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shihalyfie · 4 years ago

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The different aspects of Miyako’s personality and character arc

Miyako is a character where there’s just a lot going on with her in general, and asking different people to summarize Miyako in one phrase could feasibly get you some very different answers -- “the computer nerd girl”, or “the one who keeps talking about boys”, or “the one who panics all of the time”, or whatnot. Given that there’s so much to unpack at once even from her base profile, ironing out the full extent of her character arc can get a bit tricky, and there’s a lot going on with it. So, given that: Who is Miyako, anyway?

Miyako’s background and personality

Miyako is a character that I think is best understood by understanding what kind of person she is, and the personality and mentality she goes into the story of 02 with.

An interesting background story behind Miyako’s creation is that she’s based off a real person -- more accurately, a certain assistant producer on the series (whose identity has remained undisclosed, presumably for privacy reasons) was used as a reference for her behavior and actions. Although Adventure and 02 have a philosophy of portraying realistic human behavior in general, this level of specificity is a unique designation to have, and series director Kakudou Hiroyuki has referred to this a few times over the years -- it seems she’s the only of the Tokyo Chosen Children to have such a concrete single-person reference, and it’s also the reason her blood type of AB and star sign Gemini were given in 02 episode 25 (the other kids don’t have mentioned birthdays or blood types to prevent personality restrictions via horoscoping, but a real person having Miyako’s personality, star sign, and blood type wouldn’t make that as much of an issue). Even Volcano Ota himself confirmed Miyako’s resemblance to her upon hearing it after the fact! Indeed, a lot of 02 fans (especially adults) have admitted that Miyako’s probably one of the most relatable people in the cast, namely because her gushing about things she likes and panicking at things that overwhelm her is...well, a bit too uncomfortably on-point at times.

(And especially since so much about Miyako’s character has to do with how happy she makes everyone around her, it’s not too hard to imagine that the staff was so fond of her real-life inspiration that they wanted to pay tribute to her in such a way...)

Still, Miyako is a fictional character, one with her own backstory and interactions in 02′s story, and said backstory is such: she comes from a family that runs a convenience store in Odaiba, and is the youngest of a family of four siblings. Running a convenience store on a small island means that Miyako has probably seen a lot of the island’s residents, and her family also has various levels of connections to the other kids’ families (her older sisters Momoe and Chizuru are friends of Daisuke’s sister Jun, and Chizuru is Yamato’s classmate). Moreover, she’s befriended her nine-year-old neighbor (one who otherwise has trouble socializing with his peers) to the point of regularly going over to do computer repairs for his family. She’s also worked in the computer club under Koushirou, and even before the series has started, she looks up to him and adores him in a way not entirely unlike how Daisuke looks up to Taichi -- and although it’s unclear whether or not she started after the beginning of 02, 02 episode 29 reveals that she helps Yamato with his band.

The pattern here is that Miyako is extremely sociable, and one who actively pokes her nose into nearly everything so she can help out. This makes her a very different sort of Mom Friend from Sora -- both of them are Crest of Love holders for good reason, but in Sora’s case, she was compulsively going out of her way to help other people to the point of exhaustion, and her character arc was about trying to find a way to detach herself from obligations and do something for herself. Miyako is the complete opposite -- she’s the kind of extrovert who actively enjoys poking her head into other people’s business, picking up a bunch of peripheral hobbies so she can do something useful for everyone and go I’M HELPING!! If you actually look closely at those hobbies of “computer programming and hacking”, “hardware tinkering”, and “sound engineering”, other than vaguely being related to computers, they are completely different skillsets, and every single one of them is one Miyako’s depicted employing in order to help someone else out. (Koushirou is never really depicted as having super amazingly high technical skill and most of his unique talent comes from being a thorough analyst, but in contrast, while Miyako is established as being good at even hacking in Diablomon Strikes Back, she doesn’t really seem to have a huge propensity for deep analytical thought.) It’s hard to tell if she has any personal preference for any of them as much as she basically turned herself into a jack-of-all-trades so she could do whatever job was necessary for someone else.

If we’re to believe the official 02 site, Miyako’s been a bit pampered by her family -- as the youngest of four siblings, she’s the “baby of the family”, who hasn’t had to live with a ton of responsibility for others. This means that, much like Mimi, she seems to have been raised surrounded by a ton of affection, which is why she herself is such an openly affectionate person who’s open-minded towards trying all sorts of things, and why she’s used to wanting to help others by actively throwing herself into situations -- but it also means that, being the youngest of a family who is now in the situation of being the oldest in a new group, she ends up in Jou’s situation of suddenly being faced with the pressure of the concept of proper responsibility for others.

As far as Miyako’s general personality goes, she is constantly overflowing with affection and cheer and a desire to dote on everyone -- but the flip side is that she’s also aggressive. She has zero sense of restraint. (If you ever get around to listening to the Japanese version of 02, Natsuki Rio’s performance is energetic and over-the-top in almost every way imaginable to the point that you get the impression of Miyako as someone who doesn’t easily run out of batteries -- at least, until things start getting really serious.) When she loves something, she’ll gush about it as if there were hearts floating around her (and, depending on the level of closeness, even jump in and physically hug them), and she has no qualms against physically manhandling if she feels she needs to, and if she dislikes something, she will make it very clear (including yelling very loudly about it). You could argue that she’s actually closer to the archetype of the brash shounen protagonist than Daisuke himself is!

In fact, Miyako and Daisuke have very similar temperaments -- pure-hearted, but also rough around the edges -- but can be distinguished by the fact that while Daisuke is actually deferential and somewhat lacking in assertion, Miyako is actually aggressive, and while Daisuke’s “honesty about his feelings” is mainly because he’s too simple-minded to be any good at hiding anything, Miyako’s honesty is because she has no brain-to-mouth filter, and everything she’s thinking comes out of her mouth before she can control it -- in other words, Miyako has a huge case of foot-in-mouth syndrome. She doesn’t want to be insensitive, but it keeps coming out of her mouth before she can control it -- and even worse, her emotions are prone to taking control of her, and she is very prone to getting overwhelmed and collapsing into a massive panic.

If you think about the two archetypes of “girl who takes care of everyone” and “aggressive action girl”, Miyako has a tendency towards both at once, and moreover there’s an extra nail in it -- most “action girls” in the latter category would be portrayed as badass, put-together characters with a cool personality, but Miyako is a mess. She’s prone to panicking, all over the place, and her tendency to get in-your-face is not exactly in the most dignified manner. And as a result, a huge part of her character arc (as we will be going more into detail about below) is that she’s aware of this and doesn’t like this about herself -- because she doesn’t want to be insensitive or rude, and in fact she wants to be someone who can better help and take care of others, but, in her mind, her own personality keeps getting in the way.

Miyako in 02

After fully becoming a Chosen Child in 02 episode 2, it only takes one more episode for Miyako to bring food for everyone, as if to say “Right! I’m going to be working with everyone now! All of you are now my new best friends!” (”Bringing food for people” is one of Miyako’s many ways of showing love, given that she returns from Kyoto in 02 episode 34 and immediately hands off souvenir yatsuhashi to Koushirou.) And with that, Miyako settles into the archetype of the group’s “mood maker” -- someone whose role is to keep everyone in emotionally high spirits by influencing everyone with cheer and energy. 02 episode 5 features the debut of her famous “Digital Gate, open! Chosen Children, let’s roll!” catchphrase -- this and her other famous “Bingo!” catchphrase establish her as the only of the Tokyo Chosen Children to have a catchphrase (at least, in the Japanese version). Because catchphrases are fun.

As much as everyone (especially Daisuke) is a bit blindsided by her behavior at first, they eventually come to embrace the positive effect she has on all of them -- Daisuke very genuinely asks her for “the usual cheer” in 02 episode 10, and, all the way in 02 episode 22, this is such an agreed-on and established role that they’ll still wait on her to do the honors even when they’re in a hurry. So in other words, it didn’t take long for Miyako to go out of her way to shower everyone with cheer, and it didn’t take long for everyone to answer to that cheer and appreciate her for it.

The flip side of this, however, is that Miyako doesn’t start off being very emotionally equipped to handle this -- right off the bat in 02 episode 2, she says that she’s not inclined for fighting, and in 02 episode 4, she refers to it as being “like an adventure game”. That is to say, she’s not at the point where she’s able to handle the full gravity of what she’s just involved herself with (Daisuke reminds her that she’d panicked earlier, but she just blows it off). She’s handling it so cheerfully now because the series is still in its early stages, when she can enter and exit the Digital World at will, and she’s capable of treating it like this.

So when the stakes do get higher, she’s the first one to take the stress hard. As mentioned before, she’s the youngest in her family, now recast as the oldest in this group -- but unlike Jou, who consciously knew this fact and took stress onto himself because of the responsibility this entailed, Miyako seems to repeatedly forget that she’s the oldest in this group, and the events of 02 episodes 9-10 (when Agumon is kidnapped) cause her to break down from stress and have to take a time-out. (Which everyone allows her to do, because this is not a series where people are pressured to fight if they’re not emotionally ready for it.) Miyako comes to terms with the fact that the stakes are going to keep escalating, and she can’t just gloss over everything with cheer -- and she does manage to pull herself enough to bring Yamato into the fray at the end of the episode, but this continues to be a recurring theme for the rest of her character arc.

While we’re discussing these early parts of the series, one thing I want to briefly address is the part where Miyako infamously calls a lot of people hot. (Although, not as many as the fanbase would love to make you think; it’s only four people in total.) This tends to get her pinned as some kind of flirt whose head is only filled with being hot for people, but while she’s certainly a bit on the shallow end at this point of the series -- dealing with that being what this character arc is about, after all -- this trait of hers tends to get exaggerated by a lot of people in the audience as if she’s completely lacking in common sense. Miyako’s ridiculous (and we love her for it), but she does have some degree of grip on herself! Context is important here -- she might show a crush on someone, but at no point in the series itself does Miyako show any indication of seriously thinking of full-on dating.

For Miyako, who’s accustomed to just blurting out the first thing that comes to mind, commenting on someone being hot is like commenting on the weather -- she means it as a compliment, but there’s no evidence she thinks she has a chance with any of them, let alone wanting to try dating. This is especially when you take into account her self-esteem issues that we learn about later in the series, and also...well, the fact she’s only twelve. (Remember: even Daisuke’s thing for Hikari comes out as a lot of unfocused affection, and it’s unlikely he’s seriously considered the concept of following that up with a serious relationship -- any serious prospects of romance or dating are not going to be on the table for these kids for a while.) Miyako has also been accused by some of being abysmally shallow for still complimenting Ken’s looks in 02 episode 9 (after it’s already apparent he’s the Kaiser), but although she certainly is a bit shallow at this point of the series, she’s not that lacking in common sense; Iori got in on it too in this scene, and both of them were doing it to tease Daisuke more than they seriously wanted to compliment the Kaiser all that much. So in essence, it’s just “Miyako has eyes” -- she still completely agrees he’s their enemy and she’s not going to judge him any better for his looks, but she also doesn’t see this as a reason to lie about the fact she thinks he’s visually good-looking, especially if it’s to tease Daisuke about it.

In any case, 02 episode 14 digs a lot more into Miyako’s stance on herself regarding others -- in 02 episode 6, Miyako met Mimi for the first time, and latched onto her for their similar dispositions and her looking up to Mimi for being beautiful, amazing, and cool (and she should, because she’s right). 02 episode 14 adds another layer to this, however, when Miyako spends the duration negatively comparing herself to Mimi. At first it starts off as simply just shallow jealousy for Michael giving Mimi more attention, but as the situation with Digitamamon escalates, Miyako spends a prolonged period of time trying to figure out Mimi’s behavior of pure-heartedly choosing to trust Digitamamon despite everything, against Miyako’s insistence that Digitamamon’s behavior proves that he was untrustworthy the whole time.

Mimi and Miyako’s stances are both on extremes here -- Mimi’s pacifistic tendencies are causing her to let her get beaten up by Digitamamon despite the fact that “appealing to people’s hearts” has never really been demonstrated as a good way to get Evil Rings off (to be fair, this is probably the first time they’ve made an attempt at this with a Digimon that can still talk coherently with it on), but Miyako’s acting as if this retroactively proves him to be untrustworthy even though she knows that the Evil Rings are tantamount to brainwashing. Nevertheless, Miyako acknowledges that her own stance was borne out of her being shallow and judgmental, especially since the discussion between Mimi and Digitamamon brings out a question about the meaning of the “true self”.

Miyako, at this point, is confronting everything that’s bad about herself -- that she’s shallow and not as much of a “good person” as Mimi is. But the Crest of Purity -- once meaning “lack of malice” back when it applied to Mimi in Adventure -- now has a secondary meaning of “not lying to oneself” (the dub translation of “Sincerity” is not actually that off in this sense), and it also means that Miyako is not going to get anywhere pretending or forcing herself to be someone she’s not. The secondary Digimental arc has a recurring theme of understanding that there are still things you need to learn and improve on in order to do better, and this is Miyako’s version of it -- she will have to acknowledge all of the bad parts of herself before she can get anywhere and become a kind person like Mimi is -- and, indeed, becoming less shallow and judgmental and not jumping to conclusions, and learning to reach out to more substantial cores of the problem, ends up becoming a major part of her character arc in the latter half of the series.

This episode also implies one more thing, even if she doesn’t realize it yet at this moment: the path to her becoming a less shallow and more considerate person is not going to involve trying to force herself to be like Mimi, but rather in a way that’s closer to her “true self”.

Miyako’s first major turning point is in 02 episode 18, an episode that’s said to have such a profound impact on her that even Natsuki Rio testified to having to alter her Miyako performance thereafter.

Back in 02 episode 10, Miyako first started to realize that this whole experience of fighting as a Chosen Child was a lot more stressful than it seemed at first, and reacted badly to it. Here, the ante gets upped even more -- the kids decide to make use of their summer break and organize a Digital World stakeout, and, eventually, Hikari accidentally becomes indirectly responsible for tipping Miyako over the deep end by making an implication that they need more “determination” to the point of refusing to leave until they’ve beaten the Kaiser. (Remember that Hikari can be terrifyingly assertive as long as it’s not something to do with herself.) For Miyako, who’s never had the same experience of being in the Digital World for a prolonged period of time the same way the Adventure group has, this is terrifying, and she tries to “get herself together” over the night -- only to completely overshoot it and go into the complete other extreme. As much as this ends up being one of Miyako’s peak hilarity moments, it’s most certainly representative of her being under a huge amount of pressure and stress, and it’s effectively her “peak worst” moment -- which results in Hawkmon ending up having to cover for her, and getting injured in the process, and Miyako immediately realizing how badly she’d messed up.

Miyako is thus forced to face a major consequence of her behavior: if she doesn’t manage to figure out a way to get herself under control, other people will be hurt, and as someone who wants to do her best for other people, that’s one of the worst possible outcomes for her.

In addition, it’s also important to point out Hikari’s role in this. The Jogress arcs have yet to set in, but the series still gives you a little preview of what’s to come eventually, such as the insight we get about Daisuke and Ken’s initial attitudes towards each other in 02 episode 8, and Iori later personally witnessing (and being very disturbed by) Takeru losing his composure in 02 episode 19. In this case, we see a bit of what Miyako and Hikari’s opposing personalities can offer for each other (especially since the later 02 episode 31 more heavily involves Miyako returning the favor in the other direction) -- Hikari correctly identifies exactly what it was that set Miyako off, takes responsibility for it, and even decides to make sure Miyako and Hawkmon get proper alone time so that they can figure things out. In general, everyone in the 02 team is understanding of Miyako’s antics and doesn’t hold any of it against her because she’s doing her best, but right now, Hikari may be the only person in this group who can actually proactively do something about it, because Daisuke’s not assertive enough to step in, Takeru has a tendency to dodge things whenever they get awkward, and Iori’s holding himself back too much for the sake of manners (especially in the presence of Miyako, who’s the oldest one in this group). But while Hikari does have an emotional repression problem, she’s perfectly capable of holding herself together and putting her foot down when it comes to other people, and because of this, she’s the one who’s able to understand what exactly is going on with Miyako, and how to adjust the situation around her to make things easier for her.

Miyako and Hawkmon have a proper heart-to-heart, and we see more of Miyako’s self-hating tendencies going on here -- she refers exactly to her problems with impulse control, and even labels herself a “bad partner” as a result. But Hawkmon reassures her that she’s fine the way she is, and it ties into how a larger theme of her character arc will involve her learning to find better ways to channel the qualities she already has, rather than trying to force herself to be someone she’s not.

Once the Kaiser is defeated, the second half of the series is where we start to see Miyako’s growth start to really kick in. In 02 episode 24, there’s a short blink-and-you’ll-miss-it scene where Miyako suddenly takes Daisuke and puts him in charge of taking care of the Punimon. Why is this important? Because two episodes prior, Daisuke had been running around in circles like an idiot due to having been third wheeled by Takeru and Hikari, and the moment Daisuke started exhibiting similar signs this time, Miyako personally stepped in and gave him a job to do -- and her actions of keeping an eye on them and her conversation with Takeru and Hikari indicate that she did it exactly because she figured that he would like it. Or, in other words, Miyako correctly identified Daisuke’s need for validation and purpose, and became the first person to proactively do something to address it -- Hikari and Takeru had generally been dodging it awkwardly for the duration of the series, which had only really been making it worse, and, in the absence of another crisis to take care of or someone like Ken to fill the void in Daisuke’s life, Miyako was able to properly figure out exactly what he needed at the moment as a stopgap, and thus is starting to settle into her proper role of understanding what others need in terms of emotional support and actively working to address it.

Since the second half of 02 is dedicated to Ken slowly establishing his place in the group, 02 episode 25 is dedicated to Miyako tussling with her conflicted feelings on the situation -- she’s just as open-minded and pure-hearted as Daisuke is, but the one thing that’s bothering her is that she’s a little more doubtful than he is in regards to whether Ken’s heart is really in the right place with all of this. She says, outright, that she believes he’s learned his lesson -- in a way far more firm than Takeru, Hikari, and Iori are about it -- but that one thing about him having potentially killed Thunderballmon in cold blood doesn’t fit the optimistic image she’d like to have of him.

Daisuke is more practical-minded than she is and is more willing to accept that there might have been a good reason -- especially since he himself starts to consider in this very episode that killing an enemy may be necessary if it’s the only way to prevent more victims -- but Miyako is more emotionally oriented and just can’t accept the idea of doing this at all. Both the internal debate over accepting Ken and the internal debate over having to potentially do a kill tear her apart over the course of this episode, and Miyako finds herself constantly waffling back and forth between the two positions. It’s not just her expressing minor doubt; she actually agonizes over this for the duration of the night and the next day, to the point she even considers asking him about it (and eventually can’t bring herself to).

It’s also made a prominent point that Miyako’s prior attraction to Ken in 02 episode 8 was not the reason she wanted to be optimistic about him -- remember, back in 02 episode 14, she completely admitted that she judges people by appearances, but at this point she’s well past that! Miyako takes this entire issue of whether Ken should be considered a friend very seriously, and that’s why it torments her so much over the course of the episode.

Eventually, all is resolved (at least, for the time being) when it turns out that Ken has been dealing with non-sentient Dark Tower Digimon, and Miyako takes this as sufficient evidence that Ken has changed -- the morality debate about killing comes back in full force in 02 episode 43, and Ken himself ends up just as shaken about it, so the important part is that she understands that he’s trustworthy and wants to put faith in him. Attention is also given to Miyako deciding she’ll now call him by given name (”Ken-kun”) from now on -- even Daisuke himself won’t start calling him “Ken” regularly until 02 episode 39, but Miyako starts slowly inserting given-name basis for Ken into her vocabulary from this point on until she finally commits to it fully in 02 episode 30. This is a proactive and conscious act on Miyako’s part that she actively wants to get to know him better and consider him a close friend, and it’s because of this that she ends up one of the only people who never gets habituated into surname basis with him by the time everyone’s come to properly befriend him.

So, at this point: Within only one episode (and, in-universe, one day), Daisuke and Miyako landed on the same page with their ideological stance towards Ken. They’re both open-minded and forward-thinking, and have an interest in becoming his friend (the next person to show active and open goodwill towards him, Hikari, won’t do so for another 9 episodes). However, despite their surface temperaments being somewhat similar, they have some differences in their priorities and way of approaching things, and it means that each of them ends up reaching out to Ken in ways that the other isn’t as good at. Daisuke, being the very practical and simple-minded sort who doesn’t overthink things or get caught in arbitrary philosophy, is the one who most proactively reaches out to Ken and most famously connects with him the most due to Ken very badly needing guidance in how to move on forward and stop getting fixated on his past. Miyako, on the other hand, being very much the type to consciously think about things (to the point of sometimes thinking about too many things at once) and focus on “how do I most show my support for someone right now?”, puts her priorities on checking on Ken’s current emotional state and actively attempting to glean his feelings and position. 02 being a series about relationships and what people can provide for each other, this ends up reflecting on their roles in the group as a whole -- Daisuke becomes the person who can pull everyone forward in determining the best thing to do, whereas Miyako fills in the parts his rough-around-the-edges demeanor doesn’t quite cover in terms of supporting everyone emotionally and keeping them together.

And thus, Miyako resolves to “wait” until the day Ken will join them -- that is to say, she takes the stance that Ken deserves proper space and to come on his own terms. It’s an interesting inversion of the usual roles you’d expect from Daisuke and Miyako at this point -- and, again, since 02 is about relationships, “each character’s approach towards the new kid and how it impacts them” reflects a lot about their own characters. For Daisuke and Miyako, who were open-minded towards Ken early in the game, you can already see the impact on them -- the necessity of reaching out to Ken causes the normally deferential Daisuke to become more proactive and put his foot down, whereas the normally uncontrollably in-your-face Miyako comes to understand when something needs to be handled delicately and starts getting a better grasp on the concept of restraint.

