#something about the movie’s tagline ‘how much time do we have to do something great’

[asgardian--angels]

I love your blog title. I love that when DJenks made his announcement this month, I went into the tags all morose and accepting defeat, and I saw you there still ready to fight, not giving up, ready for a marathon. Truly, that means SO much to me. A little bit of hope is a powerful thing to have, and we need people who are determined to keep that flame burning bright. So happy to have you in this fandom. You really do make a difference. 💕

Aw, thank you! I really appreciate it. And yeah, I'd almost forgotten about my blog title, which I've had for over a decade, and how hope really does embody me and everything I do.

The streaming landscape is in upheaval, things are changing by the week - even since our turbo-cancellation was announced, two other shows (cancelled for much longer) were saved. Like others have been saying, we were all mentally prepared for a marathon and realistically I don't think anyone can just call everything off after just two months when so many shows have to fight for years before getting a movie deal. I respect David - he told us that news so that we'd know that there's nothing more we can accomplish right now by shouting at streamers, and that we did make a difference. There WERE interested parties, we proved we were lucrative. But that does not mean the fight is over, it just means we need to change tactics and pivot to keeping the fandom active and vocal in the long-term, and bide our time until shifts in the industry open new doors for revisiting OFMD (like David Zaslav leaving, or Max going under, or another merger). That might be six months, or it might be six years. What I am certain of is that there's so much love and passion for this show from the cast and crew that everyone would be down to get the gang back together for a season 3 years down the road.

Basically, I have no doubts the fandom will persist - this fandom is composed of very enthusiastic and artistically talented people who have an unending well of inspiration to draw from. What I do think needs to be done though, that I'm seeing wane a bit on Twitter, is to ensure we direct that noise; most people have stopped using OFMD hashtags, which means our posts won't get noticed. Something that has been great is just how vehemently the fandom has gone after Max on pretty much every single promotional post they've made in the past few weeks - check any of them out, and you'll see 95-100% of the comments are OFMD fans using #DontStreamonMax and #FireDavidZaslav , plus the great new tagline 'Sell The Show, Let Us Go'. That is something that I feel is critical we keep up, as I think one of the most powerful means of influence we have right now is to hold this industry responsible for the cancellation of queer content and just quality content overall. That's one direction we can really put our might towards - toppling the WBD empire faster. Other things we can shout for are a physical release, 'The Jenkins Cut' of s2ep8, deleted scenes/bloopers, merchandise, etc. Max is being absolutely idiotic right now in a way that shoots themselves in the foot, because they're holding onto this IP that could have been their lifeline for keeping subscribers and stock prices up, and not only did they cancel it but they're not even maximizing on the rights they refuse to sell by promoting it or making merch of it, anything that could continue to bring in revenue for what they KNOW without a doubt is one of the best performing shows they've ever had on their platform. Them trying to forget OFMD exists is the nail in their own coffin, because it's the only reason a whole lot of people ever did business with Max in the first place.

So, the long and short of it is, I'll never stop having hope for the return of our show! David said we got the attention of this industry, and we've proven our worth. It's just a really unstable landscape right now, so we need to be patient. It's annoying to see these streamers invest in less successful and more expensive shows, but I think they're all panicking to stay afloat even though they're not making decisions that could help them there. The dust needs to settle. If we can show that there's still a loud and passionate fanbase in a year, in three years, then they will revisit us. We need to keep calling out WBD and Max, we need to keep using hashtags to be heard, and just try to settle into a rhythm that we can maintain long-term. We still have a bunch of BTS to see from Samba, and we will have WJW with David at some point. I think it's important that we DON'T request any season 3 info from him, because that's what jeopardizes the possibility of that storyline then ever getting made. I'm seeing some people on Twitter start to burn out or fall into a state of sad acceptance and if you need to do that for your health, that's fine. But I don't want that mindset to spread throughout the fandom. Our outlook, our words, do have the power to become reality - if we sit back and wave the white flag, then that seriously hurts our chances of ever getting the show back. But if we can carry on like it's just a season hiatus, continuing to demand the question 'ok so WHEN *taps watch*' then our insistence can help make season 3 a reality.

#thanks for this i'm glad i can help inspire some folks to keep the fight going #ofmd #our flag means death

[anonanimal]

every time i go to a concert i have the same experience of like "wow...they're real." yes i coughed up the tshirt money. purple tour bus!!!!!!!! more random notes + what i can remember of the setlist below

their walk-on song was "just the two of us" (because it's john and matt get it) and they intended to start playing immediately but had technical difficulties so they left and walked on again. if it was a bit to warm up the crowd it worked

two words. soprano saxophone

at one point people tried to sing along to a quieter song and john went "shh" i can't even remember which one bc concerts become a blur to me

everyone reacted to "mark on you" like it was an old favorite, partly because the performance was just that good i think. they took it kind of slow and john said "we didn't mean to play it that slowly it just happened"

john suggested we dance to "first blood" and we did and it was great, i had my fingers crossed that they'd play it, probably one of my favorites on bleed out

introducing "lakeside view apartment suite" (i think) he said this song was depressing and a guy yelled "HELL YEAH!!" john bent over the keyboard and laughed for a solid 10 seconds and said "god bless you sir"

introducing "soft targets" he said something about a movie the tagline of which was "steven seagal is...a hard target" and then he called steven seagal a soft target. but wasn't jcvd in hard target. did he accidentally or intentionally mix up hard target with hard to kill. whatever, it was worth it to call steven seagal a soft target

john explained he's made it a tradition on this tour to do a song matt has never heard. someone shouted a suggestion and john said "sorry ma'am i've already picked it"

happy heretic pride u.s. release 15th anniversary

i'm trying very hard to remember the setlist but i haven't been a mountain goats fan for very long and i am very stupid, this is what i've got so far. very much not in order. we'll see how it compares to whatever people put on setlist.fm

[29pageshomestuckeveryday]

Homestuck, page 2,567

Kanaya: Reply to memo.

Author commentary:

"IT TURNS OUT YOU CAN'T ALTER THE OUTCOME OF DECISIONS MADE BY MORONS, NO MATTER HOW MUCH YOU YELL AT THEM.” Not to get overly political down here in the laugh gutter. This just sounds like the tagline for the result of the 2016 U.S. election.

When Current Karkat actually starts arguing with Current Karkat, not only did he not notice he was doing it, I think it's safe to say that even we didn't notice he was doing it. A lot of arguments he has with other versions of himself are hard to differentiate, because it's always gray text, and it's always yelling. It blurs together. Much later, he "solves" this problem by switching to red for a bit, during one of his more pathetic conversational loops of self-hate. A little further down he starts wondering what they did wrong in the session. Which, as I was saying earlier, is not really anything, and he kind of almost has that epiphany here. But then loses that epiphany once he discovers the humans, decides to hate them with a refreshed sense of rage, and starts blaming all the wrong things again for their failure, including himself. It's almost like he gains clarity in his rage gaps. When one fog of rage subsides, he starts seeing things clearly, but that all goes away the moment he enters a new fog of rage. Regardless, we're getting close to the end of Hivebent now, and you can kind of start sensing this wildly fractured, manic narrative start to gather itself and point itself back in the direction of where we left off. The new hate-hobby Karkat discovers, of course, we know to be the humans.

This is also the first time in Hivebent when we spend any real time tuning into a part that takes place on the meteor they end up stranded on after whatever catastrophe causes them to flee there. For all the zipping up and down the timeline we do, we never actually go that far until now. Again, it's about starting to gather up and organize all these loose threads and direct them back into something we recognize as connecting to the main narrative line. Even when certain stories or arcs are really chaotic and wildly out of order, I think most of us have good intuitions when it comes to picking up on when a story is making moves in preparation for the approach to its own endgame material. This memo starts feeling like that turning point. You've also got Kanaya weighing in, playing the role of a sort of wise, sympathetic ear to a down-and-out protagonist. You know That Moment in the movie. We all do. We're all experts. Homestuck knows you're a media expert and uses that assumption to its "advantage" all the time. The only time it backfires is when it turns out you're nowhere near the expert I thought you were. You know those moments when you see me shaking my head in grave disappointment? That's why I'm doing that, FYI.

Karkat suggests Aradia isn't a great Maid of Time. I dunno about that. She time traveled to make a thousand doomed robotic copies of herself to help defeat a crazy-strong Black King. Seems pretty good to me. He's probably remarking more on her mental stability than her competence. Of course what's really going on here, story-wise, is that he's foreshadowing her violent freakout in the End-of-Hivebent animation coming up soon.

Karkat mentions here an "invisible riddler." This is an idea that comes up from time to time throughout the story. Recall the "unseen riddler" in the narration during John's early animation, when he's listening to the wind in his neighborhood. It conjures the idea of a hidden Loki-like figure somewhere, whose pranks have nihilistic designs, an intangible force of mischief that robs its targets of a meaningful or dignified existence. In John's case, the nihilistic rumination about this figure seems to focus on the shapeless and uncertain direction of his life. Karkat's remark here focuses on the futility and self-fulfillment of one's own foolishness, passively allowed to play itself out by this prankster figure, who he links to "Father Time" as well. There is no one true god of Paradox Space, but to whatever extent there is, it's probably this riddler figure, which is why it's left in doubt as to whether he even exists at all. He's never discussed without also referencing his invisibility, or dubious reality. A much less cagey explanation is, it's probably best interpreted as the forces of mischief and authorial cruelty or callousness toward the subjects within this fiction, which are laced into the entire narrative and relate closely to the quality of "authorial scorn" that was mentioned earlier in some of the Vriska meta. When galvanized through more extreme figures like Caliborn, these forces become less passively nihilistic and prankstery, and more actively hostile and destructive.

That Kanaya has trouble imagining how Karkat could have a strong handle on the subject of romance without access to an online manual (like her access to Rose's walkthrough) says something about the way she thinks, and views skill or expertise. Here she says romance and psychology aren't her strong suits, and a couple pages ago she was expressing doubts about her role as a Space player. Some characters struggle with self-loathing issues (she's talking to one of them now), but she seems especially troubled by self-doubt issues. Maybe this is why these two resonate as friends so well. One is there to reassure him he is not loathsome, the other to reassure her she is not incompetent. We've been over Kanaya's role as a mother figure to a bunch of people, and it helps for a good mother figure to have a good son figure as a counterpoint, a son who's there to remind her, "No, you're not bad at this. Stop it with that talk."

Karkat's dissertation on magic is a pretty good summary of the ongoing tension between the realness/fakeness attribute of magic throughout the story. We get pretty flippant about magic in Homestuck, don't we? It's just a word you can use to describe certain forces, in the same way that you can use the word "luck" to evaluate certain outcomes, if you're fixated on that concept. This isn't really mind-blowing wisdom here. I'd describe it more as premise-level information, upon which the story elaborates in certain ways. Magic and luck are more like states of mind. If there is any deeper truth to sift from these semantics, it's an idea that the story keeps returning to, which is that the power of belief is the key to everything. Believing in things reduces their fakeness attribute. It's the force that shapes your reality, used to snatch personal meaning from the jaws of a cynical and nihilistic environment. Could this be why Hope is framed as the most fundamentally powerful aspect? Even the other aspects themselves are ideas like this (recall: luck=light), whose power is subject to the ebb and flow of one's belief in them. And belief itself isn't necessarily just a trick of willpower. It can be an expression of one's willingness to embrace an idea, or pursue a deeper understanding of it.

Obviously Karkat is reacting to the moment Kanaya saws off Tavros's legs, while Equius watches creepily. We saw one frame of that earlier. Yes, it's a funny beat in the conversation that calls back to that moment, but it also establishes an important hour of missing time for Karkat while he's passed out. This gap where he's asleep on the floor comes up again later in Act 5. The second part of Act 5 does a lot of what Hivebent does. Where Hivebent skips around, chaotically fitting together the greater puzzle of the troll session until we finally reach the end, A5A2 skips around a lot, fitting together the puzzle of their stay on the meteor and sorting through the mystery of exactly what happens and when. So there starts to be an accounting of many little moments like this, to use as points of reference for when certain things are happening. "Aradiabot explodes" is another such benchmark for the reader to use to track surrounding events. Interestingly (maybe), Karkat uses this idea too, by setting "Jade's dreambot explodes" as a similar benchmark to help Jade get her bearings through a nonlinear swamp of communications.

#gif #pesterlog

[marypsue]

movie references in the road goes ever on

When I set out to write the road goes ever on, also affectionately known on this blog as ‘the monster longfic’, I did so with the goal in mind of making it as closely resemble an actual season of Stranger Things as I could. Part of the genetic makeup of a season of Stranger Things, though, is shot-for-shot recreations of scenes from classic movies of the era, something that was a little difficult to do in text. So...I got creative. 

I threatened to do this once, and now it’s a reality. Here’s a list of every deliberate movie reference I can remember making in the fic. I may have missed one or two, since it’s been a while since I actually wrote it; if you spot something you think is a reference, it was definitely on purpose and deliberate and I will be taking all the credit for it, thank you. 

Chapter One: Phone Home

The title of this chapter is, obviously, lifted from Steven Spielberg’s E.T. The Extraterrestrial (1982). 

“You look like shit,” Steve says, and Robin flings the empty plastic case for Invasion of the Body Snatchers at his head.

...

It takes the girl who’s walked in what feels like hours to pick a movie. In the end, she rents Sixteen Candles and maybe flirts with Steve a little bit while he checks the movie out for her.

Do namedrops count? Season four said namedrops count, and I’ll take every opportunity I can steal from season four. That bitch owes me.

Jonathan grabs the empty fourth seat, across the table from his mom, and pulls a white paper carton towards him at random. “This smells great. Thanks.” He peers into the box. “What’s this?”

“Maggots,” Will says, innocently.

I lifted this gag directly from The Lost Boys (1987), which was a big inspiration for this fic and probably the movie I referenced the most. It doesn’t work quite as well when the person with the takeout carton of rice isn’t being hypnotised into seeing maggots, but oh well. 

