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themagenamedsage · 2 years

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Eddie Munson/Corroded Coffin “Making it Big” Headcanons

~ written by 🦇~

Part 2 can be found here.

***Eddie Munson lives and his name is cleared AU because he deserves no less***

***technically the 4th member of corroded coffin has no name (sad face), so I’ve named him Grant, after the actor who plays him***

Eddie, Gareth, Jeff, and Grant scraped up every possible spare change they had.

Gareth and Grant had finally graduated, which meant they had the time to get “real” jobs, just like Eddie and Jeff had to before them. But with those “real” jobs, came real adult debts and other responsibilities that required money, so things were tight for a while.

But it was a group effort, and they were all in it together to save whatever money they could in order to get Corroded Coffin’s first official album produced.

After almost a year, they finally scraped up all the money they could manage to hire some guy Gareth’s cousin told them about a few towns over. Said guy had an entire little studio set up in his mother’s basement, and offered them a “friends and family” discount- which basically meant he’d take whatever money they could give him, plus other forms of payment.

Other payments included food but also included goods that Eddie was able to provide

They recorded the album in the man’s mother’s dimly lit basement, but the experience wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows.

Eddie swore the smell of mothballs would never leave his nostrils, and the group had to spend literal hours narrowing down Corroded Coffin’s expansive repertoire to come up with the ten most perfect tracks to put onto the album.

After the album was recorded, came the even harder part: making about a kajillion copies of it to distribute.

Speaking of the master copy of the album: Grant was tasked with guarding that bad boy, on pain of death. He was down to go down for the cause, though.

Once the many, many copies were made, the group mailed them off to as many record labels that they could find the information for on the East and West Coasts.

Eddie had never spent so much time in a library than he did while trying to look up all those mailing addresses information.

For a few months, nothing happened. The band would sell a couple tapes at their local shows at The Hideout, but beyond that, their precious album remained relatively unknown. But they’d done it- they had an album! If no one else saw the brilliance of their work, that was alright. They knew they had something special.

Then one day, Eddie was at work (at a local record store, AKA the most tolerable (and legal) “adult” job he could find) when he got a call. He never got calls at work, so immediately, he panicked, thinking something was wrong with Wayne.

But Wayne was the one calling- and Eddie had a call waiting for him back at the trailer.

Eddie sped, a lot, but he’d never sped home quite so fast as he did that day.

The call was from none other than a relatively decent sized record label out in LA. They liked Corroded Coffin’s stuff, and they wanted more.

Years later…

Corroded Coffin quickly became a household name.

In the several years since the band’s launch into stardom, they’d gone on countless tours, played shows in almost every US state, and had even done several shows overseas in the UK.

They even supported Metallica on a few tours.

Jeff most definitely did not have to keep pinching Eddie the first time they met the legendary band, for fear that Corroded Coffin’s front man might simply faint on the spot.

The 90s brought all sorts of change, even for the small town of Hawkins. Though Corroded Coffin’s members were once considered the freaks of their town (and for one of them, a prime suspect in a gruesome “murder”), the band’s major success changed the tune for many of Hawkins’ residents.

Former-Sheriff-turned-Mayor-Hopper was so proud of the once deviants, he even had a sign added to all entry points to town.

“Welcome to Hawkins: Hometown of Corroded Coffin”

Every time the band played in Indianapolis, Eddie would never, ever forget to secure the entire group VIP passes.

Though everyone (except Robin) now had their licenses, the gang still opted to ride up to Indianapolis together, for old time’s sake. Nancy and Steve took turns driving, while the other made sure all the passengers in the back refrained from fighting with one another for the hour and a half drive.

Corroded Coffin’s gigs were intense, and that was not made any less apparent despite the increasing sizes of the venues they played.

Eddie Munson may or may not have been notorious for stage diving at the most unpredictable of times.

He did so once during one of Corroded Coffin’s slower songs and would have broken his arm and guitar with the fall if Corroded Coffin’s fans hadn’t been so dedicated to catching him.

Though Corroded Coffin’s type of music was not everyone in the gang’s first choice of musical taste, the concerts were still nice for all of them to break up the daily grind and escape for a night.

But Dustin always had the most fun at the gigs.

Every time they had a show in Indianapolis, Eddie made sure Corroded Coffin’s cover of Master of Puppets was added to the show’s set list. And each time they played it, he invited Dustin out on stage for the song.

Even though Dustin couldn’t describe the joy he felt in seeing his friend literally living out his dreams on stage, a bittersweet thought always lingered in his mind.

Corroded Coffin’s shows now were electric, grand even.

But Eddie Munson’s concert in the Upside Down had been legendary.

If only the world could know.

Most. Metal. Ever.

Part 2 can be found here.

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just-a-floofy-catt · 6 months

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I took a bit of a break from posting cus im tired as balls atm lmao

But i wanted to atleast chuck something out today so heres the ref/original idea sheet of Avery, my fnaf sb self-insert/oc from a while ago :)

(Ive already kinda shown this b4 but now it just looks nicer)

(And has all the writing stuff below the pic in this post)

Also here's some bonus info on him and his role and all :)

• Hes a trans dude (he/they pronouns) that "is built like a twink and dresses like a femboy" (quote from my friend lmao), and has an extremely ambiguous voice - British accent btw (grew up in the UK, he moved over to his current residence and lives w a roommate who was his online friend).

• Hes can occasionally be a lil bit of a freak behind the scenes XD. Has indulged in alot of fanfiction, draws some questionable stuff for money and also generally can have pretty crude and vulgar humor sometimes lmao.

• Hes pretty creative with a long ass list of hobbies. Loves fashion and costumes, is an artist, avid sewer and just generally loves making things with his hands in his spare time (100% brings his crochet to work XD)

• Has almost crippling anxiety about literally almost everything.

• Hes very polite and tolerates alot of bullshit to avoid conflict, but inside he is 100% raging with the heat of 1000 suns despite the fact hes outwardly shaking enough to be practically vibrating. He will definitely talk shit about the situation to himself in great, excruciating, dramatic detail with alot of angry cursing later and then probably cry about it.

• The boi is a little try-hard that will do their job above minimum effort in order to get praise, or out of fear for getting in trouble.

• Hes typically empathetic to a fault and a straight up (un)qualified therapist.

• Oh, also, hes a raging insomniac.

- First got the job because art commissions were a little slow and, hey, a more reliable source of money at the time wouldnt hurt.

- He was always kinda curious about the place because the scary stories about it were fun to pick apart and he loved the designs of all the animatronics (pft furry).

- He showed up to the interview scared shitless but they hired him almost on the spot, much to his confusion, as he was probably less than entirely qualified for this sort of job.

- From his very first day, he showed up pushing the dress code XD. But, he was indeed wearing the uniform, so he was technically following the rules(THEY COULDNT DO SHIT TO HIM 🥰) (well they could) (but the understaffing issue was more prioritised).

- His coworkers genuinely have no fucking clue how he manages to give enough of a shit to put that much stuff on every morning. The fits are always very over the top, considering all he had to do was put the damn uniform on, but alas, he usually showed up in head to toe accessories and such. It's honestly the best way he can make himself go into work. If he's gonna work a kinda shitty job that doesn't fit his schedule that well and have to do it on barely any sleep, THEN FUCK YEAH HES GONNA DO IT WHILE LOOKIN GOOD. Thats his philosophy on it, atleast XD.

- At first while he settles into the job hes just given shifts in general areas, working joint shifts with more trained security guards or maintenance people or animatronic handlers (those were his favourites. He always got excited like a little kid when getting to see any of the animatronics) to get him used to the place.

Fazbear ent. Was clearly desperate for employees as they were almost always understaffed, but it seemed that they weren't willing to give many employees a strict job role. Rather, expecting them to be a jack of all trades as to try and fix that little issue.

This also happened to apply to Avery, explaining why he was given such oddly scattered and different jobs to settle him in.

- Even as he did start becoming independent, this didnt much change.

One night he could be watching security cameras in the office, the next he could be counting stock at a gift shop, the next he could be helping out with minor maintenance tasks on the robots (despite his ZERO FUCKING KNOWLEDGE ON THEM. Great job there Faz.Ent. Oh well. As time went on he did get atleast a little accustomed to it and managed not to electrically fry his no-robotics-degree-having ass. And he also gained a bestie in the Parts and Services Department, so that was pretty helpful too).

Shit was pretty damn good.

- Thats when they 'suddenly' decide that daycare security is necessary. Something about parents becoming increasingly weary of the odd 'Daycare Attendant' animatronic.

With Avery being their newest hire and most likely to agree to take the position, he immediately gets targeted.

- Now, Avery isnt fond of kids.

Theyre annoying little shits.

So the second he hears 'daycare' hes like "fuck no".

Not to mention that his uh... 'look' (that management had still protested until eventually giving up) would probably set off some entitled mothers or something, and he'd rather not have parents screaming in his face about it.

- Alas, hes eventually convinced into it, under the condition that he gets to stay behind the security desk and not be bothered at all.

- Theyve had security there before, after a few... incidents... but it seemed like they were putting him on a more long term intended job.

- Turns out, from what he can gather from coworkers, a few people have been assigned to the daycare in the past for multiple different roles, but noone really enjoyed it and everyone avoided the place as much as possible. Sun just generally freaked everyone out with that weird... desperation he always had (which was definitely a part of what the parents had also been complaining about) and Moon just scared them all shitless, with the night security guards always looking over their shoulder in hopes of not crossing patrol with him. Noone really downright hated them, some even felt sympathy, but most were just too unsettled to interact with them.

- Avery, being a bit of a pussy, is even further put off from the job by these sentiments.

However, he perseveres and dresses his best to try and convince himself that itd be fine (aka, that if he died atleast hed die pretty).

- The daycare actually had its own themed uniform alongside the plain guard uniform, as did alot of other places in the pizzaplex. However, since the employees were given a choice, basically everyone chose to not don the more whimsical fits, and instead just use their badge to show the specific job or branch they were supposed to be legally assigned to.

- Avery, on the other hand, fucking lived for that shit. XD

Styled it like a girlboss and walked into work at exactly 6.30am, 30 minutes before the daycare opened, prepared to look perfectly the part for his job.

- When he walked into the daycare (he avoided the slide... hm.. maybe if he ever has a night shift here....) and the lights were already on and bright enough to blind a bitch.

Oh well, their electric bill, not his problem.

- He immediately settled behind the desk, planning to keep his ass planted there for the next few hours with one earbud in, hidden under his hair, as he would halfheartedly watch the kids.

But...

Something felt off.

Really fucking weird.

He was definitely being *watched*.

Observed.

Ugh, creepy.

He ignored it, blaming it on lack of sleep.

And thats about as far as i got plan wise for his lil plotline XD

Yippee

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butterflyrry · 1 year

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The problem is that everything always has to be a competition when it comes to Harry! And US harries are the WORST!! They are so possessive of him and most of them don’t respect him at all and just want to use him for clout or to brag about! They always feel superior to fans in Europe/UK or the rest of the world! They talk about him as if he’s American and most seem to really believe that! And then they also get all the special shows (Harryween twice, his birthday now (and he was supposed to play the Miami Pepsi show in 2020 on his bday as well!), then they also get so so many tour dates: there we’re probably around 100 shows in the US alone in 2021 and 2022, not even the rest of the world COMBINED got so many! He wrote a song with the line „leave America“ and yet shows if not all, US harries decided to stay mute during this part out of pettiness! And now they get rewarded over and over and over again with even more shows, special shows at that! And it’s not even the end! So they don’t even gonna change their behavior because why would they? They behave like shit and feel all smug and still get handed everything on a silver platter while we get the crumbs that are left over! I‘m sure US stadium shows are just waiting to be announced and it can’t be that long anymore. I‘m just tired and I wish European/UK fans would at least get a fraction of what US harries get, ESPECIALLY since he’s literally EUROPEAN!!

