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vancampemily · 3 years

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EMILY VANCAMP IS TV'S ULTIMATE SUPERHERO

With ‘The Falcon and the Winter Soldier,’ the actress adds another sure-to-be smash to her resume.

Emily VanCamp never expected to be a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. “I came into the process very late in the game — I don’t think anyone thought of me,” she recalls of her first audition for Captain America: The Winter Soldier, back in early 2013. “To me, it was a long shot and I didn’t think it was going to happen. Then I got the call that they wanted to move forward with me, and I was just delighted.”

It’s been eight years, and 14 Marvel movies, since. On Friday, the actress will reprise her role as Sharon Carter for the third time in the new Disney+ series, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Marvel’s second foray into streaming series, following this year’s smash hit Wandavision. The show will be Carter’s first appearance in the MCU since 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, and picks up where we last found the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent: on the run.

Speaking over the phone a few days before the show’s premiere, VanCamp says that she first got the pitch for the show back in 2019. “The answer is always yes,” she says. “[With MCU], you’re not sitting around holding your breath, because there are so many moving parts, especially with streaming now. You never know where they want to slot you in to these big stories and ideas. It’s always fun when you do get the call.”

“It’s bananas,” she continues. “It’s like the gift that keeps on giving. These characters are so much fun, and everyone involved is incredible. You feel like you’re a part of this big ol’ family.” As a veteran of the franchise, VanCamp is well-versed in the act of talking about her latest project without talking too much about her latest project. Here’s what she can share for now: “This time around we get to see another side of her, and that made it even more interesting,” she says. “Sam and Bucky are characters that are really loved in the universe but never got that much screen time, so exploring their relationship and dynamic is really nice to watch.”

While her co-stars Sebastian Stan and Anthony Mackie may have had the advantage of playing their characters more recently than 2016, by transitioning to TV, VanCamp had something of a home court advantage; starring in hit TV shows is something of her speciality, having played the lead in everything from the cult classic teen drama Everwood to ABC prime time hits Brothers & Sisters and Revenge.

VanCamp’s reign as TV’s MVP is still going strong; while shooting The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, she was simultaneously filming her medical drama The Resident, both of which shot in Atlanta. “There were nights that I would shoot nights on Winter Soldier and go straight into The Resident,” she recalls. “It was a challenge, to say the least, but it was worth it and one of those times where you hang on tight and hope that you can deliver.” What’s more, COVID-19 delayed both productions, only intensifying shooting schedules, as well as the pressure to do right by the medical professionals she was portraying on The Resident. “I’ve always had an insane amount of respect for medical workers,” she says. “Playing a character in that field, you see how much goes into it and how many sacrifices are made. You add in a pandemic and you realize these are our real-life heroes. It made it that much more of an honor to portray one of them.”

In the days leading up to The Falcon and the Winter Soldier’s premiere, her schedule was no less hectic: throughout the week, she was filming The Resident, and come the weekend, had the ten year reunion of Revenge to shoot. That much she was still wrapping her head around. “When they said ten years, I was like, ‘That’s not possible.’ I actually cannot believe it,” she says. “It goes to show that people really like what we did with those characters and those stories. That was a really special time. It’s delightful when people still remember work you did years ago.”

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#emily vancamp #the falcon and the winter soldier #the resident #revenge #interview #*

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daleisgreat · 3 years

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The Avengers: Endgame

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Over the last couple months I finally upgraded to somewhat modern TV and gaming rigs in the form of a 55” Samsung 4KTV and Xbox Series X. I own three 4K UHD discs, but one I already covered a couple years back with my entry of the BluRay version that came bundled with the 4K disc of Die Hard. The other is a two pack of the first two John Wick films, and rest assured those will get their day in the sun here eventually. From my research, the Xbox Series X is not a top shelf 4K BluRay player, at least not at the system’s launch before presumable system software updates, but also sounds like a fairly better quality version of the drive that came in the Xbox One X|S, and also supports upscaling of regular BluRays to 4K. Coincidentally, on top of my movie backlog pile was a movie I absolutely wanted to take advantage of that 4K upscaling and thus here we are with today’s write-up for 2019’s The Avengers: Endgame (trailer). WARNING: Unlike nearly most of my other movie recaps I will be diving into serious spoiler territory ahead. The amount of hype leading up to Endgame was insurmountable. Anthony and Joseph Russo did an astounding job directing the first part in 2018’s Infinity War (read my entry for it here). Both that and Endgame top the three hour mark to squeeze in as many characters, references, periphery side plots and so much more from the previous 21 Marvel Cinematic Universe films that lead up to this finale. By accomplishing just that, both movies are the breeziest three hour viewings I have experienced because the Russo brothers do a commendable job at keeping the scenes flowing and doing their best to give everyone their proper time to shine. The ending of Infinity War saw Thanos (Josh Brolin) deliver the snap heard around the world that vanished half of all life in the entire universe. It was a soul-crushing downer of a cliffhanger to end on, but the post-credits tag hinting at the cry of help for Captain Marvel (Brie Larson) left crowds with a glimmer of hope. This being based around comic books there is the unwritten rule where no one truly stays dead either, so part of the experience going into Endgame was to see how the remaining Avengers plan to bring everybody back. Endgame kicks off with the fresh effects of ‘the snap’ when it starts with Hawkeye’s family all getting dusted from him in the middle of a picnic.

The film transitions to the remaining un-dusted Avengers squad of Nebula (Karen Gillan) and Iron Man (Robert Downer Jr.) floating aimlessly in space until the convenient deus ex machina that is Captain Marvel miraculously tracks them down and hauls them back to Earth. A few weeks Avengers HQ tracks down Thanos on an isolated planet and with Captain Marvel’s power, they anticlimactically kill him off in a brief scene. This was one of the parts of the film that did not sit well with me after building up Thanos as this unrivaled threat in all the previous films, and to have the Avengers cold-bloodedly put him down in quick order seems so……unlike them, but he did off half the universe so I understand how the Russo’s felt justified for filming it that way, but I cannot help that it did not come across right, and could have been handled better. Of course, a more proper Thanos battle would be coming later in the final act thanks to my pet peeve plot device that is…. …TIME TRAVEL!!!! This and alternate dimension traveling I despise and have turned me off to many shows over the years like Lost and CW’s DC shows. The worst of it is indeed present here because meaningful character deaths that happened in Infinity War to Loki (Tom Hiddleston) and Gamura (Karen Gillan) become undone and their sacrifices proved for naught. All that griping aside however, I will give the Russo brothers credit because even with those qualms I feel they pull off time travel and have it appear as more than a convenient storytelling method. Again, major props because that is a hell of a hurdle to overcome. The filmmakers go out of their way in a couple scenes to directly call out Back to the Future’s style of time travel bullshit, and have a couple characters ever-so-carefully explain in detail and for the laymen how “real” time travel works.

This is all thanks to a rambunctious rat who inadvertently zaps Ant Man (Paul Rudd) out of the Quantum Realm…after being trapped there five years due to his team being on the end of a dusting before bringing him back. Ant Man deduces upon his return that he is able to undo the dusting through his van-quantum-realm-contraption, and convinces the Avengers to conjure up a plan they cleverly dub the “Time Heist” to travel back to capture all the Infinity Gems Stones before Thanos does. I loved how these scenes played out, and there is a plethora of fan service throughout it as the three squads of Avengers jump to different periods like the final battle of the original Avengers film, and a 1970 military base where Howard Stark (John Slattery) unknowingly meets his son. Plans do not proceed swimmingly to say the least, and past timeline Thanos becomes clued in to their plan and thwarts the Avengers attempt at trying to undo the past in a CG showpiece for the ages with his assault on Avengers HQ. The CG fireworks continue to dazzle for the bulk of the final hour of the film with a climatic showdown between Thanos and his forces against The Avengers and the returning of the dusted Marvel characters. I have seen too many comic book films fail at translating over-the-top comic book action on the silver screen, but the Russo brothers always manage to pull it off. I fondly remember the theater crowd going gaga when Captain America (Chris Evans) summons Mjolnir and wallops Thanos with it. The women of Marvel have another moment to shine together where they collectively team up to kick ass. Moments of levity are brilliantly peppered in throughout the chaos for a much-needed chuckle from the nonstop adrenaline-boosting action. That final battle masterfully builds up to the dramatic sacrifice of Iron Man in the standout emotional scene of the film.

The resulting aftermath was heartwarmingly done here with a pre-recorded farewell from Iron Man, and a collage of nearly all the major and minor MCU characters at Iron Man’s funeral. I believe this is the first MCU film without a post-credits tag, and that is 100% fine by me, because the beginning of the credits is a lovingly crafted tribute to the original Avengers cast done in the fashion of the Original Series cast of Star Trek VI that resonated with me feeling the end of a pivotal era of the MCU that I have been largely enjoying since the original 2008 Iron Man. I usually do not dive into this much detail and spoilers when recapping the movies here, but due to this being the final chapter of this era of the MCU films I could not help myself, and believe me there is so much more I wanted to dive in here on because like I said, the Russo brothers crammed in an incredible amount of narrative into three hours. There is so much ground in here it is impossible for me to recap it all, and that it will in all likelihood be the fastest three hour movie you will ever endure. I did not get a chance to even touch on over-the-hill Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and the hybrid Bruce Banner/Hulk (Mark Ruffalo (spoiler: they both killed it!)). Endgame unsurprisingly did major bank at the box office, so I feel safe knowing most of you reading this already watched it by now which is another reason I went all out on the spoilers.

I re-watched the film for this entry a second time with commentary from the Russo brothers, and writers Christopher Markus & Stephen McFeely, and that greatly helped explain some little tidbits that were easy to miss and/or not fully comprehend in the midst of the three hours. I know this is a little detail, but I want to give props to Marvel for being one of the few companies out there for shelling out resources to caption the commentary track! I exponentially appreciate it more than you know! The commentary helped with understanding why they did not do a lot for Black Widow’s (Scarlett Johansson) aftermath of her death because she has her prequel film set to release. Other notable takeaways from the commentary was how Stark’s “I am Iron Man” line was a last minute addition to the film, giving credit to Star Trek VI as inspiration for their credits sequence, being hopeful for Marvel capitalizing on Falcon donning Cap’s shield and lots of understandable love for the visual effects team for their hard work. Aside from the commentary track, the BluRay has a second disc with just under an hour of bonus material. There is the requisite short, but top-of-the-line gag reel that is standard in most Marvel Studios home videos. There are five minutes of deleted scenes worth a look, with some of them lightheartedly covering up plot holes. Remembering Stan Lee is a touching tribute to Stan, filled with archived interviews from him on his experiences in the cameos, and showing plenty of delightful off-camera interactions with the cast and crew. There are well done character profile pieces for Thor, Black Widow, Captain America and Iron Man, with each one having countless cast and crew state proper kudos to what the actors have done for those characters over the years. If you only have time for one then I recommend Man Out of Time: Creating Captain America, because it goes into a little more detail than the others and Chris Evans has some intriguing introspection from his years with the character. Finally, there are short, but worthwhile pieces on the Russo brothers and the women of the MCU that should not be skipped out on either.

As I mentioned above, the hype building up to Endgame was insurmountable, but Joseph and Anthony Russo overcame the odds and delivered a gratifying conclusion to this era of the MCU. Watching the BluRay upscaled in 4K on a TV about a third bigger than my previous set made it a grander experience too for those showpiece moments. Sure I had quibbles and nitpicks I mentioned above, but by and large those are easily overcome by how much the Russo brothers got it right with this film. I am kicking myself for waiting a year and a half to re-watch it, but picked up on a lot of little things that went right over mine and Drax’s heads the first time out. If you have yet to give The Avengers: Endgame another viewing, then do not hesitate because you will not regret once again taking in this landmark epic that delivered against all odds! Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs 3 12 Angry Men (1957) 12 Rounds 3: Lockdown 21 Jump Street The Accountant Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie Atari: Game Over The Avengers: Age of Ultron The Avengers: Infinity War Batman: The Dark Knight Rises Batman: The Killing Joke Batman: Mask of the Phantasm Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice Bounty Hunters Cabin in the Woods Captain America: Civil War Captain America: The First Avenger Captain America: The Winter Soldier Christmas Eve The Clapper Clash of the Titans (1981) Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special The Condemned 2 Countdown Creed I & II Deck the Halls Detroit Rock City Die Hard Dredd The Eliminators The Equalizer Dirty Work Faster Fast and Furious I-VIII Field of Dreams Fight Club The Fighter For Love of the Game Good Will Hunting Gravity Grunt: The Wrestling Movie Guardians of the Galaxy Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 Hell Comes to Frogtown Hercules: Reborn Hitman I Like to Hurt People Indiana Jones 1-4 Ink The Interrogation Interstellar Jay and Silent Bob Reboot Jobs Joy Ride 1-3 Last Action Hero Major League Man of Steel Man on the Moon Man vs Snake Marine 3-6 Merry Friggin Christmas Metallica: Some Kind of Monster Mortal Kombat Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpions Revenge National Treasure National Treasure: Book of Secrets Nintendo Quest Not for Resale Payback (Director’s Cut) Pulp Fiction The Punisher (1989) The Ref The Replacements Reservoir Dogs Rocky I-VIII Running Films Part 1 Running Films Part 2 San Andreas ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery Scott Pilgrim vs the World The Secret Life of Walter Mitty Shoot em Up Slacker Skyscraper Small Town Santa Steve Jobs Source Code Star Trek I-XIII Sully Take Me Home Tonight TMNT The Tooth Fairy 1 & 2 UHF Veronica Mars Vision Quest The War Wild The Wizard Wonder Woman The Wrestler (2008) X-Men: Apocalypse X-Men: Days of Future Past

#random movie #marvel #avengers #avengers endgame #joseph russo #anthony russo #chris evans #Robert Downey Jr #mark ruffalo #Scarlett Johansson #jeremy renner #chris hemsworth #josh brolin

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katsukikitten · 5 years

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Smile

A/N This is not the spooky story I wanted to post but uh I have a problem. I cannot stop writing about angry boi

You slide back three feet or so after taking a direct hit from the perpetrator that you're in pursuit if.

"Fucking idiot remember what the briefing said?!" Katsuki yells over one of his blasts as he counters the villains advancing attack. Deterring him from your panting, severely bruised form.

"Yea yea." You hiss, still pissed that you were paid with such an unbearable hot head. All he does is shout and fuss about how you're "in the way" or "slowing him down".

His scarlet eyes forever glued to you no matter the circumstance, whether it be a meeting at the agency or a fucking mission you can feel the burning intensity of his gaze.

Even now as you watch the battle commence his eyes are on you, barely focused on the task at hand but since the ash blonde is both the number one here and almost two years your senior he is quite skilled at multitasking.

For a man that is.

You scoff at his arrogance as his eyes narrow on you. He sends a small blast your way to redirect thrown knives aimed for your precious cheeks.

"Get your head out of your ass!" He yells, landing hard on his feet. His eyes finally move from you and advanced toward a blue flame with unmatched fury. You huff, struggling to collect yourself as one of your broken ulnas heals itself.

Durability was your quirk and quite honestly you hated it. All it did was make you a good candidate for close combat or melee, meaning you had to get up close and personal. You had broken more bones than you dare to count in your first month of hero work although you were thankful they coul heal themselves. But that was pretty much it, maybe it made you a little more thick skinned but apparently not where it counts as every time a certain husky voice is aimed at you it cuts deeper than any knife.

Cuts harder too.

You had seen past his arrogance at once point, seen his burning, often misguided compassion on TV. In the way he would blush ever so softly when asked certain questions.

You might even say he and Deku were the main reasons you even decided to become a hero.

The reason you were so fucking elated to be accepted into Ground Zero's agency.

Yet here you are, back to square one of hating the ash blonde's guts. He did not keep his scarlet hawk eyes on any of the other newbies. Hell he barely looked their way. He did not scold them as he did you and he sure as hell didn't make them do extra training with him as, that's right, as he did you. So why *was* this pro hero giving you such a hard time?

The answer comes in the form of a surprise fist that breaks your nose with a sickening *crunch*. Katuski whips his head back just in time to watch a harder than concrete sucker punch kiss your delicate face. He grits his teeth as you return the punch faster than you recieved it.

"Damn her..." He growls as he pins the dark haired man to the ground, affixing his burned wrists behind his back, pulling harshly in the black zip ties until they bite into skin. He tosses the perp harshly against the wall before making his way towards you.

