn’t taught me the vocabulary to realize the kind of story that Nomura has been telling right under my nose for the last 18 years.

Sources:

[1] “Kingdom Hearts III Ultimania interview with Tetsuya Nomura”; March 12, 2019

https://www.khinsider.com/news/Kingdom-Hearts-3-Ultimania-Main-Nomura-Interview-Translated-14763

[2] “Iwata Asks: Nintendo 3DS: Third Party Game Developers, Volume 12: Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance], Part 3: Square’s Intentions”; April 2012.

https://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/#/3ds/creators/11/2

[3] “2004 GMR Nomura Interview 2004!”; Translation by Kingdom Hearts Insider posted May 5, 2012.

https://www.khinsider.com/news/GMR-Nomura-Interview-2004-2563

[4] “E3 2018: Tetsuya Nomura on If Kingdom Hearts 3 Is the End of Sora's Story”; June 14, 2018.

https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/06/14/e3-2018-tetsuya-nomura-on-if-kingdom-hearts-3-is-the-end-of-soras-story

[5] “Character’s Report Vol. 1 Translations”; Jul 16, 2014

https://www.khinsider.com/forums/index.php?threads/characters-report-vol-1-translations.195560/\

[6] “A Look Back: Kingdom Hearts Ultimania Gallery Comments Part 1″; August 30, 2019;

https://www.khinsider.com/news/A-Look-Back-KINGDOM-HEARTS-Ultimania-Gallery-Comments-Part-1-15519

[7] “How Kingdom Hearts III Will Grow Up With Its Players.” September 24, 2013

https://www.ign.com/articles/2013/09/25/how-kingdom-hearts-iii-will-grow-up-with-its-players

[X] “The Heroine with a Thousand Faces”; June 13, 2019;

https://www.teampurplelion.com/heroine-with-a-thousand-faces/

[X] Murdock, Maureen. The Heroine’s Journey. 1990.

[X] “Maureen Murdock’s Heroine’s Journey Arc”. The Heroine Journeys Project. https://heroinejourneys.com/heroines-journey/

#kingdom hearts meta #kh analysis #meta analysis #kh sora #kingdom hearts and the heroine's journey

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starwarsfic · 4 years

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II.12

Originally posted October 17, 2020

Summary: Obi-Wan readjusts to old routines.

Details: Jango/Obi-Wan. Mandalorian Gods AU. Sequel to II.8.

xxxxxxx

What gods a people worshiped reflected their values.

Thus why the New Mandalorians were called the Faithless, for they'd had no gods. The weak god of Peace from failure, from diminishing oneself, could have been theirs, but it had been killed off by the Faithful themselves, millennia before, after being seen as a cowardly adversary for much of Mandalorian history.

Obi-Wan could remember it, vaguely. And the disdain he had felt for it, despite its attempts to forge kinship. Jango, Ja'rango Vhetine, in particular had despised Naa'ibral, both for their place as natural enemies and for its attempts at a connection to Suu'mirjah, to who Obi-Wan was and is again.

Even the New Mandalorians had made no attempt to resurrect it, despite how it fit so well with their own beliefs. It wasn't until they wanted to draw the Faithful in, trick them into believing they could keep their faith and be Faithless at the same time, that they turned their sights on any gods.

Back, in some way, to his rightful position, Obi-Wan was spending much of his time simply familiarizing himself with the state of the pantheon that had once included over a hundred gods, great and small.

Of the great, only three remained: Jango, Cabur Yai'alii, Family, and Kyr'kantayl, Death. Obi-Wan himself had never placed so highly, dragged along through his marriage to Jango and the way their romance called to warrior hearts into far greater prominence than he may have otherwise had among the Mandalorian pantheon.

Even if, since coming back, he'd felt...more. The focus of tens of thousands of "clone" troopers' fervent daily prayers, of the sacrifices they made everyday on battlefields and at command. Jango's plots had born fruit in many ways.

Kyr'kantayl could not die so easily as all the rest of them, for all the dead Faithful had followed them, and when the Dral'han killed so many, they had bolstered them through the lean centuries ahead. Obi-Wan found it a relief, to see a familiar face, even as Kyr'kantayl loomed above him, taking the form of a skinless pureblood Taung even after so long.

"I have come to plead for the souls of my Faithful," he intoned, as he had so many times before.