I’m going to preface this by saying I am an American fan.

Like I said in an earlier ask, I get the frustration and I can’t explain why his team does what they do. I think any Harry fan who wants to see him live should get the opportunity. But I also don’t care for the generalization of American fans because we are not all like that. There are shitty fans in every corner of the fandom.

This is not directed at you specifically and is more of a general statement but…quite frankly, I find these constant fandom wars and competitions to be absolutely ridiculous. Nobody has ownership of Harry nor should we make everything into a competition over who gets what, who Harry likes best, etc, etc etc. That is not why I’m here. I’m here because he brings me a lot of joy. It’s not about clout or anything of the sort.

The fans, regardless of where they live, do not have control over when and where shows are booked. I have no expectations and I don’t feel entitled to anything where Harry is concerned. But if he’s playing a show and I can go, I’m gonna go and I’m gonna enjoy it. For the record, though, I’m not near any of the residency cities. He wasn’t in my backyard but I’m not complaining because I made the choice to travel. It just is what it is. As far as the special shows, I haven’t been to Harryween, ONO, etc. I would’ve loved to see him sing Songbird live like he did in LATAM but I’m not mad at the fans who got to experience that just because I didn’t.

I think the argument could be made that the “Leave America” screaming was born out of pettiness. I get it, do your thing, but why would Americans scream that at him? (FYI, I sang along and danced just like I did for every other song. I have no strong feelings about that line either way.)

I’m sorry that you’re upset but I just don’t think there’s anything to be gained by blaming people who have no control over the situation. His team needs to hear from you regarding his tour dates because they’re the ones who control that.

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daydreamrry · 2 years

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I've seen so many people saying "let him have fun" or stating that there's nothing wrong with partying and travelling if you're vaccinated or even completely dismissing harry's responsibility in this just cause "it's allowed to attend events, it's not ilegal" as if that was justification enough.

Today Lionel Messi (football player) tested positive for covid after he travelled to argentina from europe and was literally partying left and right. No matter how rich you're and how "exclusive" the parties you attend are, it doesn't prevent you from catching the virus and even worse...... IT DOESN'T PREVENT YOU FROM SPREADING IT.

There's absolutely no way that Harry's behaviour this past month is right. Especially after so many people had to cancel their holidays plans to protect their loved ones.

see this is what pisses me off: people defending those traveling and partying during this time. i’m about to rant ya’ll.

YOU CAN BE VACCINATED, YOU CAN WEAR YOUR MASK, YOU CAN TAKE CAUTION, BUT YOU ARE STILL AT RISK OF CATCHING THIS VIRUS AND SPREADING IT TO OTHERS!

i’m not sure how many times this needs to be said to get through these thickheads, but being vaccinated and wearing your mask does NOT, N O T, make you immune to the virus. taking caution, wearing your mask, getting your booster, sanitizing, doing whatever you can to be careful does NOT mean you aren’t at risk of catching this virus. this variant is spreading like an absolute wildfire. if you actually took time to read about omicron (which is exactly what harries who are defending him need to do) you would understand the dangers of traveling and partying now. you can be vaccinated, you can wear your mask, but you can still catch this virus, and the scary part is, you can catch this virus and not feel sick, so you won’t even know if you’re actually positive which means that you’re putting others at high risk. yes, it’s different for every country. some countries are handling this variant a lot better than others. america and italy are two of the many countries that have high cases. just because you are vaccinated and wearing your mask doesn’t mean that it’s okay to travel from one Covid infected country to another, you are still at risk! just because your country is handling this situation a lot better than others still doesn’t mean that it’s okay to go out.

harry is a 20 fucking 7 year old grown man, he knows damn well what he is doing traveling and partying during this time. just because UK residents are able to travel to italy doesn’t mean that they should. just because the UK may have different rules for this virus doesn’t mean that you should still go out and party. you’re just being straight up selfish if you ignore Covid protocols and continue to go out without thinking about how your actions could affect others. you could still catch the virus, not feel any symptoms, and spread it to someone else, specifically someone who isn’t vaccinated. yes, there was a time when it was considered okay to go out and travel but NOW IS NOT THAT TIME!

and every single person who is defending him are the same mf’s who constantly go out and party, maskless. no doubt about it. that’s why they don’t have an issue because they’re just as selfish, inconsiderate, and only care about themselves.

if kendall jenner can stay home during NYE, so can harry. he’s a grown man. he knows better. he doesn’t need to “live his life” during this specific time. he doesn’t need to vacation. he doesn’t need to party. instead, what he needs to do is keep his ass home, use his platform to encourage others to do the same, and help stop the spread of this. be apart of the change, don’t be apart of the spread.

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1ddotdhq · 3 years

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💐Fri 4 Dec ‘20 🌍

Cooking competitions were fought, flower shops were opened, petitions were signed, and today was all in all a lovely, gentle sort of day!

Before last night’s Variety show, real!Harry popped back on instagram to tell Kid Harpoon that the producer award he got was “Fake News” and to “Stop the Count”. Look if Harry wants to keep showing more personality on Instagram I WANT TO SEE IT! Then Variety’s show aired, and Niall and Harry were “there”: Niall presented Lewis Capaldi’s “songwriter of the year” award (in response to it, Lewis thanked the other songwriters for “being a worse songwriter than me”), and Harry, of course, was the Hitmaker of the year! He was introduced by a lot of Big Industry People who all decided to say that they were, uh, so proud of him for leaving a boyband and becoming a rock star? Ah, good, that means it’s the “elitist music takes” segment of the hour. When are people gonna realize that shitting on a really successful, record breaking band in order to say nice things about Harry (one of its members!) is not the compliment they think it is. Nick Kroll's longer intro was at least more interesting, sharing some DWD set moments, confirmed that Harry is a ‘manly man’, and jokingly said that he and his wife and Harry have become a throuple (ANOTHER threesome? Really Harry?). Harry then showed up, looking pretty tired (he’s been doing very long hours, guys!) and wearing his dick banana necklace, and said, “Thanks to [my team] and everyone who supported me through it...thanks to the label for leaving me alone..this is...cool. Cool. I’m gonna get back in the studio”. Cool!

Anyways, that discourse was quickly overtaken by the revelation that Harry DID pay his touring crew back in the spring when his tour was postponed: it came from a local Belgian publication in Ghent, where a man named Yves Van Acker has opened a flower shop (yes I DO think that this sounds like the beginning of a fairy tale!). Anyways, Yves has toured with a number of famous bands over the years, Harry being most recent. “The entire crew was suddenly out of work,” Yves said of Love On Tour’s crew, “But Harry Styles did not want to leave us. Each member was therefore paid an amount. A nice gesture, on which I decided to do something positive with this latest income”. A few things about this 1.) it was not just a nice gesture, it’s the Right Thing to DO! He’s paying people for work he hired them to do! 2.) It's wonderful enough to see, in fact, that it really isn't actually necessary to inflate: the employee told us that he received an amount, clearly a decent amount (enough to open a business), but we do not know if he was given his full wages. It sure is amazing though! And 3.) he named bouquets of flowers after Harry songs! He has “Adore You”, “Golden”, “Canyon Moon”, and “Ever Since New York”, but not, shockingly enough, “Sunflower Vol 6” - COME ON! It’s RIGHT THERE! Anyways, I adore Harry and I want everyone to know that - he does always do his best to be kind.

Liam has a new COVER out, and one of my favorite songs: “Waiting on the World to Change” by John Mayer! The cover is for UNICEF Changemaker, and Liam says that he’s “proud to support them in any way I can”. Okay I’m a NERD so I’m about to rant about how this was the PERFECT song for Liam. The first is his RANGE: he gave the song a really gravelly, soulful sound that it deserves, and his falsettos are SO GOOD that he hits the high notes EASILY. The second are the LYRICS of the song! Literally: “It's hard to beat the system when we're standing at a distance” and “and when you trust your television, what you get is what you got; ‘cause when they own the information, they can bend it all they want”. UGH CHILLS! But that was NOT ALL for Liam, who made a guest appearance on Abby Robert’s YouTube channel in a cook off competition! They made roasted potatoes and Yule Logs (weird combo but okay), and chatted about Christmas traditions a bit. Liam said that he actually DOES do quite a bit of cooking on Christmas because he liked to watch the “tea” go down but not be a part of it (Liam do you read this blog? Was that a hint??). Anyways, he also said that he spends every Christmas with his son, because “Christmas is about kids” (Abby Roberts did a HARD eye roll it was very funny), he put out a fire (firefighter!Liam), and he dropped a boiled potato and lots of powdered sugar. Liam won for his potatoes and Abby won for the Yule Log, and *I* got really hungry. “Don’t set your kitchens on fire,” Liam warns cheerily at the end of the video. Yeahhhh, thanks for that! And now for Liam’s short but lovely content: his alarm this morning said, “It’s that Friday feeling” and then he and Roman talked about their holiday plans - Liam with his fam, Roman with his booze and Karaoke (“I’ll be doing strip that down in front of my mum”. Yeah, cuz that’s not weird at all), and they FINALLY released their bedtime story - It’s twenty minutes long and it’s called “Bedtime Bromance” (can’t wait to hear it!). He also posted an Instagram story of himself in a recording studio in Stockholm singing “Last First Kiss”. “Back to Where it All Started,” the caption read. :{)

And now for Niall and Louis, both of whom are taking up some social issues! Sam Fender (who got into a bit of hot water yesterday for, uh, a joke about Louis’ fans and our key smashing tendencies alkdjfladj) called on the UK-based “Tomlinators” (lmao no <3) to sign a petition which requires local governments to have free helplines for the homeless and vulnerable. And, of course, fans got right on that and helped Sam reach his goal! Oh, wait, no, that DIDN’T happen - instead, fans jumped down his throat for, uh, clout chasing?? And they told him that he couldn’t get away with mocking us and expect us to HELP him!! YEAH GUYS! How DARE he try to use his influence to make a difference?? Anyways, Louis was clearly super mad, you could tell by how he liked the tweet, retweeted the petition, and then said, “Very important cause. If you’re a UK resident please sign!”. As of right now, the petition sits at 10,000 out of 100,000 signatures needed, so. Let’s get it done! Niall is also going to do some community work: he will be at Comhairle Na Nog’s meeting ( it’s an Irish child and youth councils in Ireland) on Saturday giving a shout out to the kids who have been working on projects and in their community despite lockdown. Awww, best of luck to both of them in their very worthy causes.

#harry styles #liam payne #louis tomlinson #niall horan #wow #busy day no thots empty head #anyways!#song of the day!#Waiting on the World to Change by John Mayer but make it Liam's cover!!#guys it REALLY was gorgeous!!

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jenniferisacommonname · 3 years

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Bonus Level Unlocked

This week marks the release of Jason Schreier’s Press Reset, an incredibly well-researched book on catastrophic business failure in the gaming industry. Jason’s a good dude, and there’s an excerpt here if you want to check it out. Sadly, game companies going belly-up is such a common occurrence that he couldn’t possibly include them all, and one of the stories left out due to space constraints is one that I happen to be personally familiar with. So, I figured I’d tell it here.

I began working at Acclaim Studios Austin as a sound designer in January of 2000. It was a tumultuous period for the company, including a recent rebranding from their former studio name, “Iguana Entertainment,” and a related, ongoing lawsuit from the ex-founder of Iguana. There were a fair number of ghosts hanging around—the creative director’s license plate read IGUANA, which he never changed, and one of the meeting rooms held a large, empty terrarium—but the studio had actually been owned on paper by Acclaim since 1995, and I didn’t notice any conflicting loyalties. Everyone acted as if we always had been, and always would be, Acclaim employees.

Over the next few years I worked on a respectable array of triple-A titles, including Quarterback Club 2002, Turok: Evolution, and All-Star Baseball 2002 through 2005. (Should it be “All-Stars Baseball,” like attorneys general? Or perhaps a term of venery, like “a zodiac of All-Star Baseball.”) At any rate, it was a fun place to work, and a platformer of hijinks ensued.