Anger fueling your unsated violence as every hit connects to a hard jaw line. Your stamina is high and you know that any bone, no matter how strong, can and will break after a certain amount force is applied.

Sometimes the action just needs to be repeated a few times and after the tenth hit you feel his jaw shatter beneath your knuckles causing a satisfying smirk to settle upon your kissable lips.

"Y/LN!" Katsuki shouts, ever watching eyes fixated on the blood dripping from your nose and lips.

First your eyes narrow in annoyance before they widen with fear. You react without think as you make your way towards the hot headed pro hero.

There is something one must know about Bakugou Katsuki and that is he has a two secret weaknesses.

One he will never admit to, surely her brash actions will not make him admit now.

And two, believe it or not he has a blind spot too.

One that a particular mask donning villain took advantage of as he simply places his fingers on the ground. The Eath splinters beneath his touch, rumbling with deafing cracks as the tar reshapes rapidly and violently. Sweat drips down your spine, strong hand out reached for your hero idol once upon a time. You fear you will not make it in time until you feel the sweet feeling of smooth skin beneath your finger tips. You grip harshly, harsh enough that bruises bloom beneath your fingers as you reposition your body in front of his earning a searing sharp pain to shoot through your body, starting at your abdomen before the pain is so intense it begins to feel numb.

Thick red liquid splatters onto Katsuki's paling face, you blink slowly, wondering where the sticky substance is coming from despite it dripping from your lips. Still you attempt to shove him from danger. But he will allow no such thing as his fingers grip tightly onto your slowly numbing arms, steadying you to him as his free hand sets off a series of explosions, rendering the spell useless as the tar no longer directly touches the masked perpetrator.

He encircles you with muscled arms as you both tumble to the earth before he lands with a harsh thud and *snap* of his shoulder.

The snap goes unnoticed by him as he looks at your quickly fading form.

"Damn it." His breathing hitches as his temper rises, "Fucking damn it Y/N."

Your eye lids are lead as you struggle to open them, with each prolonged blink a memory flashes before your dulling eyes.

Seeing Katsuki, someone with a hot temper like you, doing well as a hero.

Meeting most of the former class 1A and making friends and hero connections quickly.

Of the laughs shared, the joy spread as you grew into a formidable hero.

Rising to the ranks of number four through hard work pushed beyond your limits by someone you now sadly resent.

Lastly your mind blurs the images of him looking down on you between a memory and the present.

You see him fighting a smile after a long and unexpected night spent together, he is propped on his side on one arm. Joy bubbles in your stomach erupting in a giggle as you reach out to him.

*"I just wanna see your smile Suki. That's all I want."* And you mean it, well meant it.

Maybe even still mean it considering you really aren't sure how you two ended up here in a few short months. Was it the long stressful hero hours?

The pushing, pulling on one another to encourage the other to grow only for it to sour into muddy resentment?

You reach up to him now, hand shaking although you do not notice. Nor do you notice your vision tunneling in as your hearing begins to fade.

"Suki..." You say so softly that he struggles to hear you over the sounds of battle. His eyes widen as he looks down at you. Something tepid falls onto your cheeks, you spot the source using the last of your energy to wipe away the fat droplets from angry eyes.

"I just want to see you smile, Suki." But he does not. Cannot, as your arm falls slack across your red gaping wound. The last of his joy dying with your final words.

#bakugo x reader #bakugou x reader #katsuki bakugou x reader #bakugo katsuki #katsuki bakugo #bakugou katsuki #katsuki bakugou #katsuki bakugo x reader #katsuki bakugo imagine #bnha kacchan #bnha katsuki #bnha #bnha bakugou #bnha fanfiction #bnha reader #bnha reader insert

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alarawriting · 4 years

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Sleepless

I have strong opinions about Nancy Kress’ Beggars series. They are not positive opinions.

There was an experiment, to create children who would not need to sleep.

Some people think such an experiment would create supermen, geniuses who would, for some reason, be unaging. Logic says otherwise. Sleep performs a function.

If you were such a child who does not need to sleep, what would you be?

You do not sleep.

You do not dream, and lacking dreams, you lack superstition. You don’t believe things just because you’re told them or because there seems to be some correlation; you need cold hard evidence.

This does not make you a brilliant inventor or a hard-nosed business person. What it makes you is a victim of analysis paralysis. Without hard facts to back you up, you can’t guess what might be true. When there’s a controversy and there’s evidence on both sides, you don’t know what to believe. You don’t accept things as true just because your parents say them, so you’re lucky to be alive after all the times you burned yourself on a hot stove or stuck a fork in an electric socket or jumped off a building because you wanted to confirm that what people had told you would happen actually would.

You’re good at debunking. You’re brilliant at finding bugs in code. You can find the flaws in a scientific study, and your merciless lens turns on academic and corporate research alike. But you can’t make anything. You don’t believe in anything you can’t prove, so fiction falls flat for you – it’s unreal – and you’re not terribly empathic, because human emotions from other humans who aren’t you is a thing you can never empirically prove. You aren’t creative – you can’t come up with inventions, you can’t innovate a brilliant new coding algorithm or prove a mathematical theorem no one has ever done before. You’re just very, very good at finding the flaws in other people’s creative products.

The autistic community embraces you as one of their own, though technically you are not autistic; you are something else. Your parents, wealthy captains of industry, are disappointed; they expected you to use your extra time in a way they would appreciate. They didn’t expect someone rigid, unyielding, someone who would demand proof of everything and whose analyses could easily disprove all the lies they used to convince themselves they were good and deserving people. You end up becoming a socialist because all the evidence suggests that, of the many ways humans can organize the distribution of resources, it’s the one with the best track record of causing less misery than the alternatives. You mock people who confuse socialism and communism. You are not above trading on your parents’ names and money to have a public voice, and you’ve become famous for your ability to debunk bad science.

You will not revolutionize the world, but you have a third more time than other people and you were born with money (the experiment that created you was quite expensive). You contribute to the betterment of humanity, in your way.

After the first generation of your kind are created, there are no more; wealthy capitalist parents do not want socialist children who can only tear down flawed structures built by others and cannot build anything themselves. Your own children, for those of you who have them, may or may not share your mutation. Eventually your condition is classified as a disorder, after your parents’ wealth has mostly run out late into your lifetime and the world has forgotten they respected you once. Humanity goes back to ignoring you and listening to superstition and tribal beliefs… because the ability to derive a pattern from a very small amount of data is the root of both superstition and innovation, and innovation turns out to be too important to give up superstition.

You do not sleep. But sleep performs the important function of re-organizing the memories acquired during the day and correlating them with each other, prioritizing some and storing others away in cold storage or even deleting them. This function was too important to do without, so your brain was re-engineered to do it while you are awake.

This means you’re dreaming, in a way, all the time, while you’re wide awake. It makes you very creative, but very unfocused. Some of your cohort actively hallucinate, but you can all generally tell the difference between the dream-things you see or hear or feel and reality; it’s just that the dream-things are vivid enough to capture your attention, most of the time. It’s a good thing there are self-driving cars, because you probably are not safe to drive yourself.

You are not a hard-nosed business person. Some of your cohort do come up with brilliant ideas for business, and because you have rich parents, they are able to get those businesses started… but all of you are too unfocused, too distractible, too deep within your own creative minds to be good at following the bottom line. Most of the businesses either fail or get sold to other companies run by people who can actually do business, but don’t have great ideas. Most of you go into art of some kind. Writing, visual arts, comic books, music… a few do movie or film, but none of you are at your best in collaboration.

The ADHD community embraces you as one of their own, though technically you do not have ADHD; no human could maintain a tight focus when ghostly images and snippets of dream are constantly playing in their minds. Because your family is wealthy, you get a personal assistant who helps you with the paperwork parts of your artistic career, and you get a publicist when you’re still very young, and the fact that you don’t sleep means you make the news just by existing. So your artistic career is successful, and your work is well-known, but artists don’t generally get rich; you live off your parents’ money until you get sick of their snide condescension because the ability they paid millions of dollars to infuse you with has a downside that means you will never be what they wanted you to be. Then you downsize your life expectations by a lot and live modestly off your successful art career. It helps that you can be very prolific, because a third of your life has been given back to you for conscious activity.

Some of the children of your cohort inherit the ability. Some don’t. Parents tend to fawn on the grandchildren who are pure human, Sleepers rather then Sleepless, because they’re the ones who could possibly inherit business empires. That’s fine. You try your best to raise your children not to compete with one another on the basis of whether or not they sleep, but kids will be kids and not all of the siblings get along.

After the first generation of your kind are created, few others are made; most wealthy parents want a child who can be good in business rather than a child who can be a brilliant artist, but there are those who like the feather-in-cap of famous, respected children who will be known for their creativity, so a small trickle of kids like you are born every ten years or so. When it happens it generally makes the news. You reach out to those kids when they turn thirteen to offer them your knowledge and life experience. When you encounter parents who have tried to cut their children off from your community out of religious belief or misguided belief in their own ability to mold and shape children, you bring child abuse charges against them. You’re not good with the paperwork but you are good with influencing public opinion, and most of you still have assistants or interns who can handle the paper part.

You don’t regret what your parents gave you, even if they do. It’s a good life.

You do not sleep. Where other people have a third of their life where the energy hog that is consciousness is shut down, and therefore the body has more free energy to carry out tasks like growth and immune response, you don’t have that. Your consciousness is always on, always consuming 80% of the free energy your body has.

You’re thin. You can eat anything you want, but it burns off of you because your body needs so much energy. You are often tired. You can’t sleep to replenish your energy; you can rest, unmoving, but consciousness is still on even if you’re meditating or vegging out in front of the TV. When you get sick, you stay sick for a long time. You get sick a lot. It’s not enough to consider a chronic illness, but it drains you. It makes it hard for you to hold down jobs, because you don’t sleep but if you feel too miserable to go to work it’s just the same as if you slept through your alarm and never went in.

You have more time than chronically ill people; there are advantages to having 8 extra hours in a day. Most of you live off your parents’ money and do things like volunteering and activism when the work that needs doing are things like stuffing envelopes or reaching out to people on the phone, or you became independent contractors so you could make your own hours.

You take your vitamins, you eat healthy, you exercise when you have the strength for it. Maybe it helps a little bit; you can’t really tell, but it makes you feel like you’re doing something to improve your life.

Your parents sue the people who created you, because seriously, wasn’t “people who live an extra third of their day need more energy to survive” predictable? They lose, because they signed a lot of waivers. You didn’t sign any waivers, so some of you try suing, and win.

No more are created after your original cohort, largely due to the lawsuits; no one’s willing to make more of you. It’s just as well. You make the best of your life, but to be honest, you long to be able to sleep – to engage in a kind of rest where you aren’t bored, and your mind invents interesting stories to show you, and when you get up you actually feel rested and energetic? (People who sleep tell you that that second part doesn’t happen. You retort that that’s because they don’t sleep enough, and if you had the ability to sleep, you wouldn’t waste it by staying up late and waking up early!) You wish for that with all your heart, but you can’t have it, and you know it.

By the time you’re in your forties, the activism of you and your cohort has gotten your condition declared a disability, and many of you have been campaigning for disability rights for years, since you recognize the similarities with your situation when people suffer fatigue disorders or other vague and amorphous conditions that make them tired all the time. So when some of your children are born as Sleepless, you’ve changed the world to make it easier for them to maximize their own capabilities, and they get a little more done than you were able to do. And really, isn’t that what we all want for our children?

You do not sleep, and it’s perfect. You were re-engineered for a faster metabolism so that you can supply enough energy to your body and brain for the extra hours of consciousness. Your brain was re-engineered so that you don’t need to go offline and have fifteen minutes of dreaming every hour and a half for eight hours; you just need to enter an optional, meditation-like rest state for one or two hours every five days or so to get the same results. You are every bit as creative and every bit as capable of focus and have every bit as much energy as the average Sleeper, but you have eight more hours a day to do it in (except for every five days, when you only get six or seven more hours. Still a huge advantage.)

Your parents are wealthy – no one who didn’t have millions of dollars to spend on a designer child was able to make their child a Sleepless – so there are no barriers to your success. You get your education completed early because you had extra time; you developed friendships with children older than you, because those were the ones who were awake later in the evening; you learned how to make use of solitude, and all but the most introverted of you can spend most of the daylight hours interacting with people and still get a lot done at night. Whether you choose to be a scientist, an inventor, an artist, or an entrepreneur, you do well. Your parents’ wealth and your fame for being born as an exotic designer child amplifies your ability to do whatever you want.

With so much success and so much extra time and so much experience socializing, most of you find relationships and have kids before you’re 30. Some of your kids have the trait, some don’t. You try, as best as you can, not to favor the Sleepless children over the Sleepers, but it’s hard not to be frustrated at the lack of productivity your Sleeper children have.

It’s when your cohort is in its 30’s and 40’s that you learn what you really bequeathed your Sleepless children, and what your parents bequeathed to you.

A faster metabolism burns out a body faster. In your 30’s you look 30 but the aches and pains and development of chronic illnesses like diabetes are accelerating faster than they do for Sleepers of equal socioeconomic status. In your 40’s the decline accelerates; you look 50 at 45, 60 at 50, 70 at 55.

Members of your cohort start dying of old age in your 50’s. You realize you aren’t going to make it to 65, and that your Sleepless children, already in their 30’s, have much less time than you or they or anyone thought they did. In the end, you didn’t get more time than anyone else; you just got to take it all at once instead of spreading it out over time.

Many of your parents are still alive, the excellent health care that the wealthy can afford keeping them going at 80-something. You’re rapidly catching up with them, and the best medical care in the world can’t stop it. Some of you rant at your parents, or sue the company that made you, but you don’t. How could anyone have known? It didn’t happen to animals in testing, but rat lives are so short to begin with, perhaps it disappeared into data noise. You know your parents only wanted the best for you, just like you only wanted the best for your children. You reconcile with your Sleeper children, who are a trifle embittered at what they see as the favoritism you showed their Sleepless siblings, because you’re dying and they still love you even if you weren’t the best parent you could have been. Your parents apologize to you, and you forgive them. Your Sleepless children visit you constantly, knowing that you are their future, that what’s happening to you is what lies ahead for them.

You’re 62 when you die, after many surgical interventions and a decade of the best prescription drugs money could buy. The creation of more like you is made illegal a year later, but not before every parent rich enough to do it has had a Sleepless child for the past six decades.

While so many of the wealthy are dealing with the impact of Sleepless shortened lifespans and how very many of the wealthy are affected by it, society finally passes laws that redistribute income in a way where very likely, no one in the future will be able to afford a designer child for several million dollars anyway, even if it hadn’t been made illegal. Out of so many personal tragedies, the standard of living rises and the general health and happiness of the population improves. If you were still alive, you might have considered that a positive legacy.

#nancy kress #response fic #libertarian science fiction is often not very good #alara gets salty about published novels

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cottonblush · 5 years

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promise me | lmh

❧ word count: 3,403 maybe?

❧ genre: fluff, one mention of a cut so like gore i guess

❧ notes: installment one of the skz powers au!! this one is kinda a drabble series?? also i’ve discovered i love the whole “i hate u” “u love me” thing a little too much but it’s not hurting anyone so yee to the haw my guys!

The first time Minho realizes he’s a gifted one, he’s on the rooftop of his apartment building, unclipping some extra laundry from the clothes line. The wind picks up all of a sudden and the large bed sheet he just unclipped comes flying at his face. He’s trapped, a tangled mass of fabric and limbs, the opaque sheets doing nothing to aid his vision.

The sheets seem to act as a pair of wings, lifting the young boy into the air. It’s just a couple of feet at first, but then he keeps going higher and higher, and Minho can’t get rid of the sinking feeling in his stomach.

When he finally manages to untangle himself and take in a deep breath, he makes the biggest mistake. He pries open his eyes and looks down. There’s no building below him now, just the apartment complex’s playground and park. It doesn’t help that he’s afraid of heights. In that moment, he feels like a cloud, yet he feels like the weight of the world is pressing down on his shoulders.

The fear overwhelms him, clouding his mind, and Minho starts to freefall out of the sky. He tries to scream but can’t seem to find his voice. All that’s left is the seemingly infinite supply of salty tears welling in his eyes and streaming down his cheeks.