The voice that answered was deep and high, soft and loud, legion. "I had felt the Ka'ra diminish, as they dragged you from its embrace. Are you not here to return?"

Obi-Wan didn't try to hide the roll of his eyes, it was always one thing or another with Death trying to tempt Obi-Wan into giving in. "I have a riduur who must be watched, I'm afraid. And a world in dire need of me."

At least Death had never pushed too hard, once denied the first time during each meeting, they held back any more attempts.

"Ja'rango Vhetine has sent me many, those creatures he has created have, as well. Faithless to be weighed and found wanting."

Grimacing, Obi-Wan realized another aspect of the "clone" plot that he hadn't considered--if everyone a trooper killed was a sacrifice, they would all be sent to Kyr'kantayl regardless of their own faiths. And, Faithless as they'd be in Death's eyes, they would not become one with the Manda, instead going to feed the Ka'ra, forever uncreated as their energy supported the network of dead leaders and gods.

"And how long will you be satisfied with such a boring task? Until you want to tear into one of the Faithful, to find them wanting?"

The more of his godhood that Obi-Wan remembered, the more he could see how it had informed his mortal life--how his quest to be a peacekeeper and negotiator had only been continuing what he had once been. Sometimes he wondered if Obi-Wan Kenobi had ever existed, but he still retained the memories--the friendships, the heartbreaks--that could not be claimed solely by Suu'mirjah.

Death laughed at him, a sound designed to make others bristle. Jango would have been at their throat, for all the good it would have done him. Instead, Obi-Wan just sat back and waited them out. He is the hard won Peace of victory, but also the reluctant Peace of strategic retreat. He can not be worn down so easily.

Finally, there was silence.

And, then, "I am not without sympathy, for the plight the others have faced. Your spirits do not pass through my domain. For many centuries I have watched the survivors struggle, lesser and weaker, many losing themselves." Their voice was soft, form seeming smaller, and Obi-Wan couldn't help but reach out, setting a comforting hand against their scalding flesh. "There were years when you were the only other of our kind I ever saw, before, and then you are gone."

Obi-Wan shifted, resisting the urge to pull his arms back around himself. "I believe that's called loneliness, vod," he replied, letting his teasing tone pull a scoff from Kyr'kantayl.

"I'll give your Faithful a pass for a century or two, but don't think that useless riduur of yours will get the same."

He laughed, now, appreciating that Death was both doing him a favor and ensuring that he would visit still, for Jango's Faithful.

xxxxxx

A/N: While writing the first Mandalorian Gods part, I had a lot of ideas about the pantheon, and this is a little bit of some of them.

Mandoa: riduur - spouse cabur - guardian Ka'ra - the mythical collection of dead Mand'alors and prior leaders vod - sibling/comrade

The god names are just made up by spending way too much on mandoa.org and smushing together some semi-relevant words.

#jangobi #kenfetti #obi wan kenobi #sw fic #character: obi wan kenobi #verse: mandalorian gods #theme: dark #ship: kenfetti

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danwhobrowses · 4 years

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Why ‘The Karate Kid Part II’ Deserves More Respect

So guess what film I finished watching today? Of course, the Karate Kid franchise is considered iconic mainly for its first entry; Wax on Wax off, Skeleton fights, Sweep the Leg and the Crane Kick all cemented its legacy that allowed Cobra Kai to also be such a success. But imagine my shock when the approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes for Part II is 45% - 21% lower than the Jaden Smith ‘The Karate Kung Fu Kid’ version (and Part III is scored 15%, which is also super harsh but hard to debate outside of the magnificence of Terry Silver). Originally this was just gonna be a general post of how much I enjoyed retreading Part II, but upon seeing that score I had to give it my ‘Deserves More Respect’ posts.

It is an off-chance, but if you haven’t watched this film there will be spoilers within, I encourage you to watch it before reading, and maybe watch it again if you have so it’s fresh in the mind