But let’s skip to the cutscene. The truth is that none of us in the trenches suspected the end was near until it was absolutely imminent. Yes, Turok: Evolution and Vexx had underperformed, especially when stacked against the cost of development, but games flop in the retail market all the time. And, yes, Showdown: Legends of Wrestling had been hustled out the door before it was ready for reasons no one would explain, and the New York studio’s release of a BMX game featuring unlockable live-action stripper footage had been an incredibly weird marketing ploy for what should have been a straightforward racing title. (Other desperate gimmicks around this time included a £6,000 prize for UK parents who would name their baby “Turok,” an offer to pay off speeding tickets to promote Burnout 2 that quickly proved illegal, and an attempt to buy advertising space on actual tombstones for a Shadow Man sequel.)

But the baseball franchise was an annual moneymaker, and our studio had teams well into development on two major new licenses, 100 Bullets and The Red Star. Enthusiasm was on the upswing. Perhaps I should have paid closer attention when voice actors started calling me to complain that they hadn’t been paid, but at the time it seemed more like a bureaucratic failure than an actual money shortage—and frankly, it was a little naïve of them to expect net-30 in the first place. Industry standard was, like, net-90 at best. So I was told.

Then one Friday afternoon, a few department managers got word that we’d kind of maybe been skipping out on the building lease for let’s-not-admit-how-many months. By Monday morning, everyone’s key cards had been deactivated.

It's a little odd to arrive at work and find a hundred-plus people milling around outside—even odder, I suppose, if your company is not the one being evicted. Acclaim folks mostly just rolled their eyes and debated whether to cut our losses and head to lunch now, while employees of other companies would look dumbfounded and fearful before being encouraged to push their way through the crowd and demonstrate their still-valid key card to the security guard. Finally, the General Manager (hired only a few months earlier, and with a hefty relocation bonus to accommodate his houseboat) announced that we should go home for the day and await news. Several of our coworkers were veterans of the layoff process—like I said, game companies go under a lot—and one of them had already created a Yahoo group to communicate with each other on the assumption that we’d lose access to our work email. A whisper of “get on the VPN and download while you can” rippled through the crowd.

But the real shift in tone came after someone asked about a quick trip inside for personal items, and the answer was a hard, universal “no.” We may have been too busy or ignorant to glance up at any wall-writing, but the building management had not been: they were anticipating a full bankruptcy of the entire company. In that situation, all creditors have equal standing to divide up a company's assets in lengthy court battles, and most get a fraction of what they’re owed. But if the landlords had seized our office contents in lieu of rent before the bankruptcy was declared, they reasoned, then a judge might rule that they had gotten to the treasure chest first, and could lay claim to everything inside as separate from the upcoming asset liquidation.

Ultimately, their gambit failed, but the ruling took a month to settle. In the meantime, knick knacks gathered dust, delivered packages piled up, food rotted on desks, and fish tanks became graveyards. Despite raucous protest from every angle—the office pets alone generated numerous threats of animal cruelty charges—only one employee managed to get in during this time, and only under police escort. He was a British citizen on a work visa, and his paperwork happened to be sitting on his desk, due to expire. Without it, he was facing literal deportation. Fortunately, a uniformed officer took his side (or perhaps just pre-responded to what was clearly a misdemeanor assault in ovo,) and after some tense discussion, the building manager relented, on the condition that the employee touch absolutely nothing beyond the paperwork in question. The forms could go, but the photos of his children would remain.

It’s also a little odd, by the way, to arrive at the unemployment office and find every plastic chair occupied by someone you know. Even odder, I suppose, if you’re actually a former employee of Acclaim Studios Salt Lake, which had shut down only a month or two earlier, and you just uprooted your wife and kids to a whole new city on the assurance that you were one of the lucky ones who got to stay employed. Some of them hadn’t even finished unpacking.

Eventually, we were allowed to enter the old office building one at a time and box up our things under the watchful eye of a court appointee, but by then our list of grievances made the landlords’ ploy seem almost quaint by comparison (except for the animals, which remains un-fucking-forgivable.) We had learned, for example, that in the weeks prior to the bankruptcy, our primary lender had made an offer of $15 million—enough to keep us solvent through our next batch of releases, two of which had already exited playtesting and were ready to be burned and shipped. The only catch was that the head of the board, company founder Greg Fischbach, would have to step down. This was apparently too much of an insult for him to stomach, and he decided that he'd rather see everything burn to the ground. The loan was refused.

Other “way worse than we thought” details included gratuitous self-dealing to vendors owned by board members, the disappearance of expensive art from the New York offices just before closure, and the theft of our last two paychecks. For UK employees, it was even more appalling: Acclaim had, for who knows how long, been withdrawing money from UK paychecks for their government-required pension funds, but never actually putting the money into the retirement accounts. They had stolen tens of thousands of dollars directly from each worker.

Though I generally reside somewhere between mellow and complete doormat on the emotional spectrum, I did get riled enough to send out one bitter email—not to anyone in corporate, but to the creators of a popular webcomic called Penny Arcade, who, in the wake of Acclaim’s bankruptcy announcement, published a milquetoast jibe about Midway’s upcoming Area 51. I told Jerry (a.k.a. “Tycho”) that I was frankly disappointed in their lack of cruelty, and aired as much dirty laundry as I was privy to at the time.

“Surely you can find a comedic gem hidden somewhere in all of this!” I wrote. “Our inevitable mocking on PA has been a small light at the end of a very dark, very long tunnel. Please at least allow us the dignity of having a smile on our faces while we wait in line for food stamps.”

Two days later, a suitably grim comic did appear, implying the existence of a new release from Acclaim whose objective was to run your game company into the ground. In the accompanying news post, Tycho wrote:

“We couldn’t let the Acclaim bankruptcy go without comment, though we initially let it slide thinking about the ordinary gamers who lost their jobs there. They don’t have anything to do with Acclaim’s malevolent Public Relations mongrels, and it wasn’t they who hatched the Titty Bike genre either. Then, we remembered that we have absolutely zero social conscience and love to say mean things.”

Another odd experience, by the way, is digging up a 16-year-old complaint to a webcomic creator for nostalgic reference when you offer that same creator a promotional copy of the gaming memoir you just co-wrote with Sid Meier. Even odder, I suppose, to realize that the original non-Acclaim comic had been about Area 51, which you actually were hired to work on yourself soon after the Acclaim debacle.*

As is often the case in complex bankruptcies, the asset liquidation took another six years to fully stagger its way through court—but in 2010, we did, surprisingly, get the ancient paychecks we were owed, plus an extra $1,700-ish for the company’s apparent violation of the WARN Act. By then, I had two kids and a very different life, for which the money was admittedly helpful. Sadly, Acclaim’s implosion probably isn’t even the most egregious one on record. Our sins were, to my knowledge, all money-related, and at least no one was ever sexually assaulted in our office building. Again, to my knowledge. On the other hand, I’m pretty sure we remain the only historical incident of corporate pet murder. The iguana got out just in time.

*Area 51’s main character was voiced by David Duchovny, and he actually got paid—which was lucky for him, because three years later, Midway also declared bankruptcy.

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alwaysalreadyangry · 3 years

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most of the UK reviews i’ve read of martin eden have been a disappointment, tbh. i don’t know if this is because critics have been busy with cannes or because outlets here just don’t have the space, or because it’s kind of seen as old news. i have seen no real engagement with the politics or form beyond a couple of cursory lines, and it’s a shame because... i think it’s really rich wrt those elements?

so i am looking again at the (wonderful) review from film comment last year and it’s such a shame that it’s not available freely online. so i thought i’d post it here behind a cut. it’s long but worth it imo (and also engages really interestingly with marcello’s other films). it’s by phoebe chen.

COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS Jan 3, 2020 BY PHOEBE CHEN

EARLY IN JACK LONDON’S 1909 NOVEL MARTIN EDEN, there is a scattering of references to technical ephemera that the 20th century will promptly leave behind: “chromos and lithographs,” those early attempts at large-scale reproduction; “a vast camera obscura,” by then a centuries-old relic; a bullfight so fervid it’s like “gazing into a kinetoscope,” that proto-cinematic spectacle of cloistered motion. These objects now seem like archaic curios, not much more than the flotsam of culture from the moment it shifted gears to mass production. It’s a change in scale that also ensnares the novel’s title character, a hardy young sailor and autodidact-turned-writer-célèbre, famously an avatar of London’s own hollowing transmutation into a figure for mass consumption. But, lucky him—he remains eminent now on the other side of a century; chance still leaves a world of names and faces to gather dust. Easily the most arresting aspect of Pietro Marcello’s new adaptation is its spotlight on the peripheral: from start to end, London’s linear Künstlerroman is intercut with a dizzying range of archival footage, from a decaying nitrate strip of anarchist Errico Malatesta at a workers’ rally to home video–style super 16mm of kids jiving by an arcade game. In these ghostly interludes, Marcello reanimates the visual detritus of industrial production as a kind of archival unconscious.

This temporal remixing is central to Marcello’s work, mostly experimental documentaries that skew auto-ethnographic and use elusive, essayistic editing to constellate place and memory, but always with a clear eye to the present. Marcello’s first feature, Crossing the Line (2007), gathers footage of domestic migrant workers and the nocturnal trains that barrel them to jobs across the country, laying down a recurring fascination with infrastructure. By his second feature, The Mouth of the Wolf (2009), there is already the sense of an artist in riveting negotiation with the scope of his story and setting. Commissioned by a Jesuit foundation during Marcello’s yearlong residency in the port city of Genoa, the film ebbs between a city-symphonic array and a singular focus on the story of a trans sex worker and her formerly incarcerated lover, still together after 20-odd years and spells of separation. Their lives are bound up with a poetic figuration of the city’s making, from the mythic horizon of ancient travails, recalled in bluer-than-blue shots of the Ligurian Sea at dawn, to new-millennium enterprise in the docklands, filled with shipping crates and bulldozers busy with destruction.

Marcello brings a similar approach to Martin Eden, though its emphasis is inverted: it’s the individual narrative that telescopes a broader history of 20th-century Italy. In this pivotal move, Marcello and co-writer Maurizio Braucci shift London’s Oakland-set story to Naples, switching the cold expanse of the North Pacific for the Mediterranean and its well-traversed waters. The young century, too, is switched out for an indeterminate period with jumbled signifiers: initial clues point to a time just shy of World War II, though a television set in a working-class household soon suggests the late ’50s, and then a plastic helicopter figurine loosely yokes us to the ’70s. Even the score delights in anachronism, marked by a heavy synth bass that perforates the sacral reverb of a cappella and organ song, like a discotheque in a cathedral. And—why not?—’70s and ’80s Europop throwbacks lend archival sequences a further sense of epochal collapse. While Marcello worked with researcher Alessia Petitto for the film’s analog trove, much of its vintage stock is feigned by hand-tinting and distressing original 16mm footage. Sometimes a medium-change jolts with sudden incongruity, as in a cut to dockworkers filmed in black and white, their faces and hands painted in uncanny approximations of living complexions. Other transitions are so precisely matched to color and texture that they seem extensions of a dream.

Martin’s writer’s optimism is built on a faith in language as the site of communication and mutual recognition. So follows his tragedy.