In the few seconds it takes to fall, the world seems to slow down. Minho sees flashes of his past, though there’s not much since he’s only at the ripe age of eight years old. He sees his mom making him ramen with an egg on top for the first time; he sees himself in the mirror, small hands running over the scar on his stomach from a surgery he needed; he sees his friends gathering around him to show him the stray cat they found behind a dumpster; he sees you, his next door neighbor and best friend, on the first day that you two met, eyes wide and curious about all the world could offer.

He won’t get to say goodbye to you or anyone else, Minho realizes. He screws his eyes shut and hopes everyone will at least remember him in a good light.

And then everything goes dark.

“Minho,” comes your high pitched voice after what seems like an eternity, “what are you doing hanging from Mrs. Yang’s terrace? Hammocks are meant to be set up close to the ground, silly! And you can’t use a bedsheet. My daddy says you have to buy a special thingy for it.”

Thankfully, the universe has decided it just isn’t Minho’s time yet, and when he realizes this, the boy scrambles to try and get to the terrace.

“Y/n! Please, help! I don’t wanna be in here anymore.”

You run off, causing Minho’s heartbeat to skyrocket, but you return moments later with Mrs. Yang. The woman quickly sees how serious the situation is and cautions Minho not to move.

“I’ll come get you so stay put,” she says, moving quickly.

Once the boy is safely back on the ground, he can’t stop crying, snot and tears turning his once pristine face into a soppy mess. You take the boy into your arms and the two of you fall to the ground, remaining in a tight embrace. Even though Minho is a couple of months older than you, you know it’s no time to point it out and make fun of him.

Instead, you hold him tighter and hope that only good thoughts can reach him, tiny arms doing the best they can to support the taller and larger boy.

Mrs. Yang calls Minho’s mom and she rushes downstairs to get her son, worried expression softening when she sees him safe and sound. She starts to pry him away from you and pick him up in her arms.

Before he can get away from you, you stick out your pinky finger.

“Promise you’ll tell me what happened?”

“I promise,” comes the reply, a matching pinky finger hastily wrapping around your own to seal the deal.

When Minho comes to terms with the fact that he has powers, specifically the power of flight, the first thing you do is urge him to start training to become a super. It’s your latest obsession, the name ‘Megaman’ leaving your mouth at least a billion times a day.

You tell Minho that you want to marry the famous super one day, regardless of the fact that there’s more than a decade between you two. That’s when the boy starts to think that maybe if he becomes a super, you’ll want to talk only about him instead.

Although it doesn’t take much convincing, actually getting Minho up in the air is the difficult part. You have to take it slow, holding his hand even if he’s only a couple of inches off the ground.

After weeks of the same results, it doesn’t seem that Minho will be able to make any improvements, so you do the only thing your ten year old brain can think of.

You unclasp the silver chain that rests around your neck, pendant shaped the same as the first letter of your name, and put it around his. Your hands come to rest on his shoulders, face serious as you try to pretend you’re like a sergeant from your dad’s favorite war-time movie series.

Minho scrunches his brows and tilts his head as he asks, “What’s this for?”

You giggle, serious façade immediately breaking, “It’s a good luck charm! This way, I can be with you whenever you’re flying and you don’t have to be scared.”

“For real? I can actually keep this? You’re awesome, Y/n! I’ll never feel scared if I have this with me!”

You give the boy a tight hug, a giant smile contouring your lips. Minho mumbles something into the crook of your neck, but you don’t quite catch it, so you pull back, hands still grabbing his shoulders and keeping him at an arm’s width away.

He looks unsurely down at the ground for a moment, contemplating if he should voice what he’s thinking or not. However, when he sees your that your encouraging smile hasn’t faltered one bit, it’s just the boost of confidence he needs.

He places his hands atop your own and says, “The necklace sure is great and all, but do you know what’s even luckier?”

You get pouty for a second, thinking your best friend might dispose of your precious gift. With a frown on your face, you grumble out, “No. And I don’t really care either.”

“It’s you, dummy!”

“Hey! Don’t call me a dummy when you’re the dummy, dummy!”

Minho resists the urge to roll his eyes because of course you’d find it in you to argue in a moment like this.

“Ugh, fine, I’m the dummy,” he concedes. “Anyway, I was thinking you can be my lucky charm! As long as you promise to never leave me, of course. And then we can be best friends forever!”

“Really? That’d be perfect, Minho!”

“Promise? That you’ll be by my side forever?”

“I promise.”

Flash forward a couple years and the two of you are sixteen. You’ve become on of the top students in school, balancing grades and your responsibilities as student council secretary. Minho has made a name for himself as a super, dedicating most of his time to saving lives and counting on you to catch him up when he returns home late at night.

However, with people on the streets becoming more aware of him, it also means bad people are better equipped to deal with him.

It’s one fateful night, the wind is howling in his ears and lightning flashes every couple seconds. He’s managed to sneak his way into a gang meeting, trying his best to calm his heartbeat and memorize every detail about the scheme that’s supposed to occur in the coming weeks.

The lightning ends up being a dangerous adversary, its light illuminating Minho’s crouched figure from his place beneath one of the windows on the second floor. One of the grunts notices something is amiss and whispers a command for the building to go into lockdown. He also alerts a guy who appears to be an interim boss of Minho’s location.

The other grunts have him in no time, using their familiarity of the layout to their advantage and sneaking up on him. They grab his arms, forcefully pressing them against his back, and drag him downstairs to the boss.

Minho finds himself seated in a chair. It feels like an investigation scene from the popular crime show on TV, the nearest source of light being an old lamp shining directly in the teen’s face. He gulps, knowing if whatever he says doesn’t please the boss—and it likely won't—he could end up in big trouble.

However, there’s one more mistake Minho makes, and that is overestimating the amount of leniency he would receive. He doesn’t even get a chance to speak before the breath is knocked out of his lungs. Next comes a sharp punch to the face and he knows that’ll leave a mark that won’t be so easy to cover up.

The gang members are relentless, each taking their turn punching or kicking the poor guy, until it’s finally the leader’s turn.

The bulky old man whips out a switchblade and slowly stalks forward. He places the tip of the cold blade on Minho’s forehead, applying enough pressure to draw blood. Minho’s eyes widen in recognition when he realizes what’s about to happen: the man is going to cut off his mask.

He can’t allow that to happen so he wills his body with all his might to break out of the death grip that the grunts have him in. He flies up into the air, shooting through one of the windows and making his escape. Although he does manage to make it out without anyone seeing his true identity, he flies home with a large cut on his forehead, gash slightly tearing into the edge of his mask.

Minho knows that if he goes home and his parents happen to see him in his current state, they’ll find out he’s a super and even worse, they may forbid him from doing the job he’s come to love so much.

Instead, he lands haphazardly on your bedroom’s balcony. He gives the sliding glass door a weak tap, hoping you’ll hear him over the sound of the raging storm above.

Like an angel sent from above, you do hear his call for help and crack open the door.

“Minho,” you call out, voice laced with drowsiness as it’s almost the middle of the night, “what are you doing? Come inside.”

You slide the door open even more, allowing his drenched body to weasel its way inside. You tiptoe across the room and turn the lights to the lowest setting that the dimmer can possibly allow. When you turn around, you resist the urge to yelp, instead rushing forward as Minho’s body collapses.

“Oh my god, Minho! What happened to you? Look at your face. It's…”

You can’t even finish your sentence, your thumb tracing over the delicate skin on his forehead, not ignoring the way his temperature is rapidly falling.

“We need to get you warmed up first,” you urge.

First, you plug in your space heater and position it in front of your bed. You then grab some spare clothes of Minho’s from your closet and turn, ready to hand them off when you see that his form is too exhausted to move on its own. Carefully, you peel off his suit, embarrassment not even close to being present in your mind due to the severity of the situation. You dress him as quickly as possible, making sure to avoid his open wound when sliding on his shirt.

Lugging his body onto your bed, you cover him with your blanket as well as the winter comforter you usually keep tucked away beneath the bed.

Thankfully, the wound is not as deep as it first appeared, and you hope that you can get away with treating it with ointment and wrapping it in bandages, at least until you can get Minho to a doctor.

You lean over his weakened body as you dab the cut with the necessary ointments and creams. Minho doesn’t make it easy for you. His right hand refuses to let go of its grip on your left wrist, skin never losing contact with your own. However, you let it be, knowing that just like that fateful day years ago, the best thing to calm him down is a nurturing touch.

He falls asleep like that and you can only hope for the best, refusing to sleep until you hear his breath even out.

When the sun rises the next morning and Minho comes to, you practically pounce on him, arms winding tightly around his neck.

“Can’t breathe,” the young man chokes out.

You instantly jump back, worry plaguing your features and tears threatening to spill onto your skin.

“S-Sorry,” you say, voice warbling and hands self consciously coming to rest at your side.

Minho softens upon seeing you so concerned, hands reaching out to grab your own.

“I’m fine,” he tries to assure you.

He tells you that he feels much better; he can’t even feel the cut on his head anymore, and that causes you to laugh, telling him he’s being absurd.

“I was so worried, you know? I really thought you were gone for a second there.”

“Don’t you remember our promise? I’m never leaving you and you’re not getting away from me anytime soon.”

“Of course, I remember. But I want us to make a new promise. I want you to promise me to always be careful on missions and always, always, always make sure to come back home safe to me.”

“I promise. I love you, Y/n. I hope you know that.”

“I love you more. And I’ve always known, dummy!”

“Hey!”

“You can’t even argue this time. You literally have a giant cut on your head. You are officially the dummy.”

“Oh god… Do you think my mom will notice?”

“It’s impossible not to. But maybe we can tell her you tripped on the way to school? She must’ve already left for work by now so at least you won’t have to worry about that for now.”

“Ah, what would I do without you?”

“Don’t know. Probably something dumb, dummy.”

“I hate you.”

“You love me!”

“…I hate when you’re right.”

You’re seventeen, not quite a dancing queen, when you’re first asked out to a school event: the winter formal dance. You’re giddy with excitement, chatting with your girl friends about the insta-worthy proposal all day. A classmate who’d recently been in a group project with you, Younghoon, asked you by stopping you at your locker with a bouquet of roses and a box of chocolates.

Because you’re so caught up in the excitement, Minho has to learn of this event through social media, grip turning his knuckles white when he sees that a picture of you and Younghoon in a side hug is your most recent post. He thinks bitterly to himself that you would’ve liked lilies or snapdragons instead and would’ve much rather preferred Haribo sour gummy bears to a cheesy box of chocolates.

He doesn’t know why he’s so irked, to be honest. He thinks maybe it’s because you’ve always attended school functions together as a tradition and you could’ve at least given him a heads up.

However, on the day of the dance, when Minho sees you leaving your apartment through the tiny peephole on his front door, he swears his heart stops. Even through the distorted view of the glass, you look stunning. Your hair is styled and you’re wearing a beautiful floor length gown, but the only thing Minho can think is how you seem to glow. You’re not wearing any makeup but it looks like a fairy came and sprinkled you with glitter and fairy dust. Your million watt smile is just as bright as any other day, but it has Minho’s heart going a mile a minute like he’s seeing it for the first time.

While you spend the night dancing with your supposed prince charming, Minho spends his night at a table sulking. His close friend, Jisung, tries to get him to dance with one of the many girls who are head over heels for him, but he doesn’t have the heart to, telling his friend that he’s just not feeling well.

As Minho downs his sixth glass of punch and crushes the flimsy plastic cup between his fingers, he makes a promise to himself. He promises that from now on, he’ll try his best to make you see him as someone you can spend the rest of your life with. Because maybe all of the 'I love you’s that he’s said to you weren’t a way to express platonic appreciation, but actually are his way of showing how he wants to be able to call you his own and vice versa.

Nothing seems to be catching your attention. You’re quite dense for an eighteen year old. Even his famed flirting and aegyo tactics breeze right by you. Minho swears if he could use one word to describe the whole situation, it would be the infamous r/woosh.

Everyone in your friend group knows about his not-so-little crush, but they’re waiting for him to make a big move. However, Minho’s used all the moves he knows. He’s about to give up hope when a friend suggests a last ditch idea: the silent treatment. That’ll have to get you to notice him.

He never predicted it would be so hard, though. Seeing you in the halls and living right next door to you but not saying a word isn’t as easy as it first sounded. You’re the first person he wants to speak to when he gets a good grade. His finger hovers over your number when he sees anything he thinks you would enjoy doing together (which is pretty often since he basically thinks about you 24/7). You’re the first thing on his mind when he wakes up and the last thing his mind remembers before he goes to sleep.

It’s taking a toll on you too because after a long week, you corner him at his favorite dinner.

Sliding into the booth across from him with a serious expression adorning your face, you inquire, “Did I do something wrong? I swear I haven’t and there was probably just a misunderstanding.”

“No,” Minho denies. “There was no misunderstanding. I just needed some time to clear my head, I guess. Something my friend said really got to me.”

It’s not a complete lie, but Minho would rather be swallowed by a black hole than admit he resorted to something as petty as the silent treatment, especially when it comes to wooing a girl.

“Next time, give me a heads up, okay?”

“Yeah, okay.”

You change the subject, offering to split a milkshake with him, eyes turning their focus from his face to the menu in front of him. You use your fingers to maneuver the menu around to face you, calling over a waitress. You order a vanilla milkshake with two straws and no maraschino cherry on top: the classic order for the two of you.

Minho hesitantly asks after taking a sip of the cold and sweet milkshake, “Hey, I know we’ve made a lot of promises, but I want you to make me one more.”

When you don’t reply but look at him with attentive eyes and an open heart, encouraging him to feel comfortable and speak his mind, he gets the extra boost of confidence he needs.

“Promise me you’ll give me a chance.”

“What? Wait, a chance at what?”

“I guess I should’ve said, 'give us a chance.’ Go out with me?”

The smile on your face is so bright and full of joy that Minho swears he’ll go blind if he sees it again, but the thought is dismissed when you jump up and reach across the table to pull him into a tight embrace.

Placing a light kiss on the tip of Minho’s nose, causing it to scrunch up in an adorable manner, you whisper, “I promise.”

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ctl-yuejie · 5 years

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the grandmaster of demonic interior design or mound squatting & a smitten renovator

⇨ for @howdydowdy who wisely suggested a home renovation tv series au based on my crack gifset

Ia . IIa . IIIa . Ib . IIb . IIIb. Ic . IIc . IIIc . Id . IId . IIId . Ie . IIe ⭐︎ . IIIe ⭐︎⭐︎ . extra

IIId.

Lan Wangji does indeed look pristine when he wakes up.

However, that is only because he has gotten used to intensely dreaming about Wei Wuxian over the years and his body has learned to mask how much it affects him.

It is still dark when he steps into the shower, cold water harshly hitting his shoulders in penalisation of the liberties he took in his unconscious state.

Stepping in for his brother had been frightening in a way. But realising that he had felt some amount of guilt for not following in the footsteps of his brother and how much liberty he had been given on account of him, this was at least a way to show his gratitude. Now, he was even less sure about everything.

Not a scheming person by nature it’d be unexpected, but meeting Wei Wuxian again after so many years could not possibly just have been a happy accident. Even trying to close off his emotions hadn’t prevented Lan Xichen from noticing his feelings for Wei Wuxian during his school days. The well-meant advice to try and contact Wei Wuxian again, or at least travel with him to Yunmeng if the occasion ever presented itself, had been too much for him and over the years Lan Xichen had quieted down, only giving him emphasised glances when mentioning the Jiang sect in conversation.

His brother wouldn’t have disregarded his duty to the show in this way or deceived him about his intentions so thoroughly. Lan Wangji is sure of that. He is less sure about how to deal with this unexpected reunion.

It should be disconcerting how hard it is to control himself but Wei Wuxian is still very much worthy of causing such turmoil inside of him.

Wei Wuxian who is passionate and who’s sense of justice always brings him much more trouble than he can deal with, but who remains radiant in spite of it. Wei Wuxian who did silly pranks in the past and is still full of mischief, but now there’s also maturity in who he addresses it at. Wei Wuxian who has such an intuitive relationship with his cultivation, who always surprises him with the ingenuity of his inventions, back then and also now. Wei Wuxian to whom conversing with strangers comes easily, to whom conversing with Lan Wangji comes easily. Wei Wuxian, whose demonic cultivation he should feel offended by, but who casts a spell over him instead.

So Lan Wangji will let himself hope. Tentatively hope that this time their bond won’t break. That at least their friendship might endure.