Which means that Miyako’s actions regarding Ken in the following episodes are significantly more passive than Daisuke’s are, but it’s clear that she’s still supportive. Moreover, it’s also important to establish that she and Daisuke aren’t fighting about this or anything -- Miyako does want Ken to come around eventually, so she doesn’t stop the more proactive Daisuke from reaching out to Ken in an important way, but she instead exerts her position in ways such as joining in with the others reminding him that Ken might have gotten a bit emotionally overwhelmed by the Jogress (and thus that it’s understandable that he might need some time to parse this before pushing the issue further). The way Miyako words this statement so casually can easily be a distraction from the fact that she is completely correct -- as we see later, Ken did emotionally freak out the moment the incident was resolved and had to go home to think about this. Scatterbrained as Miyako may seem, as the series proceeds, it turns out that she has a natural propensity for empathy that means she’s capable of making perfectly correct readings of the situation, even without her thinking that hard about it.

Not that she’s correct all of the time, though. 02 episode 30 has her attempt to get Ken and Iori to hopefully be a little less tense around each other end in complete disaster (although to be fair to her, it’s not like she and Daisuke were particularly forceful about it, it’s just that their plan was so poorly set up that it was too easy to read the motive behind, and it’s ultimately thrown off because -- as Daisuke correctly points out -- the two are being really childish about it.) But in response, Miyako takes direct action and responsibility to fix the situation when Ken continues to refuse to help despite how badly the situation is escalating, and when she finally reaches him, she gets frustrated at the fact he’s being so stubborn, smacks him, and personally drags him back over. Miyako cared a lot about this, she had wanted Ken and Iori to get along for no reason of personal benefit to herself but more because she cared that much about the group’s dynamic and friendship, and she’d held herself back so much because she was worried about him, but here he’s taking all of that and still giving them all the cold shoulder when everyone is in grave danger, and all of that frustration causes her to break down at once.

And note Ken’s reaction -- he’d been holding off on the grounds that he was being a burden on everyone’s friendship, but he sees Miyako distraught and upset and calling him an idiot (i.e. his whole pretense of not hurting others has clearly not worked here), and his “idiot...?” comes out flustered and off-guard, and he shows no resentment towards her thereafter and comes quietly with no protest, even holding a hand to the place she’d smacked him as if mulling in agreement that he deserved that. So, again: Even when Miyako is coming to all of these conclusions in a haphazard manner, it doesn’t change the fact that her readings of these situations are often completely correct.

02 episode 31 is another landmark episode in which we get a lot of insight into Miyako’s current feelings regarding herself in comparison to others, and what she’s trying to achieve at this point in the series. Daisuke makes an offhand remark at the beginning of the episode about Hikari being more “kind” than Miyako (”kind” having a double meaning of “gentle” in Japanese, so Daisuke’s mainly referring to Miyako being such a rough and belligerent person). The way Miyako takes this statement indicates that Daisuke had accidentally just hit a very deep-seated complex within her -- Miyako had never liked the fact she was aggressive and belligerent and in-your-face (remember, back in 02 episode 14, she was constantly negatively comparing herself to Mimi for not being as good of a person as her, and now this has extended to Hikari, who “keeps so much inside”.). As the crisis in the episode escalates, Miyako continues to fall victim to her foot-in-mouth syndrome, saying things and instantly regretting it, because she sees herself as making the situation worse -- and especially when it comes to a situation also involving Ken, whom she’s actively trying to reach out to right now. Her frustration at the fact she can’t see what Ken and Hikari see is because, unable to understand what they’re talking about or what their feelings are, she’s basically a sitting duck who can’t do anything while things are getting worse for them.

Which ultimately results in Miyako completely losing her marbles and Hikari having to smack her out of it -- again, recall that in 02 episode 18, it was shown that Hikari is one of the few people who has enough assertiveness to be able to rein in Miyako’s behavior, and even outright admits that Miyako is a bit of a handful. Miyako, as it seems, had been carrying a complex that Hikari had been thinking of her badly for all of this -- but Hikari then proceeds to reveal the flip side of all of this: she’s also conversely jealous of Miyako for being able to express herself so clearly and easily, because she herself is the type who compulsively represses her own feelings about herself, which is why nobody had been able to properly reach out to her for the duration of Adventure and 02.

For someone who had spent so much time considering herself a “bad person” and a “worse person” in comparison to people like Mimi and Hikari, that someone considers her qualities outright enviable is a huge deal -- it’s not that Miyako’s an objectively worse person than all of the other people who aren’t as rough or in-your-face, but rather, that those qualities can bring out positive things in their own way. And, immediately after that, we see one of those things -- she makes Hikari laugh, thanks to her antics. Of course, it involves Miyako being a bit all over the place and making a lot of mistakes, but even she admits “I guess it is funny.”

And there’s another thing to this, too: Miyako continues to end up with foot-in-mouth as she casually refers to things like the Evil Ring and Ken being the Kaiser with zero fanfare, before realizing seconds after that she probably shouldn’t be doing that in front of him, but, once again, even without her realizing, her evaluation is not incorrect -- although the fact he’s extremely out of it doesn’t make that clear quite yet in this episode, Ken is not the kind of person who’s touchy about acknowledging that he was the Kaiser, and, by his own statement in 02 episode 23, his stance is that he wants to “accept everything about it”, take responsibility, and move on. So here we are with Miyako, who just casually tossed that statement out like it was no big deal, has accepted his past with no lingering grudge against him, and even made a casual evaluation about him presumably having the same resilience he had as the Kaiser, which, again, is completely accurate. All of this is exactly the kind of attitude that Ken needs to be surrounded by right now, and Miyako had just touched on this without even thinking that hard about it, and also is still making it clear she doesn’t want him to feel bad about it...

And so, the episode’s climax has Miyako finally attaining the solution to the question of reaching out to Hikari, the one that nobody had been able to successfully accomplish throughout Hikari’s childhood of never expressing herself properly and the majority of Adventure and 02: to get Hikari to stop being so passive and accepting her inevitable fate because she doesn’t want to burden others, someone as aggressive as her will need to reach her and yank her out, and hit all of the exact points about understanding that someone will be there for her and that she should not accept this defeatist mentality. Hikari is unusually, unhealthily passive, and Miyako, being outwardly aggressive and someone who never hesitates to be blunt about things, is the best person to yank her out of this; it was never a sign of her being a “bad person”, just something she needed to channel in the right direction.

At the end of the episode, we’re also reminded once again that this is a series about relationships, so this kind of growth is important to everyone’s relationships with others as well -- thanks to Miyako’s efforts, Hikari is finally able to speak honestly with Takeru in contrast to her way of leaving off in silence with him at the end of 02 episode 13, and Miyako herself is happy that she’s finally gotten to have a better understanding of both Hikari, whom she herself had been unsure about the position of earlier, and Ken, whom she’d been worried she hadn’t been reaching out to in the right way.

While Ken was out of it during said episode and unable to coherently respond, we do get confirmation that he himself has hopped on the train of respecting Miyako’s intent well enough that he doesn’t hold anything over her -- during 02 episode 33, a mere three episodes after she’d personally slapped him in the face and two episodes after he’d practically seen her at her emotional worst, he still takes it upon himself to personally deliver Poromon to Kyoto and trust her to handle the rest. This isn’t that particularly interesting by itself, but moreso in terms of the context this is in -- this is a point where Ken’s still at awkward arm’s length with a lot of the team (including even Daisuke, in some ways), and he’s seen Miyako do all of the above messy things only not too long ago, but he still is comfortable enough around her and trusting enough in her abilities that he’s okay with casually approaching her and saying “you got this.” So it’s working, all things considered!

We also learn that Miyako had trusted Koushirou with Poromon during her trip to Kyoto, which says a lot about the fact she trusts her senior that much -- and, on a meta level, seems there specifically to facilitate the existence of the above scene (it would have been very easy to save time by just having Poromon accompany Miyako from the get-go and ending Ken’s involvement in the episode at his conversation with Koushirou...).

The following episodes also meanwhile establish that Miyako’s relationship with Hikari has been improving a lot -- with Miyako now actually understanding what Hikari needs, she’s much more proactive in reaching out to Hikari, and it’s even said directly by Iori in 02 episode 36 that their relationship seems to have gotten much better now. And, once again, Miyako’s antics are depicted as making people laugh -- note her and Hawkmon’s over-the-top advertisement performance doing so for everyone in the vicinity.

Which is also reinforced, again, in 02 episode 38, when this even spreads to Ken himself, in a moment that’s said to be particularly unusual and portrayed as one of the first times Ken has been able to be truly carefree in a long time. Again, the point here is: Miyako’s “all-over-the-place” nature brings joy to other people, and that “she makes people laugh” is continually reinforced as a symbol of this over the course of the second half of the series.

Beyond that, the visit to Ken’s house kicks off with Miyako noticing the picture of Osamu and asking about it, to the point she’s shown leaning over and staring at it for quite a while -- Koushirou had allegedly informed her about it earlier, and a whole point is made that she’s the one very prominently wanting to understand more about Ken and his background.

Also, Miyako reminds us all that she still does think Ken is attractive, but it’s a huge contrast to her behavior from back in 02 episode 8, when she knew nothing about him except that he was some celebrity genius boy -- she got completely worked up about it, moped about it for a whole day, and even dragged the fixation into the next day when she started aggressively confronting Daisuke about it, but we’re here 30 episodes later with Miyako actually considering him an important friend that she respects the feelings of, and she simply casually tosses out the statement of him being cute in her usual “like it’s commenting on the weather” manner, with no extra weirdness about it.

We close up some of the threads of Miyako's character arcs when Miyako herself is forced to confront the possibility of fighting an enemy to the kill in 02 episode 44, and Silphymon is eventually forced to kill LadyDevimon to save Miyako's life. Miyako’s emotional reaction is given the most attention here, since she herself had fixated so much on the horror of potentially killing Golemon back in 02 episode 25 -- in fact, everything Miyako does in this episode is about her emotional empathy and empathy for others, in that she rails on LadyDevimon for being a “coward” who hurts other people. Eventually, it’s once again the assertive Hikari who’s able to get her back on her feet by putting it in a way she can understand -- they were not doing it out of a callous and cruel intent to kill, but to save the exact victims that Miyako herself wanted to prevent.

And, even to the very end of the series, Miyako continues to channel her proactivity into emotional awareness first and foremost -- 02 episode 46 has her take the lead in the Dark Seed roundtable, and it’s implied that she’s doing this mainly because she knows this is a very personal issue for Ken to have to witness. In contrast to the way she frantically started spitting out potentially insensitive things in front of Ken in 02 episode 31, here, she outright says that she doesn’t want to make him feel bad about this (and, fortunately, he understands perfectly well that she’s trying). Even all the way to the very end in 02 episode 50, she’s the one who first brings up the question of the issue, because of how emotionally invested she got into this and her high level of awareness as to how deeply this impacted Ken.

In 02 episode 49, BelialVamdemon presents everyone in the team with a potential deep-seated desire that none of them want to admit, and in the case of Miyako’s, it ends up being a rather tame thing in comparison to Iori and Takeru’s more severe family issues, Hikari’s desire for WORLD PEACE!!, and Ken’s complicated feelings about punishment and forgiveness. In Miyako’s dream world, she’s just eating cake, and it says a lot about the fact that were it not for the fact that she overthinks things and often gets easily stressed, she’s fundamentally fairly free of deep-seated issues in a way not entirely dissimilar to Daisuke’s simple and pure-hearted way of life.

The thing that causes Miyako’s issue is often misinterpreted to be about her selfishly wanting everything to herself, or the idea she’s fighting for attention with her siblings, but Hawkmon actually says what the real problem is in direct words: her crowded family is “noisy”. Or in other words -- Miyako, being the overly empathetic type and someone who easily succumbs to stress, is just really overwhelmed and stressed because of everything around her.

An interesting thing about Miyako’s “illusion” is that it’s the only one that in itself starts making its victim feel lonely and sad even before it’s taken away or dispelled -- Takeru and Iori had to have their happy images pulled away from them, Hikari had to have Tailmon clarify that everything is fake, and Ken had to have Wormmon personally chase the image of his brother away. But in the case of Miyako, all Hawkmon has to do is ask if she’s happy right now, and she’s quick to admit that she’s not. It’s just that everything was stressful and overwhelming and there was so much to deal with all of the time, and for once she wanted to be able to enjoy a little peace, but she loves her family and she loves everyone around her and she doesn’t want to be alone, and she’d rather have them back even if it’s stressful. Miyako’s love for others is so strong that even an illusion supposedly made to cater to her won’t make her happy if everyone’s gone.

Miyako also takes the moment to realize that for all Hawkmon’s been going out of his way to be steadfast and loyal to her, she hasn’t been doing enough to understand her own partner in turn, and there’s still a lot more she can do in terms of thinking of others.

Miyako after 02

As per Spring 2003, once Miyako graduates elementary school and moves to middle school, she continues trying to be helpful to her juniors -- she joins the computer club and once again ends up under Koushirou, and now outright makes music for Yamato’s band (some creative differences aside). It’s also interesting to note her attitude towards her other friends when she tries to recruit them into her music unit -- she snarks at everyone right up until she gets to Ken, who declines politely, and in exchange, she just can't bring herself to be mean to him and simply apologizes for asking too much. It’s ambiguous whether this is because she’s still trying to have a heightened level of consideration around him (this is still only four months after 02′s finish, after all), but it seems she’s still concerned about the idea of handling him overly roughly, and is able to exercise a proper level of restraint about him.

Which brings us all the way to Kizuna, a whole eight years later where we have to fill in a lot of blanks about what’s been happening in the meantime, but the official website establishes that she’s now pursuing a degree in computer programming at an engineering university, and is now on study abroad in Spain (implied to be Barcelona, given details in both the movie itself and the drama CD). Pretty ambitious stuff!...or at least that’s the first impression one would get, until it turns out that she’s getting her flighty personality enabled by the local culture. As we learn in the drama CD, she’s absolutely taking the time to milk this entire situation so she can play around -- and, in accordance with how she was established to be an important factor in bringing Hikari out of her shell, it’s rubbing off on Hikari, too.

In addition, Miyako is still working under Koushirou despite their educational careers having completely diverged, this time as his assistant in terms of managing the Chosen Child community. Interestingly, her specific job seems to be consultation, and people come to her for “advice and stuff” -- meaning that it’s very likely that a lot of new Chosen Children who are having a hard time adjusting to life with a partner are coming to her for practical and emotional advice, and she’s still continuing to channel her ability to be emotionally aware and supportive of others.

That is to say, until she gets a mysterious request from a certain Menoa Bellucci. We learn later that Menoa’s motive was to obtain the list of international Chosen Children, meaning that she most definitely was not approaching Miyako for emotional help, and with that, Miyako decides that she doesn’t want to do this and dumps it on her seniors...

...but then picks it back up with zero hesitation the moment her friends present her that exact same job, and not only is it just “zero hesitation”, Ken even comments on how “fast” she arrived to do so! (This was also before Iori came up with the plan to infiltrate Menoa’s office; there wasn’t any indication Miyako’s computer abilities would be particularly necessary at the time.) On top of that, the drama CD gives us full context as to why she was so willing to dump this on her seniors in the first place -- she had wanted to see her friends so badly that she practically invented D-3 gate exploitation so she could hang out with her friends despite technically being in another country, and even wanted to invite them to come visit her, and eventually they’d all made an organized plan to meet up in New York. In other words, her loyalty to her friends is still stronger than anything else -- remember, she’s the kind of person who was picking up tons of jobs specifically so she could help her friends in the first place.

On that note, Ken’s ability to be casual with everyone besides Daisuke has noticeably improved, and that’s especially prominent with Miyako, whom he proactively converses with in a way that wouldn’t have happened back in 02, and, likewise, in contrast to the sense of distance she’d still been maintaining with him back during the final arc of 02 and Spring 2003, she has no qualms about handling him as casually as she would anyone else.

Which eventually leads us to...

This is a recurring theme on this blog, but every so often I have to draw the distinction between creative concepts “in meta” (i.e. the way the audience will read it, in relation to franchise standards and other real-life factors) and said concepts “in-universe” (i.e. with audience factors completely removed, whether there’s a presumable logical reason for these events happening in-universe, and whether this is reasonable behavior to expect out of the characters). This blog is largely dedicated to the latter, but the reason why I have to keep drawing this distinction in the first place is that I get the impression that the staff behind Adventure and 02 really did not pay much mind to the former part as part of their dedication to the latter. And, I mean, part of the reason I respect the writing of Adventure and 02 so much is how uncompromising they were in terms of not really pandering to what a fanbase might expect, which allowed the story to retain a lot of creative integrity that it wouldn’t have otherwise.

But every so often you get something like this that makes me want to just bang my head on the table and scream, I swear, I get what you guys were going for, but I am begging you, please think a little harder about how people are going to read this!! In general, I do think there’s something that’s not very good about disregarding your audience completely, because if you’re trying to say important things and those things are going directly over your audience’s heads (this is a kids’ show, for goodness’s sake), you can’t call that good communication, and it’s not like you can blame the audience for getting blindsided or being upset, and this is before we get into what they just dropped on the global audience that was presumably full of young girls interested in STEM fields who were hoping to see them go all the way with that, or the feelings of those who are bothered that one character has to be singled out to be defined solely by her relationship to others, and I mean -- to be fair, with a character like Miyako and the tons of things going on with her, there was probably no outcome they could come up with that wouldn’t be reinforcing some negative stereotype (believe it or not, there are people who have conversely mentioned identifying deeply with Miyako’s personal story and the meaning of this ending to them, and have also expressed discomfort about some of the comments the fanbase has made over the years), but at the same time, holy hell, they really went for the one that immediately looks the worst on its face...

...That aside, I will reiterate that this is a blog and analysis meant for that latter category of “analyzing things in-universe”, and making good-faith assumptions that there was a reason for everything (and, I’ll be quite honest, reading everything the staff has said about the characters, including Miyako, there is no indication that they didn’t treat every single one of them with love and zero intention to curse any of them into a horrible fate). We can debate whether this was a good or bad choice in the context of real life, or how much they really should have thought this through more or considered alternative ways to do this, in another place and time (it’s been done by many other people, myself included, in the last 20 years, and it will most certainly continue after this, and probably should continue). It’s not like I’m necessarily giving my blessing to every single creative decision in Adventure or 02 in running this blog, it’s more of the attitude of “now that this decision was in the series, can we figure out what that was intended to mean?”, and that’s going to apply to this one too. And so, we’ll proceed with the analysis.

In any case, here’s the first thing to start with, which may surprise some people to learn: at no point in the epilogue is the word “housewife” ever used to refer to Miyako. The only words that Takeru uses to describe her are: that she is married to Ken and is a mother of three. Not only that, post-02 materials that have referred to the epilogue and Miyako’s part in it have also avoided using that word -- the Character Complete File and the Animation Chronicle only reiterate the same points of “married to Ken” and “mother of three children”, and practically go out of their way to avoid insinuating that being a stay-at-home housewife is the main focus of her life right now. It would have been so easy to say it outright if they’d wanted to, but they didn’t, and they consistently don’t, to the point the omission is almost suspicious. And, indeed, if you want to believe the Character Complete File, Miyako is not a full-time housewife and is simply not working at the time of the epilogue due to maternity leave because the third child had recently been born. So it’s completely within the realm of possibility that she’s still working! In that case, why is something that could easily be a big deal left ambiguous like this?

If you look at the way the epilogue presents its information, there’s a certain pattern: what information is emphasized and what information is given little attention or omitted has very little to do with “how curious the audience would be about it”, but rather “how relevant it is”; just because a certain piece of information is omitted doesn’t mean it necessarily isn’t true. For example, Sora; she’s married to Yamato, but despite how much the audience would probably consider that as vital information, it’s left for you to infer from the visuals and an oblique comment that Sora’s daughter is a “dependable older sister”, and even the question of whether Sora did succeed her mother in flower arrangement is left up in the air despite that also probably being a question the audience is curious about (and in fact, a few flower branches are clearly visible in the front, implying very heavily that, whatever happened, she’s at least still maintaining her roots with her family instead of violently cutting it all off). But we do learn about the fact that she went into fashion design, which is something that’s not an expectation that was placed by her family but rather something she presumably decided on herself. Hence, presumably why that’s the part emphasized, and moreso than her marriage to Yamato -- said marriage is of course an important part of her life, but it’s not as prominent as the fact that she has her own independent career, especially since her entire character arc was about doing things that she wanted for herself instead of doing things for others. That is to say, compared to their own individual ambitions, Sora and Yamato’s love life is “an important part, but not the important part.” This is especially when you add the context that Takeru is delivering abridged single-sentence “catch-up” descriptions of his friends on their behalf (possibly to the world, if this is part of his novel), and so, it begs the question: what would each of these characters want to be most remembered for accomplishing?

(And if you think I’m being tinfoil hat about this, remember that a constant theme with this blog I’m running is that “being annoyingly subtle and relying on ridiculously oblique messaging” like this permeates the entirety of 02 in general, and it’s definitely not the only time they’ve used this kind of technique to communicate details that are too consistent and on-the-nose to be passed off as coincidence. As far as assuming that this series follows rational storytelling logic goes, we are far past that point, and in ways that extend far beyond this epilogue.)

So we look back at Miyako, and the hobbies she’d indulged in and what purpose they were for, and her personality, and the fact that the main point of her character arc was about her complex that she would never be a good enough person who could properly emotionally reach out and take care of others -- in some ways, her arc was the opposite of Sora’s, in that while Sora’s was about not being as beholden to others, Miyako’s was about how to become someone who can better support others -- and once we apply the above question, there lies the answer to why the priority and emphasis given to her future in the epilogue is “Miyako is the kind of person who prioritizes taking care of and supporting her loved ones more than anything else.”