“I hear the new high school has a much nicer darkroom…”

“My whole life is a dark room,” Jonathan mutters to his ginger beef.

And this iconic line was, of course, stolen from Beetlejuice (1988). I made a post after my first watch of Stranger Things about how we all make fun of Jonathan for being an overdramatic emo, but if it had actually come out in the 80s he would be right up there in black and white gifs of the ‘I don’t like most people’ scene on all the goth blogs right beside Lydia quipping that she’s strange and unusual, so. Like mother, like son.

Chapter Two: Splitting the Party

“I’d rather have El back,” Mike says, setting his rifle against his shoulder and sighting down it. He fires, once, twice, three times in quick succession. Points scroll up across the screen.

I stuck this Duck Hunt video game into the Palace Arcade because I saw it in The Karate Kid (1984), so I’m counting this as an 80s movie reference.

Robin shakes her head again, waits a moment for the headrush to pass, then unties her Chucks and kicks them onto the floor. She doesn’t bother to take her sunglasses off, just collapses backwards onto her bed –

- and into shallow water.

In the camera of my imagination, this bit is shot in reference to that one scene in The Lost Boys where Michael drops off the trestle bridge and it transitions via superimposition to him lying across his bed at an awkward angle with his Wayfarers on. You may notice this is part of a pattern. 

Chapter Three: Sleep All Day, Party All Night

This chapter’s title comes from the tagline for The Lost Boys. The full line is “Sleep all day. Party all night. It’s fun to be a vampire.” I picked it because this chapter is the motherlode of The Lost Boys references, and also because it introduces a nighttime meeting of the Party, so it’s also a bad pun. 

“I knew I shouldn’t have let you all watch that movie last night. You weren’t even supposed to see Fright Night! You and your friends all bought tickets for Follow That Bird!”

More namedrops - Fright Night (1985) is (imo) the inferior 80s teen-vampire-hunters horror-comedy, and Follow That Bird (1985) was a Sesame Street big-screen offering featuring Big Bird. 

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Samantha says. “So. All I know about you is that you’re into photography, you’re a high school senior, and you have a little brother. Oh, and you’re capable of identifying Siouxsie Sioux by sight, you don’t like roller skating, and you prefer Evil Dead to French arthouse. What other essential Jonathan Byers facts should I know?”

Does it count to namedrop Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead (1981) if it’s already shown up onscreen? I say yes. 

“Maybe we should just have him over for dinner,” Lucas suggests, as Erica takes cloves of garlic out of the jar on the counter. “Make Italian. Grate some garlic, tell him it’s parmesan.”

Another gag from The Lost Boys, as is Lucas’ vampire-hunting getup in this same scene. He seemed like the most likely character to dress up like a Frog brother. I owe Joel Schumacher for the idea of water pistols full of holy water, too. 

Samantha’s nodding, still with that too-knowing look. “Sure. Sure. Way more to it than some Revenge of the Nerds fantasy. Got it.”

“The sarcasm is not appreciated,” Jonathan says, and Samantha laughs again.

I didn’t love Revenge of the Nerds (1984), but you gotta admit, it and Jonathan/Nancy most likely came from the same sort of inspiration (disgruntled nerd boys from the 80s who couldn’t get a date with a ‘popular’ girl). 

“Bet that burns, huh? Nosferatu?”

“What? No, it’s -” Steve shakes off his now-wet hand, feeling a little like he’s lost the plot. “Freezing. [...]”

I took this dialogue directly from The Lost Boys - actually, from the very dinner party scene where the teenage vampire hunters feed the suspected vampire grated garlic and tell him it’s parmesan. 

“Oh no you don’t,” Erica says. “You are not leaving me alone with Eddie Munster.”

This works on two levels - it’s a namedrop from TV’s The Munsters (1964-1966), and it also nods to another line of dialogue from The Lost Boys, where one of the teenage vampire hunters refers to a child vampire freaking out at them as ‘the attack of Eddie Munster’. This is a reminder that this part of the fic was drafted before the second s4 teaser dropped; I’m pretty sure the Duffers and I just went to the same well on this one. (Tangentially related, but have I mentioned why I’m pretty sure Chrissy’s name is a reference to Stephen King’s Christine?)

Robin drops Firestarter back into its black plastic video-store-issue case, and grabs the next tape off the stack to rewind. If people would just rewind their own tapes when they were finished with them – well, maybe she wouldn’t have a job. But still.

Psychic. If she was psychic, would Robin really be working at some shitty minimum-wage job, mindlessly rewinding tapes and straightening shelves and keeping twelve-year-olds from renting Animal House – all right, not really trying all that hard to keep twelve-year-olds from renting Animal House, sue her - and trying not to drop dead of abject boredom?

...

She drops E.T. into the rewinder and starts it up, before picking up Firestarter and heading out to find its rightful place on the shelves.

More namedrops! We’ve seen Firestarter (1984) get a nod in the show already, in a poster outside Family Video in the epilogue of s3, and obviously E.T. was one of the major inspirations for Stranger Things. I tried to make sure all the movies that were referenced by name in the video store had some kind of thematic or plot relevance to whatever was going on at the time they were namedropped, although Animal House (1978) kind of breaks that pattern.

Chapter Four: 10-4

This chapter’s a little light on movie references, but I did sneak in one piece of dialogue I lifted from Labyrinth (1986):

“If you need us -” Mick starts, and Kali smiles.

“I’ll call.”

Chapter Five: Man’s Best Friend

Mike doesn’t answer. Mike’s busy staring at the boarded-up main door leading into the lab.

And the two guys in blue coveralls who’ve just come out of it.

Since all the costuming’s in the reader’s mind’s eye, I could easily tell you these #lewks were meant to be modelled off Michael Myers or Hannibal Lecter, but...nah, no, that’s exactly what I’m going to tell you. Just try and prove otherwise. 

The creature gives a curious rumble. Robin forces herself not to move as it drops forward onto its knuckles, and pushes its head forward.

Into her hand.

Wrong era of movies, obviously, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t at least acknowledge the obvious influence of How to Train Your Dragon (2010) on this scene. 

“Dart. And -” Dustin gestures with both hands towards the creature. “Gizmo!” He pauses, turning to give the creature a long look. “Yep, you’re definitely a Gizmo.”

The newly-christened Gizmo clicks at him, but Robin puts a hand on its flank and it settles.

“Yeah, yeah. Just make sure you don’t feed it after midnight,” Steve says.

Gizmo is, of course, named after the friendly little monster from Gremlins (1984). What can I say, it seemed appropriate. 

Joyce doesn’t find anything out of the ordinary, though. A chequebook. A wallet, with a Michigan driver’s license and a few credit cards in the name of Rhonda Williams, with a slightly younger Rhonda’s face smiling from them.

It is extremely not obvious at all, but Rhonda’s last name is another nod to Labyrinth. 

Chapter Six: The Swarm

“Evil Ed,” Erica says, with a pointed stare at Lucas.

“Erica. Seriously. It’s not vampires.”

Erica is, of course, referring to a secondary character in Fright Night, who actually, believe it or not, got the ‘Evil’ part of his nickname before all the vampires even showed up. 

“Who are you going to call from a pay phone?” Nancy asks, with this kind of pissed-off smile.

“The Ghostbusters,” Mike deadpans.

...

A note of hope works its way into her sarcasm as she says, “Unless that was all a horrible fever dream and that’s not actually a giant monster and I’m not actually telekinetic and covered in blood like a bad Carrie ripoff?”

“Sorry,” Steve says. “You’re still giving Sissy Spacek a run for her money.”

We’re still counting namedrops. Because I said so.

“Jesus Christ, Nancy!” Lucas calls from the backseat. There’s an edge of panic in it. “Pull off!”

[...]

Nancy lets out a long breath, her shoulders slumping. She says, “I won,” like she can’t believe it.

This passage, dialogue and all, was lifted straight from Stand By Me (1986). In the camera of my imagination, it’s a shot-for-shot recreation of the street racing scene. 

“[...] And it never hurts to have a smoking gun.”

This fic’s version of the Hellfire Club was heavily inspired by The X-Files’ Smoking Gun. Obviously The X-Files is a TV show, not a movie, and it’s from the 90s, but I’m still including it here because I was very proud of myself for sneaking in a dialogue reference even though the show didn’t exist yet at the time the fic’s set. 

Unlike Dustin, the giant, horrifying monster currently wearing – yep, those are Robin’s Wayfarers – at least has the decency to seem embarrassed.

Steve stands there with his hands on his hips and looks Gizmo – and the blue windbreaker and unconvincing curly grey-brown toupee it’s wearing – up and down. “No. Nope. That’s never gonna work,” he says.

Gizmo’s incredibly convincing disguise is a direct visual reference to the way the protagonists disguise Bernie’s corpse in Weekend at Bernie’s (1989). Gizmo’s just lucky that Dustin didn’t try to staple the toupee to its head. 

“Okay, well, you guys come up with a brilliant plan to sneak him out of here, then! Because the whole town is crawling with feds, and he’s a little big to throw a blanket over and stick in a bike basket!”

Dustin’s obviously referencing E.T. here. And here:

“Don’t give me that look. I’ve seen E.T., I’ve seen Escape to Witch Mountain, I’ve ridden this carnival ride before. I know how this goes.”

Escape to Witch Mountain (1975) is about a pair of psychic twins who’re being hunted by people who want to use their powers. The psychics turn out to actually be aliens. As you can see, it’s slightly relevant. 

Samantha taps her foot against the floor. “It’s still missing something.”

“Try this.” Will passes her the hat. It’s a huge, black cartwheel, with fabric bunched up around the crown. When Samantha settles it on El’s head, she unfolds the fabric, draping rose-patterned black lace over El’s face. If the makeup alone hadn’t made her unrecognizable, the makeup under the lace veil is definitely doing the trick.

“Yeah, I wouldn’t even know it was you under there,” Jonathan says.

El grins wider, pushing back the veil, and grabs her Polaroid camera off the dresser, holding it up to her eye to snap a picture of herself in the mirror.

Samantha grins, too, studying her handiwork. “Strange and unusual. Perfect.” She looks up at Will. “Where’d you find that hat?”

Will shrugs. “My mom had it in the back of her closet with a bunch of old stuff.”

Another visual reference. Sadly, they’re difficult to make work in text. This is Lydia’s introductory outfit from Beetlejuice, with the rose-lace veil from the scene with the line ‘My whole life is a dark room’. In the camera of my imagination, when El holds up the Polaroid instant camera, it’s a nod to the shot where Lydia first sees the Maitlands looking out of the attic window. The hat was found in the back of Joyce’s closet because Winona Ryder plays both her and Lydia, and I’m clever and hilarious. Obviously. 

Steve glowers at her. Unfortunately for him, Robin knows that, of the three fistfights he’s gotten himself into ever, he’s lost two of them, and the only one he’d won was against Russia’s answer to the Keystone Kops. She can take him.

The Keystone Kops were the stars of a series of silent slapstick comedies in the early 1910s, and their bumbling, overenergetic, exaggerated reactions and general incompetence have been much imitated on film ever since. 

Robin has to agree with him.

“Toto,” she says, turning in a slow circle, “we are definitely not in Kansas anymore.”

You all recognise The Wizard of Oz (1939), right? Yeah you do. 

Sam leans closer. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Murray doing the same. The screen’s actinic glare throws a sickly light on all of their faces as the four of them crowd in to read.

Does it count if the shot I’m recreating in my mind’s eye is from season 2 of the very show I’m writing fanfiction for? Because I imagined this as a funhouse-mirror version of that shot of the Party from the perspective looking up from the screen of the Dragon’s Lair game from s2e1. 

Robin shoots him a look. “Unless your monster buddy can E.T. these bikes into the air, we’re not going any farther along this street.”

...

“Come on, pal, get your head in the game.” He immediately ruins it by glancing back over his shoulder and then adding, like this is some normal bullshit conversation about comic books or girls or whether the Terminator could beat the Alien, “Because if you don’t, we’re all gonna die. Again, no pressure.”

Namedrops!

Chapter Seven: The Rainbow Connection

The song ‘The Rainbow Connection’ came from The Muppet Movie (1979), so I’m counting it. 

(this town is so small it only has Cantonese, she has to go all the way to Indianapolis for an edible Szechuan)

I based this version of Steve’s mom on Delia Deetz from Beetlejuice, and stole this complaint right out of Delia’s mouth. 

“Really?” Jonathan raises a terrifyingly black-pencilled eyebrow at her. “I was thinking more Robert Smith. Or maybe Frank N. Furter.”

Of course Jonathan Byers has seen The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975). And of course so has Robin Buckley. I’m right. 

“[...]Wouldn’t you want to see what kind of results you’re going to get before you go shooting yourself full of monster juice and hoping it’ll give you superpowers and not just, like, melt you down into a blob or give you a fly head or turn you into a giant uncontrollable green rage monster or whatever?”

Okay, technically, David Cronenberg’s remake of The Fly (1958) didn’t come out until 1986, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Dustin had caught the original on a late-night creature feature.

“So you have to get rid of this – mind flayer – before E.T. here can phone home?” Kali asks.

Listen, I never said I had a wide breadth of movie references. Just that there were a lot of them. 

Chapter Eight: Project Unicorn

“You know, there’s one thing about living in Hawkins that I just can’t stomach,” Scott says. “All the -” He looks down, into the glare the girl – she can’t be more than ten – still has fixed on him. “Darn feds.”

One of the first things I knew when I set out to write this fic was that I had to put a paraphrase of the final line from The Lost Boys in Scott Clarke’s mouth. 

Max’s smile is vicious and victorious and maybe the most beautiful thing Lucas has ever seen. “Maybe you should be asking yourself: do I feel lucky?”

The guy stops himself almost as soon as he starts to move, but Lucas doesn’t miss the way he starts to turn his head to look back at the door. He must be wondering, too, where his army of big guys with big weapons are. Why they haven’t come bursting in to rescue him yet.