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

They smoothly pick up from yesterday’s shoot with individual interviews. He chooses his words carefully when asked about the style of cultivation, emphasizing the aspects of intent and self-control. The director doesn’t seem to be educated in cultivation techniques and Lan Wangji hopes that Wei Wuxian won’t suffer from any repercussions if some elder manages to read between the lines and deduces that demonic cultivation is at work at Burial Mounds.

Somewhat antsy since morning, Wei Wuxian is pre-occupied with refortifying the area with protective talismans and isn’t there to witness his account.

Instead Ah-Yuan somehow has taken a liking to him, following him around like an obedient shadow, one hand firmly grabbing onto his outer robes.

He never has to deal with the children outside of the Guqin classes he teaches at the cultivation heritage centre so he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do with this small and muddy 5-year-old attached to his side.

But Ah-Yuan doesn’t seem to mind his silence, amusing himself with trying to reach for the sword in Lan Wangji’s hand instead. Luckily his upbringing at Cloud Recesses has the advantage of resulting in some formidable arm-strength; he easily keeps the sword raised high without straining or regretting donning the full cultivator’s uniform.

He wonders what will happen once Ah-Yuan will be old enough to attend school. Burial Mound is a last resort for the evicted, not a place for a child to grow and prosper.

The wind changes and faintly there’s the scent of burning paper and resentful energy in the air.

Instinctively he pulls Ah-Yuan behind him, the other hand on the hilt of his sword.

Seconds later the line of newly painted talismans around them bursts into flames, the glowing ashes whirling into the form of tigers, roaring at the coming invaders.

The production crew is occupied with protecting their gear, obviously overwhelmed by what is happening, or more by what they don’t understand is happening.

The squatters guide them in the direction of secret trails down the mound, arming themselves with Wei Wuxian’s talismans.

When the first group of intruders breaks through the forest line a flurry of yellow papers flies past him, leaving small explosions and smoke in their wake.

He quickly scoops Ah-Yuan up into his arms, covering him with his long sleeves, and makes a run for his grandmother at the other end of the clearing. Ah-Yuan is shocked silent, looking at him with wide eyes as he steadies all three of them on his sword and flies down the mountain.

He can make out a stream of red in passing and Wei Wuxian’s cackling as he proceeds to attack what must be the Wen clan’s goons.

At the foot of the mound he makes sure that Ah-Yuan and his grandmother find shelter in one of the film crew’s busses and then makes his way back up the mountain.

Wei Wuxian puts up an excellent fight with his talismans, many a low-level cultivator weighed down by ghosts of gluttony, flailing futilely on the floor.

Their eyes meet in understanding and they switch places, Wei Wuxian leading the remaining squatters down the mountain while Lan Wangji makes short work of the assailants.

He knows that he has to let them go eventually, they’re just hired muscle after all, but he makes sure to collect enough evidence to tie them back to the Wens before that.

Wei Wuxian returns to his side, just as the smoke clears, and he softly closes his hand around Wei Wuxian’s arm as they take in the damage.

The squatters have all escaped unscathed but most of their makeshift houses and fields are destroyed, once more extinguishing all life from Burial Mound.

Wei Wuxian turns to him, a wide smile on his lips. “Well, this was bound to happen. At least we know the talismans are working correctly. Did you see how Forth Uncle whooped that guys ass?” Laughter pearls from his lips, but Lan Wangji can see the hurt in his eyes.

His grip tightens.

“Lan Zhan-ah, Lan Zhan-ah, why are you trying to squeeze me? The fight is over, I’m not the enemy, unless you think my cultivation is evil.” “Not evil.” Wei Wuxian laughs his fake laugh again and softly removes Lan Wangji’s fingers from his arm. “Wei Ying is not evil.” He says, feeling the silly need to convey his feelings as best as he can. “Ah, ah. I get it, I get it. If you think so –“ “I know it.” “– Lan Zhan! Come on, lets go! I really need a drink!”

They find a small pub downtown already open for business and Wei Wuxian doesn’t waste time and just drags him to a low table, well out of sight from the door. His banter with the waitress seems awfully forced and soon enough he downs one shot after the other without concern to his surroundings.

The next time his hand goes for his cup, Lan Wangji gently covers it with his and holds it down. “Lan Zhan! Whyyyyyy?!” Wei Wuxian is pouting at him disapprovingly but doesn’t protest then he picks up the cup and downs it in one.

The last thing he hears is Wei Wuxian’s joyous shout and he can feel his lips pull into a smile at the sound.

“At least I made him happy.” Is the last thing he thinks before passing out.

#the grandmaster of demonic interior design #ctlyuejie writes #the untamed #the untamed fanfic #mdzs #mdzs fanfic #lan wangji #wei wuxian #wangxian #also: sorry for the bad planning but this will get longer by a bit so i have to redo the structure...

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schoe1995 · 4 years

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Solo Traveling

I’ll first start off by saying and acknowledging that I do come from a well household. My mom runs her own dry cleaners and my dad works at a hospital for computer programming. Wasn’t like that always. In elementary school, I had classmates leave school to go on vacation. Super jealous that they went because I hated being in school 🤣🤣🤣 so the few times I could go on vacation was during like the major breaks or holidays. As I got older and family tensions increased, i began traveling with other people. Let’s just say after a series of not knowing other people’s personalities, cliques, and plus ones....I called it quits with group traveling. It’s a huge part of why my extroverted personality changed to more of an introvert/ extrovert. Since I have my own money, why not travel by myself.

I’ll talk about the cons of traveling solo first.

It can be very expensive: even if you do go with a group...be prepared to shell out a couple of dollars depending on where your going, staying, and activities

Have to be more aware of the surroundings: there has been a couple of times I’ve been exhausted because I was trying to be more aware of what’s going on. I have to watch my own back without relaying on somebody.

It can be scary: not going to lie...the day of trips I get really bad anxiety that I kinda want to throw up. Scratch that, I have thrown up. For example, when I went to D.C, I wasn’t worried about Lyft or Uber because my big bro was picking me up. However other airports....I have no idea where lyft or Uber would pick me up. Certain airports like O’Hare Chicago airport has two levels. One is for traditional friend/ family pick up. The other level is for rideshares. Ever since that mess I decided to look up airports ahead of time and look at maps for where to find the designated area. Helps a lot of stress out.

Benefits of solo traveling

Lollllll there wasn’t a whole lot of cons. Granted not everyone is going to have the same experience as me. So this is all from my personal experience.

Planning can be fun: When you travel alone, YOU are in charge of everything. I’m every pop culture orientated so I’m looking for the best spots for photos, food, shopping, etc. it’s the millennial (probably spelled it wrong) in me.

Moving at my own pace: so this was the best part for me. I’m a huge theme park junky! When I went to Orlando with my parents back in 2017 we did Disney World all in one day. Yes it can be possible to visit all 4 parks in one day😂 but that trip in general had the most arguments I had with my mom. She basically complained about all the walking we had to do. Also couldn’t watch fireworks. Everything was so rushed that back in 2019, I did a redo Disney World trip. Oh! I’ll definitely be doing a multi part blog for that. So when you travel by yourself you don’t have to deal with “I don’t want to do this!” “Why we going here?” Less arguments...PERIODT

Moving at your own time: this kinda goes with your own pace. I’m a huge HUGE be on time person. One of my sayings is “If your early, ya on time. If your on time, ya late. If your late...don’t bother showing up”. It’s one of my biggest pet peeves when people aren’t on time. Idk if it’s just Asians but Asian people AINT NEVER ON TIME FOR ANYTHING! So you have free reign with time.

Flexibility: This was one of the things I found super awesome when it came to solo trips. My schedule to travel had so much flexibility. And since I was working in retail, I could do what I want...per say. If my days weren’t approved I’d still go on this trip🤣 but I found traveling during the off season for holidays or non busy or non important seasons were a lot cheaper. That’s what I kinda wanted to make up for; not being able to travel when I was younger and leaving school to go 🤣 now that I can...✌️

No cliques: personality wise, I describe myself as a walking tv show. So picture every Disney show, Nickelodeon, and VH1 reality shows all in one person. I really don’t fit into a mold so I call it an outsider habit. I thought I’d get super lonely when traveling alone but oddly...I’m more comfortable with it. There is this no judgement zone when traveling alone. When I went to Universal Studio with my parents, it was “why do you want to buy this” or “how old are you?” First of all...you can never be too old of anything:) This might be a con for others, so it all depends🤷‍♂️ besides with technology I’m able to FaceTime, Live Stream, record things I want others to see. Ha! This is what this blog is for!

In no way shape or form am I throwing shade to group trips. I call those experiences that helped shape my travel knowledge. I’m always grateful for that. But the couple solo travel tips I’ll give is this.

Research! I can’t stress this enough. Knowing where you are going can save so much hassle. If your traveling internationally know where your country embassy is just in case. Second, the culture of the city or country. Being knowledgeable can help avoid any cultural ignorance, stereotypes.

Flights: alright flights can be very touchy subject. I usually find great deals with Southwest when they offer sales. Sometimes buying two - one way tickets is cheaper than round trip. They also offer two free checked bags, one carry one, and one personal items. If Southwest is a little out of your budget, don’t worry! Other airlines have great prices. I use Google Flights.

Train: if your destination is a couple hours away, I’d suggest taking Amtrak. Believe it or not Amtrak depending on what city you go too have awesome deals. If you follow them on Instagram they have beautiful photos of scenic railways. When I was younger I had a huge obsession with trains. I had every train from Thomas The Tank Engine. 😂 anyways, trains also have dining cars, and sleeping cars. Some have observation decks so you can do a 360* of the surroundings

Car: I put this last for transportation. Believe it or not, traveling by car may sound cost efficient but it’s really not. Just from my personal experience from driving to Branson Missouri, Tennessee, Chicago. There is gas you have to pay and hotels can charge a ridiculous amount for overnight parking x the amount of nights your staying. WHEW CHILEEEE THE MESS!

Hotels & location: This is the boujee side of me. I like to be comfortable after a day of riding rides or exploring. Just being able to act like this is my home for the time being. I usually use Bookings.com, Trivago.com, etc. to find the best one. Use filters if you need to find exactly what you need. When I travel to concerts, I try finding hotels close to the venue. That way I’m not paying extra for lyft, Uber, or taxis. BTW, don’t ever take taxis after concerts. Such a rip off...idk if there is a law that prevents them for jacking up their prices.

Air BnB’s: So I found this to be half and half. Sometimes it’s less expensive sometimes...not so much. Air BnB is pretty much either paying for a room or whole house for a certain amount of days. My big bro introduced me to it when we went to LA. I used it on my road trip to LA with a “friend” who is no longer a friend. But it was more of other situations I don’t really use. Honestly after seeing videos of how people were being racist to other guests, that was a major turn off to me. Second I had a friend who posted a conversation of a Air BnB host who tried to play her. Yes the app does have host ratings and reviews but there are so many fees and rules that it’s like, I might as well pay for the hotel. Again it’s totally up to you but staying at a random strangers house....Issa no dawg if I’m traveling by myself.

BUDGETING IS CRUCIAL!! Anytime I go anywhere I budget how much I’m spending. So with that being said, I get all information from attractions I want to go see, restaurants, ride share, everything. You don’t have to be so exact like me but it certainly helps me to know exactly how much I’m spending. Lol

Oh!!!! Sign up for reward programs at any restaurant you eat, shops you shop, or hotels! I do it all the time because for a lot of reward programs just by signing up you get a freebie. So why not take advantage of it.

So I wrote this blog up at like 5:30AM in the morning 🤣🤣🤣😭 I know I’m in for a struggle. But I decided to do this blog post because I was just going through my social media of all the travels I did. I really hope it does help you guys out a lot.

#travel #solo travel #travel blog #travel tips #blogger #blog #solo traveller

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stokan · 5 years

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Top 20 Things of 2018

1.) Beychella How do you make a long awaited surprise album between two of the biggest names in music that is also one of the year’s best feel like complete afterthought? Set the bar as high as Beyonce’s Coachella appearance.

First awards show performances, then music videos, now music festival gigs: is there anything that Beyonce CAN’T turn into high art?

2.) Explained by Vox The most exciting development in the world of television in 2018 was radically breaking the rules on episodes length. We saw 30 minute dramas, and hour long comedies. We got shows like Maniac where episodes were as long as 49 minutes and as short as 27 minutes. Now television creators can tell exactly the stories they want to tell in however much time they want to tell them in. And perhaps nowhere were these loosened restrictions taken better advantage than Explained, Vox’s documentary series for Netflix. Many topics cant sustain a full length documentary, but, say, 14 minutes explaining cryptocurrency to me? Sure! 17 minutes on designer DNA? Sounds great! 20 minutes on the origins of K-Pop? How do you say “yes please” in Korean? Every episode has a different narrator, a different look, a different feel, and varies wildly in subject matter. Yet they are all exactly the length they need to be. The only thing left I really need explained to me is why no one thought to make this series before.

3.) Serial Season 3 If Explained was a great example of the latest evolution in television, then the new season of Serial is at the front line of the evolution of our newest artistic medium: podcasts. Serial’s third season was nothing like its second, which was in turn nothing like its first. It’s a series still figuring out what it CAN be, while now defining forever what it NEEDS to be. Serial this year explained a deeply important topic in a way that wouldn’t have been possible through any other medium. They always say if you’re a writer you have to ask yourself what form of writing your idea needs to be. Don’t write a play that’s really a TV show, or a movie that should be a book. And now we can add to that don’t make a TV series that’s really a podcast. As Homecoming proved this year, the two mediums are very different and better equipped to tell different stories. And after hearing Serial Season Three I can’t imagine there will ever be a better way to explore the current American criminal justice system. It was 2018’s version of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle. It may not change national food safety standards, but it hopefully will do something perhaps even more important: it will make us never again take lightly the election of local judges and sheriffs. It was a podcast for the heart, the head, and the time capsule.

4.) Black Mirror - “Hang the DJ” I know this technically came out December 29th 2017 but I’m counting it here because nothing was more 2018 than this. The sadness, the isolation, the uncertainty, the living in a world you don’t understand the rules of anymore, the unfairness of modern life, but the ultimate perseverance of hope and love: it’s all there in the best episode of Black Mirror’s third season. It made me cry out of sadness and happiness in equal measure. Could anything be more 2018 than that?

5.) Kesha at the Grammys Ok so maybe one thing was more 2018.

The Grammys, an organization led by Neil Portnow, a man who said this year that “women need to step up”, and an organization that didn’t offer its one female Album of the Year nominee a solo performance spot, also offered us 2018’s most powerful show of female solidarity and one of the most moving moments of the Me Too era. It all amounted to the perfect encapsulation of this year. Kesha scream crying and then collapsing into a sea of strong supportive women WAS 2018.

6.) Eighth Grade My favorite movie of the year was also the year’s best horror movie. It was so real, and visceral, and intense, and frightening that at times I literally had to remind myself to breathe. I watched at least half the movie through my fingers and on the edge of my seat. Proving what everyone who has lived through it already knows: there’s nothing in the world more terrifying than being in junior high.

7.) Big Mouth Speaking of junior high, the other side of the pain and trauma of growing up is humor, so why it took this long for someone to make a comedy series explicitly about puberty is beyond me. I guess, of course, making a show like this work is a fine needle to thread. It wouldn’t work without being animated and being on a streaming service that lets them go as far as they did. It wouldn’t work without writing that is both laugh out loud funny and deeply compassionate and human in equal measure. And it wouldn’t work without one of the best voice casts on TV, including a true tour de force from Maya Rudolph. But work does it ever. In a just world junior high health class homework would be simply watching this show.

8.) Emma Gonzalez speech Here’s how long 2018 was: this was from 2018.

Finishing off my personal 2018 Growing Up Trifecta is the most powerful 12 minutes of the year. That high school students could be more inspiring, articulate, and better leaders than the President of the United States is sadly, at this point, a given. But that they are now more effective and efficient than him at starting genuine political movements still feels revolutionary. The kids are our future, and our future has never looked brighter.

9.) Childish Gambino - “This is America” video 100 years from now if theres only one cultural artifact that still exists and is still remembered from 2018 this will be it. A “you know where you were the first time you saw it” level cultural event. No song will ever be more closely associated with its music video, and no music video will ever be more of an avatar for an entire cultural moment than this. THIS is, of course, a truly shocking and horrifying (in a good way) music video from the former fifth lead of the TV show Community. A profound and brilliant piece of art underscored by a fun-sounding dance song. The year’s most complex and important social-political message delivered in 4 minutes via YouTube. This is America indeed.