This is especially because (in an epilogue with not very many lines, so every bit of information becomes vital) the lines we see Miyako and her family exchange are representative of a lot of what that character arc was about. According to her son, Miyako is still her panicky and emotionally messy self, even when in the role of the matriarch of a large family who’s responsible for taking care of all of them. She did not ever become the ideal “gentle” and “mature” kind of person that she considered Mimi and Hikari to be and negatively compared herself to. However, her family responds by cheerfully laughing, which is -- most likely not coincidentally -- the same thing that was shown to be the positive flip side of Miyako’s over-the-top personality back in 02 episodes 31, 36, and 38, in that it brings joy and cheer to others.

If you do want to take the Character Complete File’s statement at face value, the fact that she’s on self-imposed maternity leave means that it’s very likely she wasn’t on a salaried job and was instead freelancing, or at least was involved with something that didn’t require constant commitment. Considering the fact she’s consistently portrayed as an impatient sort who gets bored easily, she probably would prefer something more flexible like freelancing or at least not being tied to a single thing; even looking back at her completely disparate hobbies back when she was a kid, when she was basically jack-of-all-trades-ing to fit whatever people needed her for, she never really came off as someone who could commit very easily to a single form of work, but what she did have commitment to was other people, especially her friends and family. If you (or, perhaps, Takeru) were to ask her during the time of the epilogue “what are you up to right now?”, it’s not really that hard to believe that gushing about her lovely family would come before everything else; not to say that everyone else here (especially her own husband) isn’t presumably devoted to their own families, but Miyako’s the type to have that much higher sense of pride in what she does for those she cares about than she would have particular attachment to any kind of work. Look at her behavior during Kizuna; she’s pursuing a degree in computer programming and thus is still aiming to be a busybody with a high level of skill, but when given a job by a stranger, she immediately dumps it off on her seniors so she can be with her friends, then happily accepts that same job again when the same friends present it back to her.

So, in other words, the conclusion is: the biggest priority and most important thing to Miyako in regards to her future is that she finally became someone who could properly support others around her, even in spite of her personality that would suggest otherwise.

In addition, the fact that she has three children might initially come off as a little in-your-face or overkill, but remember that Miyako came from a family with four siblings, and 02 episode 49 had her say outright that she does treasure that – or, in other words, being part of a big family surrounded by affection and love is something she considers to be a valuable part of her life (especially since the age gaps between the three children imply a reasonable likelihood of actual family planning, moreso than even Miyako’s own).

Incidentally, this is just a bit of a personal note, but one might notice that I’ve also never actually used the word “housewife” to refer to the epilogue’s depiction of Miyako in the course of writing for this blog, because of how little evidence we have that she is one – being on temporary maternity leave still being a very viable and, given the post-02 materials we now have, arguably heavily likely interpretation, it’s not like you’d necessarily call someone a housewife if their break from work is only temporary, even if they’re a freelancer. Given the above circumstances, perhaps something like “family matriarch” would be more accurate…

#digimon #digimon adventure 02 #digimon adventure last evolution kizuna #inoue miyako #miyako inoue #kizuna spoilers #shihameta

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fyeah-bangtan7 · 4 years ago

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The Boundless Optimism of BTS

IT IS THE MORNING OF CHUSEOK, A KOREAN HARVEST FESTIVAL akin to Thanksgiving, and the members of BTS would normally be spending it with their families, eating tteokguk, a traditional rice-cake soup. Instead, Jin, 28; Suga, 27; J-Hope, 26; RM, 26; Jimin, 25; V, 24; and Jung Kook, 23, are working. Practicing. Honing their choreography. In a few days, the biggest musical act in the world will perform in the live-stream concert that, for now, will have to stand in for the massive tour they spent the first part of this year rehearsing. At this moment, they’re seated inside Big Hit Entertainment headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, the house they built, dressed mostly in black and white, ready to answer my questions. They’re gracious about it. And groggy.

Before I’m done speaking with them for this story, BTS will have the number-one and number-two songs on the BillboardHot 100, a feat that’s been achieved only a handful of times in the sixty-odd years the chart has existed. Their next album, Be, is weeks away from being released, and speculation about the record, the tracklist, the statement, is rampant across the Internet. BTS are, to put it mildly, huge.

There is something about complete world domination that can really cement a friendship. What jumps out at me as I connect with the members of BTS is their level of comfort with one another. Tension has a way of making itself evident—even over Zoom, even through a translator. There’s none to be found here. They are relaxed in the manner of family. Lounging with their arms around each other’s shoulders, tugging on each other’s sleeves, fixing each other’s collars. When they speak about one another, it is with kindness.

“Jimin has a particular passion for the stage and really thinks about performance, and in that sense, there are many things to learn from him,” J-Hope says. “Despite all the things he has accomplished, he still tries his best and brings something new to the table, and I really want to applaud him for that.”

“Thank you for saying all these things about me,” Jimin responds.

Jimin turns his attention to V, explaining that he is “loved by so many” and describing him as one of his best friends. Suga jumps in, sharing that Jimin and V fight the most among the group. V replies, “We haven’t fought in three years!” They tell me this distinction now belongs to Jin and Jung Kook, the oldest and youngest members. “It all starts as a joke, but then it gets serious,” Jimin says.

Jin agrees and recounts what their arguments sound like. “Why did you hit me so hard?” he says, before mimicking Jung Kook’s response: “I didn’t hit you that hard.” And then they start hitting each other. But not that hard.

Since the start of their careers, BTS have shown a certain confidence in their aesthetic, their performances, and their music videos. It’s right there in the name: BTS stands for “Bangtan Sonyeondan,” which translates to “Bulletproof Boy Scouts,” but as their popularity grew in English-speaking markets, the acronym was retrofitted to mean “Beyond the Scene,” which Big Hit has described as “symbolizing youth who don’t settle for their current reality and instead open the door and go forward to achieve growth.” And their affection with one another, their vulnerability and emotional openness in their lives and in their lyrics, strikes me as more grown-up and masculine than all the frantic and perpetual box-checking and tone-policing that American boys force themselves and their peers to do. It looks like the future.

“There is this culture where masculinity is defined by certain emotions, characteristics. I’m not fond of these expressions,” Suga tells me. “What does being masculine mean? People’s conditions vary day by day. Sometimes you’re in a good condition; sometimes you aren’t. Based on that, you get an idea of your physical health. And that same thing applies mentally. Some days you’re in a good state; sometimes you’re not. Many pretend to be okay, saying that they’re not ‘weak,’ as if that would make you a weak person. I don’t think that’s right. People won’t say you’re a weak person if your physical condition is not that good. It should be the same for the mental condition as well. Society should be more understanding.”

When I hear these words in October 2020, from my house in a country whose leader is actively trying to make the case that only the weak die of COVID-19, well, it sounds like the future, too.

IF YOU ARE JUST NOW CONSIDERING GETTING INTO BTS, IT IS natural to feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of stuff. It’s a bit like saying, right this second, “Let’s see what Marvel Comics is all about.” In the streaming age, BTS have sold more than twenty million physical units across fourteen albums. Their multi-album concept cycles, The Most Beautiful Moment in Life, Love Yourself, and Map of the Soul, have unfolded over multiple records and EPs. There are collaborations with brands, including a BTS smartphone with Samsung. There is a series of short films and music videos, called BU, or BTS Universe, and an animated universe called BT21, in which they’re all represented by gender-neutral avatars. Their fan base, known as ARMY, is a global cultural movement unto itself.

“Dynamite,” their first English-language single and their first American number one, is pure, ecstatic pop. Shiny and joyful. What sets them apart from many of their peers, and many of the pop acts who achieved worldwide fame before them, is what came earlier. Beneath the sheen and the beats has always been an unflinching examination of human emotion. Their lyrics seek to challenge the conventions of society—to question and even denounce them. BTS’s first single, “No More Dream,” unveiled at their debut showcase in June 2013, concerns the intense pressure South Korean schoolchildren face to conform and to succeed. According to Suga, lyrics about the mental health of young people were mostly absent in Korean pop music. “The reason I started making music is because I grew up listening for lyrics that speak about dreams, hopes, and social issues,” he tells me. “It just came naturally to me when making music.”

Suga’s early ambition of making music didn’t involve him being in a group at all. About a decade ago, in his hometown of Daegu, the fourth-largest city in South Korea, he started recording underground rap tracks under the name Gloss, listening to and learning from the early works of songwriter and producer Bang Si-hyuk, known as Hitman Bang. Bang is the founder and CEO of Big Hit Entertainment. In 2010, Suga, a junior in high school, moved to Seoul to join Big Hit as a producer and rapper. Then Bang asked him to become part of a group, envisioning a hip-hop act with fellow new Big Hit recruits RM and J-Hope. The guys call this “season one” of their development.

“At that time, I don’t think our label exactly knew what to do with us,” RM says. “They just basically let us be and we had some lessons, but we also just chilled and made music sometimes.”

It got more intense. The family grew, occasionally by accident.

V accompanied a friend to a Big Hit casting call in Daegu for moral support and ended up being the person chosen from those sessions.

Jung Kook was signed in a feeding frenzy after being dropped from the talent show Superstar K, fielding offers from numerous entertainment companies before settling on Big Hit because he was impressed by RM’s rapping.

Jimin was a dance student and class president for nine years running at his school in Busan; he auditioned at the behest of his teacher.

And then, to hear him tell it, Jin got picked up off the street. “I was just going to school,” he says. “Someone from the company approached me, like, ‘Oh, this is my first time seeing anyone that looked like this.’ He suggested having a meeting with me.”

“Season two is when we officially underwent hard training,” J-Hope says. “We started dancing, and that’s how I would say our team building started.”

School in the daytime, training at night. “We slept during classes,” V says.

“I slept in the practice studio,” J-Hope counters.

Hitman Bang kept the pressure comparatively low. And he encouraged the guys to write and produce their own music, to be honest about their emotions in their lyrics. Suga is on record saying that no BTS album would be complete without a track that scrutinizes society.

And yet for their new album, Be, they’re putting that aside. Even this has a greater purpose that relates to mental wellness: RM, the group’s main rapper, says, “I don’t think this album will have any songs that criticize social issues. Everybody is going through very trying times right now. So I don’t think there will be any songs that will be that aggressive.”

Though the new rules of COVID-19 mean they can’t come here and promote Be, its first single might not have happened in the first place but for the pandemic. “ ‘Dynamite’ wouldn’t be here if there was no COVID-19,” says RM. “For this song, we wanted to go easy and simple and positive. Not some, like, deep vibes or shadows. We just wanted to go easy.”

Jin agrees. “We were trying to convey the message of healing and comfort to our fans.” He pauses. “World domination wasn’t actually our plan when we were releasing ‘Dynamite.’ ” World domination just happens sometimes. You get it.

MAP OF THE SOUL ONE AIRED VIA THEIR ONLINE FAN PLATFORM and attracted almost a million viewers across 191 countries. The guys say they tried not to think about the enormousness. J-Hope adds, “I felt a little bit more nervous knowing that this was being broadcast live. I actually feel less nervous performing live at a stadium.” Jin replies with a smile, “J-Hope, born to perform at a stadium.”

The graphic layout of the title throws a colon between the final N and E, which makes it look like Map of the Soul On: E, and as I watch it live, as I do in my office at 3:00 a.m. with noise-canceling headphones and a steaming pot of coffee, it feels a lot like I’m watching Map of the Soul on E. It is an explosion of color and fashion and passion, over four gigantic stages, from the boozy swagger of “Dionysus” to the emo-trap introspection of “Black Swan.” Not a step, not a gesture, not a hair is out of place. If there were nerves, they didn’t come through.

There is also, at the end of Map of the Soul One, an intimate version of their 2017 track “Spring Day,” which encapsulates what’s really made BTS stand out. On the surface, it’s about nonspecific love and loss, about yearning for the past. “I think that song really represents me,” says Jin. “I like to look to the past and be lost in it.”

Fair enough, but there is an undeniable allusion, in both the song’s video and its cover concept, to a specific incident in recent South Korean history. “Spring Day” was released just a few years after the sinking of the Sewol ferry, one of the country’s biggest maritime disasters, in which a poorly inspected, overloaded ferry toppled in a sharp right turn. Hundreds of high school students drowned, having obeyed orders to stay in their cabins as the boat was going down. According to some reports, the South Korean government actively tried to silence entertainers who spoke out against it, with the Korean Ministry of Education fully banning the tragedy’s commemorative yellow ribbons in schools. I ask whether it was about a specific sad event, and Jin tells me, “It is about a sad event, as you said, but it is also about longing.” The song kept the disaster front of mind for young Koreans and for the media, indirectly leading to the impeachment and removal of then president Park Geun-hye.

If an overburdened, undermaintained, slow-moving vessel capsizing because of a reckless rightward turn strikes you as somehow symbolic of the country in which BTS are about to explode even further, you won’t hear it from them. “We’re outsiders—we can’t really express what we feel about the United States,” says V. But their actions speak volumes; in the wake of the George Floyd murder and subsequent protests in America, the group made a $1 million donation with Big Hit Entertainment to Black Lives Matter, one that was matched by BTS ARMY.

The fans offer a fascinating inversion of stan culture: Rather than bullying rivals like many other ardent online fan bases do, ARMY have put the positive message of the music into action. Their activism goes deep. Through micro-donations, they’ve regrown rain forests, adopted whales, funded hundreds of hours of dance classes for Rwandan youth, and raised money to feed LGBTQ refugees around the world. Where pop fans a generation ago might have sent teddy bears or cards to their idols for their birthdays, where five years ago they might have promoted a hashtag to get a video’s YouTube viewer count up, for RM’s twenty-sixth birthday in September, international fan collective One in an Army raised more than $20,000 for digital night schools to improve rural children’s access to education during the COVID-19 crisis. ARMY may have even entered the conversation around the 2020 presidential election when hundreds of thousands of Tulsa Trump rally tickets got snapped up online in June. The event’s actual attendance was pathetically low. No particular person or entity claimed credit for this top-notch trolling, but a video urging BTS fans to RSVP to that rally did get hundreds of thousands of views. We have no choice but to stan this fan base.

The relationship is intense. “We and our ARMY are always charging each other’s batteries,” RM says. “When we feel exhausted, when we hear the news all over the world, the tutoring programs, and donations, and every good thing, we feel responsible for all of this.” The music may have inspired the good works, but the good works inspire the music. “We’ve got to be greater; we’ve got to be better,” RM continues. “All those behaviors always influence us to be better people, before all this music and artist stuff.”

Yet for every devoted member of BTS ARMY, there is someone who’s looked right past BTS. Jimmy Fallon, whose Tonight Show hosted the group for a full week this past fall, was one of those people. “Usually if an artist is on the rise, I hear about them ahead of time. With BTS, I knew they had crazy momentum, and I’d never heard of them.”

Here’s a thought that used to be funny to me: There were members of the live audience of The Ed Sullivan Showon February 9, 1964, who weren’t there to see the Beatles. Elvis was in the Army, Buddy Holly was gone, and the three number-one albums in the months before Meet the Beatles! were an Allan Sherman comedy record, the West Side Story original cast recording, and Soeur Sourire: The Singing Nun. America had left rock ’n’ roll behind for the moment, and with the culture aimless and fragmented, it wasn’t quite sure what to pick up in its place. It is possible to imagine that a youngish, reasonably hip, and culturally aware human being might cop a ticket to that week’s show, settle into his seat, and say, “Bring on a medley of numbers from the Broadway musical Oliver! and banjo sensation Tessie O’Shea.”

The instinct is to laugh at that guy, and it’s a good instinct, because what a dope.

And then you become that guy.

Sometimes there is a whole universe alongside your own, bursting with color you’re too stubborn to see, bouncing with joy you think is for someone else, with a beat you thought you were finished dancing to. BTS are the biggest thing on the planet right now, yet the job of introducing them to someone new, particularly in America, seems like it’s never done. Maybe it’s because they are adored by screaming teenagers and we live in a society patriarchal enough to forget that screaming teenagers are nearly always right. Maybe it’s the cultural divide, in a moment when our country is unashamed enough of its own xenophobia to get openly bent out of shape when it has to press 1 for English. Maybe it’s the language barrier, as though we understood a single word Michael Stipe sang before 1989.

Whatever the reason, the result is that you might be missing out on a paradigm shift and a historic moment of pop greatness.

IF BTS SEEM A BIT CAUTIOUS WITH THEIR WORDS PUBLICLY, IT’S because—perhaps more than any other massive pop act in history—they have to be. Shortly after our second meeting, BTS were given the General James A. Van Fleet Award by the U. S.–based Korea Society for their outstanding contributions to advancing relations between the United States and Korea. In his acceptance speech, RM said, “We will always remember the history of pain that our two nations shared together, and the sacrifices of countless men and women,” as seemingly diplomatic and innocuous a statement as he could have made. But because he didn’t mention the Chinese soldiers who died in the Korean War, it didn’t go over well. The Samsung BTS smartphone disappeared from Chinese e-commerce platforms, Fila and Hyundai pulled ads in China that featured the group, the nationalistic newspaper Global Times accused them of hurting Chinese citizens’ feelings and negating history, and the hashtags “BTS humiliated China” and “there are no idols that come before my country” began trending on the social-media site Weibo. The pressure is not small.

Even as the number-one pop group in the world, even with their hard work day in and day out, even with tens of millions of adoring fans redefining the concept of “adoring fans” by literally healing the planet in their name, these guys still suffer from impostor syndrome. RM explains, “I’ve heard that there’s this mask complex. Seventy percent of so-called successful people have this, mentally. It’s basically this: There’s this mask on my face. And these people are afraid that someone is going to take off this mask. We have those fears as well. But I said 70 percent, so I think it’s very natural. Sometimes it’s a condition to be successful. Humans are imperfect, and we have these flaws and defects. And one way to deal with all this pressure and weight is to admit the shadows.”

The music helps. “When we write the songs and lyrics, we study these emotions, we are aware of that situation, and we relate to that emotionally,” J-Hope says. “And that’s why when the song is released, we listen to it and get consolation from those songs as well. I think our fans also feel those emotions, maybe even more than us. And I think we are a positive influence on each other.”

If there’s one thing they’re sacrificing, besides free time and the ability to speak freely without the Chinese foreign ministry releasing an official statement, it’s a love life. I ask about dating, broad questions like “Are you?” and “Is there time?” and “Can you?” and the answer to all of them is pretty clear: “No.” “The most important thing for us now is to sleep,” Jung Kook insists. Suga follows right up with “Can you see my dark circles?” I cannot, because there are none, because flawless skin translates even over Zoom when there’s an ocean between us.

So they’re not, at least publicly, having romantic relationships with anyone. If there is a strong relationship that’s guided their journey into adulthood, it’s with Big Hit. “Our company started with twenty to thirty people, but now we have a company with so many employees,” RM says. “We have our fans, and we have our music. So we have a lot of things that we have to be responsible for, to safeguard.” He considers it for a moment. “I think that’s what an adult is.”

“Our love life—twenty-four hours, seven days a week—is with all the ARMYs all over the world,” RM adds.

In a world that is determined to sand down anything that isn’t immediately recognizable to the average pop-music fan, when it comes to acquainting you with Korean culture, BTS very much do not wanna hold your hand. While the first song on night one of their Tonight Show week was a joyous but expected take on “Dynamite” with Fallon and the Roots, they took some chances during their second performance.

As a friend of mine, a thirty-three-year-old BTS fan in Los Angeles, told me, “The second song they performed was ‘IDOL,’ ” from 2018’s Love Yourself: Answer, “and it celebrated their Korean identity. They performed it in Gyeongbokgung Palace in Seoul. They wore clothes inspired by traditional dresses called hanboks;it was almost entirely in Korean, so it felt super subversive. As a fan, I read it as: ‘Dynamite’ was an invitation, and this is who we are and this is our home.”

“I was a little concerned that people might not understand,” Fallon says. “I was like, ‘There’s nothing in English here.’ But what you see is just pure star power. Pure talent. Immediately, I thought, Oh, this is everything. If you’re that powerful, it transcends language.”

American popular music in the twenty-first century is more fragmented than it has been since . . . well, since Allan Sherman, Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim, and the Singing Nun battled for that number-one spot. The monoculture that the Beatles helped bring on has breathed its last breath. Each of us is the program director for our own private radio station, letting our own past habits and streaming-service algorithms serve up something close to what we want. Which is great, except that huge moments can whiz right past our ears. Each of us, even if we’re more clued in than our parents were when they were our age, can miss some era-defining, excellent shit. Particularly if the radio is our Spotify Discover Weekly, or the Pandora channel based on the band whose T-shirts we wore in college. We can let a moment pass us by if prime time is a Netflix binge, and the Tonight Show hour is spent on one more episode before bed. But we shouldn’t. “Honestly, I think it’s history that we’re living through with BTS,” Fallon says. “It’s the biggest band I’ve seen since I’ve started late night, definitely.”

THERE IS ALSO THE SMALL DETAIL THAT, UNLIKE THE BEATLES AND literally every other worldwide sensation to break in America, BTS don’t particularly need to go to the trouble. They are massive all over the world. Thanks to the recent IPO of Big Hit Entertainment, of which each member is a partner, they are all now incredibly wealthy. (Hitman Bang is the first South Korean entertainment mogul to become a billionaire.) What good is a culture in decline to a pop act this much on the ascent? “When I dreamed of becoming an artist, I listened to pop and watched all the awards shows in the United States. Being successful and being a hit in the U. S. is, of course, such an honor as an artist,” says Suga. “I feel very proud of that.”

They’re breaking out in a country that either worships them or fails to notice them. So do they feel like they’re getting enough respect in America? “How can we win everyone’s respect?” Jin asks. “I think it’s enough to get respect from people who support us. It’s similar everywhere else in the world. You can’t like everyone, and I think it’s enough to be respected by people who really love you.”

Suga agrees. “You can’t always be comfortable, and I think it’s all part of life. Honestly, we are not used to getting a ton of respect from when we first started out. But I think that gradually changes, whether it be in the States or other parts of the world, as we do more and more.”

There is, without a doubt, one colossal, unmistakable sign of respect for a musician: a Grammy. They’ve been nominated only once, and even then it was for best recording package. But their sights are set on a big one next year. RM puts it out there: “We would like to be nominated and possibly get an award.” Dragging the hoary, backward-looking, and Western-focused Grammys into the gorgeous, global world of the present through sheer force of will, talent, and hard work? Stranger things have happened. “I think the Grammys are the last part, like the final part of the whole American journey,” he says with a smile. “So yeah, we’ll see.”