Max gives the gun a little waggle. “Well? Do you?”

And yes, I do have Max quoting the most famously misremembered line from Dirty Harry (1971). An earlier draft of the fic actually had Lucas bring it up, later, but I cut it because it didn’t work. 

Robin presses on. She’s seen It’s A Wonderful Life. She’s totally got this.

...

“[...] You’d have all the same problems – well, okay, not the giant monsters and Bond villains problems, but the other ones, about the future. And you never would’ve gotten to know any of us. You’d be all on your own.”

Namedrops!

“You bastards! You bastards, you killed my sister! You killed my sister! You shit-sucking, evil – You killed her! Nancy!”

This one might be a bit of a stretch, but The Lost Boys remains the only place I’ve ever actually heard someone use ‘shit-sucking’ as an insult. 

A blunt, blind little knob of a head pokes up out of the gory mess that was Billy’s chest, glistening obscenely under the flickering lights.

Yeah it’s the chestburster scene from Alien (1979), and you know it. 

Chapter Nine: The Fellowship of the Gate

“Son of a bitch!” Dustin gasps, flinging the first of the makeshift acid bombs. It bursts against the floor just in front of the leading edge of the swarm, spattering holes in the concrete and the advancing monster squad both.

I’m counting this as a namedrop for The Monster Squad (1987) because I used this specific phrasing on purpose. 

“Okay,” Robin says to herself, looking all around her. She still can’t see anyone – or anything – that might be watching her. Only the endless, indistinguishable dark. “Kind of short on ruby slippers, here.”

Jokes referencing The Wizard of Oz are gimmes, but hey. 

I did model El’s confrontation with Brenner in the mindscape after the climactic scene of Labyrinth, though I’m not sure it’s obvious. 

Not that it seems like it cares, Jesus, is he trying to fight the Terminator here?

Naaaamedrops. 

And, kneeling on the roof a few feet away, forehead pressed to forehead, clinging to each other like they’re each the only thing holding the other up –

Again, wrong era of movies, but I stole this visual from the denouement of Pacific Rim (2013). It seemed thematically appropriate. 

“Steve, you look like hell.”

“Yeah, no shit, douchebag, I just got back.” 

Slightly modified this dialogue from Heathers (1989). I also wanted to give Joyce an adapted line of Veronica’s (”Karen, my love, there’s a new police chief in town”) but unfortunately couldn’t make it fit. 

When she mentions that to Steve, though, he just shrugs and says, “That’s the way it crumbles, cookie-wise,” and any disappointment Robin might have felt immediately goes straight out the window.

“Dingus! You actually watched The Apartment?”

The Apartment (1960) came up on TCM the New Year’s Eve of the year I first bingewatched Stranger Things seasons 1-3. Serendipity is real. 

Steve looks so blindsided that Robin has to magnanimously offer, “We can even double feature with Star Wars, if you want. You know, the one with the teddy bears.”

Namedrops!

“Scared you’re gonna miss a code red?” Erica needles at him, and Lucas can’t help a disbelieving stare in her direction.

“Says the fearless vampire killer.”

I haven’t actually seen The Fearless Vampire Killers, or Pardon Me, But Your Teeth Are In My Neck (1967), but it has the best title in horror-comedy history. 

“No way. You dorks are not depriving me of the chance to drop Mike in a bog of eternal stench. Not after Lucas made me waste a whole Saturday afternoon rolling this character.”

The Bog of Eternal Stench is, obviously, from Labyrinth. 

“Jesus, Buckley,” Steve says, not bothering to try to hide how impressed he is. “At this rate you’ll be back to re-enacting Carrie by Christmas.”

And one last namedrop to wrap this roundup up!

By my count, that makes an even 60 references! (Even if I had to fudge a couple of those just a tiny little bit.)

#this is mary's fic tag #was this an excuse to reread my own fanfiction? what of it #i had a Lot of fun smuggling some of these into the fic

[anhed-nia]

And now that I've been positive about something that didn't demand it, I'm gonna be MEAN for no reason just to restore balance to the universe. I fucking hate this movie. Never has a tagline been so accurate. TRICK OR TREATS is one of these things that has remained in circulation long enough for me to wonder, like, do people LIKE this, and there's just something good about it that I don't get? Or is it just anomalous that it's still available enough to be on Shudder 40 years after its accursed birth? I'm not just irked that it's "bad", which it is, but because I have no idea what the fucking point of it is supposed to be. What form of pleasure am I supposed to receive from it? This is a movie that's loaded with sluts and blowjob jokes, but it's completely devoid of graphic nudity or violence or even proper swearing. You might point out that it's more of a comedy, as horror-comedies go, but it's also not at all funny. It features a (not scary) escaped homicidal lunatic, but most of that plays out as a long gag about how, if a big ugly dude puts on a frumpy dress and a stuffed bra, absolutely no one can tell the difference and randos will start trying to fuck him immediately. Ha Ha Ha. It's a movie that seems to be aimed at horror buffs, but the "special effects" basically amount to Halloween decorations and cheap prefab magic tricks for children, which gives you that suspicious feeling that the filmmakers actually kind of hate horror movies and think that you can put any stupid thing in front of a genre fan and get their unqualified, brain dead approval.

Also like, maybe this is a personal thing, but I'd say MOST pranks are pretty unfunny, and movies that prominently feature pranksters are almost unbearable. If you're going to anchor your movie to the idea of tricks and pranks, it really better be as outrageous as the setup of TERROR TRAIN (a movie that also isn't very good, but at least there was an idea in there somewhere); you really cannot ask me to pay rapt attention to, for instance, an endless scene of a snot-nosed brat duping his babysitter into thinking there's somebody at the door. Oh wow, the little boy uses a string to pull on the door knocker, oh boy, the babysitter answers the door, oh no, there's no one there. Lather, rinse, repeat. Ha Ha Ha. By the way, why is this frustrated woman running around in like a Joan Collins type of nightgown while she's both managing this unruly child and having to answer the door for trick-or-treaters every ten minutes? Who fucking knows. How much time can we kill by putting the babysitter on the phone with her inconsequential boyfriend so he can report in about his awful-sounding Shakespeare performance? You'll find out if you watch this piece of shit! (FYI the occasional appearance of cult favorite actors only makes you wish you were watching something better)

There's a lot more to be perplexed about behind the scenes, like the fact that the writer-director-etc also shot movies for Orson Welles, and great horror movies like THE TOOLBOX MURDERS (where's the horror in this movie?), and also a huge amount of porn (where's the damn sex appeal in this movie?). I vaguely worry that TRICK OR TREATS was just made as a simple excuse to create a starring role for the filmmaker's young son, which makes it seem innocent and like something I shouldn't spend so much energy bagging on, but it's just so un-fun, and vaguely insulting, that it's hard for me to just turn a blind eye. AND ANOTHER THING I really hate that the title is pluralized. You can DO trick-or-treating, you can BE a trick-or-treater, but there's no such thing as "trick or treats". It reminds me of when I watched NOTTING HILL a couple years ago (*John Waters voice* What was I thinking about?) and among other sticking points, I could not get over Hugh Grant repeatedly saying "whoopsies-daisies". I mean. What the fuck, guy? Why are you, an adult, saying that, but also it's NOT PLURAL. It's just "whoopsy-daisy"; sure, you'll find a few variations in an idiomatic dictionary, but not one that pluralizes both words. "Whoopsies-daisies" isn't even easy to say. How the fuck did you come up with that? I think I've finally drained my poison gland for this morning, so to leave on a bright note, here's my favorite part of NOTTING HILL. Just Hugh Grant's roommate's implausible shirt. I kinda want one.

PS I posted that NOTTING HILL review on Facebook a few years ago, because I thought it was fun and like one of the more publicly acceptable/accessible things I'd written, and indeed, a bunch of people found it pretty funny. But then within a day or so, I had to go to a friend-of-a-friend's birthday party where I was quietly informed that I was nearly dis-invited because it was the adult birthday girl's favorite movie and she just, like, didn't want to see my face after she found out what I had to say. So, never let it be said that my opinions are not powerful and of consequence for others!

#blogtober ramp-up i guess! #trick or treats

[ghostwriterofthemachine]

War stories of your time in book pr you say 👀👀

God do I ever have some. 

This was a job where I needed to spend a huge chunk of my time keeping up with things on twitter, which I simply,,,, do not have the personality for. There are people who can dedicate massive amounts of time to twitter and that is a skill I do not have. There are people who can dedicate massive amounts of time to YA twitter, and that is a skill I really do not have. I would rather go through an unfiltered political hashtag on twitter than go onto YA twitter again. Maybe it’s gotten better in the, like, 4ish years since I worked this job, but at the time it had more petty drama blowing up into massive fucking problems than the damn youtube makeup space.

But I digress. The first thing you need to understand is that if you are a booktuber, or if you run a blog where you review books on a fairly regular basis, you are going to get free books. That’s a huge reason that a lot of people do it -- ARC (advanced review copies) are a huge draw. Not only do you get books for free, but you get books for free before they come to print! Isn’t the cool? That sounds great!

And it is! That’s really, really great for some people. This is how it works for people who publish reviews on blogs or newspapers or culture websites. Why wouldn’t this work for youtubers? They get free books, they promote the books on their youtube channel, that gets more clicks on their videos, boosts their ad revenue. Seems like a win all-around, right?

Then things started to get tricky because, most of the time, these booktubers will only talk about the way the book looks, and then repeat some buzzwords and tagline from the press release (and I would know, because I was writing the press releases). Because so many publishers and PR firms/agents would be sending them so many books, they had no time to read them at all. They say yes to pretty much every book pitched to them, because that’s the pace that youtube goes. But books aren’t like netflix shows or movies, you know? Most people can’t just knock them out in one or two sittings. And that’s a good thing! That’s a really wonderful thing about books, that they force you to slow down in a world where media is increasingly fast and immediate. 

So haul videos became the bread and butter of booktube. A lot of them got disguised as “TBR” videos, but they were totally hauls. Basically “Look how cool these titles look! look how many cool books I have!!!” videos. Which is, you know, exposure, and PR will take pretty much an positive exposure (for books, particularly in the YA space at the time, you really wanted positive exposure). But what PR wants more of it quotes, and a throwaway line in a haul video is not what we’re looking for. 

So booktubers who only did haul videos started getting sent less ARCs, because people like me were keeping up with their videos and seeing that they didn’t really do full reviews. So we started pitching them less (pitching is when we offer them the book, basically saying “do you wanna review this?” and then see if they say yes), and because they’re getting less books, they’re getting less clicks (not that most of them were getting a ton anyway - youtube just does not mesh well for that kind of literary content, no matter now hard people try, with a few exceptions). 

So that’s where the really awful “30 books in 30 weeks” challenges that the original post mentioned came from. Basically booktubers are pushing themselves to read enough of the books so they can say something interesting about the books to keep getting free books to keep their content alive. It’s a really capitalist, unhealthy, and un-joyful way of engaging with stories and nothing convinced me of the soullessness of the currently publishing promotion model more than that. 

Oh, the other thing people started to do instead of those “30 in 30″ challenges, was start making bookstagram content, where you literally just take as pretty a picture with the book as possible and post it with an excerpt of the press release. PR goes crazy for bookstagram content. 

But yeah. It’s all very soulless and consumerist, while also pretending they were too good for soulless consumerism. Very weird vibes. 

#ask #noun: book #thenegoteator

[interactiondesignstudio4chiara]

Week 3 Activities (Monday)

Today to do;

Testing, 1-2 people

Prepare animations/transition design - questions to ask about them - to prepare for user testing

User Testing session

TESTING

To check if things produced work in the way we thing/expected to work, if they are intuitive, and up to the user expectations

Double diamond system

USER TESTING

Remember is not 50% about THEM and 50 about you, but mainly 80% about the User/Them

ESTABLISH THE FRAME OF MIND

 Create a perspective to introduce your work, what why how, etc..Ask questions: have you ever been on a flight? What do you expect? Everyone is already an expert using things, so we have to see if we reach their expectations. Never ask Yes and No questions, but  - What is different from your expectations? How? Why? Does it fit or how much is different?

OBSERVE THE USER/AUDIENCE BEHAVIOUR

“I noticed you behaved like that/ reacted like this...why?”

Think out of the box, maybe there are 2 ways to get sort out something.

GROUP OF 3 - to do: 

Each designer invites 2 other designers:

Establish the frame of mind (2min)

Ask about expectations (5min)

Reveal and ask (10min)

Exercise:

MY FRAME OF MIND + OPEN QUESTIONS for classmates of the group:

Have you ever taken a flight that is longer than 10h? Have you ever felt bored and tired that you don’t even feel searching for the content you’re interested in? This IFE is designed to pair your phone with apps you use mainly (such as movie apps, music apps, reading content, search content, and social media) and proposes to you content on the IFE that you are interested in.

1) What do you expect from this? ..their answer.

You can pair with individual apps, and you can reverse the pairing at any time during the flight. 

2) When do you think is possible to pair it and how? ..their answer.

I thought just before departure, and via Bluetooth or a plane Wi-Fi that then turns down when departing, or even earlier before the flight.

3) Would you worry about the data stored by AirNZ from the pairing? ..their answer.

You can delete all the info/data of your interests at the end of the flight.

THEIR ANSWERS:

1) They suggested as an expectation ‘fluidity’, good selections of apps that most people use, taking into account that different apps are used in different countries. Work on apps that work on Tablets too, to maintain a great format. = They expect them to see the app's configurations on the IFE, so to have for example Spotify and Netflix on the screen. --> I should make clear that it doesn’t sync with existing apps, but incorporates your interests in the IFE. They imagine connecting the screen of the phone to the IFE. They suggested to use Samsung decks, and Nintendo steam deck, to create a smooth pairing between screens. I should make clear when onnecting a device --> the concept, maybe with a pairing icon and a phone at the beginning. 