10.) Drake - “God’s Plan” video While Donald Glover may have perfected the music video as art form, it goes without saying that long ago Drake mastered the music video as promotional tool. And in that sense the music video for “God’s Plan” seems like minor failure. It seemed to sort of come and go from the culture, especially in light of the success of the In My Feelings Challenge. But for me, there was nothing more heartwarming and human this year than watching Drake give away almost a million dollars to strangers. It was an idea so simple it’s shocking no one had ever done it before. And so affecting I was shocked it didn’t seem to penetrate the public consciousness more. There’s so much going on at all times now it’s hard for anything to truly break through all the noise, but this really deserved to. It’s impossible to watch this without smiling, and is there anything 2018 needed more than that?

11.) Nanette The dumbest debate this year was whether or not Nanette was stand up. Form and genre aren’t delineators still worth discussing in 2018. It’s now only about the message and the messenger, everything else is just details. An important fresh voice, the most timely, and sadly, timeless message imaginable, delivered in a way that reached and deeply affected seemingly every person you knew? What is there to debate? Nanette may or may not be stand up comedy, but it’s definitely RISE UP comedy. And in the end, that’s all that matters.

12.) Amber Says What Please click on the link above. The final two minutes are by far the best comedy of 2018. It still makes me laugh so hard that it causes me physical pain. You’ve been warned.

13.) A Star is Born trailers A Star is Born is maybe a perfect film. The performances, the songs, the direction, the fact that there’s literally no human being on earth who could have played her part and made the movie work like it did other than Lady Gaga. It was all perfect. But there was actually something better than watching A Star is Born: anticipating watching a A Star is Born. Before the first A Star is Born trailer came out I thought the whole project sounded dumb and unnecessary. After I finished watching the first trailer I knew I was going to see A Star is Born opening night. True story: I was at a movie where the same A Star is Born trailer got played three times in a row for some reason. And it was riveting every time. There was no grumbling at all in the audience, and I for one was sad when it didn’t replay a fourth time. So as much as I loved A Star is Born what I would really love is be able to still want to see A Star is Born for the first time.

14.) Ariana Grande - “thank u, next” It’s genuinely impressive that a song released in November could be the song I listened to by far the most this year. Somehow it took less than two months for this song to feel completely ubiquitous. Hell, even the PHRASE “thank u, next” is omnipresent now. Forget Song of the Summer, this was maybe our first Song of the Winter. Which is perfect because has a hit pop song ever sounded more winter? It’s cold, but it keeps you warm. It’s the sadness of the holidays with the life reaffirming joy of the holiday season. It’s a sweater for you to wear on the dance floor. And it’s clearly exactly the song so many of us needed. No matter how many times I’ve heard it (and as I said, I’ve listened to it, uh, A LOT) its existence feels like a holiday miracle. Having a new and fresh take on the breakup song in the year 2018? That shit IS amazing.

15.) The proposal at the Emmys This is literally the only thing anyone remembers about this year’s Emmys. It was amazing, and special, and made anyone who watched it believe in true love. But for me it still cant touch the most heart-melting awards show moment of all time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCJrku4fSxk

(Was this whole entry just an excuse to link to one of my absolute favorite YouTube clips? Perhaps.)

16.) Succession When I saw the promos for Succession I literally made the sound UGH out loud. The last thing the world needs is another show about rich white people behaving badly, I thought. How could there possibly be anything original left to say on that topic? Who on earth is still greenlighting shows like this in The Year of our Lord 2018?

People much smarter than I am clearly, that’s who.

Because from writing, acting, production design, direction - whatever element you want to focus on - this was the best and most exciting new show of 2018 by a wide margin. People have been saying for years that TV is the new movies; this show made movies look like the old TV. It was the most vibrant and perfectly crafted big budget feature film of 2018, stretched out over 8 episodes on HBO. Did it have anything new and important to say about the world? Probably not. And turns out, I couldn’t have cared less. The phrase compulsively watchable might have been invented just to describe the world these actors and writers created. I would watch the team involved with this show dry paint.

17.) Angels in America on Broadway Angels in America is the best play of the past 30 years and its not even close. So the fact that it would get a production that’s this good is just unfair for everyone else on this planet who makes theater. It was so good it made all other plays I’ve seen since seem small and cheap and unimportant. It was such a towering achievement that it has made the entire rest of theater as an art form seem insignificant by comparison. When you hear old people talk about seeing Brando in Streetcar or watching the original production of Death of Salesman I now can relate to what they are talking about. I’ll be thinking about Andrew Garfield’s final monologue for the rest of my life. It was unfair that we the audience had to all leave the theater when the lights finally came up and that we couldn’t all just live in that feeling forever. The eight hours I spent watching this play are what art is all about.

18.) Jesse Plemons in Game Night If dying is easy, and comedy is hard, then they should cancel the Oscars and give Jesse Plemmons Best Supporting Actor right now for his work in Game Night. And ok, maybe it wasn’t the BEST performance of 2018, but it was DEFINITELY the best performance relative to what it needed to be. It should have been a dumb throwaway part in a big-budget mainstream ensemble comedy. But Jesse Plemmons crafted a performance so strange and singular and memorable that it elevated the entire movie into something way better than I’m sure even its creators expected. I legitimately don’t know how everyone didn’t break in every one of his scenes. It’s a master class in the comedic power of silence. It should be studied in acting classes everywhere. And 20 years from now when Game Night is considered a comedy classic, Jesse Plemmons will be the main reason why. You heard it here first.

19.) The 1975 - A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships Saxophones? Electric guitar solos? Backing choirs? A concept album about being uncomfortable with the internet? Dumb pretentious song titles? This album couldn’t be any more in my wheelhouse if I made it myself. Its best song is basically a modern reimagining of “We Didn’t Start the Fire” for God’s sake!

For me this wasn’t just an album, it was an experience. It was big music to get lost inside of. And I did. At age 36 it’s nice to know that sometimes I can still feel 16. And it’s fitting that a band named The 1975 would be the ones to make music that’s so transporting.

20.) Emma Stone Ok so as someone who once argued in this very space that Emma Stone deserved an Oscar nomination for Easy A, it’s clear I’m pretty deep in the tank for Emma Stone. But even an Emma Stone hater would have to admit than this was a banner year for Emma Stone. Signing up for the insane acting challenge that was Maniac and completely acing it while totally exposing two-time Oscar nominee Jonah Hill in the process? Going toe to toe with Olivia Colman in the battle of the best acting performances of the year in The Favourite? Coming across as more charming than Jennifer freaking Lawrence ?!?

2018 was Emma Stone’s year, we were all just living in it.

#this is america #drake #emma stone #the 1975 #eighth grade #a star is born #beychella #nanette #jesse plemmons #succession #thank u next #angels in america #big mouth #serial

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rikiroy1793 · 6 years

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Reply 1988

I wish I could write my thesis reports this well. The following analysis was made by an YouTube account owner who goes by the name of ‘ 0dandie0 .’

On another note, Reply 1988 withdrawal setting in once again.

It says, “ "I have no intention to dissuade you, everyone's entitled to their feelings. But it does seem that your feelings are mainly coming from watching through JH-colored glasses and not fully understanding the drama as a whole. Your misunderstanding could likely be based on lack of knowledge in Korean language/culture/and the concept of Baduk. This drama is not just what you see and hear but it's brilliantly written and twisted with style, and you really need to watch carefully and analyze to get 100% out of it. The main theme of this series of Reply is Family(and love ofc but family first)and Baduk is the biggest metaphor in the drama representing Family/Love. Baduk is a game of building "zip"(means home). So it is very fitting that the main lead is a professional Baduk player(someone who builds home/family). Baduk is often compared to life, as you make "choices" that can't be undone and every move you make along the way will determine final outcome. Also there can never be two identical Baduk match ever, every match is unique and original of its own, hence the old Korean saying "there is truth of life in Baduk". The main love competition btw JH and TK is a big game of Baduk. JH is black stone and TK is white. Black stone has the advantage and always plays first. White starts off late and has the disadvantage of 6.5 zips(homes) behind. Does this rule of Baduk ring a bell? Yes, TK only came forward in this love triangle in the latter part of the episode 6(TK calls DS and asks her out to a movie on the night of the first snow) Also, note that TK's character is based on a real-life, legendary Baduk player Lee Changho. There are countless homage references to LCH from his matches(the games in the drama are exact copies of LCH's) to his family background(LCH's father also owns a jewelry shop) and personality(LCH is also introverted, hates interviews, can't tie his shoe laces, challenged in operating simple household gadgets) LCH's Baduk style is non-aggressive, appears to be very slow, low-profile and timid. Many players who were brutally beaten by him recall that they "thought" they were winning until the end. And this quality of LCH is closely mimicked by TK in the drama. TK always made right choices at the right time(this doesn't make him an strategical opportunist, but rather as JH puts it TK was more ardent, and out of love, without any hesitation, he gives DS what she's looking for every time. TK is also represented as a slow turtle(his nickname was "turtle-Taek" since episode 10 among fans, he proposed DS with golden turtle as well) but we all know who wins the race in Aesop's fable, "a turtle and a hare." At the end of a Baduk game, the white player is given 6.5 homes for the initial disadvantage he had. This explains the more screen time for TK and less for JH twrds the end. The kiss scene of TK and DS in Beijing Hotel in episode 19 gave me chills. As the camera zooms out, did you notice the house-motif fire place in the background? And yes, it's white. TK's been earnestly and successfully built his home all along, step by step. Now then why did the director decide to use the perspective of JH instead of TK or DS? We were mainly shown from JH's one sided point of view and this made a lot of people confused. Is this just to troll everyone to think that JH is the husband? At the end of every Baduk game, players do sth called "Bokgi"(review match). Although the outcome is already determined, Bokgi is still a crucial part of the game and often referred to as "the flower(beauty) of Baduk". It is basically a replay of all the moves during the match. Bokgi is entirely a time for the loser, it is time of humility and introspection. Only the loser can refuse Bokgi, the winner has no say in this. Bokgi is a very painful process for both parties but it is the only time where the loser will gain much more than the winner. Through Bokgi, the loser identifies his own mistakes, face his weaknesses and learn from them. The love relationship btw JH, DS and TK was indeed JH's Bokgi. This is very evident especially in episode 18, at the end JH revisits all his mistakes from the past to present and faces it like a man. He thinks about what he could have done, and learns a life lesson to step up. Although this type of storytelling(anti-antagonistic narrative) did somewhat trolled many, I personally was in awe with the writer/director for employing such innovative, original method. This sure is not a typical everyday drama that we come across. This is just brilliant! Another big point to recognize is that although TK had a bare minimum screen time in the beginning, his presence was always there. Everyone talked about TK, the kids, the parents, friends from school, even the radio and TV. The kids always gathered into TK's room whether he is there or not. TK's room is a big metaphor for TK's presence. He provides the emotional "home" for the kids. The kids spent their childhood and youths, their young days in his room. It's a place of heart for the kids, it represents the good old times they can reminisce and wish to go back in time in a heartbeat. Therefore, the show rightly begins and ends in TK's room. TK's little cozy room under a soft afternoon sunlight is the signature scene from Reply 1988. Now, was the male lead switched at the end from JH to TK? I hardly doubt it. Although the storytelling was from JH's perspective, everything else in the drama was all pointing to TK. That's why unlike Overseas fans, many Korean fans did catch early on that TK is the husband. I myself became sure TK was the husband by episode 6, during the narration of Lee Munse, but many caught on by the first 2 episodes. There are endless amount of foreshadowing and metaphors that are all pointing to TK. I rewatched the entire series 3 times and now I am convinced that by episode 2, you are given pretty much all the clues. For example, when TK enters his room in episode 1, the camera focuses on the swing clock at 6pm, and it rings 6 times, indicating that TK will make his real appearance in episode 6. 4.33 is another very clever metaphor. The name Suyeon and goldfish candies and goldfish buns were great foreshadowing tool leading to TK as well. So many symbolism on wedding theme btw TK and DS gives no room for any doubt. Anyways this is getting too long. I suggest you do some research and re-watch the whole thing again. You will only see how much you know, but I promise you you will see much more than the first round."

#reply 1988 #kim jungwan #choi taek #lee hyeri #ryu jun yeol #park bo gum #reply series korean #kdrama addict

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joyofcrime-elinorhigh · 5 years

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Teen Titans Go! REVIEW: (Part 2)

Hello everybody, my name is JoyofCrimeArt and welcome to part two of my Teen Titans Go! retrospective! Or should I say my Teen Titans.....................................................................................................................No....retrospective.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzKJ4HX4Fuk

Get it? because the show isn't that good! Okay, remember to click that bell icon and turn on notifications to- So in case your just joining in, this is part two of my Teen Titans Go! retrospective/review. If you haven't seen part one than I highly recommend that you check it out before going forward. To sum up the point I made in my last part...I didn't like this show that much. WHAT?! A CARTOON CRITIC ONLINE WHO DOESN'T LIKE TEEN TITANS GO?! WHAT A NEW AN UNIQUE TAKE- But for THIS part we are mostly going to step away from the show itself, and focus on the more meta aspect of the show. So really this part isn't even a review of Teen Titans Go! and more of "A review of elements that are tangentially related to Teen Titans Go! and the conversation around it." But since that title won't fit in the Deviantart title box and it's not "clickbait-y" enough, we're going with this instead. So I just want to re-emphasize that, for the most part, none of the things I clique here are actually the fault of the shows crew or creators or anything. But I think it's still important to discuss these points because, as I stated last time, I think the conversation around the show is far more interesting than the show itself. So let's dive in. We'll start with the elephant in the room. Let's talk about the shows handling of critics. This is one of the most notorious elements of the series. Now, I'm just going to say this...I kinda get where the creators are coming from. For real. While there are MANY legit reasons to dislike the show, (Around 4,000 words worth according to my last review alone.) However, out the gate, Teen Titans Go! got hate from ALL cylinders. Young Justice fans bitter about there show being "replaced." Old school Teen Titans fan upset this wasn't season six. People who just wanted action shows. And I'm not going to be high and mighty, as I said last time, I was one of these people. (However, I never made long curse filled rants on Youtube or called for the creators to be shot or anything crazy like that.) Some people say that reboots are "lazy and easy" because you get a built in audience with zero effort. But I believe the total opposite. Making a reboot sounds like a nightmare. People are much more unforgiving when it's an i.p they love and often times will hate you for the littlest things and won't give you a chance. Just look up how many Powerpuff Girl 2016 rants there were BEFORE any footage of the show was even released. People who are in these positions have it rough, and deserve more appreciation. I can't imagine the amount of hate the two show runners must get on a daily basis, which is probably why they don't seem to have social media accounts. HOWEVER this is where we get into what I think is one of the biggest problems in society today, and that's strawmaning. And I feel like I shouldn't have to say this, but here I go. And this can apply for anything. JUST BECAUSE SOME PEOPLE WITH AN OPINION ARE ASSHOLES DOESN'T MEAN THAT EVERYBODY WITH SAID OPINION ARE ASSHOLES! I'm not going to act like there aren't people out there who take Teen Titans Go! WAY to frickin' seriously. That's just factually wrong. But not EVERYONE who has issues with the show are loud obnoxious neck beards who are mad that there "childhood was ruined." And that's how the show and some of the more hostile defenders of the show try to paint "all the haters." Some people just have legit criticisms that they want to get out into the world. When most people write a review of Teen Titans Go!, I don't think there doing so expecting the creators to see it and change the show for them. (I know some do, but again, don't mix the rude jerks in with the rest of us.) They're doing it because they feel passionately, and want to share there opinions with others. Or because they see wasted potential. There's a difference between criticism and hating.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4Ai4G6ccfA

And the thing is...and this is something that I think I'm in the minority opinion on, but I don't think you HAVE to listen to every piece of criticism you get. I've noticed this trend as of late, where people expect that if they criticize something, the author or creator is obligated to change it. And if they don't then there just "not taking the criticism." But that's not how it works though. For example, if someone where to tell me "You're reviews are too long." I would definitely take that into consideration, and I would appreciate the input. However, I like overly long analytical reviews, and that's what I'm going to keep doing because that's the type of reviews I wanna make. I might try to shorten them a LITTLE bit, but I would never just start writing few hundred word reviews, cause that's not the art I wanna create. In the same vain, if Teen Titans Go! doesn't wanna except any of there criticism, that's fine. If the show wants to just go about doing it's own thing, more power to it. But when it does these criticism tackling episodes it's breaking the first rule of the internet. Never let people know when something bothers you. And yeah, I think if a TV show goes out of it's way to tell the critics "you suck" than the critics have the right to say it back. And I know you could say that the show has the right because they started that. But I don't know, there's just some part of me that believes that as the content creator, you have a responsibility to be the bigger person. If that makes sense? This show basically is "Dab On The Haters: The Animated Series." Really, all the criticism tackling episodes can be summed up like this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rnd6WLi3TWk

And the thing is, Teen Titans Go! really doesn't need to defend itself so hard. Because the show is a huge hit! It's clearly super popular with a large group of kids and adults alike. Why be so fixated on pleasing the people who you know your not going to please, when you can focus on the people who love you just the way you are? You don't see shows like Powerpuff Girls or Ben 10 reboots attacking the "haters" like this, and those shows don't even have the added advantage of being that popular. As it stands, Teen Titans Go! is a show that reeks of insecurity. And as much as I shit on the show last time, it shouldn't be. Clearly the show is doing something right if it lasted this long. Teen Titans Go! the show that taught me how NOT to handle criticism. And honestly, I thank the show for this. I'm a sensitive guy, and I can be very harsh on myself. Without Teen Titans Go! acting as an example of what NOT to do, I could see myself becoming that kinda guy, who mask his insecurities with a faux ego.