The Recording Academy’s seal of approval is one thing. But BTS have already conquered the world, clowned tyrants, inspired individual fans to perform the small and achievable acts of activism that have collectively begun to save the planet, challenged toxic masculinity by leading with vulnerability, and, along the way, become bajillionaires and international idols. Whether the Grammys are paying attention matters about as much as what an Ed Sullivan audience member expected to see that night in 1964. BTS have already won.

#bangtan #jungkook #jimin #v #suga #jhope #jin #rm #o:esquire #o:interview #201123

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multifansky · 5 years ago

Text

Scenario - Knowing Bros Episode 200

Anon - can you do a chapter on knowing bros ep 200 with sky and the members. Thank u!!!

I did my best and tried to only get Sky content with the members of course. I hope you like it!

The credit belongs to the show, with my little twist here and there!

Sky’s P.O.V~

Another episode of Knowing Brothers. The 200th episode to be exact. And what better way to celebrate it by having the members join. Just like the 100th episode, the members are back. All 10 of us and I couldn't be happier.

Today I’m in a different schoolgirl outfit than I usually am for filming because I’ll be on the other side.

All the knowing bro’s cast was wondering where Heechul and I were since we aren't at our seats. They kept yelling our names and Heechul and I decided to walk through the door of where the guest comes in. The cast looks confused, “We’re here as singers today.” I said. “Yeah, We’re not about of Knowing Bro’s today.” Heechul then said after me. The cast kept wanting us to sit down, not liking the sudden change.

“We brought some friends today,” Heechul said.

“Indeed we did. Come out here!” I said and the rest of the Super Junior members came along. I stood back, pushing lightly at the members to all stand at the front. Heechul and I are standing on opposite ends. Us members and the cast all clapped and cheered as we all gathered around the front.

“We’re from “We are Back After 100 Episode″ High. We are Super Juni-” Leeteuk said.

“Or!” All us members said and did our hand poses. Everyone cheered again and I smiled proudly. The Knowing Bros cast tried to copy us, but instead of Super Junior, it was Knowing Brothers, which turned out... not good at all.

“Wow, that was a fail. Glad to say I’m with the members and not the cast.” I said and smiled after everyone laughed.

“It seemed like they made it up,” Leeteuk said.

“I got a shock. It seemed a little rushed” Heechul said after.

Kang Ho Dong then started to explain how amazing the group Super Junior is and how we released a new song called “Super Clap” and are now joining them for their 200th episode. Then Kyuhyun explained how we all came here not knowing it was the 200th episode, we just found out before we started recording.

“I honestly didn't expect this show to reach 200 episodes,” Leeteuk said.

Then Shindong and the cast began to talk about how the show would have gotten canceled because of how risky it was at the beginning. Then, of course, Shindong got cocky and said he was the one that made the show alive after he danced with JYP perfectly.

Then, of course, Lee Soo Geun talked about how Leeteuk looked like a tour guide especially with the bag. Leeteuk then proceeded to act like one, which got a huge reaction from our reaction man, Siwon.

Finally, we got to introduce ourselves and Shindong came up with the idea of doing it like how we used to in debut years since our album title is called “Timeslip”.

“Hello, I’m “Cinderella” Kim Heechul,” Heechul said. Then he explained that it was his social media username in the past and that he had to go home in the past and that he had to go home or go out at 12:00 AM.

“Hello, I’m a special leader of this world, the angel who lost his wings, Teuk, Teuk, Leeteuk!” Leeteuk said, even doing his old hand gestures. I giggled to myself, thinking he is still cute to this day.

Then Before Yesung started, Ho Dong said he lost weight and Yesung began saying that his face his swollen today. Then we all made fun of him about how he has no face at all making everyone laugh. “Hello. I’m the lead vocalist of Super Junior, with the voice of an artist. I’m Yesung. Nice to meet you.”

“Hello. I’m Donghae, who is cuter than the animation Finding Nemo. ” Everyone laughed and I smiled wide, nodding my head in agreement. He sure looks like him.

Everyone was curious about Siwon’s introduction and how he is handsome. What will come to them is a surprise, but to them, not to us. “Hello. I’m Choi Siwon.” And that was it. Nothing more to explain about him, making me roll my eyes in a joking matter.

Since Shindong was on Popopo at the time, the name of his character was “Dongridong” so he used it in his introduction. “Hello, Donridong, Dong, Dong... I’m Talented Shindond,” He did, with his hand movements as well.

“Hello, I’m self-illuminating handsome jewel, Lee Hyuk Jae.” 'Everyone chuckled because it wasn't his stage name, he then explained that he often forgot his stage name and just used his regular name instead. “He really is stupid, huh?” I pointed at him, looking at the cast, making them laugh. Eunhyuk just staring me down, trying to get through an episode without us ending up arguing.

“Hello, I’m Super Junior’s vocalist, one of the youngest member’s Ryeowook.” Everyone forgets that he is older than Kyuhyun and me, especially since he looks young as well.

It was finally Kyuhyun’s turn and he stepped back, “ I used to kind of hesitate. I was introverted and lacked confidence. When we were standing, I would stand slightly behind.” Everyone laughed. “I swear he did this and I felt bad all the time. I tried to bring him to the front and he would always just find someone to slightly stand behind.” I explained to everyone. Kyuhyun got into his act, looking at everyone first, then began talking with no eye contact with anyone and talking quieter, “ Hello, I’m Super Junior’s new member, Kyuhyun.”

Finally, it was my turn. I bowed and said energetically, “Hello, I’m the only girl who’s the cutest of them all, Ji Sky!” Also adding my poses was putting a peace sign to my eyes, with a wink. Everyone awed, “She’s still cute now, oh gosh!” Heechul said. Everyone agrees.

After introductions, Ho Dong explained about our album concept and how almost all of our hair colors are different, and about how we picked our own style this time around. Which made everyone to proceed to attack Eunhyuk because of his bright ass hair that no one wanted to see. “I sometimes wonder if Leeteuk is the attention seeker or Eunhyuk,” I said, making the members laugh. Then we also talked about Siwon’s hair and how it’s the rich hairstyle of a young businessman, which also targeted Seo Jang Hoon who has the same hairstyle.

We then proceeded to talk about how it's our first time back with all the members back from discharge. “Sky, how did you feel when the members kept coming and going because of their military service?” Lee Sang Min asked me. I thought for a moment, already feeling a little emotional, “They are my brothers, almost my whole lives have been about them. Seeing the members come and go was very hard. I knew they were doing a great job, but I couldn't help but feel selfish. I get lonely easily and sometimes I go to specific members for different things, so at times when I needed them for that certain thing, they weren't there. It took me a while to process it and understand. After more members started to leave, I accepted it more. When we were on our hiatus that’s when it hit me hard. Because for a couple of years we went and all did our own thing. It was very weird. But I’m happy, we’re all back together because now they get to deal with me again.” I laughed at the end, making sure tears didn't fully come out. Everyone chuckled, “She tried to make it funny so she didn’t cry,” Kyuhyun said, laughing and giving me a side hug. I smiled and leaned into him, “She learned that from me” Heechul said.

After we proceeded to talk about other topics. Such as; Leeteuk being the most complicated when it comes to our upcoming tour because of how much he messages us, Us members saying happy birthday to Ryeowook in a group chat that he isn't even a part of, Who visited Ryeowook in the military, Heechul and I suddenly becoming awkward because we aren't in our original spots on the show, Leeteuk being popular among elders even J-Hope’s family, after Yesung’s confession about Ho Dong other victims came and talked about their trauma with ho dong which led to Kyuhyun talking about that one incident with yesung and Ho Dong, Siwon having a bad experience with Jang Hoon when he was a kid, and Kyuhyun being the Genie on Masked Singer.

Eunhyuk got to do his interpretation of our song “I think I” by dancing and he never fails to impress me. In which not many people know right now, but we just started dating recently and it’s so hard for me to not have a bigger reaction like I wanted.

After we got to talk about Shindong and how he is the best at dancing of all of SM and even trainees use this one video to audition or do a cover of it. Shindong then proceeded to redo that dance, which had a great storyline. During towards the end of the song, the old Dance Line used to be a part of it, So Eunhyuk, Donghae, and I stepped up with Shidong, Leeteuk being close behind. We danced with him.

After we all got to sit down with each other, Ryeowook with me, Yesung with Heechul, Eunhyuk with Kyung Hoon, Siwon with Jang Hoon, Donghae with Young Chul, Kyuhyun with Ho Dong, Leeteuk with Soo Geun, and Shindong with Sang Min.

We are playing the game, “I am sorry, I love you.” It’s basically where we get something off our chest about someone else. The other person should apologize after one says something and then, in the end, both say “I love you.” It seems simple enough.

After Leeteuk and Kyuhyun went first, Heechul replaced Kyuhyun’s spot, which got us, members, freaking out not wanting another Incheon battle. So, we went over dramatic with our reactions whenever they said anything about each other. Eventually, they did makeup and no battle happened. Everyone got to confess and misunderstanding and on now asking questions and trying to guess the answer.

After Shindong, it was my turn. “Everyone Listen up, I’m asking the question now,” I said, holding the hammer in my hand and raising an eyebrow, looking at everyone. “Oo~ she thinks she tough,” Eunhyuk said, looking away, which earned a well-deserved glare from me. The members then gasped, “Don’t fight!” they all started to say and the cast was confused. “When they are on a show together they start to sometimes fight and cause an actual argument,” Shindong explained.

“Anyways! I’ll start.” I start reading the card, “Everyone knows I was really young when we debuted, yes?” I looked at everyone, then went back to reading, “What did I use to hate about myself but now I love?”

Everyone “ooo'd” and I examine all of them, everyone looked at each other then started laughing, “Min Kyung Hoon is growing his beard back!” Heechul yelled out. I looked at him and held my hammer ready to fire at him, “What are you thinking about, huh?!”

I walked over to him, hemmer ready in action. “B-breast?” He stuttered laughing and looking away with his face red. I laughed and hit him with the hammer lightly, “Wrong even though that is a good answer.”

I smiled and went back to the front. “I Got it!” Eunhyuk yelled loudly with his hands up. “Your dancing skills?” I glared and walked over to him and hit him hard, making the sound of the toy hammer echo in the room. “Wrong. Plus, I’ve been better than you since trainee years and I was 11.” I walked away from everyone and the boys all laughed.

“I got it! Was it your chubby cheeks? ” Shindong yelled out and I hit him on the shoulder lightly. “Wrong,” I said.

“Kyung Hoon was the closest to it.” The boys started to think.

“I-i got it!” Kyuhyun stood up and I looked at him, “Was it your body figure in general?” he asked.

“You got it!” I said and everyone clapped.

“W-why?” Everyone started to ask.

“Back then I was really young and obviously was still growing. I’ve hated myself for years. My first relationship made it worse for me. And when I am stressed, I eat a lot and then not eat for days because I was scared of my image. My weight would function weird and go to places that made me feel unattractive. Now that I’m older and things balanced out, I enjoy how my body looks. The fat goes to the right places.” I winked at them and sat back down, getting a hug from Ryeowook.

The last segment of today was the Super Scholarship Quiz where we find out who is the best in variety by playing some games. It was very chaotic as usual when it comes to us. I was with Leeteuk, Shindong, and Ryeowook. With Ryeowook and I together. It was an easy win. Us, Super Junior, won the Ice Cream which I was so excited to bring home, I saw Kyuhyun in the corner of my eye, smiling at me.

During one of the questions, Kyuhyun was asked what his girlfriend's name was, which of course was asked by Lee Soo Geun. He wasn’t supposed to ask that, but that man wanted to win. Kyuhyun said “No one” which meant he didn't have one. Then we all bagged on him because he didn't say E.L.F. Leeteuk made me laugh as well when he said, “She must be disappointed” which was funny enough until Heechul slightly mumbles, “At least it wasn’t to a different member then we’d be in trouble. “ And at that moment all the members started yelling and hitting him because we all knew who he was talking about.

In the end, Super Junior is the best of variety shows. We got some good food and then we promoted our new song “Super Clap.” Overall this has been the best time I’ve had since episode 100 of Knowing Bros. Not only am I with my Knowing Brother’s cast family, but I’m also with my Super Junior family.

Masterlist

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thelatelockdownlist · 4 years ago

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A Series on Series 01: Bridgerton

Hi. I’m Alex, a YouTube newbie.

I resurrected this channel mostly because I wanted to do this thing. It’s something I’d planned back in 2019 and never got around to it because I was too lazy. However… life happened and I thought that with everything that happened in 2020, I should stop procrastinating. So I did nothing in 2020 -- aside from the usual like work. I was one of the lucky ones whose only inconvenience really was being unable to go outside when I wanted to -- which, to be honest, wasn’t really that often. In ordinary circumstances, I don’t really like going out. But the thought of having an actual lockdown order PREVENTING me from going out, well, that’s a whole ‘nother thing.

So 2020 was a bust, but I wanted 2021 to be different. However long this pandemic is going to go, I wanted to make better use of my ‘free’ time.

On to the show. I’m doing A Series on Series, where I talk about my favorite book series. I figured since I read a lot of them, might as well talk about them right here. So let’s start with what’s currently popular: Bridgerton.

So I watched Bridgerton on Netflix the day it came out in my country, January 1.

I’d actually read the Julia Quinn series -- all eight books -- years ago. After I watched the first season, I went back and reread the first book in the series which is the basis for this first season.

Just a disclaimer: I’m watching this through the lens of someone who has read historical romance novels almost my entire life. I understand that there are a lot of issues that should/need to be addressed here like race. However, as I’ve read the books that this series is based on, I know the period in which it’s set. That is to say, the characters are mostly white and mostly straight. It’s the overarching theme of most historical romance novels.

With that said, it’s not to say that I won’t have comments about current issues that we see play out in the series, but I just want to ground this -- this whole thing -- on my own experience mostly because that’s really my frame of reference.

On the race issue, my comments are going to be from someone who is a person of color BUT has lived all of my life in a country, Philippines, where we’re really mostly just one race. There are a lot of biracial people in my country, but for the most part our issues are nothing compared to what black people have experienced and are experiencing everywhere -- especially in the U.S. What I’m saying is, I am aware of the Black Lives Matter movement and I agree with what they stand for and what they’re fighting for. What I’m also saying is that as a person of color who lives in a country with people who have the same skin color as I am, I don’t have the same issues of representation in the media. In OUR media here, I am very much represented. However, in the U.S. people of color are in the minority and struggle with representation. I’m saying that now because we’re going to come back to that later. Also most of my comments are going to be from the lens of someone who identifies herself as a decades’ long (yes, I’m aware that I’m aging myself) historical romance reader. However, even though I used to be the kind of reader who belongs to the ‘the author is dead’ school of thought, these days, one finds it difficult to divorce the author from the work.

From “The Death of the Author,” an essay by French literary theorist, essayist, philosopher, critic and semiotician Roland Barthes. Basically, it says that the author does not factor in the reading of their work -- that their words get to be interpreted by the reader however they may. The point is not to try to understand what the author’s intentions are, and just focus on the actual work itself.

I went to school for this so I’m going to have to balance the death of the author vs my own thoughts -- immediate and otherwise -- when it comes to what I read.

So we’re good? If not, I’ll come back to it -- if you’re still here. [wink]

So in this first episode of A Series on Series: Bridgerton, I’m going to talk about my impressions regarding the series and then point out the differences between the Netflix Season 1 and the first book, The Duke and I.

First impression of the series & some issues:

I was pleasantly surprised to see a black man play the Duke of Hastings.

In the book, he is described as tall, dark-haired and with ice-blue eyes.

Also a pleasant, surprise? Queen Charlotte played by a black woman.

You see, some historians believe that Queen Charlotte was Britain’s first black queen.

She was born the youngest daughter of a duke and a princess in the Duchy of Mecklenburg-Strelitz in northern Germany. She married King George III -- yes, of Hamilton’s ‘You’ll Be Back.’

However, in this timeline set years after that, he’s more The Madness of King George.

Going back, historians are split about this because while some believe they can trace her lineage to the mixed-race branch of the Portuguese royal family and that the royal physician of her time described her as having a “true mulatto face,” other historians say that it’s never been proven.

History says that she might be black or she might not be. In the series, she is, and I had absolutely no problem believing from the get-go that the black actress playing her is in fact, Queen Charlotte.

Some people actually point out the casting of black people in the series -- not just the Duke and the Queen -- but others as well like Lady Danbury, the late Duke and the current Duke’s sparring partner, Will Mondrich -- as race baiting.

Merriam-Webster defines it as the making of verbal attacks against members of a racial group. But that’s the 1961 definition. However, its other definition says it’s the unfair use of statements about race to try to influence the actions or attitudes of a particular group of people. This, I think, applies better.

As someone who isn’t black, I feel like my opinion doesn’t hold much water here -- or at least not the ‘diamond of the first water.’ Yeah, yeah. I went there.

But for me, since the series creator -- who is white -- made a big deal of wanting a diverse cast and ‘colorbind’ casting, a lot of hype surrounded the casting of black people in these particular roles -- who are white in the book. I think certain expectations were set -- whether intentionally or not -- about what it means to cast black people in historically white roles. Hence, the issue of race-baiting.

Was that an issue for me? No. But I’m not black and I’m not the one who may or may not be baited. So what I say isn’t exactly something you can hang your hat on. However, I’ll say it anyway. I like the black actors who play their characters.

In the book, Simon is almost god-like because of how handsome he is. The actor who plays him, really hot. I don’t mind that he doesn’t have ice-blue eyes.

Lady Danbury is my favorite character because of her interactions with Simon and how fierce she is as a friend and aunt. She doesn’t feature much in the book.

Queen Charlotte, also not in the book, is great. I especially liked her in that scene with George who was lucid one moment and then crazed the next. I didn’t think this at the time, but she must have both pitied him and been afraid for herself because he did threaten her. And what does that threat really mean for her? Is it just for her? Or for her people as well?

Because as Simon says later during his conversation with Lady Danbury, their ‘elevation’ relies on the whims of this madman.

The late Duke, well, he was just mean. But that part, when he gets so mad that Simon can’t speak -- I sort of understand why he wants a perfect child. It’s self-preservation. He says that their situation is precarious, that what they have will only remain theirs as long as they remain extraordinary. I felt that vehemence there. While I don’t condone it -- after all, he’s doing this ranting at a child, his child -- I understand the reason behind it. Book OG Duke doesn’t have that reason.

The series kind of followed the book. There were certain departures, but it didn’t really bother me.

For those of you who have not seen the series and/or read the book and don’t want any spoilers, leave now.

Okay.

SPOILER ALERT

The first 9 minutes (more or less) in the series don’t actually appear in the book. But it does a good job of setting up this world. We’re introduced to the Featheringtons and the Bridgertons.

In the first book, the Featheringtons don’t really feature as much. Also, the Baron is dead there. Then there’s Marina Thompson, the Featheringtons’ distant cousin --

Not in the book.

Then there’s Lord Anthony, Viscount Bridgerton and his mistress’ (Siena) amorous activities -- also not in the book.

But I suppose it’s there to give us a glimpse of his character. You know, that he’s a playa.

Also, in the book, Daphne has come out -- as in debuted -- for nearly two seasons. In the series, it’s actually her first time hence the presentation to the queen.

Lady Danbury’s ball is in the book, but Daphne’s entrance which causes a stir due to her being proclaimed as ‘flawless’ by the Queen and --

#recordscratch

Did you think I’d forgotten about Lady Whistledown? Of course not. Especially when she’s voiced by Julie Andrews. I love that they chose her to be Lady Whistledown, but for the purpose of this comparison, I won’t be dwelling much on her, as much as I love Dame Julie Andrews.

#backtoourregularprogramming

Lady Whistledown as ‘a diamond of the first water’ doesn’t happen in the book. While book Daphne was by no means unattractive, according to her: ‘no one was dazzled by her beauty, stunned into speechlessness by her presence…’

Then there’s how Daphne and Simon meet. In the series, Daphne bumps into Simon accidentally, trying to escape Nigel Berbrook. In the book… it’s a little complicated.

First, there’s when and where (and really how their ‘grand scheme’ is concocted). In the series, it happens at Vauxhall Gardens where Simon overhears Daphne and Nigel Berbrook arguing. Then he discovers them after Daphne hits Lord Berbrook when he tries to assault her. Then Simon concocts the scheme with the dramatic cutaways of them rejoining the crowd as they watch the fireworks.

In the book, this actually happens at Lady Danbury’s ball (which we see in the series; the ball. The scene with Berbrook does happen, but it’s at the ball, off a corner. It’s how Daphne and Simon actually met. Anyway, it’s a whole coverup. They leave the unconscious Berbrook and they go back to the ballroom, separately.

Simon meets Daphne’s brothers and they end up introducing him to Daphne and they both agree to pretend that they’d never met before. Anyway, Simon gets all these looks from Lady Featherington and the other mamas and feels the need to escape. He then asks Daphne to dance.

THIS is where and when they concoct the scheme. The plan -- thought of by Simon, same in the series -- actually happens during this -- their first dance at that ball. AFTER their witty repartee, while waltzing. They multitask.

And unlike what happens in the series, the scheme didn’t happen because Daphne needed to be saved from ruin. Simon proposed it because he wanted an out from being stalked by ambitious mamas and offered it to Daphne AND this is a departure from the series -- to make her more desirable to other men.

See, in the book, Daphne always gets FRIENDZONED. I know, I know… but the term really does apply to her here. And with no malice, really.

They don’t view her as someone desirable. She says that she’s still unmarried “because everyone sees me as a friend. No one ever has any romantic interest in me. Except Nigel.”

So Simon’s reason of “men are always interested in a woman if they think other men are interested,” which he also says in the series is due to this.