Let’s start with a controversial point shall we? There are several parts where Part II is actually better than the original. Now I know! There’s a lot about the original which is iconic, but nostalgia does blind you to other shortcomings and while it’s easy to sell the first part because of its mystique, a sequel has the added pressure of rising above and developing on old and new themes set by the predecessor. The Premise In case you decided against refreshing your memory. Karate Kid Part II starts with a recap of Part I, a bit of content that was meant to be Part I’s final scene (in the script, not for filming) and then a timeskip. Ali with an i is gone - brutally dumping Daniel for some Football Player before Senior Prom and after crashing his car, Daniel’s mother is in Fresno for work and Miyagi has received a letter from his home Okinawa in news of his father’s fading health. The stage is set for Daniel and the audience to learn more about the iconic Mr. Miyagi and the life he left behind. Okay, so there is bad in this film Part II deserves respect, but it’s not perfect. It definitely gets messy near the end with Daniel’s antagonist Chozen, he mainly took beats from Johnny Lawrence in physically confronting Daniel when he could with a bunch of no-named goons and he fought pretty similarly to Johnny in catch counters and leg strikes. The opening recap did take a lot of time too, while the ending remained somewhat abrupt having just beaten up Chozen to embrace Kumiko (who had a delayed recovery after being punched once). While not bad, a fair amount of retreaded content felt like downgrades of the original; Chozen and Sato lacked the charisma of Johnny and Kreese, the crane kick was far more impressive than the drum technique and the Tournament setting was grander than the O-Bon festival. But, there are Iconic Moments in this film too Part I may have the Crane Kick and the Skeletons and the Training and Sweep the Leg. But people may forget that Part II had awesome moments too.

Like Daniel chopping through 6 Sheets of Ice! If that isn’t one hell of a power play I don’t know what is. It is a moment genuinely impressive in and outside of the 80s cheese universe of Karate Kid, and it gets referenced in Season 2 of Cobra Kai.

Also referenced in Season 2 is Miyagi vs Kreese. While this is the intended ending for Part I, it certainly acted better at the start of Part II, especially given that is foreshadows the situation Daniel finds himself in at the end of the movie. This moment is equally iconic as it completely encapsulates the character of both senseis - Kreese the confident brute brought to a sniveling mouse when size and power failed him and Miyagi the cool-headed and vastly more intelligent fighter still with the cheeky prankster lightness to him as he honks the scared shitless Kreese on the nose. Perfect.

While I did want to cite the Tea Ceremony as well I think the more iconic moment for Part II had to be Miyagi chopping the log during the storm. The storm itself is a very well-done scene which unmasks several characters in the face of adversity. True tension, worry and stakes are sold as the village are in danger of the cruel whims of nature, an act which is all too real for Sato when the house he’s in collapses on him in the calm before his scheduled deathmatch with Miyagi. Not only is this again some great foreshadowing by the rule of three (Daniel asking if Miyagi can chop a log like Sato is doing with a banner and then Miyagi and Sato meeting and seeing Sato fail to chop a log) it proves a pivotal point where Sato turns from aggrieved antagonist to repenting ally. A great show of power and friendship as Miyagi metaphorically breaks the rift between their friendship that weighs Sato down. Okay, we hear you, but how is it better? I do have to preface that I do still love Part I, I have to because in pointing out where Part II is better I have to pick at Part I’s faults. While the ending is messy Part II definitely has much better pacing, until the skeletons scene Part I doesn’t really pick up because it has to set up, Part II while it does recap doesn’t need to worry about it. Giving Miyagi the main plot was definitely Part II’s strongest suit. Part I profited from Miyagi being the ‘mysterious old teacher’ but learning a lot more about his humanity and history was engrossing and it allowed positive development for Miyagi and Daniel, especially their bond as a surrogate father and son when Daniel personally goes out of his way to support Miyagi on a very personal matter. The main characters maintain their charm as well, still a lovely array of life lessons in Part II more than just finding balance, Miyagi teaches Daniel through words and action on taking time to breathe, to refocus when imbalanced, to forgive rather than to harbour hate, mercy, selflessness and humbleness