Hey...did you see the way I just casually used the word "faux." Oh, I'm great and anyone who think otherwise is dumb... However, I will give Teen Titans Go! this. I do think that when the humor goes "meta" it's when the shows comedy is at it's best. Because the people behind this show clearly know what this show is. They know it's reputation and it's status among other works of superhero fiction. Plus, as I said, the conversation around the show is far more interesting than the show itself. So when the show tacking these more interesting aspects the episodes tend to be more interesting as well. It's rare to find a show as self-aware of it's own status, and they take advantage of every opportunity that this presents. I just wish it could do so without insulting me is all. But do I even have the right to be criticizing this show though? I mean it's for kids, and kids clearly like it. Who right do I, a fully grown adult, have to stop kids from enjoying what they like. Why do I have to stand here and push my radical pro-Steven Universe agenda?! That has been an argument I have been seeing a lot lately. And honestly, there are some aspects I actually do agree with. If you are reviewing a show with the hope of convincing someone to hate something that they previously liked, just because you hate the show, than in my personal opinion you are reviewing the show for the wrong reason. If you like Teen Titans Go! and somehow made it this far in the review, I want to be clear, you have the right to like whatever you want to like. Whenever I do a negative review of something, it's never with the intent of trying to stop someone from enjoying something they like. I just want to express why I don't like it. As for the kid show argument, in some instances I agree with that argument too. Kids and adults are different. They have different taste and different things that they relate to. And shows are, from a business standpoint, targeted at a specific age demographics. I don't know why it's okay to call a show an "adult cartoon." but if you call a show a "kids show" it's deemed as an insult to the medium. Why is it wrong to say that I enjoy things aimed at kids? But getting back to the point, adults and kids look for different things in a show. Like, a kid obviously wouldn't be able to relate to the theme's presented in Bojack Horseman, and an adult would likely be board to tears by something like Peppa Pig. However, the difference here is that Teen Titans Go! airs on Cartoon Network. And thus, it should be held to the same standard as other Cartoon Network shows are held to, since all CN shows are pretty much aimed at the same general age range. Not only that, but the show is rated TV-PG! i.e.) The same rating as Adventure Time, Steven Universe, Regular Show, and Over the Garden Wall. Technically speaking, kids aren't even suppose to watch this show without an adult. So I think it's fair to say that this show SHOULD be made with kids and adults in mind. If this show was truly intended only for kids, and adults shouldn't watch it, than why are there so many 80's references and scenes that feel very...um....

Totally Spies...If you know what I mean. Basically, my point here is that it is, in my opinion, completely reasonable to cirque this show. And it's weird because the whole "It's for kids" and "Don't like, don't watch." arguments are usually seen as a joke argument. (even though I personally feel like both arguments do apply in certain situations.) But with this show, I see people using these arguments a lot. And to each there own, I'm not going to stand her and say your argument is "invalid." But I think it is odd that this show seems to be the only show where these arguments is deemed "acceptable." Also, if you watch Cartoon Networks live feed on a regular basis, it's hard to follow the "Don't like, don't watch." rule because the show is on so frickin' much!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyxX3ix2jp8

What makes this ad worse is how much this kid looks like Logan Paul... Cartoon Network spams this show. And while I'm sure that this show would still very much be hated regardless of the scheduling, I think the scheduling is a major factor in how this show manged to stay a relevant topic of conversation in the cartoon community for over five years at this point. Humans, in case you haven't realized this by now, are very stubborn and spiteful creature by nature. If you shove something down someone's throat, or in this case tell that that it's there new favorite show, there bound to have an adverse reaction. Regardless of the actually quality of the product. Also, the show wasn't even "new" when that ad campaign started! However, I do want to point out that it isn't Teen Titans Go's! fault that it's being spammed so much. It's Cartoon Networks scheduling departments. Traditional television is dying, and channels need to air what gives them ratings. Cartoon Network has always been in last place rating wise, when compared to there rivals Nickelodeon and Disney. They need to air what gives them ratings. And Teen Titans Go! is that. I get it. However, and keep in mind I'm not an expert on any of this and have no idea what I'm really talking about, I feel like eventually this will come back to bite them. EVENTUALLY Teen Titans Go! is going to end. Even if it's after we're all long dead and buried, the show will die. It's already been running for five years, which is an eternity in kid cartoon time. And when this show does end, CN is going to need something else to keep people coming back. Because as of now, this show and Gumball (which is ending soon.) are the channels only main draws with the ratings. CN, as of it stands now, needs this show. And when this show does end, they'll need some kind of back up series if they hope to survive in this modern, cord cutting climate. This cash cow can't be milked forever. R-right? P-Please God, tell me it can't last forever!

...Again with the Totally Spies. But while I'm on the topic of Teen Titans Go! success, I have to ask the question of why? Why do kids gravitate more towards this show, in particular? Because as I stated in the last part, the idea taking an establish i.p and making a more comedic slice of life reboot may have been fresh back in 2013, but now of days we are over saturated with shows just like that. Show's like Powerpuff Girls 2016, Ben 10, and to a lesser extent Justice League Action and Be Cool Scooby-Doo are all more comedic versions of there respected brands, but none of those shows are nearly as successful. (And this isn't me saying those shows are bad because they follow TTG's mold. It's all about execution and I'm trying to make a point.) What does Teen Titans Go! have that these other shows don't? The way I see it, the reason why Teen Titans Go! is popular while those other "Teen Titans Go-esq shows" (Even the really good ones like Justice League Action.) aren't has to do with intent and execution. Those other shows only chose to become more comedic because it was deemed "more marketable." And while I'm sure that was a factor in why Teen Titans Go! was pitched as a comedy, I feel the difference is how the shows chose to treat itself. Those other shows are made to be safe and marketable. They want fans new and old to like the show, so people will be more likely to buy the merch, which in turn will fund more seasons. Teen Titans Go! on the other hand, doesn't care about playing it "safe." It'll do whatever crazy and messed up things it wants to. The show revels in it's inaccuracy to the original. A marketing team and a bunch of executives think Teen Titans Go! is successful because it's a comedy based on a beloved brand. But the reason I think it's popular is because it doesn't give a fu*k! To people who like this show, that's why they like it. And that's why the show is so interesting to talk about. Also there a lot of elements in Teen Titans Go! appeals to kids. It's full wish fulfillment. Who doesn't want all the power and none of the responsibility. Who doesn't want to not have to worry about school or work, and just sit on a couch eating food all day. The show is loud, crazy, and colorful. It appeals to kids, and some adults, on a base level. It appeals to our more lazy and selfish aspects of our personalities that we all have, but chose to keep buried inside out of fear of social consequence. And while all that may sound harsh, I really don't mean that as an insult. There's nothing wrong with a show appealing to those aspects of our subconscious, because it can allow us to express those feelings without acting upon them. It's the same reason why people like characters like Bender from Futurama, or Rick from Rick and Morty. Teen Titans Go! is that for kids, and there's nothing wrong with that. Especially in a time where so many other kids shows are so nice and non-cynical. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So, to wrap everything up, Teen Titans Go! might just be one of the most fascinating and influential shows of the 2010's? But do I recommend it? Well, despite EVERYTHING I ranted about in part one, from the lackluster comedy, horrendous writing, lazy reusing of voice acting and animation, and the lack of basic understanding when it comes to telling a story...I surprisingly actually do highly recommend it.

Listen, just hear me out here. While this show in all technical aspects is a frickin' train wreck. But sometimes, you just want to watch a train wreck unfold. It's fascinating to see just what this show is going to do next. What crazy, half backed decision it'll do. And honestly, it's hard not to admire how much the show just goes for it, even if "it" isn't something that you should go for. The show has this element of "watch-ability" even if I know the show itself isn't technically "good." It's a show worth watching, if for no other reason than to have an opinion on it. I think it's pretty obvious who will love this show, who will hate this show, and who will ironically love it. Maybe it's just Stockholm syndrome, but I will be genuinely sad when this show does come to an end. But I want to end on this note. If you hate this show with a fire-y passion, feel free to do so. You have the right to like or not like whatever you want. Don't be afraid of giving your opinion just because your worried that people will think that your a "hater" or that it's "cringy to still be talking about Teen Titans Go! in 2018." Value your thoughts and share them with the masses. Just don't be a jerk about it. Don't assume that "everyone who likes Teen Titans Go! are mindless sheeple." or complain that this show "ruined your childhood." Because forcing your opinion down other peoples throats will get you nowhere. And remember that no show last forever. In ten years from now this show will most likely be forgotten about. Think about how many people HATED Johnny Test just a few years ago, and complained about how much CN spammed that show. When was the last time anyone talked about that show? Meanwhile the original Teen Titans, a show that originally aired fifteen years ago, is still getting prime time reruns on Cartoon Network as recently as early 2018. And honestly, without Teen Titans Go!, there's a good chance that the interest in the original Teen Titans wouldn't have risen to the point where it is today. So you should thank TTG for that. And to the people who defend Teen Titans Go!, I get it. It can be rough loving something when EVERYBODY online hates it. I went threw a similar thing when the Powerpuff Girls reboot came out. It sucks feeling like you're in the minority opinion, but remember that just because something is hated online, that doesn't translate to actually results. There's a reason this show is on it's fifth seasons and got a theatrical film. And if you love this show, if it really is your new favorite show, enjoy that fact that a show you love is as popular and influential as it is. But don't be a jerk about your opinion either. Don't belittle people for feeling passionately about a series and remember that not EVERY person who hates the show isn't some kinda "hater." Never assume that the worse people in a group represents the whole group. And never let other people force you to hate something you love. You're taste make you the individual you are, and never forget that. I want to end this review with a line from Teen Titans Go! A line that I believe the show sadly forgot about, but is a message that I think is very important. Especially given the current climate of the cartoon community.

This applies to all sides. Hopefully this review was able to add something new to the table. What do you think of Teen Titans Go? Leave any thoughts you may have in the comments down bellow. I love love to hear all opinions from both sides of the aisle, and start some conversations. Maybe help people gain some new perspectives. Also what did you think of the format of this review? Would you like more deep dive retrospects in the future? Please fav, follow, and comment if you liked this review and have a great day.

https://www.deviantart.com/joyofcrimeart/journal/Teen-Titans-Go-REVIEW-Part-2-755898579 DA Link

#Teen Titans #Teen Titans Go!#Cartoon Community #Cartoon #Review

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the-desolated-quill · 5 years

Text

Luther 5x04 - Luther blog (So... now what?)

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

I’m extremely annoyed. Yes it’s because of the ending and no it’s not because Alice is dead. In fact that was the one bit I actually liked, believe it or not, but we’ll get to that later. For now let’s discuss the fifty eight minutes leading up to it.

So the hitman that killed Benny in the previous episode has kidnapped Alice and Mark, using them as a way to lure Luther to him. First up I’m irritated that Alice has once again been made the role of damsel in distress like she was in the Series 3 finale. I’m sorry, but she deserves better than that, thank you. Also, poor Mark North! His return in the previous episode was a pleasant surprise, but Neil Cross has done absolutely nothing with him. Paul McGann is brilliant as ever, of course, but he has no good material to work with. You could have replaced him with a lamp or a prize Yorkshire terrier and it wouldn’t have made a difference. What a waste of great talent!

Same goes for Wunmi Mosaku has DS Halliday. Over the course of this series, we’ve learned precisely nothing about her and she and Luther have never spent any significant amount of time with each other to truly bond. Her main role in the story seems to be to cover for Luther while he goes AWOL and to get killed by Alice so that it would give Luther something to be pissed off about in the last five minutes.

A lot of the problems in this series stems from Cross trying to juggle all of these plot points around like a one armed clown that has gotten too ambitious for their own good. The initial premise of a creepy murderer/sex fetishist and his scheming, malevolent wife has often been pushed to the side to make way for increasingly convoluted story threads that seem to be picked up and discarded more times than a TV series adaptation of Constantine. Even the whole hitman plot is resolved within the first fifteen minutes. Rather than doing what the hitman wants, Luther just goes to George Cornelius and the two of them just go and kill him. So what was the bloody point of any of that? (Of course this comes back into play later on, but we’ll come to that).

Anyway, with Vivian in police custody, Jeremy is now completely unshackled and free to hammer as many nails into as many corpses as he likes. Except he doesn’t do that. He instead plays ‘Happy Families.’ No, not like the card game. He instead kills the teacher who witnessed the murder in the first episode and from her house hires everyone from plumbers to escorts to come round so he can kill them and stick masks of his own face onto them. I swear this guy changes MOs like Warner Bros changes their DC movie schedule. I get that this is a power thing, but that’s not what was driving him initially. He was having these uncontrollable urges because of his job as a heart surgeon and was encouraged by his wife to kill people as a form of sexual release. It was never about displaying strength. It was about managing weakness. As creepy as ‘Happy Families’ is, it doesn’t really fit with what’s been established about him before. And when did he get the time to make masks of his own face?

Vivian on the other hand has been a really strong character throughout this series and I love how she’s outsmarted in the end. She of course has been entirely complicit with her husband’s actions, but is claiming she was merely a reluctant accomplice trying to rescue Jeremy, sticking to her story that she was trying to save the kidnapped woman from the previous episode, as opposed to disposing of her. However Luther picks up on the dynamics of their relationship and uses it to his advantage. Whereas Vivian wanted to keep the killings private for the sake of her career, Jeremy was always very public about his obsessions, allowing it to bleed into his work life. Turned out Jeremy had been keeping records of their crimes for years, written in code so that his wife wouldn’t realise what he was doing. This was such a satisfying moment and that dawning realisation on her face, that her husband had dropped her in the shit, was just absolutely priceless. Both Idris Elba and Hermione Norris were outstanding during this interrogating scene and Dr. Vivian Lake is without a doubt the highlight of Series 5.

So Vivian is convicted and Jeremy is captured, which leads to one last plot thread to take care of. Alice Morgan and George Cornelius. I have to say the final confrontation between Alice and Luther was extremely gripping, well written and exceptionally performed by Elba and, in particular, Ruth Wilson, with many callbacks to their first encounter in the first series. We see Alice grow increasingly desperate as she realises that she no longer has any control over Luther and as the scene goes on, you slowly realise that there was only one way this was going to end. With either one or both of them dying. Yes that was a surprise, seeing Alice fall to her death, but I felt it was good decision on Neil Cross’ part as it allowed their story to come full circle. It would have been a good ending not just for the series, but potentially the entire show itself. Luther ends the same way he began. Staring down a big hole with the body of his arch-nemesis lying at the bottom. Very poetic.

That’s how it should have ended... but then the last two minutes went and spoiled it.

Schenk finds out Benny is dead as well as discovering the body of the hitman. Naturally he assumes George Cornelius did it, so he goes to arrest him, only to then be presented of a photo of Luther holding a gun (bearing in mind that while Luther did shoot at the hitman, it was George that fired the killing shot). At which point he toddles off and arrests Luther for murder, even stripping off his tweed coat for symbolism’s sake, and our weary hero gets taken away in handcuffs. The end.