So to sum up the difference: In the series, it’s to save Daphne from ruin; in the books, it’s so she no longer gets friendzoned.

So they both agree and the next day…

In the series, Daphne and Simon start to hang out and they go out on dates.

Kind of the same in the books, BUT they let Anthony in on the secret.

Anthony was incensed because Simon appears to be breaking the bro code. You know, the one where family is off limits? So they had to tell him. Of course he thinks it’s stupid, but goes along with it because he does see the benefits for Daphne.

In the series, Anthony is in the dark.

Anyway, the dates. BECAUSE this is a historical romance novel set in the regency period, book Simon isn’t quite so bold. The spoon scene?

Not in the book.

The scene where Simon basically gives WAP tips to Daphne?

Not in the book.

And the biggest plot in the series that isn’t in the book?

Yeah... he’s not in the book.

But the part where Anthony catches them in flagrante delicto?

That happens.

And the duel?

In the book.

The heartfelt speech to the queen?

Not in the book.

The scene where Mama Bridgerton tries (and fails) to explain the birds and the bees?

Happens. And it’s actually funnier in the book because Daphne asks her, “So you did this eight times?” (whisper) And her mother blushes furiously and says that, no, not just eight times because sometimes you do it because you like to.

Read the book. I found it funnier than the scene on Netflix. For one, Daphne is actually quite eager for this conversation “I’ve waited for this all week.” -- which shocks Mama.

The wedding?

Kind of the same, since Daphne only remembered the funny moments -- which were not shown in the series.

And I know you’re waiting for this: the wedding night.

Um, they were different.

For one thing, the ‘I burn for you’ line?

Not in the book.

In the series, their wedding night was pretty intense.

In the book, it starts out funny because remember Simon telling Daphne how he couldn’t marry her because he CAN’T have children? Well, Daphne -- having had what passes for sex education for women in Regency England -- thought that meant he COULDN’T have sex -- as in he’s impotent. Which sends Simon into paroxysms of laughter.

And then there was sexing.

But in the book, the sexing was confined mostly in the bedroom.

In the series, it was everywhere, including the bedroom. You know, the library (against a ladder), the mausoleum, in front of the swans near the lake

all to the tune of an orchestral version of Taylor Swift’s ‘Wildest Dreams.’

BUT

You know the course of true love never runs smooth. Our lovely couple has to hit a snag. And it’s in the form of animal husbandry, planting and a little putting of two-and-two together.

How Daphne finds out is sort of the same, but also different.

Like I mentioned before, I’d read this years ago. I’d forgotten about the particulars of this. So when I saw this scene in the Netflix series, I somehow sort of hazily remembered that that’s not what happened in the book. But as soon as I re-read it, I had to put it down. Not because the scene was well-written. But because I just had so many problems with it.

Which kind of makes me thankful that they changed it for Netflix. Because in the series, Simon doesn’t come inside Daphne but this is also what convinces her that he DID lie to her. Remember that earlier scene when Mrs. Colson, the housekeeper, tells Daphne the story of Simon’s parents? How his mother died in childbirth and how his father always wanted a son and blamed his wife when she miscarries? Then Mrs. Colson says, “A womb won’t quicken without strong, healthy seed.”

In the series, Daphne clues in to this when during one of their romps, AFTER she’d spoken with Mrs. Colson and the wheels started turning, she noticed Simon spend on her handkerchief. She then marches to her maid’s room and asks her for essentially a rushed version of sex ed. Then after Daphne and Simon have dinner, they have sex… and I honestly don’t know if Simon came in her or not. But that’s when she accuses him and Simon basically admits it, they then fight. From then on, their marriage becomes strained and they sleep in separate bedrooms. So that awful scene in the book doesn’t exactly appear in the series.

Book Simon comes home drunk because he and Daphne had been fighting because of THE LIE. He manages to convince her to stay with him in bed, and she does. Then she is awakened later and as she talks to him and starts basically caressing him in his sleep, he responds. Which she realizes that this is when she could do WHATEVER she wanted, have WHATEVER she wanted.

So she basically giddyups and rides him like a cowgirl and being super extra, impressing even Simon, as is written in the book. BUT things take a turn when he starts climaxing and she essentially uses what strength she has to pin him down so he couldn’t pull out.

He’s angry and is feeling betrayed and then he starts to stutter -- which makes him angrier, with her, with himself. He’s just a confusing mass of emotions at this point.

And then he leaves for one of his other estates. Daphne goes to London and her brothers visit. One day, she assumes she’s pregnant and sends a letter with Anthony to send to Simon. Simon receives said letter and promptly sets out for London.

In the series, this doesn’t happen. They’re basically living separate lives, apart from posing for a portrait, several social engagements and a ball.

In the book, Simon goes after Daphne who’d been out riding at Hyde Park and she tells him that as it turns out she’s not pregnant. They don’t exactly resolve things there, but at least they’re talking. Daphne’s brothers sort of accost them at Simon’s house demanding that he convinces them that he loves her. Which sort of terrifies Daphne, but Simon takes her to another part of the house and in there actually professes his love, which he does unknowingly in front of her brothers who followed them.

And then sex. This time they both finish. Together. Inside. With enthusiastic consent. On both sides.

In the series, we have sort of the same but in the rain. Not just the Bridgerton boys as audience, but all of their guests.

Then sex. This time they both finish. Together. Inside. With enthusiastic consent. On both sides.

In the series, it ends with Daphne giving birth to Simon’s heir. Then we see them saying good bye to Colin who’s off to tour the continent. Book Colin actually returned FROM the continent the night of Lady Danbury’s ball.

Then we get a hint of the next season, knowing that it’s going to be Anthony’s turn.

AT THE END OF THE DAY

What do I think?

Well, the series was HIGHLY entertaining. I enjoyed watching it, which, for me, is the chief purpose of TV shows like this. So that’s one box checked.

Was it faithful to the book?

Largely, yes. And whatever departures it made didn’t take away from the book, IMO.

Was I bothered about the ‘colorblind’ casting?

No. Like I said before, I had no problems believing the black actors were the characters they played. It wasn’t a shock and it certainly wasn’t distracting.

So I loved it; I may rewatch it from time to time while waiting for Season 2 as we go into Anthony’s story in, The Viscount Who Loved Me.

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robomin · 4 years ago

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seventeen and karasuno: a comparison

hello everybody! here is my not so cursory post before I disappear once again into mere reblogs for another 2 months. I just finished the haikyuu manga and needless to say... I am devastated. I've also been following the series for 5 years..,.,,,., and I’ve noticed some similarities and points of comparison between karasuno and seventeen,, and I decided to look into it just a lil further both to understand my own love for both teams and to unpack my own biases and judgements!

1. history/ past

both Karasuno and seventeen hail from previous ‘powerhouse’es - Karasuno being known as the ‘fallen crows’ and pledis having been in a slump for a bit at the time of seventeen’s debut despite having debuted previously successful groups. I think this does fundamentally set up similar foundational values in both teams, and can possibly be the reason the hunger and drive to improve is so pertinent and palpable in both teams. I’d think both teams take on critical underdog roles in their respective spheres, and this is possibly a reason for their similarities!

2. outstanding values

there are certain values that I strongly associate both teams with, and here I wanna unpack that a lil more and see exactly what it is that these two teams really have in common! in particular, these values are teamwork, earnestness, energy, and unpredictability.

teamwork

I think the cornerstone of both teams is undeniably their strong strong teamwork. at the core of Karasuno is their cohesion, their ability to pick up after each other and cover for each other - their unwavering confidence and reliance on each other. think Hinata’s faith in Kageyama, Asahi’s faith in Nishinoya, their seamless synchronised attacks and the sheer amount of love and support they have for each other. and seventeen definitely also displays this! It’s a known fact that seventeen is known for their ridiculously synchronised everything, from their choreography to their mistakes (lol), and for their teamwork. think woozi supporting the rest of the members in recording, in their musicality, think about how their love for each other (when asked to describe svt,, answers like ‘my everything’ ‘my youth’ ‘family’ ,,,, pls… how can u not cry…….) and just how much they all complement each other so well (hiiing) and spend time with each other even during holidays and go for family dinners together like. do you see what I mean??? these two teams love each other so much………

earnestness

ok imo I think svt is one of the most genuine kpop groups out there, in their sincere focus and love for their art, in the way they (esp woozi, dk, vern, dino) are so focused on honing their skills, improving their musicianship and doing it for each other, to grow together, to continue making music and having fun with their friends… I think coups mentioned somewhere once that though they started out fixating a lot on achievements and awards, they have grown to focus more on just doing what they love w the people they love for a long time…… and …. :””””””( yeah. although this point isn’t super pertinent and present in karasuno, it’s definitely there too, somewhat! the way they’re all focused on improving, on becoming better versions of themselves and fighting it out together as a team (quote kags saying ‘but I wanted to do it with this team’,,,… cry…….) and not for the fame, not really for anything else, but to get good and play volleyball for a long time…. hiiiiinnngggggg

energy

ok I think I might be kinda biased on this one, and I think it overlaps a lil with the earnestness point, but I rly rly think both teams have this !!!! presence on the court and on the stage… it’s likely a combination of how special the individual members are and their synergy, and also how dedicated they are to putting on a good performance and winning. to me they kinda just vibe the same way, with that boundless, contained energy that kinda exudes in the form of self-assuredness and quiet, stable confidence. ya know??? ok this is rly more vibey than anything tangible so it’s a lil hard to explain but I hope you get what I mean!

unpredictability

ok so maybe unpredictability might not be the best word, but Karasuno is always pulling ridiculous plays out of their asses in the middle of matches and bewildering everyone,, which to me is kinda similar to how seventeen always comes up with tracks that are so different, so wow (including and sometimes especially their b-sides!), and so refreshing. their performances as well, always leave an impression due to how ! woah! they are and I think that stems from a certain degree of unpredictability and flexibility - you never really know what svt’s new music is gonna sound like, what Karasuno’s next play is going to be, but you know that in both cases, they’re the only ones who can pull those off flawlessly (think the Miya twins’ imitation freak duo quick, and seventeen’s entire. discography and how immaculate and ! wonderful it is…… music analysis post for another day…)

3. special mention for similarities between characters/ members! hehe

s.coups and daichi: ok. i feel like this is the most obvious comparison.. like they are both tired dads and so responsible.. their thighs.. how reliable they are as pillars for their teams, but also…. how cute and actually equally reliant they are on their teammates as well (think coups’ duality, daichi’s new year eve dream (nightmare? LOL) and how they don’t take all the limelight for themselves but support the team by uplifting their teammates instead and making sure they have the space and freedom to do what they want (daichi always picking up receives on court despite being a spiker, coups always talking to the company and sitting in on meetings even when he doesn’t have to be there….. dads…)

jeonghan and suga: both pretty faces with a penchant for stirring shit LOL like. I always thought both of them were really similar in this aspect, cause although they are definitely both core emotional pillars for their teammates and members, they also stir up a lot of shit and join in on a lot of shenanigans (think Suga riling up daichi for fun and how that is… very similar to how jeonghan screws around w coups) but they’re also v caring and sweet at the same time… we love duality and consistency……

hoshi and nishinoya: ok. I actually think hoshi’s a mix of kags and nishinoya, but def more noya….. like they both have their personal Brand - noya’s rolling thunder, hoshi’s tiger agenda, they’re both reliable and cornerstones of a certain important skill in their teams, and they both have this willpower and determination to fight it out and improve on themselves. not! to mention how they’re like disciplined but also ridiculously chaotic with the rest of their teammates as well and how they’re always both doing dumb stuff…….. (booseoksoon and the tanaka/hinata/noya circus)

dk and asahi: I think this is a comparison that has been made quite a lot as well! clearly, both dk and asahi are the aces (dk as the main vocal and asahi…. is literally an ace) but they’re also prone to insecurity and constantly asking a lot of themselves….. although they’re not completely the same (as is for all the pairs here) I think the way they’re both kinda timid and demand a lot from themselves is p similar and! I also love them both very much

dino and hinata: ok while. I think dino’s a lot smarter than hinata, I think their work ethic is pretty similar - think dino who literally grew up dancing and how much passion and drive he has to prove himself and improve in that regard, and how much he loves it as well. this to me is p similar to Hinata’s unabashed love for volleyball - their ambition is also p similar to me, in that they don’t shy away from professing their desire to win and to become the best (dino’s artist who will go down in history ambition and hinata’s one-track determination to become the greatest) also the both of them just have a lot of energy and ! sprite! also dino’s laugh is. so sunny it screams hinata’s sunny vibe.

ok so basically in conclusion,, this whole thing was just for me to get my feelings out a lil bit and organise some vague comparisons I had thought about. i really hope there’s a significant enough overlap between the two fandoms so more people can appreciate and understand what I’m saying so we can talk about it!! I personally think it’s super interesting how I’m the most involved in these two fandoms, and how they have so many similarities… I think it reveals the values that I value in judging others, and I’d urge you to consider and reflect on the things/ people/ shows you like and see if there are any similarities there! going a lil meta on myself has been really fun so please! don’t be shy to talk to me about this and any other similarities you might find between anime and kpop LOL

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chenoehi · 5 years ago

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My thoughts on Grammys, BTS, and the Academy's supposed 'diversity'.

Can't do 'Keep Reading' on mobile guys so if you don't care about it keep on scrolling.

The only BTS music I thought might have a slim chance for a nomination was "Boy With Luv (ft. Halsey)" as a pop duo collaboration. That was it. Anything more than that was just wishful thinking.

The Academy (both Grammy and Oscar's) talk about diversity when controversy comes up, they give some Black artists and actors awards, they look like try-hards, and then the next year they repeat history. Each year more men continue to be nominated than women, even in years that women dominated the industry. Each year artists who push boundaries continue to be overlooked or less favored than more traditional artists. Each year recognition continues to be bulk awarded to the most basic artists with the most basic styles with the most basic music, often times the same (mostly white) artists each year. No one get me started on always having to award artists like Taylor Swift or Ed Sheeran or Adele each year they make music, despite whether or not what they put out is actually good, original, or better than what they did the year before. I'm not singling them out, but I think they illustrate my point. I will make one exception for Adele because she is a phenomenal singer, although I did not personally believe 25 deserved to sweep; I've been told by fans that Ed Sheeran is a good performer, so I'll give him that but I'll keep my thoughts of his music and the rest of my opinions to myself. But I get tired of artists like these getting nominated every time or almost every time they put music out and then getting awards every time they're nominated, hence sweeping. It gets tiring when the music that frequently-awarded artists put out sucks and they keep raking noms because of who they are.

There is absolutely nothing BTS or any other Asian et al. artists can do to beat that system. None of the criticism in the world has changed it thus far and I don't know that anything ever will. It's a hard institution to tear down. They will use "diverse" artists for ratings by inviting them and having them hand out awards and, in BTS's case, making such a big deal as to even display their Grammy outfits in the museum, and then they will refuse to nominate them.

It's a back handed compliment to non-Western artists. The Academy is saying they're good enough to help win over a predominantly younger and more diverse generation of viewers but they're not good enough to be awarded for their achievements.

What's worse is, the only expectation I had was for the Academy to invite them as performers despite whatever minuscule nomination they might have garnered, because it's been clearly hinted they would attend another Grammys and the Academy would frankly be fools to not have them perform after the shitstorm going on the pop industry rn. If you know anything about the Taylor Swift situation (you may not be able to tell which one because there are always so many) who knows if she will be performing this Grammys, and her medley of her songs was supposedly going to be a highlight; something's always stirring things up so who knows if certain artists don't end up going at all or bow out of performing. Ariana Grande bailed on the 2019 Grammys because the Grammy producer wouldn't let her perform songs she wanted to, and these kinds of disputes happen and artists who are nominated become no-shows. So, the opportunity to invite a group with a huge following, who have already proved to increase ratings, seems like a sure move right?

But BTS can't exactly perform at the Grammys if they're not nominated for a Grammy; I don't see them doing a tribute any time soon either. And if the Academy even dares to invite them at this point for a performance it will be an insult and a transparent ratings grab. BTS may still go to avoid appearing as if their pride has been wounded or just because they want to go regardless. They know better than their fans how it feels to lose, to be discarded, to be overlooked. This is happening to them first and foremost, not us. And if they decide that they will deal with this the same way they dealt with all their other struggles, to push on, perform for their fans, and use the opportunity of exposure for what it's worth, then support them and their decision. I, for one, won't be watching it live regardless of whether they are there. If all the Academy wants is ratings from BTS fans when they are fine with treating them like garbage, they won't get ratings from me.

I fully believe that the Academy is not only discriminatory to non-Western, non-white artists but that failing to nominate BTS for any award at all is out of fear. Fear that their traditional, safe artists will be offended and boycott the awards if they lose out on a nomination, fear that their fanbases will retaliate, but more importantly, fear that BTS or any other gigantic force of a non-Western artist may be a shoe-in for whatever award they are nominated for and potentially sweep if allowed to compete with all other artists. This comes after BTS won Best Group at the Billboard Music Awards this year. Their first time being nominated for a major U.S. award category. It wasn't even a Best New Artist schtick. It was a main category and they were up against established, popular, Western groups like Imagine Dragons and Maroon 5. It comes on the heels of Super M earning number 1 debut album and beginning a successful tour they are on right now. It comes after Blackpink performed at Coachella and toured the country. It comes after NCT 127 and ATEEZ toured the country. Even TXT, a months old group, had successful showcases in major U.S. cities.

The Academy is too racist and xenophobic to acknowledge Asian artists--they always have been and they always will be. The most diversity we'll see is the nomination of Black artists, but still only 2 were nominated for SotY whereas 4 were nominated for RotY. I don't know the exact numbers, but any time I've ever kept up with the awards I don't see very many other diversity groups being represented in nominations either, such as artists with disabilities or LGBT artists who have different gender expressions and identities or sexual orientations that impact their music, performance, and artistry. Halsey's intimate performance at the BBMAs with that female dancer was huge because that's just not something that's really done. Still. And any time it does happen it's a Britney and Madonna moment all over again, it's a fetish to everyone. Progress has been made but it's very minuscule in comparison to the 'diversity' touting approach they've taken.

I'll just leave the words of this morning's Rolling Stone article here:

So, the Academy selectively extends its diversity goodwill just as they always have. No shade to the artist, but just using this example of Lil Nas X versus BTS, you have a young Black, gay artist who started his career in late 2018. He's nominated for some of top Grammys with a minimal discography--an 18-minute EP. This is groundbreaking, it's great. BTS, a 6-year-old established group of young Korean artists who break nearly every record there is and dominated Western charts this spring, and they continue to chart Billboard and Western streaming platforms. They earn no nominations.

The two artists ironically happen to have a collaboration in the form of Old Seoul Road.

Congrats to Lizzo and Lil Nas X (that's not shade at Billie btw) but this tweet from the New York Times is so unbelievably misguided because the Academy's conception of diversity is like seasoning with mostly salt, a little pepper and no cayenne (hate to use that analogy but am I wrong?):

I do appreciate that some artists who don't get nominated a lot got nominations, but looking at the list of top awards I just can't imagine how some of those got through. And I listen to a lot of different music and some BTS stans may have know idea who the fuck Bon Iver is and I'm not saying they don't deserve nominations period, but when you look at the list it's just mind boggling how a song like BWL that was listened to and appreciated like a summer anthem would be could not be included in that mess. (Vampire Weekend for Album of the Year, what, who the fuck, is that, they've been around since 2006, that's when I listened to nothing but metal and rock and I don't, know who the fuck this obscure band is? I may have heard of them once eons ago but they apparently made no impression? I'm sorry). I won't go as far as to say BWL was a Western summer anthem because much of the gp still doesn't know them, this is true. But apparently that's never stopped the Academy before. Bonus, anyone remember Bon Iver winning Best New Artist over Katy Perry all those years ago? No, just me? Good times. (Respect to Bon Iver, I'm just making a point that a lesser known artist won that award over a popular artist and the public went "waH?" Bon Iver being nominated for Record and Album of the Year this time honestly has the same effect as before because what is Hey, Ma even. I listen to Indie music so. What it is.)

Anyway. That's my thoughts. Expect nothing and you won't be disappointed is a myth. You will always have room to be disappointed in humanity.

Edit: while I'm at it, a big, massive fuck you to the Academy for never nominating Halsey for Without You.

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yourdreamscenarios · 6 years ago

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When he tries to calm your nerves

Characters: Jungkook / OC Genre: Fluff Word count: 2,293

“I thought this was going to be just a small performance. There are thousands of people in that concert hall.” Elena said as she huddled back into the dressing room, eyeing every single one of you before dropping her body down on the nearest chair in the room. You couldn’t help but smile as you turned your gaze back towards your own image in the mirror and watched as one of the stylists tried your hardest not to burn your ear while curling your locks. Even after all these years Elena still got nervous during performances and you found that extremely adorable.

She’d always come in, saying that she heard the crowd cheering all the way into the backstage or that she could see all the fan lights in the dark room after taking a peep behind the curtains. It was as if she thought that the rest of you wouldn’t know that she was nervous, but you all knew her much too well for that. “It’ll be fine! We practiced hard, besides, the song rose very well on the chards last week.” Amanda said, sitting down beside her and patting her on the leg. As the leader she always took every opportunity she got to speak some good words, or to cheer all of you up.

“I’m just worried they still remembered last time, when I totally messed up.” Elena muttered, shewing her thumb nail in silence as the all of the members who were in the small space eyed her carefully. You’d known that she was still struggling with that, she just hadn’t been willing to admit it. You’d asked her before, because you could tell that these past few days she had been pushing herself, that there had been a certain pressure laying over her. But she hadn’t been willing to talk about it. She wasn’t the one to talk about her feelings. “I’m sure they already forgot! Besides, that stage was so slippy, I wouldn’t have been surprised if even Amber had landed straight on her butt.” You said, reaching out to smuggle one of the biscuits on the plate a little further ahead on the table when you felt someone slap your shoulder.