Patchworked from the scraps of a long century, this composite view seems to bristle against a story of individual formation. It feels like a strange time for an artist’s coming-of-age tale adapted with such sincerity, especially when that central emphasis on becoming—and becoming a writer, no less—is upended by geopolitical and ecological hostility. At first, our young Martin strides on screen with all the endearing curiosity of an archetypal naïf, played by Luca Marinelli with a cannonballing force that still makes room for the gentler affects of embarrassment and first love. Like the novel, the film begins with a dockside rescue: early one morning, Martin saves a young aristocrat from a beating, for which he is rewarded with lunch at the family estate. On its storied grounds, Martin meets the stranger’s luminous sister, Elena Orsini (Jessica Cressy), a blonde-haloed and silk-bloused conduit for his twinned desires of knowledge and class transgression. In rooms of ornate stucco and gilded everything, the Orsinis parade their enthusiasm for education in a contrived show of open-mindedness, a familiar posture of well-meaning liberals who love to trumpet a certain model of education as global panacea. University-educated Elena can recite Baudelaire in French; Martin trips over simple conjugations in his mother tongue. “You need money to study,” he protests, after Elena prescribes him a back-to-school stint. “I’m sure that your family would not ignore such an important objective,” she insists (to an orphan, who first set sail at age 11).

Anyone who has ever been thrilled into critical pursuit by a single moment of understanding knows the first beat of this story. Bolting through book after book, Martin is fired by the ever-shifting measure of his knowledge. In these limitless stretches of facts to come, there’s the promised glow of sheer comprehension, the way it clarifies the world as it intoxicates: “All hidden things were laying their secrets bare. He was drunk with comprehension,” writes London. Marcello is just as attentive to how Martin understands, a process anchored to the past experiences of his working body. From his years of manual labor, he comes to knowledge in a distinctly embodied way, charming by being so literal. At lunch with the Orsinis, he offers a bread roll as a metaphor for education and gestures at the sauce on his plate as “poverty,” tearing off a piece of education and mopping up the remnants with relish. Later, in a letter to Elena, he recounts his adventures in literacy: “I note down new words, I turn them into my friends.” In these early moments, his expressions are as playful as they are trenchant, enlivened by newfound ways of articulating experience. His writer’s optimism is built on a faith in language as the site of communication and mutual recognition. So follows his tragedy.

One of Marcello’s major structural decisions admittedly makes for some final-act whiplash, when a cut elides the loaded years of Martin’s incremental success, stratospheric fame, and present fall into jaded torpor. By now, he is a bottle-blonde chain-smoker with his own palazzo and entourage, set to leave on a U.S. press tour even though he hasn’t written a thing in years. His ideas have been amplified to unprecedented reach by mass media, and his words circulate as abstract commodities for a vulturine audience. For all its emphasis on formation, Martin Eden is less a story of ebullient self-discovery than one of inhibiting self-consciousness. There is no real sense that Martin’s baseline character has changed, because it hasn’t. Even his now best-selling writing is the stuff of countless prior rejected manuscripts. From that first day at the Orsini estate, when his roughness sticks out to him as a fact, he learns about the gulf between a hardier self-image and the surface self that’s eyed by others.

WITH SUCH A DEEPLY INHABITED PERFORMANCE by Marinelli, it’s intuitive to read the film as a character study, but the lyrical interiority of London’s novel never feels like the point of Marcello’s adaptation. Archival clips—aged by time, or a colorist’s hand—often seem to illustrate episodes from Martin’s past, punctuating the visual specificity of individual memory: a tense encounter with his sister cuts to two children dancing with joyous frenzy; his failed grammar-school entrance exam finds its way to sepia-stained shots of a crippled, shoeless boy. These insertions are more affective echoes than literal ones, the store of a single life drawn from a pool of collective happening.

But, that catch: writing in the hopes of being read, as Martin does (as most do), means feeding some construct of a distinctive self. While the spotlight of celebrity singles out the destructive irony of Martin’s aggressive individualism, Marcello draws from Italy’s roiling history of anarchist and workerist movements to complicate the film’s political critique, taking an itinerant path through factions and waves from anarcho-communism in the early 1900s to the pro-strike years of autonomist Marxism in the late ’70s. In place of crystalline messaging is a structure that parallels Martin’s own desultory politics, traced in both film and novel through his commitment to liberal theorist Herbert Spencer. Early on, Martin has an epiphanic encounter with Spencer’s First Principles (a detail informed by London’s own discovery of the text as a teen), which lays out a systematic philosophy of natural laws, and offers evolution as a structuring principle for the universe—a “master-key,” London offers. Soon, Martin bellows diatribes shaped by Spencer’s more divisive, social Darwinist ideas of evolutionary justice, as though progress is only possible through cruel ambivalence. Late in the film, an image of a drunk and passed-out Martin cuts to yellowed footage of a young boy penciling his name—“Martin Eden”—over and over in an exercise book, a dream of becoming turned memory.

In Marcello’s previous feature, Lost and Beautiful (2015), memory is more explicitly staged as an attachment to landscape. Like Alice Rohrwacher’s Happy as Lazzaro, Lost and Beautiful plays as a pastoral elegy but lays out the bureaucratic inefficiency that hastens heritage loss through neglect. Rolling fields make occasional appearances in Martin Eden, but its Neapolitan surroundings evoke a different history. Far from the two oceans that inspired a North American tradition of maritime literature, the Mediterranean guards its own idiosyncrasies of promise and catastrophe. Of the Sea’s fraught function as a regional crossroads, Marcello has noted, in The Mouth of the Wolf, a braiding of fate and agency: “They are men who transmigrate,” the opening voiceover intones. “We don’t know their stories. We know they chose, found this place, not others.” Mare Nostrum—“Our Sea”—is the Roman epithet for the Mediterranean, a possessive projection that abides in current vernacular. Like so many cities that cup the sea, Naples is a site of immigrant crossing, a fact slyly addressed in Martin Eden with a fleeting long shot of black workers barreling hay in a field of slanted sun, and, at the end, a group of immigrants sitting on a beach at dusk. Brief, but enough to mark the changing conditions of a new century.

Not much is really new, however: not the perils of migration, nor the proselytizing individualists, nor the media circus, nor the classist distortions of taste, nor, blessedly, the kind of learning for learning’s sake that stokes and sustains an interest in the world. Toward the end of the film, there is a shot of our tired once-hero, slumped in the back seat of a car, that cuts to sepia stock of children laughing and running to reach the camera-as-car-window, as if peering through glass and time. It recalls a scene from Wim Wenders’s Wings of Desire, which leaps backward through a similar gaze, when the weary angel Cassiel looks out of a car window at the vista of ’80s Berlin and sees, instead, grainy footage of postwar streets strewn with rubble in fresh ruin. Where human perception is shackled to linearity, these wool-coated and scarfed seraphs—a materialization of Walter Benjamin’s “angel of history”—see all of time in a simultaneous sweep, as they wander Berlin with their palliative touch. Marcello’s Martin Eden mosaics a view less pointedly omniscient, but just as filled with a humanist commitment to the turning world, even as Martin slides into disillusion. All its faces plucked from history remind me of a line from a Pasolini poem: “Everything on that street / was human, and the people all clung / to it tightly.”

Phoebe Chen is a writer and graduate student living in New York.

#martin eden #film

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politicalsci · 4 years

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Jeremy Corbyn helped my dad when nobody else would

By Sophia Leonie 9th December 2019

One day, my dad asked me to drop him to the airport. I couldn’t – it was last minute and I had other plans. When I asked what the urgency was, he said that he needed to put up a headstone for his recently deceased mother and attend her memorial. He had been going back and forth to Zimbabwe for years. I wished him a safe trip and hoped the memorial went well. We expected to meet and have lunch the following Sunday.

But he never came home.

My father, Francis Mtandwa, was one of Jeremy Corbyn’s constituents. Jeremy did everything in his power to bring him back. As the mainstream media continues to slander Jeremy and lifelong Labour supporters across the UK consider voting Tory, painfully against their own interests, because they fear he’s a racist, I can only despair.

I am happy and proud to call myself British. I’m mixed race. My mum watched my grandmother, fresh from Germany, deal with the hostility of a patriotic postwar Britain. My dad, who came to London in the 1970s from Zimbabwe, wanted a good education and had high hopes for a successful career. But upon entering the UK, he soon became a victim of unimaginable racism. Not just from a hostile public, media and fascist political parties like The National Front – but from the police too. Dad told me stories of frequent stop and searches, then named SUS laws. Once my parents married and with mixed race children in tow, racist abuse intensified. It was the 80s – Zimbabwe had just gained independence from British rule and Nelson Mandela was still in prison. Things were changing and a lot of people were unhappy about it...

Upon attempting to return from his trip to Zimbabwe, my dad was denied re-entry to the UK. The government wanted 30 years of proof that he had lived and worked here. No problem, we thought, the records all exist. But there was a catch: the Home Office said they would not seek out anything pre-digital, so it was up to us to find them. Friends and family all helped where they could, trying to contact people and organisations from years ago. Then our case suffered a massive setback. My father was in a house fire in Zimbabwe. He received 75% burns and suffered a stroke. Now severely disabled and with his speech affected, we were unable to continue our efforts without his guidance.

Desperate and distraught, my mum and I met with Jeremy Corbyn at one of his local constituency surgeries. The first time we tried, we attempted the walk-in clinic. The line reached far down the street and eventually we headed home and decided to take another approach. We emailed Jeremy, explained the situation and were invited down for an appointment a few days later. He came into the old church where the meetings were held, wheeling his bike. Taking his helmet off he looked at us, smiled, and apologised for being late. We followed him into a side room and I began to explain what had happened to my father. He listened carefully, making notes and asking questions. He said he was sorry and that he would write to the government, asking them to search their archives for records.

His request was eventually granted and working with Jeremy, we were confident we would have dad home in the next few months. But before this could happen, my father suffered another stroke in Zimbabwe. He passed away.

My dad was one of the earliest victims of the Tories’ “Windrush scandal” (which extended beyond the Caribbean, to other Commonwealth countries). Before it had a name, media coverage and national outrage, Jeremy cared. After my father passed, we immediately received a heartfelt letter from him sending his condolences and showing his support for our family at this tragic time.

I’m not saying vote Labour because Jeremy was nice to me and tried to help my family when nobody else would. I’m not saying vote Labour because my story is just one of many. I’m saying vote Labour because Jeremy is one of the only people in a position of possible real power, that truly, honestly cares about the vulnerable, the exiled, the poor and the disfranchised ahead of his own interests.

Which other politician has spent a year volunteering in Jamaica? Which other politician would happily be arrested fighting anti-racist regimes like apartheid? And again in 1987 when the Tory government called the ANC terrorists? At the Battle of Wood Green on 23 April1977, the National Front planned a march through Turnpike Lane, North London, to celebrate Hitler’s birthday. Jeremy, then a Labour councillor for Haringey, helped to organise a powerful counter-protest, involving approximately 3-4,000 people, who successfully stopped the Nazis from marching through the busy multicultural high street that Saturday afternoon.

Labour’s leader has also forged other long-standing relationships with constituents, which he goes out of his way to maintain. My aunty Katrin, who also lives in Islington, told me of how he would often pop round and visit her and her husband. “The last time he came we chatted in the hallway for ages and before he left he said: ‘Is there anything I can do for you?’ – I looked at the four bikes in my cramped hallway and said ‘A bike shed would be nice!’ A few months later, guess what? A bike shed appeared by the flats.”

Another Islington resident, Tina, told me of how, in the mid-2000s, she and other local residents went down to Islington Town Hall in an attempt to save their local community centre from closure and Jeremy was there. He sat next to her and as they chatted, he mentioned that he had just returned from East Timor (an island nation near Indonesia) earlier that day and had to be at the BBC at 7am, but wouldn’t have missed this. That is the real Jeremy Corbyn.

The relentless, constant media slander of Jeremy really tries to make people forget this – but we must not. With people like Rachel Riley literally trying to erase his history of anti-racist activism, the history of Jeremy’s passion for human rights, his kindness and absolute love for people of all races and backgrounds will always be firmly cemented in the minds of us in Islington North.