Okay. Let me explain why this pissed me off so much. First of all, this is the third time we’ve seen this happen. Luther being framed for a murder he didn’t commit. It’s just boring and unimaginative at this point. Second, it just feels incredibly forced, trying to build up hype for a Luther movie or a potential series 6, And third is what this does to Schenk.

Now I like Schenk. He’s a great character and Dermot Crowley has always given an extremely good performance. What makes Schenk stand out for me is how his character is presented in the context of the show. When we were first introduced to him in Series 1, he was the head of complaints investigating Luther, and Luther’s reaction to his first appearance spoke volumes. Luther has made many enemies within the police department during his career, but Schenk was the only one he was ever actually intimidated by. And the reason for this was because Schenk is a bloody good detective, and the show justifies this. In the first series finale, Schenk was the first one to realise something wasn’t quite right and realise that Ian Reed had framed Luther for Zoe’s murder. Also the dialogue between Luther and Schenk implied a kind of mutual respect between them that we’ve never really seen with any of the other coppers Luther has worked with. In other words, Schenk is not an idiot. He’s a great detective in his own right and, above all, he knows Luther. He knows him and respects him enough to give him the benefit of the doubt.

This episode feels like an utter betrayal of his character because in order for the final cliffhanger to work, Schenk has to be an idiot. What proof is there that Luther killed the hitman? A photo. There could be any number of reasons for that. The gun could have belonged to the hitman and he picked it up. It could have been self defence. And it doesn’t discount the fact that there’s CCTV footage of George Cornelius pulling a gun on the hitman. So doesn’t it seem more likely that george was the one that killed the hitman? Also Schenk knows Luther and knows this isn’t the first time he’s been framed for something like this. Surely he must know by now that Luther would never do such a thing. Okay, Halliday gets shot minutes after Schenk instructs her to bring Luther back for questioning, but considering he knows Alice Morgan is back and later finds her body lying at the bottom of a hole, doesn’t it seem more likely that Alice killed her and Luther attempted to make an arrest? (which is what actually happened). But surely the biggest giveaway should be that when Schenk does find Luther, he’s injured with several gun and knife wounds, again all pointing toward self defence.

Now look, I’m not saying Luther is squeaky clean, because obviously he fucking isn’t, but there’s more evidence to suggest Luther’s innocence than his guilt. In a court of law, guilt must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. There’s more doubt here than at a scientific conference hosted by Dr Oz. It’s just utterly moronic and it really pissed me off.

In a way Series 5 represents the best and worst aspects of the show. There’s some great ideas, great character moments and superb performances, but also an abundance of overly convoluted plotting, poor pacing and moments of utter stupidity, all culminating in a massive cock-tease cliffhanger that does more to annoy than entice. If Luther does come back for another series, I confess I won’t be in that much of a hurry to watch it after this.

#luther 5x04 #luther #idris elba #neil cross #bbc #review #spoilers

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ducavalentinos · 5 years

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Hey, what are in your opinion the best fiction and nonfiction books about the Borgia family? And why?

Hey anon!

It took me awhile to answer this because is always a tricky question for me lol. I think I’m rather picky when it comes to them, but also I’m constantly changing my mind. Anyways here it goes:

Best:

The Poisoner Mysteries, Sara Poole: So, I must say that the main character, Francesca, can be very annoying and completely unrealistic as a woman in the 14th. But these trilogy has been my favorite so far because the Borgia family is written amazingnly well. I was suprised actually! The writer achieved such a wonderful characterizion of Cesare, a rare balance of giving him his humanity, but also acknowledging his flaws. I adore her Cesare. Her Lucrezia is fine here, didn’t bothered me, she has great dialogues. And her Rodrigo is pretty much how I see him irl. Also there’s a lot of mysteries, which I love. I just had a lot of fun reading it, it was delightful.

Fuyumi Soryo, Cesare: Il Creatore che ha distrutto: I think is brilliant how Soryo showed that serious, historical fiction about the Borgia family can be done without resorting to old clichés and sensationalistic gossip, and still make it fun and entertaining. I’m grateful for the respect and dedication her and her team have showed towards Cesare. And I just love everything about her manga. The main character, Angelo, is great. The relationship he develops with both Cesare and Miguel is so so good! The Medici family is also great here. Lucrezia is adorable! Rodrigo is again, exactly how I see him. And last but not least, the drawings! especially the coloured ones are stunning. So much detail, it’s a work of art, really.

Mario Puzo, The Family: It’s like a classic Borgia fiction, some people hate it, but I absolutely love it! If you must take advantage of all the rumors and misdeeds that surrounds the Borgia family, then I expect you should do it as masterfully as Puzo did it.

Sara Bower, Sins of the House of Borgia: I love it because 1) The main character is super relatable to me sorry not sorry lool, 2) Bower wrote Lucrezia so so well. A complex, well rounded character, that’s neither a victim nor a poisoner. Which it’s how I see her irl. Her writing is beautiful too. Those Cesare and Lucrezia’s letters had me dying!!!!! That being said, I must say that nowdays her Cesare feels ooc sometimes, and her Vannozza still feels rather harsh and unfair imo. But overall it remains a favorite of mine.

Françoise Sagan, Le Sang Doré Des Borgia: I actually haven’t read the book, but the book is basically the transcription of the tv series, which I watched and it’s my favorite Borgia adaptation! I don’t know how Sagan did it, but her Lucrezia is amazing and accurate and ughh what a queen!

Worst:

Jean Plaidy, Madonna of the Seven Hills/ Light on Lucrezia: OH MY GOD, these books are so cringely bad I think the only reason I was able to finish is because it was my first borgia fiction and even then, I suffered getting through with it. Everyone is ooc af. There is one or two good dialogues between Lucrezia and Cesare, but overall what a disaster! I still don’t understand wth the writer was thinking while she was writing that, nor how you can get the WHOLE family all wrong at the same time??? But yeah, I guess that happens sometimes idk lmaoo.

Sarah Dunant, Blood and Beauty: Listen, if you go to Goodreads, you’ll see how praised this book is. And I do admit Dunant is a good writer. However, she is on this side of my list for a very simple reason: she made me hate Lucrezia. Goddd, she tries way too hard to present Lucrezia as the good girl™, beacon of innocence and goodness, and what comes out of it is this incredibly annoying, dull and stupid character that made me roll my eyes each time I had to read her dialogues like: Oh no, more bullshit! can we just go back to Cesare and Rodrigo? their servants? Juan? Joffre? literally anyone would be more interesting to read than her Lucrezia istg. Also if you are a cesare x lucrezia shipper, just know that in order for Dunant to keep Lucrezia on this ridiculous and unrealistic pedestal, their relationship had to be sabotaged. So don’t be fooled by the hardcover copy, nor the lovely dialogues at the beginning, it gets bittesweet pretty fast. And as if all this wasn’t enough, I still had to read with my own two eyes Dunant claiming her book is as close to real life as possible. Just no. Unacceptable. I realized this ended up becoming a mini-rant, sorry anon! I just really loathe this book. It broke my confidence on Goodreads’s review system, that’s for sure.

Elena/Michela Martignoni, Cuore di Tiranno/Verdugo de Tiranos: Too sensationalistic and badly written. And it does have unnecessary violence against women. It would be one thing if they could back that up with hard evidence, which they can’t. All we have is a bunch of theories, so how their minds went where it did there is kinda disturbing imo. It’s not type of reading.

Dumas, The Borgias: Not so much for how he uses and abuses of all the Borgia alleged “sins”, but because his writing is very confusing. It’s too dry to be fiction, but it doesn’t work as non-fiction either because there are some dialogues sometimes. It’s weird and I couldn’t finish it.

Non-fiction:

So, I kinda answered this one here. I would only add that Woodward’s bio on Cesare is not too bad. I mean there were times I wanted to quit reading it, but his last chapters are ok and he offers a good amount of sources and evidence, which I always appreciate.

#ask answered #anon ask #house borgia #books #my thoughts #there are other books anon #but they're not good enough to enter best category nor so bad to enter worst imo #these are the main ones i think #i'm currently reading another one in french called la vie de césar borgia but i need to finish to really say what i thought #but it's ok so far #just know that borgia books both on fiction and historical are mess and it depends on how you see the family and personal taste i think #thanks for the ask!#i love talking about my beloved renaissance family #<333

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parachutingkitten · 6 years

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Season 1 Analysis

STANDARD DISCLAIMER: I am going to be applying the concept of criticism to a TV show you presumably love and adore as much as I do. If you do not want your idea that the show is immaculate to be challanged, I would not advise reading past this point.

Mood for this season: Logic? Nahh...

I'm taking three film classes right now, I only rip it apart because I love it! (Sry, if I seem a little overly critical at times)

So, let's start with some background (you get to learn about me, yay! This is what you came here for. Right?). When the original series (seasons 1 and 2) came out in 2012, my little brother, at the age of six, was THE target audience for lego ninjas that you could battle and spin really really fast. I... am five years older than him. He collected sets, and he even bought me a spinner pack with the "girl character", the "blue one", and one of the skeletons so that I could play with him. To this day they are the only legos I own, but they sit in an altoids tin in my night stand. It was right before our family moved to Germany (we're a military family btw) that our parents purchased the disk episodes of seasons one and two. When you live in Europe, you tend to want to do a LOT of traveling. Every weekend, I kid you not, we went to another country. Which means road trips. And road trips mean movies. I would always let my brother choose what we watched, because he was the one who would get fussy and upset, so we watched a lot of Kung Fu Panda, and Madagascar, and a LOT of Cars (as in plural movies. I quote Cars 2, regularly), but the thing we watched most often was those niniago DVDs. Because you could just auto play those episodes one after another for a seemingly endless movie that would last until you arrived. So, I've seen these episodes a few times. Like, A LOT of times. Drilling these episodes into my mind over and over is what made me obsessed with it later (but we'll talk about that when we get to season 3).

Upon rewatching... they are exactly as I remember. There were no real surprises, so I don't feel like I have too much to say shock value wise, but that doesn't mean I don't have anything to say.

Plot

I've made a joke post about this before, but season one does fall into the treasure hunt formula. Find a fang blade. Lose it. Look for next one. Repeat for the next few episodes. Same thing can be said for the true potential. Find what holds them back emotionally, overcome it by the end of the episode to save the person/people you needed to fix your relationship with, glowing orb/pillar to make you certifiably awesome. For four. Episodes. Straight. Even if you space out the episodes where the ninja get their true potential, or when they find the fang blades, it would keep you on your toes a bit more. This being said... it does greatly help to give every episode a PLOT purpose. Every one of those "previously on ninjago" recaps was shoving a bunch of stuff in there. Most ninjago episodes do serve a purpose (except of course the atrocity that is the first half of season two - we WILL get to that next time) at least character development wise, but it is nice to have meaningful plot development too and keep a consistent pace throughout the season. This season certainly keeps up the pace. There is not an episode you can just miss. Even with the recap, you would still probably be confused. One thing that NO OTHER SEASON has over this one, hands down (aside from season 9 maybe, idk yet) is flow from season to season. Planning benefits this season GREATLY. It carries over things from the pilot, and sets up more to come in the next season. Watch them all together and it flows more naturally than any other season bookends. (Although I will say all the ninjago season transitions are smoother than any of Chima's [I will not touch that rabbit hole EVER again])

Characters

Character interaction is AMAZING this season. You really get to know the characters and feel all their growth equally. Every. One. Of. Them.

Think about it, Wu has an arc with his brother, Lloyd has an arc with the green ninja, Nya has an arc as samurai x, and it goes without saying that all of our regulars have an arc. And... that's about it. Those are all the characters. And I think that's why this season works so well.

You have four main characters, a handful of side characters, and they all get time and focus. Everyone has something to do during this season. As the season's go on and we accumulate more and more characters there's less screentime to go around, and the characters can suffer for it. There's a reason by season 6 they were literally REMOVING characters from the show. They don't have time to get distracted by Kai and his petty problems and drama this season, cuz Jay needs some focus for once, and we'd like to give him a little development gosh darn it! But I'm getting ahead of myself. This season works really well. Just because I feel like I should, I'm going to give you a breakdown on my feelings on new characters as they pop up or change dramatically, and because this is the first season, that means we get to do it for... all the characters! So here we go.

Nya

She's good this season. She's the most responsible in the group. The samurai x reveal was handled really well. Making all the ninja jealous of her really worked to give her credibility. She's just the right amount of strong and independent while still retaining her femininity. It goes WAY down hill when season 3 hits, but as for season 1 Nya I actually really enjoy her.

I mean... what are you going to say? He's Wu? Anyone have a problem with Wu? No? Good, moving on.

Kai

So... this is where my bias comes out. Quick piece of info, my elemental personality is water... so like the opposite of fire. I see a little bit of myself in each of the ninja... except Kai. And I think that's why he's my least favorite. Don't get me wrong! I don't hate Kai or anything! He's got some good lines (episode 5 comes to mind) he's adorkable enough. It's not hard to play or to write a hot head, but it's hard to play or write a hot head that I personally enjoy. I think what Kai is missing for me personally is the tripping over himself because of his attitude, and sarcasm. Sarcasm and sass. It's there, it's just not as prevalent as I personally would like it. He has a lot of opportunities and theoretical development, I'm not sure too many of them were taken advantage of fully, or maybe they just didn't read the way I personally can grasp it, but none of it felt very completed or meaningful. Like I said, I'm a water gal, so maybe I just can't relate and that's why it's not as powerful. I'd be interested to see your rankings of the ninja and how they line up with your own elemental personality. There's got to be a correlation there, right?

Conclusion, just not for me

Cole

Cole and Jay are tied for second favorite in general. It fluctuates from season to season depending on what's going on, but for season 1 Jay has Cole beat. I think the only reason just being screen time. Goodness knows Cole has been a bit neglected in that category, but hey. He's still really good for what he's got. I think in real life I probably act the most like Cole. I try to be serious, responsible and a leader and then I just get goofy sometimes. I love his true potential episode! It's funny, and heartwarming, and the only episode actually about him, so it's fun to see!

Conclusion, just needs more love

Jay

Jay is then, my second favorite for the season. He's funny. What else can I say? Personal opinion; Jay freakouts are the best this season. Especially at the climax. He just has that pure goofball-ness to him this season that makes his humor not annoying and actually relatable and funny. I also love his family to death! He loves them, he knows it, we know it, and the interactions between them are precious! It really is the way he plays off of other people that makes him enjoyable. He has a lot more dry humor here than other season, which I am partial to. I've got some kinks to work out with this one in later seasons but for now, he's good.

Conclusion, No, I'm the real Jay!

Zane

...My baby! Especially this season he is so innocent, loving, caring, and mysterious that I can't help but love the heck out of this guy! I am a sucker for a good mystery! He has this whole other world he's a part of with his "sixth sense" and falcon and running away at night. It's unique and special to him and it's really cool! Plus, there is SO much ATMOPHERE that comes with this guy and MAN I LOVE it! It's all just so beautiful. I love interactions between him and Jay, I love his mutual respect with Cole, I love EVERYTHING. This season and the next have the most growth for him, and it shows.

Conclusion, there's a reason we call him the pure one

Romance

Kinda adding this one last minute, but I think it needs to be here. All we got this season is Jay and Nya but BOY has their relationship changed! This is the single one thing that caught me off guard. I forgot what their relationship, especially before Jay's true potential, is like. Honestly, I love it! They're so awkward and clumsy around each other at first, and then grow into this understanding couple of one another. There's not too much emphasis on it, but it's sprinkled in everywhere. I like it! Maya approved!

Villians

The devourer arc is one of my favorites. Maybe it's the nostalgia tingles at work again, but the snakes are ninjago's quintessential villains. Nothing can ever hope to replace them. It feels natural in the plot, they have their own culture and beliefs, and their motivation makes sense. You have your legitimately scary villains and bumbling comic villians in perfect balance. Scales starting as second in command was an amazing call. It proves he has power he's earned, is not easily put down and sets up his lust for power to be explored later. Pythor. Oh man oh man Pythor. I am a sucker for ATMOSPHERE and his introduction is BEAUTIFUL. Utilizes the rule of 3s and completely subverts your expectations with that eerie empty tomb. I love it! So manipulative! So sly! They aren't my all time favorite villians, but they're certainly among the best the show has to offer.