You pulled a face, and pretended to be hurt as you looked at the person responsible behind you. Amber shot you a small smile, but didn’t say anything more about your teasing as you winked at her playfully. As the best dancer of the group, Amber rarely made any mistakes on stage which involved her movements. But you didn’t mind teasing her with that. “Even our baby is trying to make you feel better.” You wiggled your eyebrows and hissed when you felt the hot material of the curling iron press against your lower neck. “Oh god, sorry.” Your stylist sang as she replaced her hands and grabbed another piece of hair.

You sank back inside of the chair and tried to relax. Because no matter how badly you tried to ignore it, even you could feel the rapid beating of your heart inside of your chest and the jitters inside of your stomach. You had debuted with your other members as a girl group 6 years ago, and you had been a teenager at the time. You couldn’t have been any more happy to be secure between these other five girls, who had taught you everything they knew. Yet, even after such a long time you still felt slightly nervous. This was an important stage though, it was your comeback.

After a rest of three months you were finally back with two new songs, and you were ready to give your all performing them for the first time tonight. It had been packed and busy weeks, working hard to make the choreography perfect and to get all the notes in place. But eventually you had been able to put down something quite impressive together, even if you said it yourself. Normally, while sitting in these chairs, and getting ready, you were the one who used that extra time to rest a little. Sit back and close your eyes for a moment, even though sleeping with these other girls around wasn’t the safest thing to do.

As the sound inside of the room numbed, every single one of you lost in their own thoughts, you heard the muttering in the hallway. It wasn’t hard for you to recognize those voices, as it were a few you listened to a lot these days. It was almost a gift when the stylist reached for the spray and made sure to secure your hair in place. As soon as she was done you shot out of your chair and searched the eyes of your leader. Though, she seemed to have figured out already, and she knew exactly where you were going. “Be back in a sec.” You mouthed before slipping through the door which was open agar. Their backs were facing you as they walked further away from your dressing room. They seemed to be stuck in a conversation. Thankful for your silent sneakers you ran over, reaching them fast before taking a leap and launching yourself.

You heard a surprised gasp as you wrapped your legs about a firm waist and your arms around a neck. “Who…” You heard him say, before he seemed to realize something and stopped mid sentence. The others stopped to stare, before smiling at you. You’d met the guys of BTS during a variety show two years ago, and you had soon become friends with them. Even though you thought all of them were handsome and they were all just as nice, you had sooner or later found yourself more pulled towards the other youngest one. It had taken a while before the two of you had actually had the balls to admit that you liked each other. And even longer for you to actually start dating, but eventually everything had fallen into place.

The thing was, that when trying to get close to each other, the fact that one was scared of girls and the other was extremely awkward around handsome guys, wasn’t really an advantage. Yet, with lots of help from both sides, you had eventually fallen head over heels for BTS youngest member. “Were you seriously going to pass without saying hello?” You asked, looking at Namjoon who was close enough to answer your stare. It was nice that for once you didn’t have to look up in order to talk to them, and that Jungkook’s height gave you a completely different point of view. “Not like we would dare, we were looking for you.” He defended himself, and you sniffed before eyeing the rest of them. They all looked handsome, every single one of them in their own special way.

There was no way could describe what each of them meant to you. “Because we missed you.” Jimin said, a bright smile curling his lips and making his eyes twitch. Each time you saw him you felt like running over to him and tackling him into a bear hug, so he would surely get all the love he deserved. “Of course you did.” You muttered, rolling your eyes at their cheesiness, causing them to chuckle before finally continuing their way down the hall. Knowing that they would perform as well tonight didn’t exactly made you feel any less calm about your performance. You always felt more nervous knowing they’d be watching, because their opinion was valuable to you.

“Are you ready for your comeback?” Jungkook asked softly, trying to make clear to the others that this was a private conversation and they were asked not to get involved. That worked sometimes, but knowing them, usually it didn’t. It only made them want to tease you even more. They had made it their thing to make the two babies embarrassed about their on going romance as much as they could, but deep inside they loved the two of you together and they always had your back. Knowing how strong he was, and having seen his popping muscles before on screen, which had seriously turned your into a pool on the couch, you knew that he didn’t need any support at all to hold up your weight.

Still, his hands curled slightly underneath your thighs, his hands closing around them. You couldn’t stop the smile that slipped onto your face as you dropped your head on his shoulder. “I guess so, we practiced a lot. We’re all nervous, we just want to do this right.” You muttered, thinking back of the group of girls you had left behind in your dressing room. You knew you had all worked just as hard to make sure that everyone got ready for today and you were proud of every single one of them. “You’ll do great, you always do.” He said as he hoisted you up a little higher, making your head jiggle slightly. While holding onto his shoulders you leaned forward so you could study his face.

“I doesn’t matter if we mess up though. All everyone’s going to be talking about all day is your new hair color.” You rubbed your fingers through his silky locks and admired the new bright color. He usually wasn’t the one to pick out these outstanding ones, normally he stayed put with basic colors like black and brown. But you had to say that it suited him. You loved it that all seven of the guys had the guts to change their hair color every once in a while. You on the other hand were very attached to your own natural hair color. “Not after they’ve seen you in those shorts.” He added, causing you to throw back your head and chuckled, and you could tell he was smiling because he had succeeded in making you laugh.

He seemed to make it his goal to make sure you were always smiling when he was around. “Our babies are flirting. Look at them!” Yoongi said and you both looked up to see the others staring at you. You playfully jabbed out your tongue at them before signing for Jungkook that he could put you down. You had worn him out long enough for now. He held still, letting the others move on as he crouched down and allowed you to step down on the floor. He hands lingered a little longer before slipping over your back, only letting go once he knew you were securely back on the ground. To your surprise, instead of heading on with the others, he turned to face you, his eyes staring right back at yours.

Jungkook had surprised you many times before in this relationship. Like by showing how caring he was and how protective he could be, but also how jealous he could become. You’d always thought he would be the guy who acted cool when his friends were around, so they had nothing to tease him with, but he didn’t really seem to care. His gaze was so intense that you could feel your cheeks burn and you couldn’t help but unlock your eyes from his, simply because you couldn’t take it anymore. “You don’t have to be nervous, you got this.” He tilted his head slightly to the side and showed you that breathtaking smirk, which he mostly kept for his performances to make his fans melt.

Though, now that he was aware of it that you were just as affected by it as everyone else, he liked to used it against you. You had given up your efforts on trying to make him stop, because secretly you loved it when he did it. “You don’t know that…” You whined, knowing that there were many factors that were involved to decide whether this comeback would be dope, or a complete disaster. Though, in the back of your mind you knew that things would be okay. You had been in this field for a long time now, if there was anything you owned by now then it was the stage. It was one of the reasons why you loved your job.

“There will always be people who won’t support you and who won’t like anything you come up with. But your fans will have your back, and we do too.” He said as he came forward and wrapped his arms around your shoulders, pulling you in for a hug. His scent overwhelmed you as you rested your chin against his chest and enjoyed the soft feeling of his oversized sweater against your skin with closed eyes. Sometimes you still couldn’t believe how you had been able to get so lucky. “And here we are, wondering where you guys went and then there you are, just cuddling in the middle of the hallway.” Yoongi’s voice rang through the corridor, causing Jungkook to chuckle before he loosened his hold on you so he could turn around to look at his friend.

“You’re just jealous because my girlfriend is much better than yours.” The youngest yelled, and you watched Yoongi’s face crunch slightly as he leaned against the doorframe of his dressing room, his arms crossed over his chest. “I don’t have a girlfriend!” He answered, and though his voice was loud, you could hear the smile in it that he was trying to hold back. Jungkook hit his arm across your shoulders and pulled you against his side, before grinning at his band member. “That’s right!” Hoseok was hiding in the dressing room with the others, but you could still hear his loud laugh filling the air as he listened to their youngest roasting his friend, and somehow you couldn’t seem to hold back those smiles either, and neither did Yoongi.

BTS Masterlist

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happymetalgirl · 6 years ago

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10 MORE albums I missed in 2017

Okay, so I’m feeling like a real numskull for this one here, not for missing out on talking about these albums in the first place last year, but because I already did a piece about albums I missed last year, and somehow completely forgot to include some of the albums I’m going to talk about here. Some of these I found out about this year and am giving my belated thoughts on because I think they deserve it. But some of these... I was just sterpid, and forgot to talk about them in the post I ALREADY DID about albums I forgot to talk about.

Anyway! Here we go, ten more albums I missed in 2017.

Arckanum - Den Förstfödde

This was one of the albums that made me originally want to make the first installment of posts on albums I missed last year, but in my infinite idiocy, I somehow left it out. And since Arckanum's mastermind, Johan Lahger, has now retired the project this year to focus on his writing career, I definitely wanted to talk about his last album under the Arckanum name. The occult mystique that has overlaid Arckanum's intimidating black metal aura from the start is here on Den Förstfödde as well. And this album ends Arckanum's artistic journey with such ritualistic and meditative tranquility amid the expansive spiritual darkness it conveys, and it does so quite powerfully, with a great, well-versed blend of slow-burning grooves and dark atmospherics to wrap everything great about Arckanum up in one final dark atmosphereic swell of slightly experimental, minimal, black metal. Another addition, a final addition, to the Arckanum legacy, Den Förstfödde is a grand and fitting conclusion to the catalog of one of black metal’s truly unique contributors.

Loss - Horizonless

I had heard a fair amount of hype surrounding this debut album, but I never really got around to checking it out somehow until earlier this year. A bit more of a slow drone-y sort of doom release, Horizonless is an example of something that usually isn't my cup of tea, but ended up being pretty potent and immersive. The band do focus on the more morose and mournful side of the genre, and they show themselves to be quite adept for the most part when it comes to capturing that doom somber. It's a sufficiently long project, but one that doesn't overstay its welcome, a good starting point for the band, but I think they are going to have to do some work on their compositional approach if they're to make a more noticeable mark on doom metal in the coming years. They have the sound narrowed down, and they do show some pretty impressive writing chops on certain tracks on here. I would just love to see this band take this sound to its highest heights with compositions that lend themselves more fully to the tone the band works best with.

Vader - Dark Age

This album came out at the tail end of 2017, and even though I was desperately looking for something better to end my year's worth of discussions on than Asking Alexandria's self-titled disaster, Vader's Dark Age didn't seem like the right kind of release (a compilation album of rerecordings of songs from the band's debut album) to end the year with. Also, it came out four days before the new year, while I was working on my year-in-review lists, hardly enough time to digest the thing and present my thoughts on it. However, as I've come back to this thing a few more times throughout this year, I've found the band's modern approach to their old songs an interesting alternative album experience at least. The steadfast death metal traditionalists make predictably little effort to shake up their sound stylistically, but this album, a rarity of its type, serves as a fascinating exhibit of a close comparison of old and new, showcasing how different they sound on the production fronts, where they differ compositionally, but also how the style of old would fare in today's studios.

Venom Inc. - Avé

I don’t exactly know what kind of Queensrÿche-esque split Venom is undergone, but I can say that this Venom Inc. offshoot has brought a more ambitious and refreshingly modern set of songs to the table than what Venom have been bringing for the past however-many years now. I have seriously not paid Venom much attention since hearing some of the goofy tracks off their previous few albums and giving up most hope of Cronos trying to seriously update his band’s prototypic sound. As vibrant and gruff as Avé is, however, it’s still incredibly drawn out and mostly just a surface-level modernization of the band’s evil thrash metal sound. Still, I appreciate the effort to bring a little bit of the kind of epic bombast akin to the likes of Behemoth to this album, and if this new appendage of Venom really puts its creative head down and focuses on trimming the fat and playing to the strengths of Tony Dolan’s gruff snarls and Jeff Dunn’s knack for groovy rhythms, they can make themselves a name to continue to keep an eye out for.

Godflesh - Post Self

I'm still not sure how exactly I missed a new Godflesh album last year, but it was pretty crazy last year; I remember only hearing of a new Morbid Angel album coming down the pipes about a week or so before it's release, so I guess I'm not super surprised. But either way, it was a pretty unexpected release, somehow. Anyway, Godflesh followed up 2014's fantastic A World Lit Only by Fire with Post Self, an album that leans a little bit more on its portion of atmosheric experimental industrial pieces than its predecessor, but one that is not without its infectious, beat-driven cuts as well. Post Self is mostly the expected continuation of Godflesh’s extraordinarily flawless industrial metal legacy. The ingredients haven’t really changed all that much, but they never really have, and yet something about Godflesh’s consistency remains admirable in a way that hasn’t staled the way the singular motives and predictability of bands like Slayer, Megadeth, or AC/DC have all transformed from selling points to fans’ clamor for something different. Godflesh don’t really deviate, and it’s perhaps because they have such a dominant reign over their musical territory, and Post Self is as solid of a reinforcement of their stronghold as any. All in all though, it's as solid as any album by the mighty and reliable Godflesh, and one I wish I had gotten to sooner before it started distracting me from 2018's metal.

Artificial Brain - Infrared Horizon

The potential for a future, technologically induced apocalypse at the hands of AI seems like the perfect subject matter at the perfect time for a technical death metal project like this, and the sci-fi-minded Artificial Brain seem like just the group to make a statement on the subject. I enjoyed their Labyrinth Constellation album from 2014 for its merits as a solid, virtuosic death metal album, but I was looking for the band to expand their sound a bit more on Infrared Horizon. I don't base my critiques off what I was hoping for from a particular album, and I won't do this album that unusual unfairness here. But man did it feel like a missed opportunity, one the band luckily still has. They could have done so much more than simply spit out more instrumental prowess, which is fine and dandy by its own merits once again. But I was really hoping their expression of the celestial would involve more than the usual sustained dissonant guitar chords and their embodiment of the technological would involve more than robotic technicality. Complex drumming, dissonant guitar atmospherics, tasty slaps of unsubmissive bass, nasty snarls, deep and entirely unintelligible growls: this album has all the ingredients to make your usual techdeath chicken noodle soup. And that's kind of all the album amounts to, a slush of technical wankery. The few times the album ascends beyond techdeath's basic standards, it reveals the band's excellent writing chops and creativity, like the dynamic and bass-heavy "Static Shattering", that I wish popped up more frequently on this album. It's not bad by any techdeath standards, but it seems like this group are punching a bit below their weight, I hope. Definitely still worth the time to digest and appreciate.

Replacire - Do Not Deviate

I heard the hype around Replacire’s Do Not Deviate a little bit late (as in earlier this year), but I have not really connected with that hype. It’s an animated and dynamic progressive death metal release, but the sophomore project still has its kinks to work out, and I didn’t completely see what all the fuss was about. It’s definitely a cut above most of the techdeath crop, but I think there is definitely growth to be done upon the ground laid by this record in the small areas. The band clearly know what they’re doing when it comes to the basics of techdeath (as much of an oxymoron as that might seem to be), it’s just those few quirks to figure out and mold into an identifiably unique sound for the band. The quality playing and presentation of what Replacire are technically and imaginatively capable of does, of course, make a great case for the potential this band has, so I will be looking out for the mastery of the madness strewn about this album on their future releases.

Scour - Red

I didn't really pay Scour much attention when their first EP, Grey, dropped in 2016, mostly because the thought of Phil Anselmo trying his hand at black metal seemed kind of goofy and like something that wouldn't end well. I thought this project would fizzle away not long after this second EP, but that was entirely me judging the book by its cover. One day earlier this year I figured that since they were just EPs I'd check 'em out, why the hell not? And I was pleasantly surprised with both. It's not the most groundbreaking black metal around, but it's hardly the amateurish embarrassment I thought it would be. Even though the black metal vocal style Phil employs on here isn't nearly as technical as his usual melodic gruffness or even other black metal vocal styles, his continued exploration of different techniques at his age continues to impress me. And he still manages to maintain his unique tone and tambre while implementing these new styles. As for how it compares to their first EP, Red is rather stylistically similar and similarly compositionally consistent, but it finds them seemingly more confident on all fronts: Phil with his improved black metal screams, his integration of his lower register growls, and the well-versed band (comprised of members of Pig Destroyer and former Cattle Decapitation bassist, Derek Engeman, who brings that band's guitar style all across the two records as a highlight feature) with their more confident writing and bolder instrumental performances. This EP and the last both possibly benefit from the potential hiding of any major compositional incompetence in the consistently short run times of the twelve tracks between them, but Scour's channeling of the sardonic, nihilistic side of black metal with compelling conviction across these tracks is respectable at the very least. Scour is no novelty side project and far more than just a curious experiment for Phil. The group has the chops to justify their entrance into the readily scornful territory of black metal. Perhaps these short, small releases mark the extent of their creativity, but perhaps not. I'm very curious now as to where this project will go from here and what they might put forth on a full-length.

Amenra - Mass VI

I have stated don't like when bands name albums based on how many albums they have, but I should probably clarify that it doesn't bug me as much when it plays a clear role in their artistic intention as opposed to a lazy showboat of "look how many albums we've made". I don't mind Amenra's numbering of their albums as "masses" because they clearly put effort into embodying a metallic version of that traditional Catholic ritual (even if it's not as true to an integration of those traditional musical elements as Batushka are). Mass VI is perhaps the culmination of the band's work up until this point, with a steady improvement on their sludgy post-metal sound showing signs of crystalizing here on this record. It's not a particularly long album, but it does what it needs to in the time it has, and that is to set and maintain an atmosphere. Amenra do well to capture a sense of liturgical ambiance amid the clashes of sounds they play with across Mass VI, and they do well to expand on them beyond the simple fundamentals of post-metal mood-setting with some truly dynamic shifts between somber, sweetly sung ambiance and soulful crescendos of guitar distortion.

Heresiarch - Death Ordinance

This album is one I found out about this year, completely randomly. I was in a record store and I stumbled upon the band's EP, Hammer of Intransigence. I had never heard it and it was relatively cheap so I just went for it. I then went to find the rest of the band's catalog and found that they had released their first LP last year, Death Ordinance. The lesson from this I suppose is that I'm sure as long as I'm around, I will never find or cover everything I like from a certain year in that year. There will always be stuff I go back and find that I wish I would have known about earlier. As thorough as I am being this year, I'm sure I'll look back and find something I missed, possibly a favorite new artist I didn't even hear of this year. And that to me is wonderful, I'm so glad there is so much metal out there to find and enjoy through this constantly exciting musical journey. Death Ordinance is a meager, but solid enough gruff death metal project that focuses on drawn out sections of low-register guitar groove and bellowing growls to carry its dismal moods. I think the band will need to work on the arrangement of those grooves into more intentional structures on long-form projects like this going forward, but it's a decent enough start.

And that's it for albums I missed in 2017. I'm sure there's still plenty out there that I just have not heard that I am missing that I would love to not be missing, but for now, this is it.

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cool-prince-arsw-shoutarou · 6 years ago

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I have finished translating the first part of Domonet’s interview with Arisawa Shoutarou! Thanks for proofreading my masterpiece, @akiyomitsu! Without you I wouldn’t achieve this great work.

The original Domonet interview part 1 can be found here.

「He’s at 120% in character when on stage」Actor Arisawa Shoutarou’s acting and pursuit of the role 【Recommended Figure vol 19】Part 1

Domoplus, a series of interviews introducing men of interest, had the chance to interview the actor Arisawa Shoutarou who is known for his active roles in various stages such as Izuminokami Kanesada in/from the Musical Touken Ranbu. Arisawa Shoutarou, who will be performing as Ban in the upcoming stage adaptation of “Nanatsu no Taizai,” in August of this year, talked about the opportunity to aim at the actor’s way/path and how to face the preparation for his upcoming role.

Full interview under the cut!

The hero that he admires, his inspiration to become an actor

― What inspired Arisawa-san to become an actor?

I came out to Tokyo from Hyogo Prefecture and ever since I was a child, I have been looking for someone to look up to like some kind of a hero. I love the dramas, Kamen Rider and Sentai Mono, and from then on I had that feeling of admiration. Time has passed really fast from there, I quit the extracurricular activities I have been doing on the way,「What should I do from now on?」is what I’ve been thinking that time. My mother brought me an advertisement flier for an audition,「Why not try this kind of work?」she told me.

I was longing for a hero and I liked television, so I was definitely interested in the actor's job before, but I couldn't quite pinpoint it. Then, because my mother recommended it to me,「You can aim for such a job.」, she said. I feel like I was being holding myself back, and from then I decided to never do work halfway, and to do it seriously. I was checking/searching for offices and agencies by own, sending my profile.

— So you had an edge and started working in your current agency?

Now that you mention it, I have sent a lot of documents, so it’s hard to know, right? I didn’t receive any contact (from the offices he applied to). And it was very regrettable, so I thought 「For now, I will go to the capital (Tokyo)」, and moved to Tokyo after I graduated from High School.. At that time, I still didn't know anything about the basic of acting, so I told myself, 「What I should do first is not to enter any office/agency」 so I decided to attend a training school in Tokyo. I think that what I learned from there is connected to my work now.

Being an actor, I met the new me

― Since you have debuted as a full-fledged actor in 2015 for Hyper Projection Engeki『Haikyuu!!』as Kunimi Akira, you have performed various characters; which character have left a (big) impression/impact to you?

I often look back at the characters I have played and thinking which one of them has the impression of, 「I was able to find a good role」 or「This role is very impressive」 – I can’t decide easily. However, if there’s a role that step up among the rest, it is definitely Izuminokami Kanesada from Musical『Touken Ranbu』.

And later I played as a high school student - Nakamura Kazuhiro for Chuubyou Gekihatsu Boy who’s experiencing a painful Junior High School 2nd year Illness (puberty), but I enjoyed that role very much. He’s wearing white gloves, and saying that there’s a “Dark God” living under the gloves. This kind of behavior (behaving in a way characteristic of teenagers going through puberty, esp. by being overly self-conscious; 2nd year of junior high sickness) is something I can’t really like. There was a time that even I was also like that, 「I want to say cool words too」. (Laughs)

However, it was a work that made me feel like I was a Junior High School who’s going through this phase too, although I didn’t show it. Besides, they seems to do a lot of stupid things, the message of the story was also very strong, and it was good that the audience enjoyed it as well. It became a turning point for me.