2) At the beginning of the flight, and being able not to pair it if you don’t want to. Make it clear on the home page too.

3) Ethical question, questions about data privacy are normally in the term and conditions, agreeing to use the software you would agree for the data to keep, so I shouldn’t worry so much about it BUT make a clear statement to inform if the data would disappear. Jackie said that for him most people wouldn’t worry so much about deleting passwords and personal data as they are stored anyway on so many other devices.

CLASSMATES WORKS:

About Jackie’s work: Modularity - create a personalised screen with what you want to do during your flight, having some icons (music and movies, for example), and we suggested what we imagined modularity to be, and to add the tagline “Personalise your entertainment on-screen/ Plan your screen entertainment” on the Home page, to make clear straight away his concept.

About Beckie’s work: interaction between users, socialising during the flight. Suggested to share screens, suggested to be about games and messaging but keeping the privacy. Suggestions on the colour palette.

WHAT TO IMPROVE ON MINE, IN BULLET POINTS:

Clear home page visuals to make understand that:

you can pair a device to the IFE

you don’t have the apps on the IFE screen but the data about your interests get incorporated in the entertainment the IFE proposes you, personalising it 

why I chose this 

that you can pair, reverse the pairing, and delete your data.

[brickle-bit]

Communicate the Plot not the Premise of your hangout.

A lot of times ive denied hanging out with friends or family, not because I didn't like them but because the reason for hanging out weren't clear or because the asking at the time was hiding an ulterior motive. When i was confronted about never wanting to hang out, I said it was because you didn't communicate clearly. And i wasn't until recently that realized where the lines of communication broke down.  When you want people to read a story or watch a movie, theres a difference between telling them the premise and telling them the plot. The Premise of a story is the tagline, the hook, the interesting piece of the tale that gets people to read. Harry Potter (fuck JK Fuck Terfs): Magic wizard boy at magic wizard school Cinderella: Pretty lady that has an abusive family but becomes a princess Avatar: A literal child has to save the world with elemental powers. The PLOT of a story is what actually happens that makes the story stick with you and makes you continue to participate in it. Harry Potter(fuck JK fuck TERFs)  is about a kid with an abusive family learning how to use his powers and grow from shitty situations to become a (arguably) decent political figure while tackling ideals about fascism and (poorly) elaborating on the manifestations of good and evil within people. Cinderella is about a young woman who despite her abusive situation is so strong that she remains a genuinely beautiful person inside and out until she is taken away from that situation by someone that actually cares about her Avatar: is deadass a story about colonization and the defeat of fascism along with the effects of war and famine on several nations Plots are what make stories great but if you inherently don’t like the Premise presented you aren't going to look further. No matter how amazing avatar is, you aren't going to get someone who genuinely doesn't care for cartoons, political plots, or dramas to participate in it, much less watch the whole thing and love it. Back to real life, I realized that each time one of those people wanted to hang out, the Premise was almost always something either  I didn't wanna do or it was so flimsy that i could see right to the plot, which was normally hard conversations or backhanded trauma dumps and so on. I never wanted to go hang with them because the plot was proposed to be “lets make bonds and memories and enjoy each others company” when in actuality it was “we need to have a serious talk about something or i need to get something off my chest.” One might ask, “If you knew that that was what they wanted, then why didnt you go along with it,” and my answer to that is simple. They didnt express therir needs so i didnt act like they did. No one wants to be surprised or tricked into having a difficult conversation. Those things need to be done and all parties involved should be able to communicate their wants and needs in such a way that the other person can not only help you with yours but get help with their own.  If you tell me you wanna go get food, but really what you mean is you want to talk to you about something, or theres something you should know, or even  you have the genuine desire to enjoy my presence, if i dont want food, i wont go. and Even if i can see through that, for me personally i dont want to participate because you didnt communicate what you really wanted.  So next time you you need to talk to someone about something serious or have something to get off your chest or even genuinely just want to be around someone say that. Be direct. Because no one wants to have an interaction that has the same premise as a Jackass clip.

[raskolni-kin]

im so sorry in advance for everyone who has to witness the person i will become once i watch tick, tick… boom! on netflix this friday and cry for the whole length of the film

#they really do know when to release the film #like ive been on crisis survival mode for months #and so far i cry every time watching the promos or listening to the songs #something something about becoming an adult #something about an aspiring artist who never succeeds #something something about the world being so fucked and you wanna do something to change it but you’re too small #something about larson’s life story that always makes me feel so much #something about the movie’s tagline ‘how much time do we have to do something great’ #😭😭😭😭😭 #tick tick boom #tick tick boom movie #jonathan larson #andrew garfield #theatre kid #musical

[dreamescapeswriting]

Keep Holding On ~ KSJ [Request]

WORD COUNT: 1.7K

PAIRING: Jin x Reader x Daughter 

GENRE: established relationship, death, angst, ANGST, sad, family au,

A/N: The song I went with was Keep Holding On by Avril Lavigne and I hope that it’s okay for you my love

TRIGGER WARNING: Details the passing of the reader please read with Caution!!!!

The moment he saw your daughter walk up onto her debut stage his heart clenched inside of his chest. Nara had turned out to look so much more like you than Jin and he couldn't help but imagine seeing you up on that stage. Nara's eyes scanned the crowd looking for Jin and as soon as she found her father she began doing a small wave with her hand. All she'd ever wanted was for Jin to come and watch her debut stage and now it was finally happening. Nerves will bundling up inside of her but with her dad watching she knew she would be able to do anything she put her mind to. The thought of the song lingered in her mind, it was a song Nara had been writing about in secrecy, not wanting Jin to see it until the time was right.

"She looks so much like Y/n," Jimin whispered as the lights began to focus on Nara, getting cameras ready to come back from the ad break. Jin stared at her, not being able to take his eyes off her for even a second. It had to have been the way your hair was styled and your makeup was done, it was like looking at a photograph of you. 

"Hyung, she looks great," Yoongi whispered giving Jin a small shoulder rub of encouragement. It had been 24 years since you'd passed away and seeing your daughter up there was bringing everything back for Jin.

"Hyung?" Namjoon questioned watching as Jin looked down at his phone getting the camera open and staring back up at his daughter on the stage. Mic in her hand as she got ready to perform for the first time in front of thousands of people. 

A slow melody began to play through the speakers inside of the room, it was a brave decision to debut with such a slow song but it was something from the heart. Something Nara had struggled with for years where your death was concerned. Although Jin had never once blamed Nara for your passing she couldn't help but feel guilty over it. 

Tears rushed to her eyes instantly as she sang her heart out, making eye contact with Jin who was already crying from the first verse. The song touched on how guilty she felt about you dying and taking you away from Jin, about how she could feel you watching over her even when you were no longer around. That she and Jin were still going to keep holding on, pushing forward with you around them in their hearts.

"She has your nose," You whispered tiredly as you watched Jin bouncing around the side of your bed making you giggle. A small cough catching in your throat as you saw Jin stare down at your unnamed daughter. The one thing you had been struggling to do for the last hour was naming her. 

"How about Hyuna?" Jin questioned as he sat down on the rocking chair beside your bed. Truth be told you had a bunch of names ready for her but when she came out of you, none of them seemed to match her.

"Nara?" You croaked out, sitting up in the bed a little and watching Jin. Your head resting on the pillow behind you as you felt your breathing begin to worsen. The doctor said all of this was normal, that you'd had such a rough birth that this was bound to make you tired for a while. But you felt completely out of it, everything sounded and felt as though it was completely far away from you and you had no energy to hold your own daughter. 

"Nara," Jin repeats looking down at his daughter as she slept soundly in his arms. He was running the name through his head looking at her and smiling proudly.

"Nara," You whispered back to him, closing your eyes for just a second to get some rest. Jin smiled as he nodded his head, 

"Nara is perfect...Little baby Nara," He chuckled softly glancing up and chuckling some more when he found you sound asleep. 

"You must have really tired Mama out," He laughs getting up and carefully placing Nara into the small crib that the hospital had provided for you both to use during your stay. As much as Jin wanted you to get some rest you had to wake up, the doctors needed to do some tests on both you and Nara to make sure you were fit for release. 

"Babe? You need to wake up, the doctors will be coming any second to discharge us," Jin nudged your arm softly but you didn't move, eyes didn't even flinch as Jin frowned. 

"Baby?" He whispered laughing a little. You must have really been tired since usually, the smallest noise would wake you up. Jin knew from the experience of leaving the house early every morning. Shaking you a little Jin shook his head at you, wondering how you could even sleep with the hospital noise but your body rolled onto your back and stayed there, Jin's heart sank realising that you were no longer in the room. 

"NURSE!" He screamed out ringing the bell beside the bed over and over again as he tried to feel for a pulse on your neck. 

"NURSE!" His voice bellowed out as he desperately began to breathe into your lips, doing small chest compressions as he shook his head, 

"Don't you dare die on me." He whimpered looking down at you as you laid there lifelessly, a nurse and set of doctors running into the room and ripping him away from you. 

"Let me be with her! She needs me!" He screamed as a security guard escorted him out of the room. All he could see were people working around you tirelessly, machines beeping and people yelling over one another. 

"What's going on? Please tell me!" He begged as a nurse ran out of the room carrying his daughter and taking her into another room with other babies. 

"Jin...Jin you need to calm down." The security guard whispered as Jin stared through the small window at your bed. The doctors freezing as they stared up at the clock above your bed. 

"Why did you stop!? HEY! HEY! Don't fucking stop!" He screamed banging his hands on the window as he yelled at the doctors to work on you. 

"Time of death, 11:58 pm." The words felt like cold ice dripping down Jin's shirt as he watched doctors leaving the room, all of them giving looks of sympathy before leaving him there. All of them going back to their wives, husbands or partners to spend the night together while Jin just stayed there. Watching as a nurse covered up your body and walked out of the room. 

"You can have some time with her...They'll come to collect her in five minutes." She whispered watching as Jin stared at your body, walking into the room and just watching you. Half expecting you to sit up or for him to wake up and have this all be some kind of nightmare.

"Mr Kim?" Jin turned to look at the coroner who had been running all of the tests on you and bounced Nara in his arms. It had been two weeks since you passed and there still wasn't a definitive answer as to how this had happened.

"It's hard to determine with things like these but we...We believe it was due to blood loss during the labour." Jin looked at Nara as he bounced her around, nodding his head. Even after getting answers that he would feel a little bit better but he didn't. Nothing made any of this better. The fear of raising his daughter alone came crashing into his head as he stared down at the report in the coroner's hands, sighing a little. Jin had held back crying for weeks, refusing to cry as he blamed himself for this. He felt as though he should have made sure that you were okay first, he should have pressured the doctors into sooner tests.

The final verse was coming up and tears were ruining Nara's makeup as she belted her whole chest into the song, holding the microphone despite shaking heavily. 

"There's nothing you could say, nothing you could do...There's no other way when it comes to the truth...So keep holding on...Cause you know we'll make it through, we'll make it through." The crowd erupted in cheers as Jin and Nara made eye contact, both of them crying as she slowly made her way off the stage toward him. 

"Daddy." She breathed as he said nothing, just pushed her into his chest wrapping his arms around her. Embracing her tightly and kissing the top of her head softly, both of them forgetting the cameras as they cried together. Sobbing against her father's chest as he kept her close to him, kissing her over and over again on the top of her head. 

"None of it was ever your fault," He promised as he held her close to him, the cameras leaving them alone as the boys escorted them backstage for some privacy. Crying together as she nodded her head, Jin held her face in his hands as he smile, using his thumb to wipe away the tears from her cheeks. 

"She would be proud of you, so proud." He whispered to her, his voice cracking as he looked down at her. Over the years of your passing, he'd never once moved on but it had gotten easier to deal with your death.

"Shall we go home and watch old home movies?" He questioned as she leaned into his touch, nodding her head over and over again. When you first died Jin could never bring himself to think or speak of you, when Nara reached the age of wondering where you were he could barely explain it. Instead, the two of them would watch home movies of you, look over old photos and videos you had made whilst pregnant. 

"Let's go." He whispered to her, taking her hand in his and taking her to go and collect her things from her changing room.

Tagline: @lyoongx @mitzwinchester @rjsmochii @taestannie​ @sw33tnight​ @sweeneyblue1​ @jin-from-the-block​ @acciocriativity​ @mwitsmejk​ @taeechwitaa​ @justbangtanthingz​ @stillwithlix​ @misa0000​ 

#bts #bts x reader #bts imagine #bts imagines #bts you #bts x y/n #kim seokjin #seokjin #seokjin x reader #seokjin smut #seokjin imagine #seokjin imagines #jin #jin x reader #jin imagine #jin imagines #kim seokjin imagine #kim seokjin imagines #min yoongi #kim namjoon #jung hoseok #park jimin #kim taehyung #jeon jungkook

[blazingparker]

What’s Up, Danger? (Chapter 3)

Here it is! the final chapter of What’s Up, Danger? As I’ve said before, I was totally blown away by the response to this fic. Thank you to all of you who commented, left kudos, reblogged, and everything else!!

read it on ao3!

---

“JARVIS, what time is it?” Tony called out as he fiddled with repairing one of the gauntlets on one of his older suits. It had gotten damaged during the battle of Sokovia, and he’d just built a new one rather than ever repairing it. Now, with his refusal to go after Spider-Man and the lack of other missions, he’d had plenty of time to catch up on lab projects and even fix up his old suit.

“It is currently 2:37 in the morning on Friday, January 25th, sir. Might I suggest you retire and get some rest?” Tony frowned, setting down his tools. Peter still hadn’t called him, and he never stayed out patrolling this late when he had a class the next day.

Peter. The last few weeks with Peter had been some of the best of Tony’s life, hands down. While they still hadn’t defined their relationship, they were more than friends and there were definitely too many feelings involved for them to just be fuck buddies.