Garmadon is also there. He's half good half bad... sorta. Idk. He's not especially interesting, at least compared to the snakes and what they're up to. Let's be honest, he's just waiting around to get awesome in season 2 ;) I do like when he comes in with all the skeletons like, "yeah, no one likes you. Screw snakes!" Only to walk that COMPLETELY back next season, but you know. Whatever.

Lloyd... should I put him here? He's enjoyably annoying for a little bit... and then just annoyingly annoying. It's not too bad. He has some redeeming moments. Once he's the green ninja and has some responsibility on his shoulders, he gets a lot better.

Climax

... I love it. I don't know what else to say. It's tense, it has proper build up, the threat is real, they get desperate, they come up with a creative solution, they work together, there are stakes, there's good action, good drama, good humor. I don't have any complaints. I can't touch this one. There are minor things, but I don't think they're worth bringing up. Go watch it. It's freaking awesome. Enough said.

Humor

Pretty good this season. There are a few eye roll lines, but that's in all the seasons. Things can get kinda stupid, but for the most part, especially some of the more subtle humor really works.

Favorite line of the season, Cole's "I don't like metaphors" episode 11 - All of Nothing. You're welcome.

Drama

Not overly saturated this season, which is kinda nice. I mean, there's always "drama" but as far as heavy stuff, we have Zane's whole crisis thing, and then the Garmadon family reunion. I'll get to how I feel about the Zane stuff down below. As for the Garmadon stuff... it's fine. Gets a lot better next season, but for now... fine.

Spotlight Episode

So for every season I'll choose one episode that stood out to me to either praise or criticize in detail. There are a lot of episodes that come to mind for season 1 for one reason or another. The one about the power of rumors (also known as the pink ninja episode), lloyd rescuing the team, Cole's true potential is a classic episode with a good mix of heart and comedy, and of course THE FINALE, but because I am biased, and because I am a sucker for personal drama, season one's spotlight episode is episode 7, Tick tock, Zane's true potential. This was by far the episode me and my brother watched together the most. Aside from the movie Cars, it's probably the one piece of media we have scene the most times together. The episode begins by establishing Wu leaving, the ninja are at a loss of what to do and then... THE FALCON. Best character this season! XD seriously, the falcon theme is one of, if not my favorite piece of music in the show. Certainly the most memorable. And most importantly it kicks in the ATMOSPHERE! Have I mentioned ATMOSPHERE?

ATMOSPHERE

I am a sucker for some good ATMOSPHERE (no, I will not stop spelling it in all caps), and BOY the falcon chase scene! Zane is slowly taken away from his team members in order to reflect upon himself, and as he runs through the snow by himself to follow this bird you can see his determination, curiosity, desperation, and just that Zane factor that makes you go "awww, my child! He must be protected!" (Even though, you know, he was built to protect and all that) but just AGHH! I can't put into words for beautiful this whole sequences is! Go watch it right now! Look at that beautiful Zane! Listen to that music! That FREAKING MUSIC AGGHHHHHH! I LOVE IT SO AGGRESSIVELY! LISTEN TO IT! LIKE SERIOUSLY, LISTEN, HERE'S THE LINK!

https://youtu.be/2p07cgwwYws

It makes my heart SO happy! Idk if I'm the only one who feels that way about this scene but oh... oh how it gets me. Every. Time. Michael Kramer and Jay Vincent are freAKING GODS!

Okay. I'm done with the falcon chase. Now onto, like... the part of the episode people care about. The tree house, again, an amazing location. Unique, and mysterious, and as soon as he walks in, you just get this sense of memory. The flash back is ADORABLE and the others finding him... I think this was handled pretty well. Their reactions seem genuine (I mean, I would want to get out of there as soon as humanly possible too XD) and you can feel the genuine concern from all of the ninja, trying to help their buddy out in their own ways.

Zane's true potential feels really earned, and his thing that holds him back was established as soon as the series began. He was different and weird and he didn't know where he came from. Coming to accept what he is, accepting his past and finding an identity of his own is what gives him the power to unlock it.

Now, just for fun and because I know I'm going to hear it in the comments like "why is Zane's discovery of identity more valid than anyone else's? What about Kai! His true potential is entirely based on finding his purpose!" And yes. Theoretical commentor you make a valid point, but I think the key difference is in the identity they find when they unlock it.

Zane accepts his personality, his past, and his robotic nature as himself and can be proud of who he is as his own person. The thing that held him back was vague and sort of indefinable, and what he became afterwards was concrete, solid, and dependable. That's why you feel like the character has gotten stronger.

Kai goes in the opposite direction. The thing that holds him back is that he wants to be the green ninja. That's solid and concrete. The problem then becomes that you know exactly how the potential will play out. He's going to face something, discover he's not the green ninja, and come to terms with it. And his ending identity is much more vague. His purpose is to protect the green ninja... okay, what does that mean? What kind of a person does that make you? He didn't change as a person, his views about a certain topic where changed. Those are two very different levels of progress.

And I know you can argue that it wasn't the green ninja thing he needed to get past, he needed to get past his pride and all that, but even if you make that argument that conclusion is harder to reach and less apparent than Zane's progress as a character. Zane's progress is entirely centered on him. Kai's progress will never be separated from Lloyd. Just watch the episode. It feels like a Lloyd episode. I remember thinking the first time I watched it when he came out of the volcano "wait... what was his true potential? Why is this happening?"

Anyway, that's my little soap box rant. I hope I didn't offend too many Kai fans. Again, it's probably just my water bias coming into play. I know there's a frame work in place for development of all these characters, and every single one of them gets an arc and theoretically everything should work out and make sense and work beautifully and perfectly, but sometimes when you step back and look at it, it's just a matter of "but does it work?" And maybe it's a matter of opinion, but Kai's potential didn't work for me.

I've been on this way to long. I'm stopping now.

Misc

I really like the suits this season. They're all unique and the masks... compliment the Lego head shape nicely? Does that make sense? It makes them look a bit cuter. Anyone else see that? Idk, maybe I'm just going crazy.

Watch this season thinking about how the snakes become good in season 3...

I want more of the Pink ninja.

I love scales and his slight incompetence. Not total, just slight.

This exchange:

Pythor: I hardly have any friends

Lloyd: Woah! I hardly have any friends too!

Pythor: You don't say!

All together I really like this season. Light hearted, funny, good action and characters. Not super compelling or anything, but it doesn't need to be. Second best season for nostalgia tingles in general, third best for me personally. Most of this is a matter of opinion, so don't fret too much over anything I say. I'd love to see your thoughts/rankings/comments/disagreements in the notes! That's the point of this thing!

If there are any aspects of the season I skipped, let me know, I'm not perfect.

Thanks for reading! And if you got this far... I don't know. Work the word saxophone into your comment. Bonus points if it makes sense!

-Maya (a.k.a. parachutingkitten)

#ninjago #ninjago season one #rise of the snakes #analysis #parachuterants

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douchebagbrainwaves · 3 years

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CALDER'S SCULPTURES NEVER GET BORING

This is part of what big companies pay extra for is the next Apple, or the market wasn't ready yet, b the founders solved the wrong problem. While writing the prototype, the group has been traversing their network of friends in search of angel investors. I think new theorems are a fine thing to create, but there are few outside the US, startups will do a rolling close, where they can choose for themselves, rely instead on the opinions of other investors. Big companies think the function of office space is to express rank. I think a bigger problem is that the kind of things most people use computers for, a tenth of your time working on new stuff. The smart ones learn who the other smart ones are, and together they cook up new projects of their own, they'd screw it up. Even worse than the spectacular abuses might be the overall decrease in efficiency that would accompany increased secrecy. You don't have the clean, sparse feel they used to be for getting users. A lot of investors hated the idea, but not because of some right turn the country took during the Reagan administration, but because it gives you another source of ideas: look at big companies, you'd need an impressive-looking sales force to sell it to them as a web service. But with company names there is another possible approach. In fact, the reason startups do better when deprived of this crutch anyway. The first stories about Jaynes cited this source, but now that the things we build are so complicated, there's another way to convince investors to let you do it like a pilot scanning the instrument panel, not like a detective trying to unravel some mystery.

The url is in such cases practically enough by itself to determine whether the email is neutral, the spam probability will hinge on the url, and it was like trying to run through waist-deep water. For some reason this seems to be toward the merely unpalatable. That means it has to stay popular to stay good. As long as you're profitable. Or rather, my inbox is a todo list. After we fund startups we work closely with them for three months outweighs the inconvenience of moving. In such rounds they won't get the 25 to 40% of the company and demand that it take immediate action to cure any past violations of securities laws. At best you end up with a statistical sort of correctness. Can't you just think of new ideas. In fact, the language encourages you to be omniscient, but actually they tend to be about 15? We're just working on search. One of our axioms at Y Combinator is not to try to create a startup hub.

And when people seem to share a certain prickly independence, whenever and wherever they lived. We hated our last TV so much that a competitor will trip them up as that they will trip over themselves. You don't need to raise money, but also as a way of saving you work, rather than carry a single unnecessary ounce. In theory you could stick together ideas at random like this, but others haven't decided what they'll do afterward. To me she seems the best novelist of all time. Don't be evil. But investors are so fickle that you can learn from them. On the other hand, startup investing is a very strange business. When you have the degenerate case. For a startup, then hand them off to VC firms for the next round. Good ideas and valuable ideas are very close to good ideas, use them, but more than full-time.

So the lower we can get the response rate—whether by filtering, or by redesigning the product in the way of redesign. There's a real difference, because an assertion provokes objections in a way that seemed to reflect the personality of the city. And while governments might be able to pinch it off at the point where they're used. And no one can tell you, that requires your complete attention. Only a few do so far, startups that turn down acquisition offers is not necessarily that all such offers undervalue startups. There will be many different ways to learn different things, and some may look quite different from what happens in college. That's orders of magnitude better than desktop software. Our startup begins when a group of people they didn't already know. If you're starting your own company, because you're only replacing one segment instead of discarding the whole thing. Though I'd really like to know how she does what she does, I can't imagine they'll work any less hard to feed stories to bloggers, if they built whole towns, market forces would compel them to pay attention to you. Now survival is the default, instead of paying attention to what users needed, or c the company spent too much and burned through their funding before they started to make the implementation easier to port, but it turned out that many did. You release software as a series A round, the round is going to solve this problem, but it can be good for writing the kinds of programs they want to write desktop software, because desktop software has become a lot less money.

But I think that while stricter laws may not decrease the amount of memory you need for each user's data. One solution to this problem, without waiting for the government. When he rides the Eunicycle, people smile at him. How are they to hear? What a wonderful thing, to be able to reproduce the error and release a fix. US News & World Report. Some time before the release date you assemble a new version of your software by a certain date? And when someone can put on my todo list, I looked to see if there was a problem with acquisitions is that they lead to more ideas.

And then there is the question of what this new Lisp also had powerful libraries for doing what hackers want to do it. Their format is convenient, especially when you're generating code, to have operators that take any number of arguments. This should yield a much sharper estimate of the probability. You have to make their fortunes will continue to work for people with high standards. Last year one founder spent the whole first half of his talk on a fascinating analysis of the limits of the conventional desktop metaphor. And it has to be modified to: stay upwind for as long as you're still actively developing the product. One way of using patents that clearly does not encourage innovation is when established companies with bad products use patents to suppress small competitors with good products. Result: if it can't contain exciting sales pitches, spam becomes less effective as a marketing vehicle, and fewer businesses want to use. This was not how things worked at Viaweb. He said their business model is a down elevator. Another great thing about Web-based applications. The problem is, the USPTO are not hackers.

One easy way to build such a whitelist is to keep a list of the n most admirable people. And the way founders end up net ahead it's not coming out of organs not designed for that purpose. And put this kind of bug is the hardest to find, and also occurs once or twice in a big program is to start from the symptom and hope to fix the underlying causes. It also has to convince instead of commanding. They just want to invest in you, or his only duty is to the advantage of investors. This time the evidence is a mix of good and bad. In effect, this structure gives the investor a free option on the next round of investors can decide in a couple days. You can afford to be candid about what you haven't figured out yet. Writing is the same reason readers like them.

But it's also because money is not the hours but the responsibility. I had to predict now, I'd say that startups will build on, they have to understand the advantages startups get from being in America. Jack Lambert. The defining feature of spam in fact, that would not only not eliminate great variations in wealth, but might even exacerbate them. You might say that it's an accident that it thus helps identify this spam. If anyone is dishonest, it's the reporters. The problem in more traditional places like Europe and Japan goes deeper than the employment laws. A throwaway program is something that more and more programs may turn out to be really useful.

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cali-brate · 3 years

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best options trading subscription service West Virginia I like to call it "RTSB" which stands for "Read the Screen Bud". Yep, that is right. Open your eyes, turn off the TV, stop texting your friends, close your chat room windows, and look at what is on the trading screen right in front of you. In addition to displaying the current price and trading period every Binary Options trading screen has a button that will allow you to display the chart of the previous trading period. While "RTSB" is the visual cue to look at what is in front of you the analytical cue is for you to look at whether the price of the Asset is going Up or Down. The direction of movement is called the Trend Line and the question you need to answer for yourself is whether the Trend is going Up or is it going Down. If the Trend is going Up then you would consider making a CALL trade. However, if the Trend is going Down you want to consider making a PUT trade. The "DDSS" StrategyThe "DDSS" Strategy is also quite simple, "Don't Do Something Stupid". This strategy is best explained by an example. As you are looking at the charts for the Asset and you see the current price start to go Up then a few minutes later it goes Down by an almost equal amount, then a few minutes after that it goes Up again. If you look at the average price during this time period you should see that it remains almost the same. Some traders call it "Flat lined", but the trading term is " Sideways Moving". This is where you apply the "DDSS" strategy and DO NOT make any Trades for that Asset. A Sideways Moving price is very hard to predict and most of the time your prediction will be wrong. Stay away from it and look for another Asset that has an obvious Up or Down Trend Line. I must admit, the RTSB and DDSS strategies are really attention getters to highlight that you must pay attention to what you are doing as you can lose money fast if you do not do your own research before trading. The Spread StrategyThe Spread Strategy is a real trading strategy that has also been simplified by Binary Options trading. In conventional options trading you use the Spread or Straddle strategy to buy CALLS and sell PUTS on the same Asset. However, in Binary Options trading you can't place a Call and PUT trade for the same Asset unless you are using two different trading Brokers which is not recommended. The basic idea of the Spread in Binary Options is to find two Assets where the Trend line is Up for one and Down for the other. On the Asset that the Trend line is up you place a CALL trade on it while on the Asset where the Trend line is down you place a PUT trade on it at the same time. The Spread strategy is often called "hedging your bet". If both trades end In-the-Money you could receive an 81% payout on both of them. A $100 Trade Price on each of the trades would result in a $162 profit. However, if one trade ends Out-of-the-Money you have minimized your loss to $19; $100 loss on one trade and $81 profit on the other trade. However, if both trades are Out-of-the-Money you would have a $162 loss. Risk ManagementIn trading, Risk Management is a major process that you must adhere to. Fortunately, Binary Options are designed to have a fixed payout and a fixed loss per trade thus limiting your risk on each trade. However, the only limit on poor judgment and gambling fever on your part is your own will power to NOT trade when market conditions are poor or when you are consistently Out-of-the-Money on a majority of your trades. Take a break, step back, and analyze why most of your trades are Out-of-the-Money.

Open your eyes, turn off the TV, stop texting your friends, close your chat room windows, and look at what is on the trading screen right in front of you. In addition to displaying the current price and trading period every Binary Options trading screen has a button that will allow you to display the chart of the previous trading period. While "RTSB" is the visual cue to look at what is in front of you the analytical cue is for you to look at whether the price of the Asset is going Up or Down. The direction of movement is called the Trend Line and the question you need to answer for yourself is whether the Trend is going Up or is it going Down. If the Trend is going Up then you would consider making a CALL trade. However, if the Trend is going Down you want to consider making a PUT trade. The "DDSS" StrategyThe "DDSS" Strategy is also quite simple, "Don't Do Something Stupid". This strategy is best explained by an example. As you are looking at the charts for the Asset and you see the current price start to go Up then a few minutes later it goes Down by an almost equal amount, then a few minutes after that it goes Up again. If you look at the average price during this time period you should see that it remains almost the same. Some traders call it "Flat lined", but the trading term is " Sideways Moving".

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