“never put passion before principle. Even if win, you lose.” - Mr. Miyagi

The scenes involving Miyagi and his father were some of the most deep and emotive of the series up until Cobra Kai, some still haven’t been topped such as Miyagi’s dad’s first words to his son or when Daniel talked about when his father died. And say what you will about Chozen, he does have a lot of Johnny vibes but a lot of the character we believed was Johnny due to nostalgia goggles was more fitting of Chozen’s manner. The story did a great job in making sure Chozen was always an asshole, at times Johnny did at least display honour and grace but Chozen was always sore about stuff and quick to claim dishonour even when he was in the wrong. Contrary to Johnny it’s more about his family than it is about a girl, which allowed a lot more freedom in the plot. Whether you felt Elizabeth Shue’s Ali with an i was prettier than Tamlyn Tomita’s Kumiko is up to personal preference, but the messy-haired Kumiko definitely had a slightly improved presence in Part II than Ali did, with actual focus on her own feelings outside of attraction to Daniel, her ambition to become a dancer directly linking to the O-Bon Festival - which in turn related to the Drum technique - as well as the delicately beautiful Tea Ceremony scene and actually contributing to the final fight (granted Ali wouldn’t be allowed to). Also Daniel didn’t try to eat her face which is a general improvement to the romantic subplot, extra applause has to go to Tomita here too because this was legitimately her first role - Shue had her second so that’s impressive too - and both women had good careers going forward. The increased stakes definitely worked in the favour of Part II as well, as sequel culture is forced to do, but by moving to Okinawa (actually filmed in Hawaii) we opened the door to better suit Miyagi’s world while keeping Daniel the fish out of water. I can’t speak too much for appropriation because there is still kinda some ‘white saviour’ undertones but I didn’t feel like Japan was treated negatively in this light, its culture of the O-Bon Festival and the Tea Ceremony was treated with the utmost respect and explained without pandering, the flute music had definitely stepped up its game for the soundtrack as did the imagery. Can also appreciate that Daniel does go for the Crane kick when fighting Chozen but is parried. Added hat tip has to go to costuming too. A lot of costumes would have to have distinct Kamon such as Sato’s twin fish and Miyagi’s bonsai on a lot of their clothing

Between Sato and Miyagi the colours of their clothes often code their emotions towards each other, with Sato usually in grey and Miyagi in white or cream, when Sato and Miyagi prepare for death they are in black and when Sato wants forgiveness he moves to a lighter shade. While Part I also used black and white to differ Johnny and Daniel, Part II put Chozen and Daniel in the more Japanese-themed Red and Blue. While both men wear red, blue and whites at time, Chozen’s clothes almost devolve from the white he debuts in as his darker side comes out before flat out embracing yellow after his chance to prove his honour in the storm is refused (and he’s in white then), while Daniel often moves to Red or red tones even in his blue shirt. Kumiko also moves from white to blue, sometimes even purple, in set up to the final fight to have the primary colours stand out in the colourful crowd of the O-Bon festival, but even in the blue Kumiko had red to pair her connection with Daniel. Also her Yukata at the festival is just stunning, the Great Wave off Kanagawa print is a nice touch.

Anything else we should know? It might not be much else about the film itself I can tell you, but I do appreciate something I’m starting to call ‘The Rocky Connection’ when it comes to Karate Kid. Like Part I’s ‘You’re the Best (Around)’ was shortlisted for Rocky III, Part II’s song ‘Glory of Love’ was shortlisted for Rocky IV’s theme, losing to ‘Hearts on Fire’, Bill Conti also chose to score this film instead of Rocky IV. I like to pair this with Daniel’s Rocky-esque character, he has that same kind of swagger but a lot more naive and childlike. Martin Kove also gets a nod because those bleeding hands were legit, he had an accident on-set and the footage was kept for the final cut. Tamlyn Tomita wasn’t the only film debut for Part II, B.D. Wong of...well, several famous roles including but not limited to Shang in the animated Mulan, Dr. Wu in the Jurassic Park franchise, Hugo Strange in Gotham and many more, also had his debut here in a minor speaking role when he’s handing out flyers for the dance party to Kumiko and Daniel before the Ice Chopping Scene. So, why does it deserve respect A film that adds to a beloved character in a respectful fashion without having really any god awful moments does not deserve a 4.5/10 rating. It may not have as emphatic an ending or as great a villain but it has a captivating plot and a good pace, better stakes and much more emotionally driven and responsive scenes. A lot of effort and dedication went into this film to explore new dimensions of the main characters in a fashion which was enjoyable and at times heartwarming. And characters are given human moments, even Miyagi confesses himself not to be perfect and it keeps each character grounded. Even to this day parts of Part II are remembered fondly rather than the campness that Part III had outside of Terry Silver and his magnificent ponytail, the fondness also continues to reflect in Cobra Kai with homages and fan theories of Daniel going to Okinawa again and even re-encountering Chozen. Not to mention it grossed $113m on a $13m budget and got nominated for a Best Original Song Oscar (losing to Top Gun) Part II was a good and enjoyable film which deserves far more credit than to be rated this low, for that it deserves respect.

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