For once, Tony didn’t dread the early hours of the morning when JARVIS would hound him to head to bed. He’d talk on the phone with Peter, listen to how his day went and maybe tell him about his latest project before they would hang up with whispered words of affection and head to bed. On particularly good nights, he’d meet Peter in his apartment with takeout (Tony wasn’t going to fool himself into thinking he could cook, come on) and they’d cuddle up on the couch with a movie. Sometimes, he’d need to stitch Peter up or help him out of his suit to tend to his injuries, which he was always more than happy to do. Things were perfect. They were perfect.

In fact, the only reason why Tony hadn’t asked Peter to be his boyfriend yet was because he knew the young man had enough on his plate without adding the media frenzy that came with dating a billionaire. Not to mention the Avengers would find out, and that would make it even harder for Peter to keep his identity a secret.

Tony wasn’t really known for being a patient man, but for Peter? For Peter, he’d wait.

Well, not tonight. Tonight, he was done waiting. It was close to three in the morning and Peter still hadn’t called, which was highly unusual.

“JARVIS, pull up the local news.” Tony turned and leaned back against the lab table and brought his mug of coffee to his lips. Maybe Peter had gotten held up with a bigger issue, like another burning building or a larger threat that required more time to take care of. If that was the case, the local news would definitely be covering it.

What they were actually covering made him drop his coffee mug, the ceramic dish shattering when it made impact with the floor.

A blonde newscaster was speaking, but Tony tuned her out in favor of reading the tagline and watching the footage.

Spider-Man Abducted by the Avengers. There was a shaky video, likely recorded by an unassuming passerby, of Peter standing on a roof with his chest heaving. Then, out of nowhere and seemingly for no reason, he tensed. A second later, a dart could be seen sticking out of his neck. Tony’s chest filled with dread as he watched Peter pluck it out and stare at it, swaying in place. When Peter collapsed, Tony actually made a move as if he could catch the young man, and felt fury bubble up when he saw what happened next.

Steve fucking Rogers caught Peter, quickly restraining him with a pair of vibranium cuffs before slinging him over his shoulder and carrying him off.

“--people of Queens are furious. There are talks of a march on Avengers tower. They have protected us from larger threats, yes. But Spider-Man was the one looking out for the people of Queens and New York at large every day. Where were the Avengers when Lacy Collins was almost assaulted last week, when Spider-Man rescued her? Where were the Avengers--”

Tony wasn’t listening anymore. The newscaster was right, of course, Peter was better than all of them. Peter deserved nothing but the Avengers’ respect and instead he’d gotten a dart to the neck and vibranium cuffs. He stormed out of the lab, grabbing his cell phone.

“JARVIS, dial Patriotic Fucker,” he all but growled as he got into the elevator. “And take me to the suit lab on level forty. The one with the landing platform.” There was no way they’d bring Peter back to the tower, which meant Tony needed a suit. Now.

“Tony, we caught him!” Steve cried out after picking up on the first ring.

“How fucking dare you,” Tony said lowly. “The mission was to learn his identity, Rogers. Not drug him and arrest him!” By the end, he was yelling into the phone. “Where the fuck did you take him?”

“Tony-I thought this was the best course of action. He was avoiding us even more.”

“Because Clint took a fucking shot at him! If an Avenger tried to take you out, would you really be peachy-keen and excited to chat?!” Tony screamed. “You star-spangled shit, you’ve compromised everything! As if he’s ever going to work with us now, after this little stunt! Not to mention they’re talking about protests against us on the news!” Taking a deep breath, he exited the elevator and made a beeline for the nanotech suit he’d just finished up. Grabbing the little housing unit, he placed it against his chest and double-tapped it, allowing the suit to encase his body.

“Clint and I are with him at the compound. We’re upstate.” Steve’s reply came after a beat of silence, and he actually sounded remorseful. Fucking finally, Tony had a location. He blasted out of the lab and away from the tower, JARVIS automatically plugging in directions for the fastest route to the compound.

“Did Natasha know about this? What about Banner, or Thor?” Tony barked out, determined to get as much information as possible before he got there. He wanted to be able to put his full focus on Peter, not these idiots.

“No. Clint and I made the call. They’re not to blame for this, Tony.”

“Oh, and that makes things better? You kidnapped my-” Tony hesitated. Peter wasn’t technically his anything. “My Spider-Man,” he finished lamely.

“Yeah, we’re gonna have a chat about that, Tony. About the Stark Tech he’s wearing, and how your number is saved in his phone under the name ‘Snarky Bitch’. You’ve known. You knew this kid and didn’t tell the team.” Tony found his blood running cold for the second time that night.

You knew this kid.

“Steve Rogers, did you take off his mask?” He yelled, and the silence on the other end was enough of an answer. Feeling fury take over, Tony let go of any semblance of restraint he still had. That was the final straw. Peter had taken his secret identity incredibly seriously, and he deserved to reveal it to whomever he chose. Not have that choice taken from him.

“Yes, I know him. I know his name, and I’ve been helping him out,” Tony seethed. “Unlike you, you frozen fuck, I got him to trust me. He trusted me, and I helped him in return. He deserved that much. He’s sweet and kind and everything the world seems to think you are. But they were wrong. The great Captain America that the world knows would never drug and kidnap a college kid just because they didn’t do what he wanted.”

“Tony.” The voice on the other end cracked, and Tony smirked. Steve knew he was right.

“I expect you to be gone by the time I get there, which will be in about twenty minutes. You’d better stay away from him until I say otherwise, or I swear on my mother’s grave that your face will be meeting my gauntlet. Capische?”

“Understood. And-for what it’s worth, Tony, I’m sorry. I really thought this was the right call.” Tony huffed out a sigh.

“For future reference, if the plan involves drugs and kidnapping, it’s not the right call.” With that, he hung up on Steve and focused on getting to the compound as fast as he could. After a painstakingly long flight he arrived, storming through the doors and down to the detention level where he knew Peter would be. Tony exited the suit and put it on sentry mode, striding purposefully down the hall of cells, looking, searching--

Tony came to a dead stop in front of the last cell on the right and felt his heart fall right out of his body. It was Peter: restrained to a chair, in his suit but without his mask. His head lolled to the side and if Tony couldn’t see the rise and fall of his chest, he might have thought the young man was dead. Each of his legs was tied down to the chair and his hands were behind his back, likely in the vibranium cuffs still.

“JARVIS, unlock,” Tony whispered weakly, and rushed in as soon as the glass door slid open. Gently brushing Peter’s curls out of his face, he dropped to his knees in front of the man. “I’m so sorry, Peter. So, so sorry,” he whispered before making his way around to the cuffs so he could get Peter’s hands free.

---

Peter woke slowly, blinking against harsh light and instinctively letting out a groan of pain when his headache made itself known. Instinctively, he tried to rub his temple and couldn’t keep from whining softly when his hands were held down.

“Sit still, Pete. Please. I’m trying, okay? I promise, I’m trying.” Tony’s voice? That didn’t make any sense, Peter had been on patrol.

Patrol.

It all came flooding back to him - the dart, his dizziness, and the vague feeling of being restrained and carried off. After that, nothing. Now, he was awake and clearly restrained and Tony was there.

Tony had sold him out? Peter didn’t want to believe it, but it was the only thing that made sense. Tony was doing something with his cuffs and he was tied down tightly, unable to move. Tony knew his routines and when he liked to head home, and could have told the Avengers when it would be best to strike. When he’d be the most exhausted.

You idiot, he thought to himself. Peter dropped his head to his chest and tried desperately to fight back tears, not wanting Tony to know he was awake. As Spider-Man, he’d been shot, stabbed, punched and kicked. But this? This hurt the worst of anything he’d ever experienced.

All of a sudden, there was a loud bang and the pressure on his hands was gone. Peter pitched forward with a squeak of surprise, not expecting to be freed. Strong hands caught him and gently eased him back into the chair.

“Peter? You back with me?” Tony was in front of him now, face etched with concern as he brushed Peter’s hair out of his eyes and moved his hands down to his wrists. The older man gently massaged them, trying to ease any soreness as Peter slowly looked up at him.

“Why’d you do it?” He asked, shocked at how raspy his voice sounded. Tony just stared at him, confused.

“Because Steve and Clint are idiots, and this never should have happened. Bambi, I’m so sorry I didn’t check in sooner, I thought you were patrolling.” Tony started to ramble, and Peter’s brow furrowed in confusion.

“You didn’t...do this?” He asked, and winced at the horror that instantly took over Tony’s face.

“I’d never. I’d never, ever do something like this to you. You’re my Danger, my sweet-hearted vigilante who puts everyone ahead of himself and who I adore. I’m so sorry. If I’d known-” Tony was cut off by the swift press of Peter’s lips against his. Peter didn’t know why he’d doubted Tony for a second. Of course he would never sell him out - why would he help him and why would they be...whatever they were...if Tony’s whole endgame was to unmask him? He would have bailed after Peter pulled the mask off that one night all those weeks ago if that had been the case.

“I’m sorry,” Peter said, hiccuping as he tried to keep the tears at bay. “I just-I woke up and felt you doing something with my hands and I thought-I thought-”

“You thought I was putting you in the cuffs instead of taking you out of them,” Tony murmured in understanding. Peter just nodded as the other man focused on releasing his legs.

“I’m sorry-” he tried to repeat but was stopped by a finger against his lips. As soon as the finger was removed, it was replaced with a set of soft lips.

“No apologies, Bambi,” Tony whispered, and Peter just nodded again. He still felt exhausted and sluggish, likely because of the drugs making their way through his system. Luckily, Tony seemed to read his mind. “How about we head up to my private rooms, get something to eat, and watch a movie? Hm? Just like we always do.”

“That sounds nice,” Peter murmured back, pecking Tony’s lips one more time. He then grasped the man’s hand, slowly standing up and yelping in shock when his knees immediately gave out and he went crashing towards the floor.

That never happened, though. He was caught in a pair of strong arms and lifted up in a princess carry as Tony prevented the cold concrete from greeting his face. Peter’s arms instinctively wrapped around Tony’s neck.

“I’m sure I can walk if I could just try again,” Peter tried to protest, and Tony leaned their foreheads together.

“Let me do it. You’ve probably still got some stuff in your system, and I’ve been worried sick ever since I saw the news. Just let me take care of you. Let me take care of my-” Tony cut himself off, hesitating.

“Boyfriend,” Peter blurted out before staring at Tony with wide eyes. You don’t know that he wants that, Parker. His friends literally just drugged and kidnapped you, he’s probably just feeling protective--

“Boyfriend,” Tony repeated. A huge, real smile was plastered on his face as he held Peter even closer. “Let me take care of my boyfriend.” Blushing, Peter responded by simply pressing his face into Tony’s neck as though it would allow him to hide. After a split second, he pressed a soft kiss to the skin there. Tony nuzzled his face into Peter’s hair for a moment before turning and walking out of the cell.

“You know, I never got to hear about your night. Before all this, I mean,” Tony remarked as he carried Peter towards the elevator.

“I guess not,” Peter mused, pulling back just enough to look up at his boyfriend. Boyfriend, he could say that now.

“So...what’s up, Danger?”

“Oh my god.”

#blazingparker writes #starker #starker fic #starker community #peter parker x tony stark

[septembercfawkes]

Writing Callbacks

I finally found the correct term for a writing technique that has been in my head a few years! I was at a panel at FanX, when author Dan Willis (not to be confused with Dan Wells) started talking about "callbacks"--I wanted to stop him right then and there and thank him for finally giving me the word (but since we were on a panel, I didn't think that would be a good idea!).

Of course, it comes from the screenwriting world 🙄 Seriously guys, I've never had much of a desire to get into screenwriting, but there are some great ideas (and terminology) in that branch of creative writing (particularly with story structures). So if you want more resources for writing good stories, look into some screenwriting books.

Anyway!

Naturally, I want to now talk about callbacks, since I have the official term (maybe I'm late to the game, and you guys already knew the correct term 😅) But, I'm also going to expand the idea, afterwards.

Callbacks Explained

By definition, a callback is a dialogue technique. It's when you bring back an old line from earlier in the story.

The Order of the Phoenix film has one of my favorite callbacks in it.

After Harry gets detention, he has to write lines with Umbridge that say "I must not tell lies."

Later in the film, this happens:

That is a callback.

And audiences love it.

Often callbacks are used in comedy, where the punchline of a joke is pulled back in later for another laugh.

Callbacks can happen in a lot of different places and have a lot of different tones.

However, most of the time, to be effective, the callback must be different than the original line in some way.

This often means changing the context and/or the line itself (by my definition).

So in the Order of the Phoenix example, the line stays the exact same: "I must not tell lies." But the context is radically different. Originally, Umbridge had the upper hand and was torturing Harry. In the callback, Harry has control. Because we all hate Umbridge and what she did to him so much, it's really satisfying when he calmly throws it in her face.

But the context can change in a bunch of other different ways too. In Galaxy Quest, Alexander loathes delivering the line "By Grabthar's hammer . . ." throughout the film, which is comedic to the audience, but near the climax, the line is flipped on its head when he uses it to comfort a man dying in his arms.

Sometimes you can use the line to illustrate an arc. At the beginning of the story it meant one thing, but by the end, it has a new, more significant meaning. This can be great to emphasize character growth and thematic statements. Mockingjay (the book) does this well in all its references to the "Hanging Tree" lyrics.

Some stories tweak the line. Pirates of the Caribbean uses this comedically throughout the series, when characters make references to the rum being gone.

In Spider-verse, the writers played around with Spider-man's tag line: with great power, comes great responsibility, and flipped it around so that we have Miles's dad saying incorrectly "With great ability, comes great accountability" or even having Spider-man himself imply how sick he is of hearing the line. (This is a smart move on the writers' part, since they are working with a story that has been rebooted four times in 16 years 🤪 Like Peter, we may be tired of the tagline ourselves.)

Often people's favorite lines to quote are callbacks. Have you noticed?

When writing callbacks, the most important thing to remember is to not be annoying.

If you overuse this technique, it can become annoying.

If you overuse a line in the same context over and over again, it can be annoying.