― When a character’s personality is completely different from yours, do you consider it more interesting?

It is interesting. It also makes me realize,「Even I have a side like this」and I think it’s one of the privileges of being an actor. Sometimes I think about that, there’s a lot people who have not yet express their own nature/personality….. (Laughs)

― Are you hiding it, or are you not even aware of it? (Laughs) By the way, you played a character that is so different from you – have you experienced being influenced by your character?

It is only during the period/process of being involved with the role. For example, with Izuminokami Kanesada, Hijikata Toshizou’s (manly) sword, I have a feeling that I have become the “Ora, ora” type. Because I was told that I have a very gentle personality, well it is not only his “Ora, ora” personality but also his short-temper nature. Now I think that this is a place that is somehow strange. But now I am in front of my next work, I am just being myself.

When you stand on the stage「 You have become the 120% of your role」

― In making a role, What kind of preparation does Arisawa-san care (the most) about?

I got involved with many 2.5D works, but at first I thought「Because it is different from my own personality、I just have to shake away (from my own self) and perform.」But, I started noticing that it was not the case.

When I stand on the stage, the thing that I have to keep in mind is that I need to be 100% of the role but I think I don’t need the part, 「What I would do if I were you」 – if you put emotions and gestures like, 「I think this is what/who you are」 it will become like I’m just being "myself", and the result will be the same no matter what/which role you play. That’s why, 100% is not enough,「I will stand on the stage as if I am in that position – 120%」I have that concept inside of me.

―To get 120%、certain preparation is necessary but what kind of thing are you doing specifically?

Although it is kind of unexpected for me to say, I do not read scripts that much. Of course I read them as part of my preparation/role making at the very beginning, if it’s about history I will do my own research and have my own base. From there, I always challenge myself「Let’s act like this」and try various things I thought myself like, how to talk and act natural and become familiar with the role, the feelings that I will also propose to the director. So I think in my own way, I try to make a lot of suggestions to the director until the character is final/settled.

― So while you are practicing, you’re also doing a lot of trials and errors until you get the feeling you are close to the role.

Not only during the rehearsals, but also during the (whole) run of production. The reactions of the audience during the performance is a very big factor for me, many actors have changed since entering the production, which I think is totally natural. Because it keeps going until the rest of the performances. I also think that there’s a difference between the first day and the rest of the performances.

― Will the character be decided by living as the character, and in engaging/interacting with your co-stars?

That’s right. After all, everyone will change (to be their character). I think that’s the good quality of stage plays. Rather than simply creating the character by myself, I think there are a lot of things to learn/get from the other characters/cast as well. Even if I’m performing the same content many times, a different play is seen every day. It’s was only recently that I noticed such things. And it makes (the work) even more fun.

The tension we get from the very first day「It makes me happy and I’m enjoying it」

― So, at what is the happiest moment you have experienced so far as an actor?

There are many, but I personally like the atmosphere of the first day of the performance. Greeting everyone I have the thought of「I’m glad I’m doing it」. I have been into various productions and I can say that the confidence during the opening day is 100% (special), I have my own challenges with my anxiety but seeing the reactions and applause of the audience「I am really glad I did it. (Hearing my name) is a really nice feeling」. That I can only think so during the first day. But of course I am deeply impressed with the rest of the performances however, if there’s anything I feel better during the first day.

― It is also the right moment to show off the role you’ve been recreating for the very first time.

After all, everyone is also getting fired up. Somehow it feels like the same way as when I was attending the school’s cultural festival during my school days, since it almost feels like a one-time thing – everyone is full of energy and very fired up. And I thought something like that will never change (even in stage plays). It is a pleasure to ask the audience to see what we have been working on, then it will eventually deliver a good result, I also have my company’s (quantity of) heat, and I, as always, will do my best.

― On the first day, Arisawa-san is in the state where the tension is constantly rising.

The tension is all around me, the kind of tension that I can only feel during the first day, it’s very fun and enjoyable. It is also a relief when it is ending safely (with no injury). Thankfully, with all the works I did up until now, 「I did not have my morning coffee」never happened but I’m still anxious from time to time.

Facing the pressure and weakness head on, creating a role by exploring

― Even if the role of Izuminokami Kanesada was already mentioned earlier who left a big impression/impact on you – what can you say about Musical『Touken Ranbu』〜 Musubi no Hibiki, Hajimari no Ne〜 that has just recently come to a conclusion?

I spent about three months with the same friends/partners on a long stage of 50 performances. The atmosphere of the group was really good and everyone is always really friendly, so I was feeling really lonely when it was finished. And since I used a lot of physical energy during the performances, after the show I can’t even move from the wings (side) of the stage anymore, I have those kind of thoughts such as, 「Aah…… It seems like I’m going to melt (as it is), I wonder if I can fall asleep like this」「I don’t want to go home, I want to live here (in the theater) just like that」(Laughs)

― So much so that you can run out of energy during the performance。

With a role that has emotions which is very visible, the amount of heat (energy power) is also important, because it was a character that compromise and carelessness is not allowed at all, I performed every show with my full power so when it ended, I feel like I’m an M (masochist) or something because I have the feeling of wanting to do it all over again (Laughs). And since it became part of my life now, even during my day off, I feel like「I will do my best again tomorrow」, and if I I’m free for a week or two, it is more like, 「I do not have any performance (today) , I feel somewhat lonely.」- kind of feeling. Also whenever I wake up in the morning with a jump, I’m like「Uwa, this is bad! I didn’t go to the theater!」 (Laughs). Even during my day off, 「I overslept! 」I’d say with a surprise and will jump (out of the bed).

― It looks like it is imprinted in your consciousness (Laughs)? Although you have said that they (Team Bakumatsu with Tomoegata Naginata) are a good company, was there any impressive episode during the performance period?

As we cherished the time we have with each other, (because we only cared about the time we can be together), we’re always together with someone (from the team) to eat outside. In local areas, we only have one performance (in the afternoon), sometimes, I go out to watch baseball and six people were beautifully divided into two-man groups of people. Members going out for lunch, members going out for hot springs, and then there’s me and Imari-kun (Nagasone Kotetsu’s actor = Imari Yu) together watching baseball.

It should have been done separately, but for some reason it will end with the six of us all together for dinner and like 「Huh? Who contacted you? 」「Why are you all together? 」(Laughs). We did not plan to gather at all, but it happened and it was a good feeling.

― What kind of scene does Izuminokami Kanesada left an impression?

It was my first time to do such kind of work, it was also my first time with Hijikata Toshizo, was there any person who actually existed – stood on stage? The weight (of the pressure) of the work was there. For the first time I feel like I have something like responsibility since he’s a really popular character and also has a very huge content (Content may be delivered via any medium such as the internet, television, and audio CDs, as well as live events such as conferences and stage performances.)

― After all, did you have any pressure there?

There is. The work itself, every performance, 「Exceeding the previous work」- it is a work that has been continued being told, and I thought we should never break what we have accumulated so far during our time. 「This is so cool」- what I actually felt when I look at the script. In this work (Musubi no Hiki, Hajimari no Ne) I felt like I have to go far beyond the previous works. During the first meeting, I thought it would be a work that could surely be evaluated in the theater word, and with that I felt some pressure as well.

― Although you seem troubled by recreating the role、what kind of difficulties have you encountered?

My last appearance in Musical『Touken Ranbu』〜Bakumatsu Tenrouden〜, the emotions were suppressed too , and for the emotions to be shown (on the table) for the current work – all emotions and pleasures were packed up, that means if he is a light character, then it will come in handy (bitter smile), but since it was not only established by form, I got things (advices) from the people around me, and because of that I have made this role.

Since then, I felt a lot of things to catch up and it was a difficult part. Even if I intend to be angry, you won’t be able to see it. If you do not have (genuine) love for the character’s partner, you won’t look angry at all. We can’t reach that kind of feeling if we didn’t properly established the relationship of each character – so I think relationship with the co-starts are also important. So I thought it would be the hardest thing to get angry. However, it was very unpleasant to become like a dashing brother who is constantly yelling, and there was considerably a struggle, yes.

― Regarding that part, have you reached a convincing point?

I don’t know if this a correct answer, but I think I was able to do it, there’s a sense that I feel like I was able to find an answer within myself. However, I felt 「I do not have my weakness yet」in the scene where I get angry, so I think that it was good in the sense that I have found my weak point.

Arisawa-san who talked about his feelings towards the play while carefully choosing his words and with a gentle tone. From the phrase, 「Tension from the first day (of the performance) it is fun and enjoyable」- I felt the strength of the core and the passion within him. In the second part we talked about watching and aiming for the image – the manner of spending his day off, the story about his part-time job, etc. so please look forward to it!

The second part is now on the work! Thank you so much and I apologized for the long wait, please credit me and Aki for the effort we have both spent for the interview. It was all fun translating, to be honest. Despite him using a very polite structure and all. See you on the second part!

PS: They might have some changes from time to time because I love editing stuff! Sooo....*sweats*

Reference:

オラ(ora) is a slang term, coined by the Japanese “Yankii”. The Yankii are a Japanese group, kind of resembling punks or greasers (if you want to go back that far). They have a very distinct style, demeanor (basically pretty rude and in your face) and most importantly jargon.

Chuubyou Gekihatsu refers to teenagers going through puberty, esp. by being overly self-conscious; 2nd year of junior high sickness.

HIjikata Toshizo is the proud owner of Izuminokami Kanesada.

#arisawa shoutarou #shoutarou arisawa #有澤樟太郎 #arisawa shotaro #shotaro arisawa #interview translation

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The Weekend Warrior October 2, 2020 – ON THE ROCKS, MANGROVE, SCARE ME, POSSESOR, BOYS IN THE BAND, THE GLORIAS, SAVE YOURSELVES! and More

It’s October, which means we’re finally getting Patty Jenkins’ long-awaited Wonder Woman 1984 after a number of delays from its original June release. Now that it’s finally coming out, maybe we can finally see movie theaters rebound with such an anticipated superhero blockbuster ready to fill those theaters right back up to 100% capacity. What’s that? It’s been moved to Christmas Day? Movie theaters in New York and L.A. are still closed and other movie theaters are only at 25-40% capacity? So we’re not getting Wonder Woman 1984 this week? So what are we working with here… Something like 30 other movies that few people have been chomping on the bit to see? Great… well, then never mind. We’ll see how far I get through the insane amount of movies being released this week, but I can tell you right now, that it might not be very far.

Possibly the highest profile release this week is the new film from Sofia Coppola, ON THE ROCKS, which is being released theatrically by A24 (where movie theaters are open) before its inevitable Apple TV+ streaming premiere on October 23. I had the opportunity of seeing Coppola’s film as part of my New York Film Festival coverage, where it got a sneak preview last week.

It’s a fantastic film starring Rashida Jones as Laura, a woman who has been married to her husband Dean (Marlon Wayans) for long enough that they have two young daughters, although she’s started to suspect that he’s losing interest in her and maybe sleeping with his assistant. As she gets more paranoid, her lethario art-dealing father (Bill Murray) shows up and tries to help Laura find out the truth about her husband’s fidelity.

Like many, I was a huge fan of Coppola’s earlier films, The Virgin Suicides and Lost in Translation – in fact, interviewing Coppola for the latter was one of my first roundtable experiences ever – and though I liked Marie Antoinette just fine, some of Coppola’s other films in recent years just haven’t connected with me. Maybe it took for her to do a full-on New York City film, as On the Rocks is, for me to return to the film but there’s so much other stuff to like about it.

First of all, it seems like a much more personal film than something like The Beguiling but she also has a fantastically vibrant lead in Jones, who doesn’t often get roles that really shows off her abilities. It’s hard not to think about some of Noah Baumbach’s movies, particularly last year’s Marriage Story, while watching On the Rocks because Coppola uses a similar segmental storytelling format. What sets it apart from just about every other film is Coppola’s ability to acknowledge that the best way to use Bill Murray in your movie is to just let him be Bill Murray and do what he’s going to do. That immediately lends itself to some great moments where father and daughter can go out on the town (and eventually to Mexico!) where Jones essentially acts as the audience for her father’s shenanigans.

But this is very much Jones’ movie even as she’s surrounded by the likes of Jenny Slate as a single mother kvetching about her dating life and Wayans, possibly playing his most serious and dramatic role since Requiem for a Dream.

I really enjoyed On the Rocks more than any of Coppola’s movies maybe going back to Lost in Translation. I think that she does have something to say as a filmmaker in terms of something as personal as this vs. a genre film like The Beguiled, and she does a particularly good job capturing New York City in a way that I really miss right now.

You can also read my more technically-minded review of Coppola’s latest over at Below the Line.

While I haven’t had the time to see as much of the 58th New York Film Festival as I like, I did get to see MANGROVE, the next chapter of Steve McQueen’s “Small Axe Anthology” which also played at the NYFF this past week. In fact, it’s the first chapter of the group of five movies about England’s West Indian community, both chronologically and when it will air on Amazon (November 20).

This one takes place in 1970, focusing on the Mangrove, a Notting Hill restaurant where the West Indian and black communities regularly congregate, but also, a target for the racist local police who are constantly raiding it and causing misery both for the customers and for the shop owner Frank Crichlow, played by Shaun Parkes. Some of the people who frequent the tiny shop are Black Panther’s Laetitia Wright as (what else?) Black Panther activist Althea Jones, but after a number of police disruptions, the people have had enough and decide to march to protest, which inevitably leads to a conflict with the same police.

Unlike Lovers Rock, which is just over an hour long, Mangrove feels like a real movie with a beginning, middle and end i.e. a simpler three-act structure, but it also runs for over two hours. Honestly, this could have been shown in theaters on its own, and I would have been satisfied, although I’m more than curious how that ties into the other movies.

The first act of the movie is similar to Lovers Rock as you’re allowed to look into this community and how they try to enjoy their lives together but having difficulty doing so due to the violent police raids, much of this part focusing more on Crichlow than the others. The actual protest march is the film’s biggest set piece where a lot of the players come together including the PC Frank Pulley, as played by Sam Spruell. This leads to the third act, which is basically a court trial of about a dozen of the people who frequent the Mangrove, including Crichlow, many of them defending themselves. If there was racism in the way the black people of London are treated by the police, it’s exacerbated when they’re put to trial in a courtroom where the jury only has 2 black members. The judge is so clearly on the side of alleviating the police of any responsibility for what happened that you just get madder and madder as it goes along.

As much as the film is very much Parkes as the lead, the strong support from Wright and the likes of Malachi Kirby as Darcus Howe, who has some amazing courtroom scenes, and Jack Lowden as Ian MacDonald, another one of the barristers. Almost every scene gives McQueen and his crew a chance to show off how well they were able to recreate every aspect of the times, whether it’s the neighborhood or recreating the Old Bailey where the trial takes place. I was just really impressed with everything about the movie from the screenplay, cowritten by McQueen with Alastair Siddons, to the cast and every single performance. All of it comes together so well while telling the very true story of the Mangrove 9 in a way that feels like McQueen doesn’t need to exaggerate anything for the viewer to really feel the injustices in play during that era.

This is an epic film that reminds me a bit of Mike Leigh’s underrated Peterloo last year. Not only did I think Mangrove was better than Lovers Rock, but I also think it’s better than McQueen’s Oscar-winning Best Picture, 12 Years a Slave, so it’s kind of odd that this wasn’t chosen to open the NYFF vs. the far shorter film.

Since it’s October, we might as well start with some scary or semi-scary genre movies, three of which premiered at Sundance earlier this year, at least two in the Midnight Section.

I’ve said before how impressed by the movies that horror streamer Shudder was sharing with its audience and Josh Ruben’s SCARE ME (Shudder), which debuts on Thursday, is no exception. I generally love horror comedies, but this one is more of a comedy horror, mainly being a two-hander as two horror writers hang out in a remote cabin in the middle of winter, trying to scare each other by telling stories. Ruben himself plays Fred Banks, a typical writer/actor/director from Hollywood who really hasn’t written or directed much, but when he meets extremely cynical bestselling horror writer Fanny Addie, as played by Aya Cash (from The Boys), there’s a certain amount of competitive flirtation that you know will lead to a fun movie.

So yeah, I’m not going to say too much about the stories they tell each other or what makes them so riveting and hilarious, but Ruben is not afraid to make things very heightened, whether it’s the performances by the two actors or the use of music or sound FX to really emphasize the horror aspect of the film. It’s hard not to think of something like The Shining or Misery due to the house out in the middle of nowhere, but Ruben also tends to show his horror influences in his script. The movie is working so well as a two-hander before Chris Redd from SNL shows up as the pizza delivery guy Carlo, drugs come out and things start to get even more outrageous and hilarious.

I have to say that I haven’t seen a horror movie this year that I enjoyed quite as much as Scare Me, since it’s so fun even when it starts to get exceedingly more dark in the last act. This is a great deconstruction of the horror genre that manages to create a truly original premise out of a mash-up of horror tropes.

In theaters and drive-ins this Friday and then available digitally next Tuesday, October 6, is Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson’s SAVE YOURSELVES! (Bleecker Street), a genre comedy starring John Reynolds and Sunita Mani (GLOW) as a squabbling couple who decided to take a retreat to a cabin in upstate New York to work on their relationship sans any electronics… only to miss the alien invasion that is progressively destroying the rest of the country.

It’s kind of funny seeing this back-to-back with the above Scare Me, because they’re both very funny two-handers, although this one was not quite as funny as I was hoping for, maybe because the main couple are cute, but they’re also quite deliberately clueless. They seem very much like a lot of younger people these days who want to try to better themselves but they’re so addicted to their smartphones, they don’t always realize how bad their behavior looks.

I did like what the filmmakers managed to do with mostly just the two actors and the semi-adorable gas-guzzling furball aliens who show up and terrorize the duo for the second half of the movie. Like with Scare Me, I don’t want to say too much about what happens to them, because that’s more than half the fun of watching the ordeal they end up going through, but it’s a different directorial debut and a great showcase for the talents of Mani (who I’ve seen a few things) and Reynolds (whose work I really didn’t know at all.

Basically, the four of them take a fun concept and do a lot with what is also essentially a two-hander that gets stranger and stranger but never is as outright funny as I was hoping it might be with such a great premise.

Brandon Cronenberg (yes, that Cronenberg) drops his second movie, POSSESSOR UNCUT (NEON), which debuted in the midnight section of Sundance earlier this year. Unfortunately, like the two movies above, it is one where knowing too much might detract from actually enjoying what happens. Essentially, Andrea Riseborough plays Tasya, an assassin who is transplanted into another body via her handler (Jennifer Jason Leigh) but one particular hit, which puts her into the body of Christopher Abbott’s Colin Tate goes horribly wrong.

I think that’s enough of a set-up for a movie that you will probably know immediately whether it will be for you as you watch, particularly after an intensely gory murder which you’ll watch with very little context of what is happening. In fact, you might spend quite a bit of Possessor Uncut unsure of what is going on, and that’s both a plus and a minus towards my overall enjoyment of the movie. Again, I don’t want to give too much away but much of the movie deals with what happens when Tasya is transplanted into the body of a man dealing with his own inner demons (Abbott), leading up to her having to conduct the hit on her target, Tate’s future father-in-law, as played by Sean Bean.

There’s something quite futuristic and other-worldly about all aspects of Possessor Uncut, but Cronenberg handles all the sci-fi elements in the film in such a matter-of-fact way that we never assume this is too far into the future but just watching another version of our own reality. I love Riseborough so much, as she’s easily one of my favorite actors, although I’m a little mixed on Abbott, so mainly seeing him acting like what she might be like controlling his body, it’s a little off-putting to be honest.

What really helps Cronenberg’s bizarre vision more than anything is his second collaboration with his DP Karim Hussain who has grown so much as a cinematographer in the 8 years since Antiviral. Every aspect of the movie’s otherworldliness is enhanced by Hussain’s use of colored filters to keep the viewer off-balance and unsure of what exactly one is watching. But those who are onboard for the type of violence and gore we get early on might be disappointed in how long we have before we get to more of it. In that way, Possessorreminds me of the recent

There’s no denying that Brandon is his father’s son with the type of storytelling he wants to explore, and he brings the same type of auteurish angle to his gore-filled genre filmmaking that is likely to be similarly divisive on who loves and appreciates it vs. those who just won’t get it at all. Either way, Possessor is as daring as it is weird and freaky and your mileage will vary depending on what you’re expecting.

I had never heard of Aaron Starmer’s book SPONTANEOUS (Paramount Pictures), but Brian Duffield, writer of “The Babysitter” movies on Netflix, makes his directorial debut with quite a dark romantic comedy that seems like a great companion to Words on Bathroom Walls from earlier in the year. Katherine Langford from Cursed and Knives Out plays Mara Carlyle, a senior at Covington High School, who is sitting in class one day when one of her classmates explodes, and as others also start exploding, she ends up bonding with Charlie Plummer’s Dylan, as the two young lovers stand together to try to survive.

I generally like coming-of-age and high school movies and I definitely have some favorites, both classics and more recent ones. Let me say right now that this one is VERY dark but also very funny and enjoyable, so it immediately reminds me more of something like Heathers in the fact you’ll just be enjoying some part of the story and then some kid explodes in fully gory glory. Yeah, it’s something that might be tough for some, because it doesn’t take the typical boy meets girl, lovey-dovey kissy-face movie, although the relationship between Mara and Dylan plays a large part in the movie.

I’ve already been a fan of Plummer’s from some of his previous work, but Langford is really fantastic in this, and this allowed me to see her in a whole new light as much as I thought she played a fine part in Knives Out. It was also great to see unlikely candidates like Rob Huebel and Piper Perabo playing her parents, and I also dug Haley Law as Mara’s best friend Tess.

The movie starts out as one thing but by the second half, it’s turning into something more akin to George Romero’s 1973 The Crazies where all of Covington’s seniors are locked up in a facility being tested with drugs that hopefully will keep them from exploding. The only real problem is that it does get very dark including one plot point that might lose a lot of those that have enjoyed watching the Senior Class of Whenever spontaneously exploding.