The mainstream media are throwing everything they have at Jeremy right now, shamelessly weaponising what little they have in bad faith because, if in power, Jeremy will challenge the right wing press, and they know it. So if you’re a Labour supporter with a zero-tolerance for racism and have been confused recently about whether Jeremy’s politics align with your own – don’t be. Look at his record. Jeremy has spent his entire life fighting against racism.

For the rest of us trying to navigate post-Brexit racist Britain, with debt, insecure living arrangements, trying to get on the housing ladder, juggling zero-hour contracts, the Labour party offers an alternative to capitalist struggle. If you look beyond the smear campaign, the media bias, and the non-polished suit, you’ll see a man who is disliked because he is simply unwilling to look and behave like other politicians. A man who cares about substance rather than surface. A man who, just as he helped me, can help you too.

[x]

#politics #jeremy corbyn #uk politics #jc4pm #tories out #labour party #the left #media bias #windrush #racism #tories #conservative party #british politics #britpol

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drawlfoy · 5 years

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The Wonders of Ohio P.1

masterlist request guidelines okay i keep saying i’m on a hiatus and i literally start like 7 series kill me now

pairing: draco x muggle!reader

request: requested from my 14 year old brain...and her wattpad account...

summary: american high school senior y/n is roped into hosting a british exchange student, and something doesn’t seem quite right.

a/n: i wanted to do some country other than mine but it wouldn’t make sense for him to be sent to a UK family (wayy too close) and also i don’t want to assume things about a culture i am not a part of. so. yeah. sorry for this being such an ameri-centric blog, i’d like to change that but for now this is my guilty pleasure self-insert fic, along with all my fellow muggle high school seniors out here.

warnings: language. intense americanness. god i hate america

tags!!! i love you all so dearly wtf @accio-rogers @eltanin-malfoy @geeksareunique

music recs: orinoco flow from enya ( i know it’s a meme shhh it fits the scene i have of draco entering the us so well)

word count: 2,174

also: i’ll be writing the entirety of this from y/n’s point of view...i’m giving draco a rest

“So...his parents are worried about his safety in England?” Y/N shifted in her car seat, wincing as the hot leather scorched her bare arms.

“They weren’t entirely clear on it,” her mother said. She had just pushed the key into the ignition, and hot air was blasting out of the AC at an uncomfortable rate. “I’m sure you read the news about the poor people who were going missing over there...and he seems to be from a well-off family who can afford this kind of venture...”

“Did you ever tell me his name?”

“Draco Malfoy.”

Y/N nearly spat out the sip of water she had just taken, spinning around to stare at his mom. “Draco? What kind of name is that?”

“Sweetheart, be nice now,” she reprimanded, giving her a stern look. “It seems as though this family has been through a lot. I remember them mentioning something about being political targets.”

“That’s funny. I don’t remember reading anything about the Malfoy family in BBC or anything.” Y/N frowned and set her water bottle in the cup holder, turning away to watch the scenery of her state pass by.

“Perhaps it’s confidential,” her mother said. “It’s best that we don’t pressure him too much. It’s just our job to make him comfortable for a year, that’s all.”

“That’s all? You want me to give up my senior year to make some random rich boy comfortable?”

“Y/N,” her mother warned. “You’ll be civil. I know it’s strange, but I can assure you that he’ll find his own group of friends after the first week or so of school. He’ll be like a brother.”

“I can only try.” Y/N glanced up at the clock in the car, noticing that it was already 10 past 4. “Aren’t we a bit late? I thought that the program said that they wanted us at the pick-up point at 4.”

“Did they?” Mrs. Y/L/N seemed hardly concerned. “I don’t think that it’ll matter. This is an exchange program after all, you remember how they were last year in the summer. The bus didn’t even show up with all the kids until half past the hour. Speaking of which, did you happen to bring the sign?”

“How could I have made a sign with his name on it if I didn’t know what it was, Mom?”

Her mother swore under her breath, her eyes darting around the car. “You’re right. I completely forgot to tell you, you know, with the PTA meeting and everything last night...”

“Yeah, yeah,” Y/N mumbled. “It was a real rager.”

“Do we have any paper in here?” Mrs. Y/L/N began opening the glove department and sorting through it.

“Mom! I’ll do it! Keep your eyes on the road, please!” Pushing her mother’s hands away, she began going through it. There was nothing but a crumpled napkin, a “Wonders of Ohio” pamphlet, and a slightly dried EXPO dry-erase marker.

“Yeah, we have some,” Y/N muttered, uncapping the EXPO marker and writing the words “Welcome Draco!” on the unfolded tour pamphlet.

“Oh, Y/N, that’s the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen.”

“Maybe if the PTA bake sale meeting wasn’t so crazy, we’d be in a different situation right now.” Y/N broke into a fit of laughter, leading her mother to do the same. “I swear. He’s not gonna want to come home with us. I think he’d probably take being a political target over going home with rednecks like us.”

“You’re bad, Y/N.”

Their conversation was cut short as they arrived in a school parking lot that Y/N had been in many times to pick up exchange students for the summer. Today, it was a bit different. The crispier fall air had turned the leaves orange and red, each color illuminated brightly by the sun, which was now hitting the earth at a sharper angle.

And, most curious of all, there was only one car in the parking lot.

“See, I told you that they wouldn’t be here yet,” her mother said, motioning to the empty lot.

“But...aren’t there usually coordinators? And other parents?”

Something was beginning to feel...off.

“Well...I suppose so,” she said, pushing her glasses up on the bridge of her nose. “Yes, I guess this is a bit unusual.”

Their confusion only grew as they pulled into the closest parking space to the front. No one was there to greet them, which was very odd. Normally there were some adults who organized the exchange program set up a refreshments table and supplied sign building equipment in the case that you had forgotten...but today, things were different.

“Maybe year-long exchanges are just different?” Y/N suggested as they both stepped out of the car and made their way to the waiting area.

“I don’t see why they would be,” Mrs. Y/L/N said, frowning. “However, I think that this is being done by a third party program. Shannon told me that while our usual program was helping, a different one was doing most of the diplomatic and visa work.”

The two waited for about two minutes in silence. Y/N had folded and unfolded her “Welcome Draco” sign probably around 6 times before a pop rang out, loud enough to startle her.

“What was that?” she yelped, turning to see her mother just as concerned.

“I don’t know, doll. Maybe someone is having...car troubles?”

Y/N knew that that wasn’t true, but she didn’t push it. Instead, she was more focused on the two two tall figures walking towards them on the street. One had a certified dad body, tall with a broad chest that was only accentuated by a strange button-up with flamingos on it (and a sports jacket?). The man’s hair was what stood out most of all: a shock of carrot orange hair, nearly identical to the turning leaves around him. A very strange tri-cornered Revolutionary style hat was perched on top of his head.

His companion was taller but wiry, clad in long dark green cloak that flowed in the wind. As they got closer, Y/N realized how ridiculous the guy looked. His hair was a startling white blonde, but he had the face of someone around her age.

“Hello!”

The older man stopped halfway through the parking lot, waving and grinning at Y/N and her mother. They both waved back, trading glances of amusement.

“Hi?” Y/N raised her voice. “Do you need help?”

The man’s face split even further into a grin. “Are you the Y/L/N family?” His voice had turned into a yell to battle the sound of a car alarm that had sounded just a few streets over.

“What was that? You need to come closer,” Mrs. Y/L/N yelled back, motioning for them to approach. The man sent the blonde boy a pleased look, almost as if to say “see? That wasn’t too hard”. They began walking, but the carrot haired man seemed especially fascinated with the other car that was parked by them. He froze in the lot, staring at the white Subaru, mesmerized as the brake lights turned on and the car began to ease back--right in their direction.

“Oh my god...he’s gonna get hit, Mom!” They shared a concerned look before they both cupped their hands to their mouths.

“Sir, you need to move! That car’s going to hit you!”

They watched in horror as the Subaru slowly eased out of the parking lot, getting within a foot of the man before the blonde boy yanked him out of the way. Y/N could’ve sworn she heard the man say “Marvelous! Just fascinating!”.

“Jesus Christ, Mom, do you think they’re methheads or something?” Y/N made sure to drop her voice to a hushed whisper, worriedly turning towards her. “Should we get in the car and go? What if they’re going to kill us?”

“You’re too overdramatic,” Mrs. Y/L/N reprimanded...but Y/N could see how she was turning her car keys over and over in her hands. “If they come close and making strange advances, then we run, okay?”

“Sounds good,” Y/N said, her voice weak as the two men stepped up onto the curb and began to get within earshot.

“Are you the Y/L/N family?” the man asked. His British accent shocked Y/N, and suddenly it all made sense.

“Yes, that’s us,” her mother said.

Now that they were closer, Y/N got a good look at the boy in the green cloak. His features were sharply aristocratic, with a nose that looked like it belonged on a statue out of the Renaissance. She felt him looking her over with the same amount of intensity and immediately crumpled up her Wonders of Ohio pamphlet, shoving it into her pocket.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” the man said. “I’m Arthur Weasley. This is Draco Malfoy.”

The boy’s scowl only deepened once Mr. Weasley nudged him forward with his elbow. “Say hello, Draco,” he muttered under his breath, his eyes carrying a degree of desperation.

“Hello.” His voice was cold and uninterested, just like the weight of his gaze.

“I’m Y/N,” she offered, throwing on a forced smile. “And this is my mother, Y/N Y/L/N.”

“You can call me whatever you’d like, Y/N, even Mom if that’s what you prefer,” Mrs. L/N said. Draco visibly winced at that.

“Mrs. L/N is fine with me.”

Y/N cringed at the painful amount of awkwardness. “Where’s your stuff, Draco?”

Before he could answer, Mr. Weasley jumped in, unfolding a piece of paper and reading it verbatim. “Mr. Malfoy’s luggage is having some trouble getting through cus...customs? Customs. His items will arrive at your place of residence shortly.”

“Did you try to sneak a musket in here to win back the US for the British crown or something?” Y/N couldn’t help but let a snicker slip through. Mr. Weasley seemed to pick up that she’d attempted to make a joke and bellowed a laugh while Draco simply stared her down.

“No.”

“This is going to be so much fun,” her mother exclaimed, clapping her hands together. “If there’s nothing more to do, we can go ahead and head home. I’m sure you want to rest, Draco.”

Y/N noticed that he flinched every time his name was uttered, and this time was no exception.

Silence ensued until Mr. Weasley decided to break it. “Sounds like a splendid plan. Feel free to owl--contact me if you need anything, or if Mr. Malfoy here misbehaves in...” He paused to send a glare to Draco, “...any way. The Ministry can’t thank you enough for your help.”

With that, he turned and walked around the corner of the building in the opposite way he came, leaving Draco to stand awkwardly in front of them. Despite his expensive appearance and haughty attitude, it was clear that he didn’t know what to do with his right hand as he kept tucking and untucking it from his pocket.

“Didn’t you guys come from a different direction?” Mrs. Y/L/N puzzled, staring back in the direction they came. A loud pop rang out once more.

“That’s very odd,” Y/N commented. She could tell that Draco was frozen up, his left hand curled up into a fist. “No matter. Let’s get you home. I call shotgun.”

“Y/N, no, he gets shotgun,” her mother corrected, walking towards their car. Draco trailed behind them with a very confused expression on his face.

‘Fine, fine,” she moaned, flinging open the backseat. Once they had settled in--she had noticed that Draco took a fair bit of time to buckle his seat-belt--Y/N leaned forward over the console to look at him. “Do they not have cars in England or something?”

“Y/N!”

Y/N ignored her mother’s shocked comment and looked at him expectantly.

“You could say that,” he muttered, refusing to make eye contact with her and choosing to look out the window at the passing trees instead.

“You have a very cool accent,” Y/N pushed, moving over to sit in the middle. “What part of the UK are you from? I’ve never been able to match an accent to a region.”

Draco shrugged. “You wouldn’t know the place.”

“Try me.”