It's like telling the same joke over and over and expecting it to be just as effective. It's not. It gets irritating.

(Unless the joke is that you tell it over and over again.)

You could say the Inigo Montoya's line is overdone, but it's intentional and part of the point.

Physical Callbacks

By definition, "callback" relates to dialogue, but I say, why stop there? Why can't objects or actions work as callbacks too? Well, they can, and actually, they do.

Let's go back to Spider-verse. The climax is loaded with all sorts of callbacks. But perhaps the most memorable is when Miles defeats Kingpin with the "shoulder touch" he learned earlier in the story. Sure, it does have the same dialogue from earlier ("Heeeeey!"), but really, it's the action that's the focal point. That's the real callback.

What about in Lord of the Rings, when we get that shot of Frodo stroking the ring in the exact same way as Smeagol? Isn't that an action that conveys a significant arc of character? And it's an action we've seen before.

What about Seamus Finnigan's magic constantly blowing up in flames through the Harry Potter series--isn't that like a callback? Finally in the last movie, he's asked to blow something up intentionally.

And then let's not forget Napoleon Dynamite and his dancing.

And why can't this be objects too? Like the changing context of a Mockingjay pin? Or Dobby and his love of socks?

Sure, these all might be a little trickier to pull off in a novel, but not impossible. For actions, just make sure to use the same or similar descriptions and keywords, so you reinforce and emphasize an association. Objects might be a little easier, and they may even take on symbolism, but you make sure they stand out.

I could go on and talk about how callbacks can even extend beyond the text to other texts. Like how Spider-verse calls back to the original Spider-man trilogy a lot in the opening (like with Peter's dance moves). But I think I'll call it good for today.

In the end, remember this: Callbacks are effective because they resonate with what the audience saw before.

#writing tips #writing tip #writing tips and tricks #writeblr #fanfic #pirates of the caribbean #spider-verse #Harry Potter #princess bride #writing help #writing reference #dialogue #writing lesson #writing advice

[deadwalkerpedia]

The Walking Dead, “Days Gone Bye” | Analysis

The final season of The Walking Dead comes in August, so I decided to rewatch the show from the beginning as the end is nigh. TWD has been a part of me since I started to watch TV series, and I’ve watched Days Gone Bye more than seven times, so this is certainly one of the pieces of audiovisual media that I’ve consumed the most. To add a new interesting layer in my rewatches, I’ve decided to see the episodes with a critical and analytical lens, seeing it more than just as a pastime, and write my thoughts here. This will be a great ride for me, and I can’t wait to see again some iconic moments from TWD throughout the seasons and write about them.

Part 1: The World Before

Before getting into the first act of the episode, let me talk about the teaser – the first five minutes of the episode – quickly. As this is our introduction to the world of TWD, Days Gone Bye couldn’t simply start with Rick and Shane having a chat. So it was necessary that the teaser served as a way to establish both the tone and setting of this story, and it certainly does. The teaser tells us that what we are watching is a gritty survival horror story that takes place in a post-apocalyptic world, and the teaser establishes this perfectly without no more than two lines of dialogue. It is established visually: Rick stops his car on a deserted road with no traces of civilization anywhere, then goes to an abandoned gas station where other cars are  – and those cars have dead bodies inside. From there, we know right from the start that this isn’t the world we live in. When Rick sees the young girl that is in fact a walker, it is established that this is a world where the main threat are zombies. At least for some part, as in future episodes the series will show us something far more scarier than walking cannibal dead bodies is the real danger. 

Now storytelling-wise, TWD already proved its value in the first five minutes. Frank Darabont directed the episode and wrote the script, and his work in the episode both as director and writter is fantastic and set the bar high if the series wanted to have a consistency of greatness in its episodes. After the perfect five minutes purely composed of visual storytelling, the first scene of the first act is dialogue-heavy and character-driven. One would think that it is to establish to us that Rick and Shane are friends, that Rick has a wife and son and that they are cop buddies, and one would be right, but it is also more than simply introduction and exposition, and that’s the beauty of the audiovisual medium as a whole.

Reading books about screenplay writing, I’ve come to know more about subtext and its applications in both movies and series. Despite this first scene doing great work in introducing us to the two main characters of the season – their mindset, persona and some backstory – it also adds so much worldbuilding-wise. Shane goes on his rant about women not switching off the lights in a house before leaving it, and Rick talks about a discussion he and Lori had earlier. See, the teaser showed us a decaying world with walking bodies. Now, the first minutes of act one show us a world where people worry about such trivialities: switching off the lights. In the tagline for the first volume of the comic book, it reads “The world we knew is gone. The world of commerce and frivolous necessity has been replaced by a world of survival and responsibility“. The scene I mentioned is basically the live-action adaptation of it. We see the world of commerce and frivolous necessity in this introduction so we can understand better and fear the world of survival and responsibility that will come later in the episode. TWD started geniously: it went from visually-driven to dialogue-driven, and after that to visually-driven storytelling, all without losing its verisimilitude and charm.

Now, something about the visuals I loved: the grainy aspect. Because this episode was shot on film – in fact, up until season ten all episodes were shot on film – the film grain is obviously visible. But instead of being just an aesthetic choice – shooting in film or digital – I think it’s also meant to have implications tone-wise. The comic books this series adapt is in black-and-white (something unusual in American comics), but it’s because the writer Robert Kirkman wanted the comic to feel like a classic George Romero zombie flick, and it worked completely. Commercially, a black-and-white TV series wouldn’t be much embraced by a large and mainstream public, but I think that Darabont solved that problem and succeeded in maintaining an aesthetic similar to the feel the comic book wanted to transmit. The excessive film grain – something that made me feel like watching a Panos Cosmatos’ movie but without the acid trips – works because it resembles the Romero zombie flicks in color, like Dawn of the Dead. It is a classical and archetypal zombie story – even if it subverts some conventions various times throughout the series – and the visuals tell us that.

Not only that, but the episode has many moments that resembled The Mist in some ways: the camera being close to its characters to make the story feel grounded and experienced by real people, the back shots to make the audience feel like they are following the characters in their journeys, the handhold camera moments that gives a documentary feel, adding a realistic perspective. All that grants a grounded vibe to the episode, which works because this is a story about how people react and live in a lawless world which can kill them at any possible moment without any warnings. It’s where chaos and anarchy reigns and where death always lurks. A story like that works better when it’s experienced through the eyes of the characters. It’s also best represented in the moment where Rick leaves the hospital and sees the sun for the first time. In the shot, the Sun is blinding us with its shining light, but then there’s a cut, and in the next shot we see only Rick covering his eyes while the blinding sun rays don’t make it to the camera. It’s the switch of subjective to objective perspective, as in the first we see the world with Rick eyes – it’s a man getting out of the dark for the first time in months – and in the second we see the same moment but from outside lens, and it showed us that this a day like any other where the sun doesn’t blind you. Besides, this episode has a low budget sensitivity – not meaning that the quality is subpar, but that it has an authenticity that is extremely convincing. It is that low budget quality that makes the story feel real in a certain way. That is, of course, until the tank in the middle of a city is shown, but even with the realism, it is still tangible, and the story continues to feel realistic in its depiction of a zombie apocalypse in the “real world”.

Not only that, but the episode has many moments that resembled The Mist in some ways: the camera being close to its characters to make the story feel grounded and experienced by real people, the back shots to make the audience feel like they are following the characters in their journeys, the handhold camera moments that gives a documentary feel, adding a realistic perspective. All that grants a grounded vibe to the episode, which works because this is a story about how people react and live in a lawless world which can kill them at any possible moment without any warnings. It’s where chaos and anarchy reigns and where death always lurks. A story like that works better when it’s experienced through the eyes of the characters. It’s also best represented in the moment where Rick leaves the hospital and sees the sun for the first time. In the shot, the Sun is blinding us with its shining light, but then there’s a cut, and in the next shot we see only Rick covering his eyes while the blinding sun rays don’t make it to the camera. It’s the switch of subjective to objective perspective, as in the first we see the world with Rick eyes – it’s a man getting out of the dark for the first time in months – and in the second we see the same moment but from outside lens, and it showed us that this a day like any other where the sun doesn’t blind you. Besides, this episode has a low budget sensitivity – not meaning that the quality is subpar, but that it has an authenticity that is extremely convincing. It is that low budget quality that makes the story feel real in a certain way. That is, of course, until the tank in the middle of a city is shown, but even with the realism, it is still tangible, and the story continues to feel realistic in its depiction of a zombie apocalypse in the “real world”.

The whole sequence of the car chase and the shooting between the cops and the criminals is beautifully conducted by Darabont, who knows his craft remarkably and executes it in a manner like no one else does. The memorable shots, shot by Darabont, immortalize the whole sequence and reach its climax – the gunshot Rick suffers – perfectly in a crescendo that works better here than in the comics, this being an easy task, but still, Darabont managed to do it in an impressive way, totally deserving a bravado status.

Also, something that I also appreciated, and I think it’s overlooked: when the police cruiser where Rick and Shane are passes through a road, we see a single crow eating a roadkill. What do this mean exactly? Animals can’t turn to zombies so one might think this is only a moment with no meaning behind it. But now I interprete it as a symbol. It is meant to represent that society has be decaying long before the dead came to eat the living. It remembers me the first Mad Max, where the world is not in the same level as it appears in Mad Max 2: Road Warrior – a full-on post-apocalyptic society – but it is in its final stages, leaning to barbarism and uncontrollable chaos. The producers of TWD announced an anthology spin-off series named Tales of the Walking Dead, and it certainly would be interesting to see more of the transition between our world and the post-apocalyptic zombie-ridden world, showing the process in-between of transformation and decay.

Part 2: Brave New World

The second act starts as Rick steps out of the hospital and faces the current reality of his world, and it’s an ugly one. Rick sees dead bodies everywhere and discarded military gear. Something dreadful happened when he was in a coma. The world undergone a change so great in his sleep that it’s impressive that Rick didn’t drown in total madness when he first saw what’s left of society. Most of act two is about Rick having to come to terms with his new life: one entirely ruled by survival. Now, another interesting element that is also a symbol in my interpretation: the bicycle girl. The bicycle girl (which is the zombie without its lower body) is the first walker Rick encounters. He is scared by her and runs away from her with the bicycle that was there next to him. The bicycle girl is nothing more than the remains of the past life of Rick and the world before. It is dead and alive at the same time – like the walkers – but in a pitiful state. It can’t be on its feet and is always trying to grasp and touch Rick, but, ultimately, it can’t. Rick fears it, and because of that he runs.

Most of the second act is focused on the interactions of Rick and Morgan Jones. Morgan, after encountering Rick and saving him from a nearby walker, takes him inside his house, but fearing that the gunshot wound was in fact a walker bite, Morgan rightly tied Rick to a bed and waited for him to wake up to ask some questions. Now, it’s incredible how this episode never misses a beat and is not made of only three truly great scenes, but all of the scenes are great. The whole dinamic of Morgan explaining to Rick what happened and what it takes to live in this new world felt so natural that no critic could say it was bad exposition. It was exposition done right, revealing more about Morgan’s character, showing him as a good man and a father to his son Duane. It’s easy to understand why Rick and Morgan liked each other one day after meeting for the first time. The chemistry is real, and it’s unbelievable how seasons later, when they see each other again, the chemistry is still there. 

Andrew Lincoln and Lennie James are spectacular actors. Their acting in this episode is astonishingly extraordinary. I’m pissed that they didn’t won any awards for it, they certainly deserve it. Andrew’s acting was great all way through, but when he first arrives at his house and cries for Lori and Carl you could feel the man’s pain and suffering. One moment that is perfect and maybe one of the bests of all TV history is when Rick is having an existential crisis. “Is this real? Am I here?”, asks Rick while facing the ground. It’s such a powerful reaction to the absurdity he is experiencing and it feels so damn real because Andrew Lincoln can cry like a pro and give the gaze of a man that is lost. Rick is lost. And this scene can provide such a powerful punch to the audience that you can’t help but be already invested in Rick’s journey. He just wants his family, so he can put some sense in a mad world. Without them, Rick is lost.

The second act makes us empathize more with Rick and Morgan. They both have admirable goals. They just want to live and provide for their family. Their bond is developed exceptionally in their final moments together – before Rick travels to Atlanta – that you are left caring for them and wanting a reunion. The final scenes of act two were made to make you feel emotional without doubt, and I’m sure that it worked on some people and made them fall in love with the series instantly. It’s when Rick kills bicycle girl and Morgan fails to kill his dead wife, now a walker. The soundtrack by Bear McCreary is phenomenal and adds so much dramatic and emotional weight to the scenes, and it fits perfectly with the tone of pretty much the core of the series. It’s a haunting song, a sorrowful one full of melancholy, but it also has a spark of hope in it. It makes a statement: everything is sadly collapsing around us, but there’s still hope of rebuilding. The Mercy of the Living is TWD summarized in an orchestral piece, and I feel like crying every time I listen to it, just like the piece Alive Inside of Telltale’s game, that also does a masterful job in creating a sad but hopeful atmosphere in its melody. The bicycle girl – which is the past Rick and the world before – must be killed by Rick if he wants to continue his voyage, to which destination is his family. Rick is teary and heartbroken in killing bicycle girl because now he has to fully embrace a life ruled by survival. “I’m sorry this happened to you.” is Rick final message and requiem to the world and consequently to his past self – a quiet Rick that didn’t want to discuss with Lori in front of Carl –, both who had problems that they couldn’t resolve before the tragedy that hit them.

Part 3: The Beginning

The third and last act are in fact the beginning. We saw a peak of a world before the zombie apocalypse and Rick waking up in this desolated society in the first two acts, but the third one is to introduce and set up what the series is about and what will do to its end: show the characters in a battle for survival, and ultimately in a quest for the return of humanity and civilization. Both are depicted in the scenes where Rick is trying to save himself from a horde of walkers that attack him and his horse, and the other with Shane’s group listening and trying to talk in the radio with a mysterious survivor (Rick himself) who warns about his coming into the city, showing their efforts to help fellow survivors who might enter Atlanta without knowing its dangers, thus demonstrating that they are still human after all.

The episode show us a little about the relationship of Shane and Lori, as well as a glimpse to their group. It wasn’t exactly necessary, but it doesn’t hurt in any way the season’s progress and development. The third act is best represented by Rick entering Atlanta and having to escape a humongous horde of walkers. Rick manages to survive by hiding in the tank that was parked in a street. The scene also show us that zombies had some intelligence  – they crawl and try to open things – and some of them look cartoonishly green or grey, instead of the realistic putrid rotting flesh look the marvelous make-up by Greg Nicotero can provide. And both of these things are common to the iconography Romero made for the zombies. It’s very clear that Darabont takes inspirations from his movies and respect their legacy by expanding it to a new range of people and an audience that is maybe not that familiar with Romero – I wasn’t when I first watched TWD and when I saw Romero’s movies I was impressed by how it influenced the series. 

Days Gone Bye is a masterclass of how a pilot should be made. This quintessential pilot introduces a storyline that will be finished within the episode. while also setting up what’s coming next in the season, laying ground for all the future episodes in the best way possible. It introduces a protagonist that proves that he can sustain a show on his own – he is a caring father, loving husband, a good man and a kind of Western hero, we see him riding in his horse towards the imminent danger full of guns and determination searching only for his family. The Walking Dead may not be recognized as a TV series that revolutionized the medium, but it revolutionized its genre, and overall it is a great series that deserves recognition, and so does Days Gone Bye. It is simply the perfect pilot.

#the walking dead #days gone bye #rick grimes

[detective-keen]

A wonderful Christmas time / Chloe and Agatha

Where : Christmas marker When : Christmas week Who : @chloeinbetween & @detective-keen

Summary : Agatha drags Chloe out to get some fresh air and rediscover the warmth of Christmas time.

TW: chronic illness, domestic abuse mention, emotional abuse mention, lydiaplot cw

The sky cleared shortly after lunch, and when Chloe suggested a trip to the  Christmas market, Agatha immediately agreed. Did she feel guilty for not being able to help her more? Nothing was more uncertain. Agatha reassured herself by telling herself that she was helping her by offering her a place to stay while she could settle in a place all to herself, but she could see that the young woman was not doing well. And she wondered how it was possible that Lydia could have orchestrated such horrors for so long, without ever having been arrested. Agatha told herself that it was impossible that no one suspected her. She wasn't really like other humans, that infamous woman, that monster hiding behind her picturesque beauty, but she must have been spotted at one point or another. Her crimes had started a long time ago. Agatha found it hard to conceptualize all of this, but she firmly believed that the oldest ID cards they had found were those of the baleful fae's oldest victims. So many lives destroyed couldn’t possibly leave anyone undisturbed…

The lights at the Christmas market weren't bright enough to bring joy back to the young woman's heart, while her mind remained troubled by the whole ordeal. She often thought about it. Although Agatha shared the case with others, she was determined to find Lydia, and put her behind bars, the murderous bitch. That was all she deserved: to have all power taken away from her, and to rot, to turn dull, and to die out. To suffer as she had made all these people suffer. This was an adequate punishment.

A mulled wine stand brought her back years, and pulled her out of her thoughts. As a child, she remembered that her father and mother made that. The scent of spices then perfumed the whole house, announcing the arrival of Christmas dinner, the gifts, of her cousins, and Christmas movies while the grown-ups conversed about subjects that did not interest her.

Agatha approached it. Her cheeks rose from the cold, she turned to Chloe and smiled at her before asking if she wanted some. "It was kind of a tradition in my family," she explained, as she pulled out her wallet to pay the seller.

 Chloe had bought herself a new coat, new woolen sweater, new hat and gloves, all so that in the hours she had energy to, she could enjoy being outside. Even the most wretched places could be made to look magical with the right collection of LEDs and pretty market stalls. In the early afternoon, the sun was already low, and the air was refreshingly biting against her skin. Since she’d moved her things over to Agatha’s, she’d seen Agatha’s concerned looks on more than one occasion. A dozen pills for a dozen different ailments, all brought on by her last four years. Not that the doctors saw it like that. Not that Chloe really cared what the doctors thought was the cause for everything. She just wanted to manage it, day by day, so that she could do things like this. Walk around the christmas market with Agatha, drinking in all the sights and smells. Cinnamon and cloves and hand made candles in every shape and size. She followed Agatha with almost a childlike wonder at all the lights, not even realising where they’d stopped until she looked around. “Yeah, yeah I would. This and… and peppermint bark was always something I picked up around christmas time.”

Agatha handed the paper cup to Chloe. She was delighted to see that there was an ingenuous and awe-inspiring glow in the other woman's gaze, as she was surrounded by equally heartwarming lights, sounds and smells. If Chloe felt like a lump of coal on the verge of going out most of the time, and though she was far from a fanned flame now, there was a light in her and that was already a lot. 

Agatha couldn't help but worry. She knew full well that Chloe was not out of the woods, that leaving Lydia had cost her dearly, and that no one could guess what would happen next. So it was foolish to get attached to this young woman in any way - Agatha had never been one to depend on others and was not too worried about that- and yet that was what she did when spending time with Chloe. Maybe she would regret it, but for the moment it seemed more important to help her rebuild. She owed her that much, she who still felt so guilty for shooting her colleague, for having seen Todd die without being able to intervene, for not understanding, for not being able to really help as she wanted.

"Peppermint bark?" Agatha couldn't recall the last time she had eaten that. It had never really been a thing that they had done with her parents, but she could understand how important those things were. The market was a bit crowded, and she had to squeeze through passersby to access the stall. They sold all kinds of things here. If her eyes were caught by the sight of waffles the size of her head, she searched for the sought after bark instead. "Ah, there we go," Turning her back to the tempting waffles, Agatha, wide-eyed, couldn't escape what she had in front of her. A stall as ostentatious as it was in bad taste faced her. In the middle of a decor entirely done in black and white, people in black leotards, their faces painted white, squirmed silently around a large box covered with stripes. Although she didn't yet believe that mimes were innately evil creatures, she still felt deeply uncomfortable when confronted with their weirdness. “We should get away from here,” she turned to check on Chloe, and once again her eyes were caught by the food. Food certainly was a good way to make her forget about the cursed sights of this town. “I’ve never heard of that,” narrowing her eyes at a label, she read out “Hops in the stomach ?” The little gums, shaped like rabbits, looked quite adorable, but she simply couldn’t believe that tagline. Still she was intrigued. “Well now I have to try that. Do you want to pick a mix with me Chloe?” She offered, hoping that she wouldn’t end up eating these on her own.

Chloe chuckled at the way Agatha’s eyes clung to the waffles greedily, and when Chloe inhaled the smell of warm caramelised sugar was incredibly tantalising. “You can have some, you know, I don’t mind waiting!” Chloe said softly, her protest mild. it felt wrong, trying to give people permission to do things, which made it all the more important to do, right? But as Agatha turned, Chloe froze as well, staring at the black and white theme. It was one thing to awkwardly dodge a security guard, another to see a stall covered in stripes. The mimes…. signed at her silently and without malice, but she still shivered and shuffled past them awkwardly. For a second, Chloe lost sight of Agatha in the crowd and began to panic, before realising that she was in front of a different stall. Candies of every stripe and flavour were lined up in cotton bags, offered up for them to build their own pick and mix bag from. Chloe touched Agatha’s arm for a split second just to reassure herself that she was real and there, before smiling nervously and nodding. “Yeah, sure.” The cashier offered them a paper bag, and Chloe started with a small scoop of ‘Fizzing fireworks,” that looked like little liquorice beans. “Your turn to choose the next ones?”

Agatha pursed her lips to the side, as if she doubted her ability to gobble up one of those waffles whole. If she couldn't finish it, she could always give a piece to her new friend. Finally deciding to order one, she walked away to get some napkins at the other end of the stall and lost sight of Chloe for a moment. The latter approaching her, she gave him a beaming smile, before trying to wipe away the sugar from the corners of her lips. “Let’s see…” she glanced at the paper bag, watching the liquorice bean cover the rabbits. “Mmmh, what about… Coco bombs.” The white chocolate balls were covered in coconut flakes, looking like they begged to end up in her stomach. “Would you like a piece of my waffle?” She wanted to save space for the candy now, and knew that the waffle would take too much room if she were to finish it alone. Giving Chloe a puppy eyed look, she tore a piece of waffle off, handing it to her : “Come on, it’s great. You won’t regret it,” she assured her.

“Oh, uh, just a small piece,” Chloe agreed, her eyes widening as Agatha dropped a chunk in her hand before she’d even finished her sentence. She took a small bite, and smiled gratefully. Even if she wanted to there was a lump in her throat that held back the word thank you. As the sugar of the waffle dissolved in Chloe‘s mouth, she remembered that she was not used to this kind of sweetness, neither the kind from the waffle nor the kind from Agatha. Between the two of them, they quickly selected a few more flavours for their bag of sweets before putting it on the weighing scale. Chloe tapped her card against the reader – contactless was also something that she was still getting used to – and picked up the bag offering the first one to Agatha. “My treat,” she said, before looking around. “Let’s get away from the mimes first, actually.”

Agatha deadpanned. "I'm nothing but generous," she was not usually one to share her food with others, but she told herself that Chloe had been deprived for too long of the greatness of waffles, and that anyway, she needed room for the candy they were picking out. And if it could let Chloe see that there were kind people still populating the Earth then all the better. She licked her lips and wiped her mouth clean all at once, which now that she had done it, didn't seem like the brightest thing she had ever done. Her eyebrows raised, she looked at Chloe as she rubbed her hand against her slacks. "Don't. I'm clearly not as smart as I claim to be," with a giggle, she looked back at her waffle and sighed. Thank God she did not believe in things being too pretty to be eaten. What kind of nonsense was that?

"You know what, excellent idea," she didn't protest about Chloe paying for the sweets, although she had that thankful look in her eyes as she looked at her. "I gotta say, I don't feel comfortable around them either. They are just so weird, you know?" She shook her head, mimicking a shiver. "You should see their bar and restaurant. Awful. I mean the food's alright, but... Well let's just say I'll never bring you to those," some people claimed that mimes were evil. While Agatha rolled her eyes at that, she understood why someone might think so. There was an uncanny, unsettling vibe that seemed to envelop these artists. Taking a piece of candy from the bag, she put it in her mouth and while she was pleased with the taste, she felt as if there was something tickling her throat and she couldn't repress laughter as she put her hand to her neck. "No, no. I hate being tickled," she cried.

“Oh! Someone gave me a map of all the mime related places to avoid. I was almost…. well, I was attacked by one a while back, so, they’re high on my radar to avoid,” Chloe whispered, looking furtively at the mimes to see if they were listening. One mimed a smile at her, and she quickly jerked back to look at Agatha. “I’m shocked to learn that the food is enjoyable at all. Their meal delivery service leaves… a lot to be desired.” Once they were out of sight of the mimes, Chloe was more than comfortable to pluck a treat out of the bag for herself/. Chloe bit down on the candy as she turned back to Agatha in bemusion. “I’m… not tickling you?” Chloe replied, staring at Agatha in growing concern as the woman jerked and flinched while laughing unrelentingly. “Are... you okay?” The candy in her mouth began to pop and fizz like pop rocks on steroids, and when she opened her mouth little sparks like fireworks popped out. Chloe’s eyes widened with alarm, although the sweet sour flavour was in fact… surprisingly enjoyable.

“That’s a thoughtful thing to do,” she might have not been scared by those mimes, they were unsettling to her, and the only reason she had pushed the door to their restaurant was for the food. Her mother had made her promise not to take her there ever again, which while it seemed a bit much, also did not feel too weird to her. The music being played on loop alone could have justified this permanent decision. “It’s not the best food in town, but there’s something about it, I couldn’t be able to tell what it is, that makes you want to get more.” It was only her promise to her mother that had kept her from going back. Then, after a while, this need to go back had faded naturally. Of course Agatha could not suspect that it had to do with a very special ingredient. 

“I had no idea they did meal deliveries, although if you say that it’s atrocious, I think I’ll save myself from this pain.” She remembered that the former sergeant used to eat food from such services. She wondered if he had been a customer of this one too. 

The mimes now at a distance, she could tell that Chloe was a little bit more relaxed, to the point of giving her tickles. I’m… not tickling you? She was not. Her eyes a bit wider, she looked at Chloe with worry as she saw light, bursts of light, almost like tiny fireworks escaping her mouth. Still, the detective wiggled her torso, holding her arm to protect herself from tickles, only for those to start somewhere else. It was when she felt it reach her feet (and then promptly fade away) that she was left with this odd feeling : what did I just eat? The candy was really good, but that kind of effect was not one she ever had experienced with food. Carefully, she picked another. It must have been the one Chloe had just eaten, because along with the fizziness, came the same outburst of light: sparks shooted out of her mouth, but it was the flavour of the candy that satisfied her the most. She couldn’t recall trying any that had been so intense with their taste. “Those are so good?!” 

“I don’t know if it’s from the actual restaurant, because Lydia actually kinda liked the restaurant, but the food is so bad,” Chloe replied almost thoughtlessly, before freezing. People always got weird when she mentioned Lydia, because for them it was such a nightmare while for Chloe it… had been a nightmare, but it had also been her reality. Talking about Lydia was habit… just not for anyone else. She had no idea how Agatha would respond, if at all, but she was relieved for the distraction. 