“Y/N, leave the boy alone,” her mother interrupted, moving her hand to push her back from the console. “He’s had a long day of traveling and he’s tired.”

“What time was your flight this morning?”

“Y/N!”

“I’m sorry,” she said, only partly meaning it. “I’ll stop. I’m really doing wonders for the loud American stereotype, huh?”

He made a sound that seemed like he agreed and rested his head on the window. From her vantage point, she could see that there were no dark roots in his hair, meaning that his color had to either be completely natural or just dyed. She mentally made a note to ask him about that later. While she couldn’t believe it, it seemed like his hair had to be natural: the strands looked so silky from where she was, with no frizz and a light gleam to it.

She flopped back into her seat, casting her eyes up to the sky.

This was going to be a long year.

final a/n: i’m so bad at managing my time...oh my god....please help...also i promise there’ll be more of this. i promise i literally love this story and also i’m not from ohio so if i get something very wrong about ohio then i’m very sorry to all my ohioan readers <333333

#draco x reader #draco #draco malfoy #draco imagine #draco malfoy imagine #draco malfoy x reader #draco x oc #draco malfoy x oc #draco x y/n #draco malfoy x y/n #harry potter #harry potter imagine #draco lucius malfoy #tom felton im so sorry

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hymnstoalienstars · 4 years

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HP&WCh: “Maybe it’s Harry who calls Tom Peter Pan”

So I was looking what to work on and the first on the list is HP&WCh tomarry thing and I thought I need to figure out some details.

I don’t live in UK, hence googling.

Full-time education is compulsory for all children aged 5 to 18, either at school or otherwise, with a child beginning primary education during the school year they turn 5. Children between the ages of 3 and 5 are entitled to 600 hours per year of optional, state-funded, pre-school education.

I know I said Harry was seven but maybe not, I was basing it on my country’s ed system which starts at 7.

Petunia wouldn’t want neighbours to think smth improper, so she would probably want to dump Harry to primary at five. And tell them all how difficult a child he is.

And I’m thinking he “runs away” - disappears into his Neverland - before starting school, so it would be used by Dursleys later as an example of difficult behavior.

Maybe use a fanon bit of Harry being used to be called “Freak” and not knowing his name at the age of five.

And now that I said Neverland... I want to make Tom Riddle a sort of Peter Pan?

To be honest, his ability to fly, “angelic” looks. He could play Peter Pan. For Harry.

In Peter and Wendy, it is explained that Peter must forget his own adventures and what he learns about the world in order to stay childlike.

Maybe it’s Harry who calls Tom Peter Pan. Because Tom can fly. Because Tom forgets forgets forgets so hard he is from an orphanage in the world without magic, where it’s all grey and dusty and cold, and food doesn’t grow on rainbows, and you don’t wake up to a world-saving missions.

Barrie states that although Neverland appears different to every child, the island "wakes up" when Peter returns from his trip to London.

It could be that The World called Tom to itself because he had magic. That the world needed magic to be healthy if the word can even be applied to such an entity.

In the chapter "The Mermaids' Lagoon" in the book Peter and Wendy, Barrie writes that there is almost nothing that Peter cannot do. He is a skilled swordsman, rivalling even Captain Hook, whose hand he cut off in a duel. He has remarkably keen vision and hearing. He is skilled in mimicry, copying the voice of Hook and the ticking of the clock in the crocodile.

Peter has the ability to imagine things into existence and he is able to feel danger when it is near.

Do I need to reread the books about Peter Pan?..

I just love the concept of PeterPan!Tom. (Not literally, but parallels and details, in childhood, the concept that he could be. Could pretend. Could play.)

Of Tom being able to fly thinking happy thoughts: "lovely wonderful thoughts". Of Tom reading Peter Pan and being sure he could do it. Without fairy dust, or maybe he even tried to find some?

Four years old, he tried and felt he levitated an inch from the ground. Tom needed to be higher, just raising into the air was too hard, he didn’t have enough happy thoughts - no wonder, he was left in this place since his mother died, other children avoided him, he rarely got new books to read. He climbed onto the roof of an orphanage and jumped. And can you imagine what he felt that day when he was able to fly?

Speaking of the abilities in the previous quote, I think Tom would have been able to do some of it. And his magic would flourish in the environment he could wield it in without constraints. Tom would use his magic every day just to survive, to fight for his world - and win.

Peter Pan was like a Young Demigod of the island, as far as I remember. If Tom get to feel that, no wonder he would get addicted to that level of power, felt he deserved it. It’s rather fitting, in a dark sad way, that he became a Dark Lord, with intentions of being as close to a god as he could get.

In the original play, Peter states that no one must ever touch him (though he does not know why).

could use it? at some point?

Pan, a minor deity of Greek mythology who plays pipes to nymphs and is part human and part goat

It is hinted that Wendy may have romantic feelings for Peter, but unrequited because of his inability to love.

👀 are you seeing what i am seeing?

In Barrie's novel Peter and Wendy (but not the original play Peter Pan), it is stated that Peter "thins them out" when they start to grow up. This is never fully explained, but it is implied that he either kills them or banishes them.

Oh my fucking god.

And now I need to google the dates for films. And books.

Peter Darling by Austin Chant (2017), a romance between an adult Peter Pan (who is a transgender man born as "Wendy") and Captain Hook.[31] Winner of the 2017 Rainbow Award for best cover and best transgender science fiction/fantasy.[32] (c) Wiki, List of works based on Peter Pan

HOLY SHIT

Okay, back to the list. (copied from W)

1904 – Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up (play): Peter brings Wendy and her brothers to Neverland, where he has a showdown with his nemesis, Captain Hook. After the play was first staged in 1904, Barrie continued to make changes until the script was published officially in 1928.[1] This play was later adapted as a novel by Barrie.

1906 – Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens: an origin story where the infant Peter flies away from his home, takes up residence in Kensington Gardens and makes friends with the fairies. The story first appeared as a chapter in Barrie's The Little White Bird published in 1902.

1908 – When Wendy Grew Up – An Afterthought, a short sequel play first staged in 1908, but only published in book form in 1957.

1911 – Peter and Wendy (novel), later published as Peter Pan and Wendy, adapted as a novel from the play, it also incorporates events from When Wendy Grew Up – An Afterthought.

1928 - Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, the first publication of the script of the play.

Walt Disney's Peter Pan (released on 5 February 1953), an authorised animated adaptation. Disney licensed the film rights to the story in 1939 from Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children. It featured music by Sammy Cahn, Frank Churchill, Sammy Fain, and Ted Sears. 15-year-old film actor Bobby Driscoll supplied the voice of Peter. This version contained little of the original dialogue from the play or its novelisation.

In the early 1930s, Edward Mason Eggleston painted a series of images for calendars that included Peter Pan, Indian princesses and pirates.

To the question of how Harry would know about Peter Pan, I think that The Very Proper daughter of the nearby family was obsessed with Peter Pan and jumped at the thought of introducing a new person to the book and film and everything. Someone she haven’t infodumped yet to!

Then, of course, she was forbidden to talk to him by her parents because of the things Dursleys told them.

#tomarry take on wayward children #w ch #harry potter ff #fanfiction #tomarry #wayward children #i'll copy peter pan things into a different post #outloud worldbuilding

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lhaewiel · 3 years

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2, 3, 11 and 25 for the language learner asks, please❤️

Hello!

2. Can your friends and family members speak a language you can’t speak ? Would you like to learn it ?

Yes, several people in my family can speak German and Spanish, which I cannot speak at all - I can understand to a certain degree, but speaking them? Nah.

3. What is the first foreign language you’ve ever (tried) to learn ?

In Italy we start learning English when we are little, about 6-7 years old, so English would be my first foreign language, followed closely by French. I used to listen to MTV, when it was still good, because a lot of the programs, like charts, were presented in English, plus my Elementary English teacher used to teach us English in a very playful way, so it stuck more.

11. Have you ever been on a school exchange ? Where ? What language(s) did you speak ? Was it a good experience ?

I have never been in one. The first would have been in my 3rd year of high school to Ireland, but I never went because mine was the only year this exchange was cancelled. I had the chance to go 1 month or 2 months in Japan when I was at uni as aupair, but mate, let me tell you the costs, which were and still are a lot, especially because in that period my mum got really sick and my dad lost his job, so yeah. I stillwant to go to Japan though.

25. Have you ever studied/worked/lived abroad ? Where ? Was it a good experience ?

I have been working and living in the UK for the past 7 years. Now I can say that it is good, but I can say that because up until November 2019 I had to fight tooth and nail for a single inch of respect and acknowledgement.

The thing is, the UK is still a very racist country, in general. Of course ou find open-minded people and good friends and good workplaces, but there is a lot of racism going on. It is worse if you are a POC, but I have been disregarded in conversations just because I had an accent. I have been treated as a stupid person because I am not British. I have gone to group interviews and I would know IMMEDIATELY that I would not be considered because I am not blonde with blue eyes and definitely not British. People, especially at the beginning, took advantage of me, because I did not know all the rules that would usually apply - and that includes payroll rights, working hours and salary.

When Brexit was passed in 2017 my British colleagues treated me and the other 2 poor Estonian girls like literal doormats, until the manager had to request a formal apology from them and had to take the 2 girls and me on side and reassure us that we would not be stripped from our beds at night and shipped back to our countries in a van - because that is fucking illegal, first of, second we are paying citizens with a residence.

It took me several house movings and several job changes - and whilst I am now ok, I am helping my husband fight these fights, because he is still getting the brunt of all of this for the simple reason that his English grammar is not an A+. And the accent.

For some reason here they really hate accents.

On this I have been told in previous roles that I had to “reduce my accent” and “sound as British as possible”.

I have had customers asking me if I was able to speak English or I was not applying myself enough and get angry at me just because I was not British, hence I was “inferior”.

Like, I got this, but my friends and colleagues who are POC get even worse than this just because their skin is not white, if my experience already sounds really bad, for them it is worse.

And let’s say that UK is very good at erasing one’s cultural background just for the sake of conforming everyone.

I have several colleagues who are Italians born in the UK and they do not speak and/or understand a single word in Italian. I am honestly scared of this.

So yeah, in conclusion, whilst some things were very positive, a lot of them were and still are quite negative.

#Anonymous

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qraydeavister · 4 years

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parc central residences condo

Since the dramatic events of 9/11, Bollywood cinema has shown an unusual interest in the terrorist film genre, especially as regards to international terrorism and global tensions between Islam and the West. Striking examples of this genre include Kabir Khan's New York (2008), Karan Johar's My Name is Khan (2010), Rensil D'Silva's Kurbaan (2009) and Apoorva Lakhia's Mission Istanbul, to name a few. Films like Anil Sharma's Ab Tumhare Hawale Watam Sathiyo (2004) and Subhash Ghai's Black and White (2008) focus on terrorist issues within the Indian subcontinent itself. The latter films have continued in the tradition of pre 9/11 terrorist films like Vidhu Vinod Chopra's Mission Kashmir (2000), Mani Ratnam's Dil Se (1998) and Bombay (1995). Ratnam's Bombay dealt with the devastating Hindu and Moslem riots in 1991, which cost over a 1000 lives. Chopra's Mission Kashmir dealt with a scenario of local terrorist activity in the Kashmir region sponsored by international terrorist cells working from Afghanistan. In this way the terrorist genre is not an entirely new genre in Bollywood, nor is terrorism an unfamiliar phenomenon in the day to day activities of the Indian subcontinent (the most recent and brutal terrorist attack was the Mumbai massacre in 2008). What makes the recent spate of terrorist films interesting is that they have entered the global sphere and have become part and parcel of a transnational dialogue between East and West and Islam and the other.