Chloe was not convinced good was the word she’d describe the flavour she was experiencing. It was as if her tongue was completely incapable of tasting anything else ever, she’d hit maximum flavour capacity. How did they even do that?/ Had candy making technologies really improve that much in just four years? As quickly as it had been there, it melted away into her mouth, not even leaving a trace. Intrigued, Chloe plucked  another out of the bag. She balked. In her hand was a small black and white striped hard candy, even though neither of them had selected them. Making an executive decision, Chloe chucked the mime candy on the ground and stamped on it. The hard candy cracked under her heel silently, and when she checked underneath her shoe, it was gone. “I hate that,” chloe said softly, before plopping another candy in her mouth. “Oh, oh, this one is a little like a jawbreaker? It keeps, oh, this is good, each layer is changing flavour.” Apple, cherry, cola, strawberry, mint, it was changing very fast but the effect was never too jarring.

The name of Lydia should have brought an eyebrow raise from Agatha. Instead, she glanced at Chloe, wondering if she should have said something. The woman chose to remain quiet. Chloe must have spoken about what had happened with Lydia hundreds of times already, to her, to other detectives, to psychiatrists and more, each time reliving it over again. It was only cruel to ask if she wanted to talk about it every time Lydia’s name would be mentioned. Someone eager to get details might pretend to “care”, but caring was allowing Chloe to talk about it when she wanted to, listening and being there for her. 

A change in the conversation came, naturally, unexpectedly, in the shape of a striped round hard candy. She watched as the other woman crushed it under her shoe, expecting a satisfying sight, but there was no trace left of it. “Holy fucking Mary, what in the goddamn,” it seemed Chloe was not so impressed, but rather blasée. It must have seemed weak compared to what she had been through, Agatha figured. “Hate is the word,” she agreed. She picked through the bag to check whether some other black and white horrors had found their way in it. “I wonder how those ended up here. The shop owner didn’t seem like one of them,” there she was, speaking like those she once considered agents of chaos ; people that she once put in the same box as flat earthers or evolution theory deniers : the mime haters. She did not want to be so prejudiced against them, but they did not do much to help their case. “Really? Isn’t it a bit too much?” She wondered how they had achieved that without it all feeling like a tasteless mixture. “I’m sorry about the mimes. But hey, those weirdos aside, how do you like the market so far? Pretty nice, huh? It’s not Germany, but I’d say we’re doing pretty good.”

“I’m definitely just pretending that didn’t exist,” Chloe said weakly about the mime candy, with a false smile that didn’t quite match her jitters. “Seriously, seriously don’t eat any striped food.” She walked them along the stalls as Agatha checked for more dangerous treats, chewing on the red wine flavoured sweet in her mouth. “It is a bit much,” Chloe chuckled, but finished the treat all the same, gulping it down when it tasted like cinnamon and apple crumble. “No! I’m enjoying it. Really. Thanks for… hauling me out here. I know I took some convincing.” Because of the fae she was sure she’d encounter between the fairy lights. It was good to be reminded that sweetness lingered in this town too. “Let’s go experience the rest of it?” Chloe suggested quietly. It had been so long since she’d been allowed to want. She would cherish every christmas-light moment of it.

#domestic abuse tw #emotional abuse tw #chronic illness tw #lydiaplot cw #wickedswriting #para #chatzy #para chloe

[watching-pictures-move]

Put On Your Raincoats #25 | Throat... 12 Years After (Damiano, 1984)

This review contains mild spoilers.

By the '80s, the nexus of porn filmmaking had shifted from New York to California, the sunny, warm weather vibes of the latter having replaced the grittier urban realities of the former. So when Throat... 12 Years After opens with images of New York City, it feels something like a statement. This isn't going to be one of your trifles from the west coast. This is a real movie, about real people, dealing with real emotions. One of these real emotions is guilt, like what George Payne feels about cheating on his wife and visiting a hooker as he argues with his conscience on his drive home. ("There's something between nine-to-five and meatloaf," he tells himself.) Now, this conversation is played softly for laughs, but the movie does stack the deck in favour of one side by casting Sharon Mitchell as the bubblegum-chewing prostitute. In a room bathed in a pulsating red light that waxes and wanes in brightness, Mitchell asks him about his sex life as they prepare to do the deed.

"You ever done anything kinky?"

"One time the wife kept the slippers on."

As the scene progresses, Mitchell recounts a schoolyard sexual encounter, and the movie proceeds to cut between her scene with Payne and her flashback with Phil Prince regular Dan Stephens (one of the more presentable male performers in that director's stock company), and you can see how the movie navigates the differences in erotic qualities between the immediacy of the Mitchell/Payne scene and the almost ethereal Mitchell/Stephens scene. But as much as the actual sex, the scene's interest lies in the before and after, the characters trying to wring meaning from their actions.

The rest of the movie follows this pattern. There's a housewife, who at first is browbeaten by her mother to make some grandkids already ("Cook a nice dinner. Put on something see-through. Kids are what you need.") and later finds solace in the visiting repairman, who sees through her marital troubles. ("People drift apart by inches, day by day, an inch at a time.") The wife is played by Michelle Maren, who doesn't have a whole lot of other credits to her name (Damiano was known for sometimes casting relative unknowns in major roles; the high water mark of this strategy would be the great Georgina Spelvin in The Devil in Miss Jones) yet is quite effective in her role (and has a very distinct hairdo to boot). The repairman is played by Eric Edwards, who I've sometimes found a little bland but happens to be very good at playing nice here, so much so that you don't really hold it against the wife for being unfaithful.

Then there's Sharon Kane, an older woman employing the services of an inexperienced male prostitute played by Jerry Butler. Kane is an experienced patron of such services, providing Butler with very specific instructions for preparing martinis and then chiding him over his inexperience. ("What's with you, you can't listen and suck at the same time? You an actor or something?") It's probably not very nice of Kane to tell Butler to his face that he's not as good as her first (who we see in a flashback), but she also gets through a tricky bit of dialogue while being orally pleasured, so much respect in any case. The climax of the film follows Joey Silvera and Joanna Storm on a trip to an underground sex club. Their cabbie is played by Damiano in one of his cameos (a Camiano? Cameo-no?), delivering a joke about why you can't drink a cold beer after a hot bath. (I won't reveal the punchline, but I did laugh.) Once there, naturally they join the orgy that's in progress, and while such scenes aren't ones I find inherently erotic, this one is well put together for what it is. After having struggled through the interminable, shapeless orgy footage in Jungle Blue, I appreciate that this one, with its mix of stark lighting, unusual angles and acrobatic positions has a pretty distinct impact compared to the previous sex scene. (It's also set to a disco song with embarrassingly graphic lyrics.)

Once all of this is over, the main characters, who we learn are couples and friends, get together, their relationships apparently having been strengthened by their sexual escapades. Their choice of entertainment explains the title, and they all toast ("To practice") as the credits kick in, with flashbacks in splitscreen to the preceding antics. Throat... 12 Years Later was directed by Gerard Damiano, who placed more importance than the average director at the time on the dramatic potency of his films. The tagline explains the mission statement ("A reflection, not a sequel"), which is about reflecting on the acts featured while it's delivering the goods, using its episodic structure to create emotional resonance. Damiano has a certain conservative streak in some of his work, but this is fairly sex positive, arguing that sex strengthens all the characters' relationships, and extends to a defense of the hardcore porn genre, offering an argument that these movies can actually be emotionally rewarding. That it works as well as it does is due to the relative naturalism on display, carried by consistently strong performances and a good ear for dialogue, and the elegant yet varied visual style (cinematography courtesy of Larry Revene), which finds a distinct and potent atmosphere for each of the encounters.

#film #put on your raincoats #movie review

[atamascolily]

Telling, not showing: subversion and missing scenes in TLJ

 I spend a lot of time thinking about The Last Jedi as I work on my fix-it fic, and I’ve finally been able to articulate one thing that’s bugged me ever since I saw it. For me, the film divides very neatly into two parts: one where Rey is anti-Kylo, the other where she is pro-Kylo. The cave scene at the film’s midpoint also marks the transition between the two.

From a storytelling perspective, the problem isn’t that Rey becomes zealously pro-Kylo, although I must admit I am not a fan of this particular evolution in her character. The problem is that the writers use a twist to subvert their audience’s expectations and surprise them with a “Gotcha!”--except that in so doing, they skip over the parts that make that transition emotionally plausible to me.

Let me explain. Up until the cave sequence, Rey’s only interactions with Kylo have been through three unexpected, unwanted conversations via the Force that neither one is controlling or directing (even if Rey/the audience is skeptical of this at first). [The fact that Snoke is setting them up is a different story problem, but that’s not relevant here.] They are all negative.

In their first encounter, Rey straight up shoots him with a blaster. (It doesn’t take.) In the second, she’s standing by the ocean next to the Falcon and she calls him a monster. (Kylo agrees.) In the third, he gives her his own version of what happened the night the temple burned, and tells Rey her parents were junk traders who sold her for drinking money. As a result, Rey heads for the mirror cave to investigate, demanding to see her parents.

The mirror cave sequence is eventually revealed to be a flashback: Rey is wrapped in a blanket next to a fire in one of the stone huts, narrating her experience to someone. We’re supposed to assume it’s Luke (or maybe Chewbacca, although goodness knows the narrative forgets about him until they need someone to fly the Falcon). But then Kylo says, “You’re not alone,” and the camera shows us Kylo, sitting across the fire from Rey. He’s been there the whole time, not Luke. And his relationship with Rey is now radically different from anything else we’ve been presented with before.

The problem is that because of the way this scene is framed--because of the twist--we don’t see the transition from angry/antagonistic!Rey who (correctly) calls Kylo Ren a murderer for killing Han Solo to the calmer, more open Rey who is willing to share personal intimate details about her life and experience with someone who literally tortured her in the last movie. I know, I know, the writers of TLJ would like me to forget that, but I really, really can’t. Sorry. That happened. And, silly me, I think that would impact their relationship. You know. Just a little.

So I don’t see how Rey softens towards Kylo, I only see the end product, when the movie presents it to me as an accomplished fact. And I don’t know about you, but I personally need to see that transition in order to find her “conversion” to the “Kylo Is Good” cult believable.

Unlike JJ Abrams, who never met a Force vision he didn’t want to show the audience in jarring and confusing detail, the writers of TLJ don’t show us what Rey experiences when she and Kylo make contact in the infamous, slow-motion “hand touch” scene that follows. All we know is what Rey tells us, and what she sees is clearly enough to convert her all the way to Team Kylo, because she immediately attacks Luke when he intervenes and orders her to stop. We don’t see what she sees to make her believe that Kylo can be redeemed, that he is trustworthy/reliable/necessary.

You can argue that we did see events from Kylo’s POV in the flashback prior to the mirror cave sequence, but if that’s the case, what makes Rey’s vision in the hand touch different from the information she got then? What changed to make her believe it now when she didn’t believe it then? And if it is different, what makes it different? 

All I know is that Rey jumps from “Kylo is my enemy” to “Kylo can be redeemed and I have to go rescue him right now” and it’s so sudden and jarring, I can’t see how we got from one to the other so quickly. I can see what the writers are trying to do. I can see what they think they’ve done. But what’s presented in the film as it stands just doesn’t work for me. I don’t find it convincing. But the film doesn’t care, the film says, “Okay, wasn’t that great, Luke is pathetic, Rey is awesome, let’s go!” and moves on, assuming that Rey is now so pro-Kylo now she’s willing to drop everything to save a man because she’s convinced everything will be saved if he can turn back to the light.

The unspoken subtext: because Rey doesn’t think she’s good enough to save the world herself? Because she’s lonely and wants a companion/lover/boyfriend? Because she needs a man to complete herself? Unlike Luke, who had a meaningful, if one-sided relationship with the idea of his father before he learned the truth, Rey and Kylo have... nothing outside of negative interactions. (Comforting Rey by saying, “You’re not alone,” doesn’t make up them, and I personally don’t consider it as positive interaction given all other gaslighting that’s been going on in their interactions over the past movie and a half.) Luke has to believe that Vader can be redeemed because otherwise he’s left wondering if he himself can be truly good if he comes from evil; restoring Vader to Anakin is the best way to resolve the cognitive dissonance. Redeeming Kylo.... doesn’t do that for Rey, because her core issue isn’t with Kylo, it’s with her identity, her relationship with her parents, and her struggles with finding her place in the galaxy. None of those things are something that Kylo--redeemed or not--can give her. So why is this suddenly her driving motivation?

And then the rest of the movie happens, and it’s more or less consistent with Rey’s character transformation as pro-Kylo, right up until the point he takes up the mantle of Supreme Leader of the First Order and roundly rejects her overtures. But it rings hollow for me because I don’t see the transformation myself--all of the important bits are deliberately kept off-screen and so I’m just left with this trailing feeling of “Wait? What just happened?”.... which is my default reaction to TLJ in general.

And I think that there are those who would argue that my feelings of bewilderment are proof of this movie’s sophistication, people who like the “gotchas!” and the twists and the “things aren’t as you thought they were” topsy-turvies. I enjoy my plot twists as much as the next person, but they only work for me if they are emotionally plausible and explained, not assumed, and I don’t see any evidence for that when I go back and re-watch the film specifically looking for it.

And this is a recurring theme throughout TLJ; in fact, film’s tagline ought to have been “This is not going to go with the way you think!” It happens with Rey’s relationship with Kylo, it happens with Luke’s death, it happens with Holdo and Poe, it happens with DJ’s betrayal... every relationship, every trope from the previous films and movies is upended. The patricidal Kylo draws the line at killing his mother; the courageous Finn is revealed as a coward; Poe’s daring becomes arrogance. The Resistance is no better than the First Order because they buy their weapons from the same vendors and slaughter innocent bystanders in their struggles, while the New Republic stands by and lets it all happen.

It’s not that there’s no place for nuance, for subversion, for this kind of moral examination in Star Wars. I just wish it was better executed. As it stands, the film comes off to me as a kind of grimdark moralism, with the message that “All your heroes will disappoint you, and there’s no point in trying to accomplish anything because you’re doing it wrong,” and I just... don’t find that uplifting or enjoyable.

TL:DR: my relationship with this movie can be summarized by this handy meme:

#star wars #WHY DISNEY WHY #tlj fix-it #SW meta