To make the terrorist genre more palatable, Bollywood has traditionally spiced up the violence and suspense with the hallmark Bollywood song and dance interludes and sentimental romantic parc central residence tampines exchanges between the hero and heroine. Mission Kashmir is notorious for its graceful dances and stirring emotional exchanges between the main protagonists, played out on the violent backdrop of terrorism in Kashmir. Mani Ratnam's Bombay likewise mixes up the most brutal scenes of Hindu and Moslem hatred and violence with delicious comedy and a forbidden love affair between a pious Moslem girl and a boy from a highly placed Shaivite Hindu family. His father is the trustee of the village temple and both the family patriarchs are violently opposed to the children marrying outside their caste and religious community.

Karan Johar's My Name is Khan

Following in the Bollywood tradition of mixing genres (known in the industry as the masala or spicy recipe film), Karan Johar's My Name is Khan blends comedy and romance with the political hot potato of post 9/11 bigotry and racial hatred in the US. The film's theme of ultra-nationalist extremism culminates in the senseless killing of a young Indian boy Sam or Sameer, who is beaten to death by youths in the football ground, in part due to the adopting of his stepfather's name Khan. Overflowing gushes of emotion and heart stirring romantic songs, such as the mixing of the 1960's counter culture anthem "We Shall Overcome" (sung in both Hindi and English), occur throughout the film to both lighten the tension and to exemplify the presence of light and hope in a world darkened by the bitter shadow of global terrorism. The fact that the central protagonist Rizvan Khan is a pious Moslem, and politically neutral to the hysteria of the debate, is significant. Brought up by his mother that there are no fixed labels such as Hindu and Moslem, but only good and bad people, Rizvan Khan freely practises his religion with equal love and respect for all other races and creeds, only differentiating between what is in the hearts and minds of people, not to what religion they profess, or to what race, culture and nationality they belong.

My Name is Khan is also significant for Bollywood fans in that it reunites the biggest heart throb couple of Hindi cinema from previous decades, Kajol and Shah Rukh Khan. The duo was previously paired in two of Karan Johar's earlier blockbusters Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (1995) and Kabhi Kushi Kabhie Gham (2001). Both of these films were sentimental gushy romances, literally overflowing with juicy outpourings of emotion and feeling; a phenomenon which is termed rasa in India. The song and dance sequences were also very elaborately staged and combined a balance of the traditional Indian music and dance forms (Hindustani music and traditional folk dances) as well as modern Western forms. This ensured the films' immense popularity in both India and diaspora countries like Canada, the US and the UK.

Karan Johar continues to utilise the Bollywood masala formula in My Name is Khan, exploiting a sentimental and occasionally drawn out love affair between the autistic hero Rizvan Khan and his eventual Hindu wife Mandira, a proprietor of a successful hair dressing salon in San Francisco (the "city of love" which symbolizes the 1960s counter culture movement exploited by Johar in the "We Shall Overcome" sequence). In the preliminary scenes of the film, America is portrayed as the land of freedom and opportunity, the nation where all races and religions are given the possibility to move forward and achieve prosperity and happiness in a way that is seen to be almost impossible in a country like traditional India, buffeted as it is with caste and religious prejudices and between half and two thirds of its population living in poverty.

For foreign nationals or NRI's (non-resident Indians), however, 9/11 radically changes this formula and shatters the American dream nurtured for decades by an Indian diaspora which has merged its Indian cultural roots with American ideals of individual freedom and consumer prosperity. According to Johar's film, this is now the plight of the Khans who, instead of continuing to act as fully integrated members of the mainstream community, now suddenly find themselves on the periphery of a post-9/11"us and them" rhetoric, fuelled by an ultra-nationalist Republican President, who perceives the world in black and white realities, which have little to do with the everyday lives of the average individual. It is no coincidence that it is the newly elected President Barack Obama (played by his look alike Christopher B. Duncan) who greets Rizvan Khan at the end of the movie and applauds him for his faith in God and his humanity and perseverance. For Karan Johar, Obama's election is symbolic of the "us and them" divisions in the US psyche being brought to a close along with the restoration of the innate ideals for which the American Republic and its people stand.

Before the nation's divisions are healed, however, the Khan's experience extreme personal hardships due to their ethnicity. These hardships culminate in the tragic death of their teenage son Sameer, beaten to death in the school playing field by racist youths. In her grief, Sameer's mother Mandira blames her husband Rizvan, accusing him of the fact that if she and her son had not taken the name of Khan, he would not be dead. She then tells him that the only way he can atone for this stigma of being a Khan and, by implication a Moslem, is to meet the US President (at the time it is George W. Bush) and to tell him that: "My Name is Khan and I am not a Terrorist." This simple phrase becomes a kind of mantra throughout the film, powerfully confronting the viewer's post-9/11 prejudices by refusing to link the two concepts of Islam and terrorism together: i.e. my name is Khan, therefore I am a Moslem, but at the same time just because I am a Moslem, does this mean that I am a terrorist? Unhappily, during the hysteria that followed in the wake of 9/11 for many Westerners the two terms, Moslem and terrorist became pretty much synonymous.

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justsomeantifas · 6 years

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If nearly a decade interviewing the wealth managers for the 1% taught me anything, it is that the ultra-rich and the ultra-poor have a lot more in common than stereotypes might lead you to believe.

In conversation, wealth managers kept coming back to the flamboyant vices of their clients. It was quite unexpected, in the course of discussing tax avoidance, to hear professional service providers say things like:

“I’ve told my colleagues: ‘If I ever become like some of our clients, shoot me.’ Because they are really immoral people – too much time on their hands, and all the money means they have no limits. I was actually told by one client not to bring my wife on a trip to Monaco unless I wanted to see her get hit on by 10 guys. The local sport, he said, was picking up other men’s wives.”

The clients of this Geneva-based wealth manager also “believe that they are descended from the pharaohs, and that they were destined to inherit the earth”.

If a poor person voiced such beliefs, he or she might well be institutionalized; for those who work with the wealthy, however, such “eccentricities” are all in a day’s work. Indeed, an underappreciated irony of accelerating economic inequality has been the way it has exposed behaviors among the ultra-rich that mirror the supposed “pathologies” of the ultra-poor.

In fact, one of the London-based wealth managers I interviewed said that a willingness to accept with equanimity behavior that would be considered outrageous in others was an informal job requirement. Clients, he said, specifically chose wealth managers not just on technical competence, but on their ability to remain unscandalized by the private lives of the ultra-rich: “They [the clients] have to pick someone they want to know everything about them: about Mother’s lesbian affairs, Brother’s drug addiction, the spurned lovers bursting into the room.” Many of these clients are not employed and live off family largesse, but no one calls them lazy.

As Lane and Harburg put it in the libretto of the musical Finian’s Rainbow:

When a rich man doesn’t want to work

He’s a bon vivant, yes, he’s a bon vivant

But when a poor man doesn’t want to work

He’s a loafer, he’s a lounger

He’s a lazy good for nothing, he’s a jerk

When the wealthy are revealed to be drug addicts, philanderers, or work-shy, the response is – at most – a frisson of tabloid-level curiosity, followed by a collective shrug.

Behaviors indulged in the rich are not just condemned in the poor, but used as a justification to punish them, denying them access to resources that keep them alive, such as healthcare and food assistance. Discussion of poverty has become almost impossible without moral outrage directed at lazy “welfare queens”, “crackheads” and other drug addicts, and the “promiscuous poor” (a phrase that has cropped up again and again in discussions of public benefits over more than a century).

These disparate perceptions aren’t just evidence of hypocrisy; they are literally a matter of life and death. In the US, the widespread belief that the poor are simply lazy has led many states to impose work requirements on aid recipients –even those who have been medically classified as disabled. Limiting aid programs in this way has been shown to shorten recipients’ lives: rather than the intended consequence of pushing recipients into paid employment, the restrictions have simply left them without access to medical care or a sufficient food supply. Thus, in one of the richest counties in America, a boy living in poverty died of a toothache; there were no protests, and nothing changed.

Meanwhile, the “billionaire” in the White House starts his days at 11am – the rest of the morning is coyly termed “executive time” – and is known for his frequent holidays. “Nice work if you can get it,” quipped an opinion piece in the Washington Post.

We don’t hear much about laziness, drug addiction or promiscuity among the wealthiest members of society because – unlike Trump – most billionaires are not public figures and go to great lengths to seek privacy. Thus the motto of one London-based wealth management firm: “I want to be invisible.” This company, like many other service providers to the ultra-rich, specializes in preserving secrecy for clients. The wealthy people I studied not only had wealth managers but often dedicated staff members who killed negative stories about them in the media and kept their names off the Forbes “rich list”.

Many even present themselves as homeless – for tax purposes – despite owning multiple residences. For the ultra-rich, having no fixed residence provides major legal and financial advantages; this is exemplified by the case of the wealthy businessman who acquired eight different nationalities in order to avoid taxes on his fortune, and by the UK native I interviewed in his Dubai apartment building:

“I am not tax resident anywhere. The tax man says ‘show me a utility bill’, and the only utility bill I can present is for the house I own in Thailand, and it’s in a language that the European authorities aren’t familiar with. With all the mobility going on in the world, international marriages, governments can’t keep up with people.”

Meanwhile, the poor can end up being “resident nowhere” because no one will allow them to stay in one place for very long; as the sociologist Cristobal Young has shown, the majority of migrants are poor people. In addition, the poor are routinely evicted from housing on the slightest pretext, frequently driving them into homeless shelters – which are in turn forced to move when local homeowners engage in nimby (not in my back yard) protests. Even the design of public spaces is increasingly organized to deny the poor a place to alight, however temporarily.

It is as if the right to move around, to take up space, and to direct your own life as you see fit have become luxury goods, available to those who can pay instead of being human rights. For the rich, deviance from social norms is nearly consequence-free, to the point where outright criminality is tolerated: witness the collective shrug that greeted revelations of massive intergenerational tax fraud in the Trump family.

For the poor, however, even the most minor deviance from others’ expectations – like buying ice cream or soft drinks with food stamps – results in stigmatization, limits on their autonomy, and deprivation of basic human needs. This makes life far more nasty, brutish and short for those on the lowest rungs of the socio-economic ladder, creating a chasm of more than 20 years in life expectancy between rich and poor. This appears to some as a fully justified consequence of “personal responsibility” – the poor deserve to die because of their moral failings.

So while the behavior of the ultra-rich gets an ever-widening scope of social leeway, the lives of the poor are foreshortened in every sense. Once upon a time, they were urged to eat cake; now the cake earns them a public scolding.

#capitalism #poverty #child death #classism #class warfare #drugs mention #health care #neoliberalism #violence #income inequality #links

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aion-rsa · 4 years

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Upcoming Movies in October 2020: Theaters, Streaming and VOD

https://ift.tt/3lducG3

October looks a lot different than it did only a few weeks ago. As the month many movie theater owners were hanging their hats on with the hope of a weekly deluge of new movies , October has recently been vacated by high profile features that include Wonder Woman 1984, Death on the Nile, and Candyman.

Yet if you’re a cinephile or movie lover who is desperate for new stories and visions, it is not all doom and gloom. Between the streaming market of Netflix, VOD, and other platforms, as well as some smaller films willing to roll the dice on a limited theatrical release, there are still more than a few things to see in October 2020…

2067

October 2 (U.S. Only)

A high-concept science fiction setup if we’ve ever heard one, 2067 is the story of Ethan Whyte (Kodi Smit-McPhee), a young man born in a dystopian future where he learns that he might be the savior of humanity… at least that’s what people from an even more distant future are saying. In a plot twist that sounds, at least on paper, akin to a reversal of The Terminator, messengers from the future say Ethan is the key to saving the world and wish to transport him via time machine to an unknowable destiny. Chaos ensues. It’s a big idea, but we’re always game for someone swinging big in this genre.

Death of Me

October 2 (November 23 in the UK)

Darren Lynn Boseman, director of Saw II through Saw IV, returns to the horror genre again alongside Nikita’s Maggie Q and Westworld’s Luke Hemsworth. In this VOD release, the pair play a vacationing couple who wake up on an island with a horrible hangover. Yet a video on their phones seems to suggest the night before was even worse: Neil (Hemsworth) spent the evening brutally murdering his wife, as per the screen in their pockets. Nevertheless, here they are now, left with a lot of questions of what happened yesterday… and what can happen today.

Black Box

October 6

The first of Amazon Prime and Blumhouse Productions’ “Welcome to the Blumhouse” series, Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour’s Black Box has a tantalizing premise. Nolan (Mamoudou Athie) survived a car accident that took his wife, but it also took large swaths of his memory of her. So in order to regain his memory, and regain a sense of stability for his young daughter, Nolan undergoes an experimental treatment where his psychologist uses hypnosis to thrust him into his subconscious where he’ll be able remember his past and face his personal demons. Literally.

Like something out of Christopher Nolan’s Inception, this horror movie shows how scary being trapped in dreams really is if all that’s in them is the stuff of nightmares…

The Lie

October 6

The second Amazon/Blumhouse feature is more of a psychological thriller than a straightforward horror movie. Originally premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2018, The Lie follows a father (Peter Sarsgaard) who discovers his daughter Kayla (Joey King) accidentally killed her friend… until she admits she may have actually murdered her.

How far will he go to cover-up his daughter’s sins? Well, that’s the logline, and it seems to be a gripping one, albeit reviews from TIFF were less than kind two years ago.

Hubie Halloween

October 7

Last year Adam Sandler warned the Academy that if he doesn’t win an Oscar for Uncut Gems he’d make a film so bad that it’d make “you all pay.” Well, he wasn’t even nominated and eight months after the ceremony, here we are with Netflix’s Hubie Halloween. It remains to be seen whether this is actually the bad one—for starters it filmed before Oscar nominations went out—but it is still very much a Happy Madison production, complete with major supporting roles for Kevin James and Rob Schneider.

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In the movie, Sandler plays Hubie Dubois, the town loser of Salem, Massachusetts. A lonely fry cook obsessed with Halloween, Hubie spends all year looking forward to decking out his home and town the same way Clark Griswold anticipates Christmas. But on this particular Halloween, the town appears besieged by actual supernatural forces, and finally Hubie will have his time to shine. Eh, it looks more amusing than The Do-Over and The Ridiculous 6?

Books of Blood

October 7 (U.S. Only)

Who doesn’t love anthological horror? Hulu certainly does, as they’re releasing Books of Blood, the latest adaptation of Clive Barker’s multi-volume series of short stories by the same name. Previous tales from Books of Blood have been adapted into movies as beloved as Candyman and as decidedly not as Rawhide Rex. In this film version, three stories are created for the screen by co-writer and director Brannon Braga. Here’s hoping it lands closer to the former?

Saint Maud

October 9 (UK Only)

The UK will be the first to get A24’s only horror movie this year. Lucky. The feature directorial debut of Rose Glass, Saint Maud follows an unhealthily repressed and zealous young woman: Maud (Morfydd Clark). Maud is technically a caretaker by trade, looking after people in hospice. But she also imagines herself to be something of an apostle, sent to save godless folks from their sins, particularly Amanda (Jennifer Ehle), the woman she’s living with as the in-home nurse.

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It’s already a tense situation, even before Maud starts hearing voices and having images of ecstasy and Heaven, and demons and Hell. Rich with atmosphere and grueling anticipation of something horrible happening, Saint Maud is a great debut for Glass and a potential star-maker for Clark, who is skin-crawlingly pious as Maud, the young woman who’s wound up tighter than a jack-in-the-box.

The Wolf of Snow Hollow

October 9 (U.S. Only)

Debuting in theaters and on VOD, The Wolf of Snow Hollow is Jim Cummings’ follow-up to Thunder Road. That earlier, underrated movie was a delightful mix of comedy and drama that won the SXSW Grand Jury Prize. So the sophomore effort being a werewolf comedy-horror movie is intriguing. Indeed, Wolf of Snow Hollow is the rare lycanthrope yarn that’s told from the point-of-view of the would-be wolf hunter, Sheriff John Marshall (Cummings).

Following a series of grisly murders every full moon, the residents of Snow Hollow become convinced they have a wolfman on their hands, even if the frustrated sheriff refuses to accept the obvious. The film also marks the final performance of Robert Forster as John’s crusty mentor.

The War with Grandpa

October 9 in the U.S. (October 16 in the UK)

For most people, having Robert De Niro as a grandfather can be an imposing experience. But kids these days! That’s at least one amusing takeaway from The War with Grandpa, the delayed family movie that sees De Niro’s grandfatherly Ed enter into a prank war with his grandson Peter (Oakes Fegley) after upsetting the youth by moving into his old bedroom—Peter’s mom and Ed’s daughter Sally (Uma Thurman) forced them into the arrangement.

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Soon shaving cream reveals itself to be foam sealant stuck to De Niro’s face, and Peter’s oral report announces he is a louse. Oh, and there’s a dodgeball battle in which De Niro is aided by a squad of screen legends like Christopher Walken, Cheech Marin, and Jane Seymour, to squash the pups. Now things are getting serious…

Nocturne

October 13

The first of Amazon and Blumhouse’s next batch of original movies, Nocturne is the tale of a hellish rivalry between sisters. Genuinely. The feature debut from director Zu Quirke stars Sydney Sweeney as Juliet, the younger sister of fellow musician Vivian (Madison Iseman). While both young women are gifted pianists, Vivian is a prodigy and the center of Juliet’s envy. That is until Juliet finds the diary of another child prodigy at their prestigious conservatory who killed herself. The book includes all the late pianist’s hidden compositions… and symbols and incantations.

Ever heard the story of Faust? It seems like Juliet is about to get an up-close modern example.

Evil Eye

October 13

As the final Blumhouse effort to be released on Amazon Prime in 2020, Evil Eye hails from directors Elan and Rajeev Dassani and presents itself as both a psychological thriller and supernatural chiller. The truth of which it really is depends on how much you believe the eye of Usha (Sarita Choudhury).

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For this mother of Pallavi (GLOW’s Sunita Mani) is convinced her daughter is necking with a new boyfriend (Omar Maskati) who’s the spirit of an evil abusive ex Usha escaped in her youth. Is he the vestiges of a half-remembered curse or the potential victim of a mommy dearest prone to snap judgements? Tune in to find out for yourself…

The Trial of the Chicago 7

October 16

“The whole world is watching.” That’s the chanted refrain of protestors in Aaron Sorkin’s second movie as director, but it might also apply to the level of anticipation regarding this major Netflix release and potential awards season darling. The movie itself is an old-fashioned legal thriller like Sorkin cut his teeth on with scripts like A Few Good Men, but Chicago 7 feels urgently (and depressingly) vital.

Following on the heels of the Chicago riots during the Democratic National Convention of 1968—riots later deemed to have been started by the police—eight men categorized as “the far left” are rounded up for a show trial by Nixon’s Justice Department where they’re charged with conspiracy.

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The film features the same blistering abundance of dialogue Sorkin has become famous for, as well as his penchant for breezy fast-paced editing. But the political heft of the subject matter and the movie’s deep bench of an acting ensemble that includes Sacha Baron Cohen, Jeremy Strong, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Eddie Redmayne, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Mark Rylance, and Frank Langella is what makes this one of the most thrilling movies of the year.

Honest Thief

October 16 (U.S. Only)

Liam Neeson plays a thief who wants a second chance. A bank robber willing to turn himself and $9 million in to be with the new love of his life. But then crooked FBI agents (Jai Courtney and Anthony Ramos) steal his money and frame him for murder instead. So he’s left with one thing to do: menacingly hiss over the phone, “I’m coming for you.” We imagine that trailer-ready threat was what Honest Thief was sold on during its elevator pitch.

Rebecca

October 21

Remaking Alfred Hitchcock remains a tricky proposition that has thwarted many filmmakers in the past. Readapting the only one of his movies to win the Oscar for Best Picture, Rebecca, appears all the harder. Yet everything we’ve seen from Ben Wheatley and Netflix’s luscious adaptation of the Daphne Du Maurier novel is highly encouraging.

With a winning cast that includes Lily James as the new Mrs. de Winter, Armie Hammer as her husband Maxim, and Kristin Scott Thomas as his menacing housekeeper Mrs. Danvers, the film opens with the young bride trying to step into the shoes of Maxim’s dead first wife, Rebecca. An apparent light of his mansion that has been long snuffed, Rebecca’s flame burns still if only because of Mrs. Danvers’ admiration for her late mistress… and maybe the ghost who prowls the house. This is archetypal Gothic horror, and with screenwriter Jane Goldman apparently keeping the novel’s original ending, we already feel seduced by the imagery.

On the Rocks

October 2 in the UK (October 23 in the U.S.)

Sofia Coppola and Bill Murray work together again. For the first time since their luminous Lost in Translation (if you ignore the ill-considered A Very Murray Christmas), the director and star are collaborating on this visibly intimate tale. It’s about an adult daughter (Rashida Jones) and her famous father (Murray) spending a weekend in New York City on an adventure after years of estrangement.

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The film, which also stars Marlon Wayans, premiered to a largely warm reception at the New York Film Festival and is already being written about as a spiritual successor to their original collaboration. Once more a woman in the midst of an existential crisis is aided by Murray between glasses of scotch. Who doesn’t want to pull up a seat and order another round?

Over the Moon

October 23

You probably don’t know Glen Keane’s name but you should. The longtime Walt Disney Animation Studios animator oversaw the design and animation of Ariel in The Little Mermaid, Beast in Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin in Aladdin, and Rapunzel in Tangled. With Over the Moon, he steps away from the Mouse and toward Netflix as a first-time co-director, alongside John Kahrs (an animator on Tangled and Frozen).

The trailer for the film is like a Georges Méliès fever dream from as a little girl named Fei Fei (Cathy Ang) builds a rocket ship to take her to the moon. But once there, Fei Fei and friends meet a mythical moon goddess (Hamilton’s Phillipa Soo) who takes them on a candy-colored odyssey through the cosmos.

Synchronic

October 23 (U.S. only)

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Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead are two of the most intriguing new voices in science fiction. If you don’t recognize their names, go watch The Endless right now. One of the strangest and cleverest sci-fi yarns of the last decade, that film is now being followed up by Synchronic, another original tale that stars Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan. The specifics of the film remain vague other than it is about two New Orleans paramedics who investigate a series of murders caused by a new, bizarre designer drug. But we already know we can’t wait to watch what horrible side effects come from these poor bastards taking it.

The Craft: Legacy

It cannot be Halloween without at least one more horror movie coming out the week of. Thus enters The Craft: Legacy, Sony Pictures and Blumhouse Productions’ legacy sequel to the original 1996 The Craft. Like its predecessor, this follows an outsider who is the new girl in school (Cailee Spaeny). She may be ostracized by the popular kids, but she befriends fellow students who have alternative tastes… like witchcraft.

The original is a touchstone for millennials and Gen-Xers of a certain age, and this reboot looks to push the story into a more complex understanding of friendship. And if it doesn’t, it’s still a Blumhouse effort so it should have plenty of spooky jumps!

Relic

October 30 (US Only)

Dementia is at the heart of this very eerie chiller where three generations of women convene in an old family home which seems to be rotting from the inside. Robyn Nevin, Emily Mortimer and Bella Heathcote star in a slow build drama which delves into the horror of losing your sense of self, as Nevin’s matriarch goes missing for days and can’t remember what happened while her house is filled with odd notes, black mould and snippets of a life slipping away from her grasp. This is the feature debut of Australian-Japanese director Natalie Erika James and it��s a stylish, chilling and confident first feature with a final act that veers into full blown horror. Out already in the States on VOD it has a UK theatrical release in the UK.

The post Upcoming Movies in October 2020: Theaters, Streaming and VOD appeared first on Den of Geek.

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