In a week where we have a truly dreadful high school movie about heroin addiction (see below), who would have imagined that a far better movie would be the one where high school kids are randomly blowing up as they frequently do in Spontaneous? This is a pretty fantastic directorial debut by Duffield, a devilishly funny take on an overused genre but one that also stands up with the best of them. Here’s hoping Duffield gets to direct another movie because from this and “The Babysitter” movies, it’s clear he has very distinct voice and style ala Election-era Alexander Payne that would could lead to some great stuff in the future.

Next up, we have one for the boys and one for the girls…sorry. Ladies.

The Ryan Murphy-produced based on Matt Crowley’s 1968 stageplay THE BOYS IN THE BAND hits Netflix on Wednesday. Directed by Joe Mantello, who also directed the recent Broadway revival, it’s an ensemble piece featuring Jim Parsons, Zachary Quinto and Matt Bomer as three of seven gay friends who congregate the Upper East Side apartment of Michael (Parsons) to celebrate the birthday of Harold (Quinto), his birthday party including a number of surprise guests including Michael’s married college friend Alan (Brian Hutchison) and a stripper known as “Cowboy.”

I’ve never seen the stageplay on which this is based, although I know a lot about it, including the fact that it takes place on a single night all on one set. Mantello’s movie includes the entire cast from the recent 2018 Broadway revival which he also directed, so you just know everyone will be bringing their A-game. While there are some big names from the screen in the cast, there are just as many amazing moments from some of the other characters, including Robin De Jesus’ Emory, Larry (Andrew Rannels), Bernard (Michael Benjamin Washington), Hank (Tuc Watkins), as well as Bomer playing Michael’s good-looking boyfriend Donald.

That obviously well-rehearsed cast brought a lot to my first experience with Crowley’s beloved play, their hilarious patter and interaction making the first part of the movie so light and entertaining, particularly a campy dance number to the song “Heawave.” But the film also gets quite serious by the second half, and that’s despite taking place over a decade before AIDS reared its ugly head.

Much of that drama arrives at the same time as Michael’s homophobic college friend Alan shows up without ever saying why he needed to talk to Michael so urgently – we definitely can put two and two together but it’s never confirmed out loud. When Harold finally shows up, he acts like a complete asshole to everyone, but it’s quite an amazing and standout performance by Quinto, although he becomes more of a spectator as the night goes on.

But the entire cast is amazing and they’re all given moments to shine. Parsons really blew me away with his performance, and De Jesus is absolutely at first but handles the drama just as well, and I can go on and on about what a tight ensemble producer Murphy brought from stage to screen.

Boys in the Band doesn’t just deal with homophobia in the late ’60s, as it also allows these very different gay men to come to terms with their sexuality, talking about how they first realized they were gay, as well as talking about monogamy and fidelity. It would certainly be interesting to see an updated version of this set in present day, but the 1968 text and context still works just fine.

If you’ve never seen any other iteration of this play, Mantello and his cast have done a pretty fantastic job turning a one-location play into something that’s far more cinematic. I think we can expect Boys in the Band to be included in a number of Emmy categories next year.

If Boys in the Band is too much of a sausage factory for you, then there’s THE GLORIAS (LD Entertainment, Roadside Attractions), hitting digital and Amazon Prime on Wednesday i.e. today. I can’t think of any filmmaker better than Julie Taymor to tell the story of Gloria Steinem, because this is in fact a biopic about the feminist activist, as played by Julianne Moore, Alicia Vikander and two talented young actresses during the earlier scenes.

I have to be honest that I never really knew much about Steinem except for her role in the Women’s Movement and trying to get the Equal Rights Act passed in the ‘70s and her involvement in so many important women’s movements in recent years, including #MeToo. As with much of her work, Taymor takes a very different approach to the classic biopic, switching between as a little girl in the past, her time spent in India seeing women there struggling with equality, to her fierce fight for women’s rights to have autonomy over their own bodies, which includes getting abortions.

I feel like I need to go back to her childhood where her eccentric father Leo (played by a barely recognizable Timothy Hutton) is always taking her family from one place to another to Steinem as a young woman (as played by Vikander) in India. There’s no question that when Moore enters the picture of the older Steinem where it starts to get interesting. She’s also far better than the generally good Vikander, whose accent doesn’t match up with any of the other actors playing Steinem.

I was a little disappointed that we really didn’t get to see very much of Steinem’s relationship with Dorothy Pitman Hughes, as played by Janelle Monae, who basically appears for two scenes and is gone. Fortunately, it gets more into her affinity for Native Americans, particularly Kimberly Guerrero’s Wilma Mankiller. Other supporting roles of note include Bette Midler as Bella Abzug and Lorraine Toussaint as Flo Kennedy.

It takes a little time to adjust to the jumps in time and not everyone is going to like the rather pretentious decision to have Steinems from different time periods having conversations on a bus together. On the other hand, Taymor’s recreation of the 1977 Womens Conference is quite impressive, and the movie includes a fun fantasy sequence. The movie essentially does what it’s meant to do, which is to instruct and educate about why Steinem’s place in history is so important, and Taymor does a good job shaking off most of the usual biopic tropes, sometimes to success and other times not so much.

Darren Lynn Bousman, director of a bunch of the “Saw” movies including next year’s Spiral, helms DEATH OF ME (Saban Films), a psychological thriller starring Maggie Q and Luke Hemsworth as married couple, Christine and Neil Oliver, who find themselves stranded on a remote island near Thailand where the couple are trapped when a typhoon hits. The couple wake up confused about what happened over the previous 12 hours until they find a video of Neil killing and burying Christine. Hilarity ensues. (No, not really. This is in fact a deadly serious psychological thriller.)

Listen, I love Maggie Q, and I’m so happy to see her in a third movie this year, even if it’s a little strange that this one is set in a similar island paradise as the generally superior Blumhouse’s Fantasy Island from earlier in the year. This one is also similarly high concept, even borrowing a bit from The Hangover (still, not a comedy), except that the premise gets so diluted by vague and esoteric nightmarish scenes used to keep Christine (and the viewer) in a constant state of confusion.

This feels like such a different type of movie for Bousman, maybe because of the environment or the lush look created by that location which informs the film. In some ways, it reminded me of Wes Craven’s The Serpent and the Rainbow, and I usually like this type of mind-fuck type movie, but Death of Me just goes too far down that rabbit hole, and the only answer it gives in terms of what is happening is a fairly lame twist near the end. There’s no question this might have been worse in the hands of a less adept filmmaker, because the movie does look good, but I had a hard time connecting with any of it. You’ll notice that I didn’t have much to say about Luke Hemsworth’s character and that’s because he has so little personality when he mysteriously vanishes midway through the movie, you just don’t miss him at all.

At times, Death of Me comes across like a Southeast Asian Midsommar, and Maggie Q generally gives a terrific performance to help sell the terror her character must endure. Unfortunately, that effort and her talent is wasted, because the movie frequently goes so far overboard it’s impossible to get back once it begins to go too far off the rails.

Going from psychological thriller right into futuristic sci-fi with Seth Lamey’s 2067 (RLJEFilms), starring Kodi Smith-McPhee as Ethan Whyte, a young man living during a time when the earth has been disabled by the lack of oxygen. Ethan works in the mines with his older brother (Ryan Kwanten) but he’s suddenly called upon as the potential savior of earth, as he’s sent 400 years into the future to bring back a cure for earth’s woes.

Where do I even begin with a movie that generally should be something I like, but it takes so long to get even remotely interesting? This one had me vacillating between enjoying what was going on and generally being annoyed by everything. I’m not even sure where to begin except for the central premise of all plant life being dead meaning there’s no oxygen for humans. It’s a decent idea for sure but one that’s quickly lost when you realize that this is going to be another well-intentioned movie that isn’t executed very well.

The entire set-up for the movie doesn’t particularly work, but when Ethan is shot 400 years into the future via something called “The Chronicle,” he’s suddenly on an earth full of lush vegetation and no way of getting back. The movie does get slightly better at that point, because it doesn’t rely on people walking around in gas masks – cause there’s no oxygen, get it? – but Smit-McPhee really struggles to carry this section, frequently leaning on Kwanten once Ethan’s older brother shows up. I just don’t think Smit-McPhee has aged well nor has he improved much as an actor, so making him the lead is already questionable, especially when you put Kwanten into more of a supporting role, and that’s really just the tip of the iceberg for the movie’s problems.

Unfortunately, 2067 is harder to follow than most time travel movies but mainly because it chooses to jump back and forth in time, frequently stealing liberally from Blade Runner’s futuristic noir and other movies. The writing is pretty bad, and the weak cast does little to elevate it with way too much over-emoting in almost every scene.

Even the score, which would have been great if used to embellish a better movie, tends to overpower everything, essentially used as a crutch to instill emotion for characters that are hard to care about. On top of that, the storytelling is all over the place to the point where few will be focused enough to care.

Sure, there’s some nice production design at work despite substandard VFX, and otherwise, 2067 is mostly bland and highly derivative sci-fi that comes off like a bad low-budget episode of Doctor Who with little of that show’s entertainment value.

Where do I even begin with SNO BABIES (Better Noise Films), a heavy-handed PSA about drug addiction written by Michael Walsh and directed by Bridget Smith that’s available via VOD right now. It stars Katie Kelly as Kristen McCusker, a Princeton-bound high school senior who has turned her first taste of oxy into a full-blown heroin addiction as we see her dragged down a rabbit hole of absolutely every possibly awful thing that could happen to her over the course of two hours, just so that… well, I won’t spoil what happens.

There are times while watching a movie when you’re not too far into it, and you quickly realize that you’re watching a very bad movie. I certainly didn’t have to go that far into Sno Babies before seeing Kelly’s character being put through so much awfulness that it made my skin crawl more than any sort of torture porn. Whether it’s watching her or her awful friend Hannah (Paula Andino) sticking a hypodermic full of heroin into her tongue or seeing her getting raped at a party because she’s in a heroin-fueled stupor. And that’s just the first 15 minutes of the movie!

Instead of staying focused on Kristen’s journey, which is like a cross between Mean Girls and Requiem for a dream, the filmmakers also introduce a young couple, Matt and Anna (Michael Lombardi, Jane Stiles), who are trying to have a baby, Matt’s sister Mary, Kristen’s mother Clare and her real estate business, as well as a problematic coyote that takes up much of Matt’s time. Yes, this coyote ends up playing as larger and larger role in the plot and how it comes together that even if you think you know where things are going (and are probably partially right), you will be left incredulous by everything that happens over the course of the movie until it’s absolutely ludicrous last act.

So yeah, the writing is not good, the actors are very bad and every aspect of the film is so poorly made and directed, it’s impossible to even appreciate it as what it’s intended – to make a PSA for teenagers to try to keep them off of … heroin. (Yes, there are lots of other drugs that are far easier to get in the suburbs, but for whatever reason, they decided to go with heroin.) Except that the movie is so bad few teenagers will be able to get past the first 15 minutes, which means it’s a failed effort from jump.

Kelly is certainly put through a lot, including a lot of bad FX make-up, but in many ways, Andino plays a far more interesting character with a better arc, but there’s no way of realizing that until the very end, which just makes the whole thing even more bonkers.

The filmmakers behind Sno Babies must have some sort of sadistic streak to make viewers endure everything various characters are put through, but especially Kristen and Hannah. Listen, I’m never been one to get so mad at a movie that I ever actually yelled at my laptop… until Sno Babies. Let me just say that it’s a good thing I don’t have direct neighbors because they would start thinking they live next door to a psycho who keeps yelling odd things out of the blue.

Sno Babies is like an Afterschool Special on heroin, in other words, it’s unwatchable trash. Your brain would have to be on drugs to stick with it through the end. As the worst movie I’ve seen this year, it would be an understatement if I were to say that the people who made this movie should never be allowed to make another movie again.

And then we get to all the movies I wish I could get to but just didn’t have time due to my insanely busy schedule right now. I hope to get to watch some of them later but didn’t want to hold up this week’s column too much.

Lydia Dean Pilcher’s A CALL TO SPY (IFC Films) seems like my kind of movie I might like, a WWII drama about how Churchill started recruiting and training women as spies for his Special Operations Executive (SOE) in order to conduct sabotage and rebuild the resistance. Stana Katic plays Vera Atkins, who recruits two such candidates, Sarah Megan Thomas’ Virginia Hall, an American with a wooden leg, and Radhika Atpe’s Noor Inayat Khan, a Muslim pacifist, as the three women infiltrate Nazi-occupied France. The film is based on true stories, and hopefully I’ll get a chance to see it.

Streaming on Netflix this Friday is Kristen (Cameraperson) Johnson’s new doc DICK JOHNSON IS DEAD, which won a Special Jury Award at Sundance earlier this year. This one is about her 86-year-old stuntman father and how she deals with the fact that he’s eventually going to die, but literally staging all sorts of cinematic ways of killing him. This one I actually did get a chance to watch before finishing the column, and it was pretty tough to watch, mainly since I’m dealing with my own coming to terms that my slightly older mother may not be around for much longer. This is such a strange and only mildly entertaining movie, because it is so personal for Johnson, but I’m kind of shocked by how many people in her life would go along with making such a morbid and macabre film. This definitely won’t be for everyone, and I’m not quite sure how I’d feel about it if my mother died – my father’s been dead for 11 years, incidentally – but I’m not quite sure to whom this movie would appeal. Either way, it’s on Netflix so you can throw it on if you have nothing else to watch.

Other stuff streaming on Netflix this week includes the kid-friendly horror film Vampires vs the Bronx and the streamer’s latest true crime docuseries American Murder: The Family Next Door.

Another music doc that I’ll have to check out is Herb Alpert Is… (Abramorama), the latest from John Scheinfeld (Chasing Trane: The John Coltrane Documentary), and it will get a live world premiere on Thursday night at 5PM PST/8PM PST featuring a Q&A with Alpert himself via Facebook, Youtube, and Twitter and www.herbalpertis.com. On Friday, it will be available via Amazon, iTunes and other platforms as well as via DVD… and lots of other formats, including “LP format featuring a coffee table book and a five-piece 180 gram vinyl set.” Wow. I’ve always been interested in Alpert from his amazing career as a musician to his equally fantastic career running A&M Records, which discovered some of the biggest artists over the decades that followed. I can guarantee that I’ll be watching this movie very soon.

Also, Daniel Traub’s Ursula Von Ryingvard: Into her Own from Icarus Films, an innocuous title about a woman of whom I’ve never heard, will open via Virtual Cinema. Apparently, she’s a sculptor, and that doesn’t do much to pique my interest, although the fact it’s only an hour long might mean I watch it soon, as well.

Also wasn’t able to get to Marcus H. Rosenmüller’s The Keeper (Menemsha Films), which will stream on Kino Lorber’s Virtual Cinema.It’s a biopic about Bert Traumann, as played by David Kross, about a German soldier and prisoner of war who becomes Manchester City’s goalkeeper, much to the consternation of the soccer team’s thousands of Jewish fans. It leads up to the team’s victory at the 1956 FA Cup Final that finally gets him fans. I’m also kind of interested in the historic epic The Legend of Tomiris (Well GO USA), which seems to be getting a digital only release, but I honestly haven’t heard peep about the movie’s release other than the fact it’s opening. That’s not good.

Another movie I was hoping to catch but there were JUST TOO MANY DAMN MOVIES! was Brea Grant’s 12 Hour Shift (Magnet Releasing), which stars Angela Bettis, and it’s a 1998 thriller set in an Arkansas hospital where a junkie nurse, her scheming cousin and a group of black market organ-trading criminals get caught up in heist that goes wrong.

To be honest, I really just didn’t have much interest in Adriana Trigiani’s Then Came You (Vertical), which actually received Fathom Events screenings before it’s On Demand/Digital release on Friday. It stars daytime talk show host Kathie Lee Gifford (who wrote the screenplay!) with Craig Ferguson, Gifford playing a widow who is travelling the world with her husband’s ashes before meeting Ferguson’s innkeeper. Gee, why on earth would Ed be dubious of a movie starring a daytime talk show host and a former late night television host? Gee, I wonder. I didn’t see it. Maybe it’s great, but nothing less than being paid to watch this movie would get me to watch it, so there we are.

Other movies out this week in some form or another include Rising Hawk (Shout! Studios), The Antenna (Dark Star Pictures), Eternal Beauty (Samuel Goldwyn Films), Tar (1091), Do Not Reply (Gravitas Ventures), The Great American Lie (Vertical), Honey Lauren’s Wives of the Skies (Hewes Pictures) on Amazon Prime on Tuesday, The Call (Cinedigm), Chasing the Present (1091), Haroula Rose’s adaptation of Bonnie Jo Campbell’s Once Upon a River, The Devil to Pay (Dark Star Pictures/Uncork’D Entertainment), and something called Alien Addiction (Gravitas Ventures). I’m sure there’s some good stuff in there, and congrats to the filmmaker for finishing a movie and getting it released but… and you may have heard this before… THERE ARE TOO MANY FUCKING MOVIES!!!!

A couple festivals starting this week includes the 43rd Asian American International Film Festival, which runs from October 1 through 11, and it seems to include a pretty impressive line-up of features and shorts, and though I haven’t seen many, the one I’m highly recommending again (as I have when it played other festivals) is the doc Far East Deep South.

Also, American Cinematique’s Beyond Fest starts this Friday at the Mission Tiki Drive-In in Montclair, California, running from October 2 though October 8. It begins with a double feature of the upcoming The Wolf of Snow Hollow (out next week!) paired with The ‘Burbs, then goes into a David Lynch triple feature of Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive and Lost Highway on Saturday and Saint Maud (a chronically delayed theatrical release) with the classic Misery on Sunday. Monday gets a double feature of new movies in Synchronic and Bad Hair.

Also, the Woodstock Film Festival begins this week, running from Weds. through Sunday, with screenings at the Greenville Drive-In, Overlook Drive-In and Woodstock Drive-In as well as an online component. Highlights include The Father (Opening Night on Thursday, October 1) and the Closing Night film is Chloe Zhao’s Nomadland, starring Frances McDormand on Sunday night. You can get tickets and more information on Eventive.

What it comes down to is that there are just too many fucking movies. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. This shit has gotta stop, because there’s no way any single movie can get any attention when so many are being dumped to digital/streaming/VOD/virtual cinema each week.

Next week, more movies not in New York City theaters, which will probably never reopen the way things are going.

By the way, if you read this week’s column and have bothered to read this far down, feel free to drop me some thoughts at Edward dot Douglas at Gmail dot Com or drop me a note or tweet on Twitter. I love hearing from readers … honest!

#TheWeekendWarrior #Movies #Reviews #VOD #Digital #Streaming #OnTheRocks #SofiaCoppola #SaveYourselves #BoysInTheBand #Spontaneous #TheGlorias #SnoBabies #2067

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amisbro · 7 years ago

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Impressions/Review: Shining Live

Alright...here we go friends and neighbors. Since we have hit our main roadblock on the game right now what better time but to do an “Impressions/Review” on the game “Shining Live” from the “Uta no Prince-Sama” franchise? This impressions however isn’t just going to be about the game but we are going to give a history on the series from its inception to where we are now because all of that is going to be factored in for a specific reason Oh and since we are in this for the long haul...this is going to be under a read more as well. Also all information comes from the wikipedia page for UtaPri as well as the .com site and Broccol.co.jp I did my research for this piece when I knew I was going to review it With THAT out of the way...shall we get started?

Uta no Prince-Sama was announced by Broccoli in the Summer of 2009. To be exact the post that was placed on the website is from August 8th of 2009 and you could go to the website from there. To this day if you wanted to go to the original version of the site you could...just hit up internet wayback machine for it. The first game’s release came in June of 2010. June 24th is the day that is referred to as the proper Anniversary of the series and this year will be 8 years for the franchise. Can you believe it will be 10 years in 2020? HOLY CRAP! ANYWAYS! As you will see for the rest of this review there will be release dates from the game series and there will also be dates for the Anime seasons. This is for a reason as you will see when we actually get talking about the game but I wanted to make sure this review was a 100% thorough breakdown for everyone both old hats and new peeps coming into the fandom. With that in mind let us continue Uta no Prince-Sama as a “Visual Novle/Otome” has currently 9 games in their “Main” series between the PSP and VITA. The Original game (Uta no Prince-Sama has been remade 2 times since its original version and they came out on August 11th ,2011 and January 26th of 2016 respectively. The rest of the ORIGINAL games came out around the following times Amazing Aria - 12/23/2010 Sweet Seranade - February 10 ,2011 Debut - May 24, 2012 All-Star - March 7th, 2013 All-Star After Secret - February 26, 2015 Now all of these are important because around some of these dates a season for an Anime came out and all of the Seasons fell under the “Maji Love” banner starting with 1000% in July of 2011 (July 2nd for those keeping score at home) and running to September 24th of that year. Of the four seasons so far this is the only season to have a a “Summer” Release as the other seasons (2K ,Revolutions and Legend Star) all fell either in the Spring or Autumn season. 2K and Revolutions both released in April of 2013/15 and Legend Star was in 2016 Okay okay I know what you are all thinking “Josh we know all of this...hurry up and get on with the friggin’ review” To which I say “I’m getting there but we need to do just a LITTLE MORE setup because the next part is important to Shining Live” When the first season of the Anime (ML1K) aired it was around “Amazing Aria” and “Sweet Sernade” and so the writers were writing to introduce you to basically STARISH as a 6 Member group with Cecil being a guest start basically (because when the first game happened 6 members were dateable from the start and one in Cecil was unlockable). When Season 2 aired in 2013 Debut and All-Star were a thing but they had to introduce QN (whom briefly appeared at STARISH’s debut concert at the end of Season 1) so they would do just that When Season 2 premiered in 2013 the first episode was titled “Poison Kiss” and in it introduced the boys of QUARTET NIGHT whom would take the roles of “Seniors” for STARISH for the season. Later when “Revolutions” happened 2 years later they would become the “In Agency Rivals” of STARISH to try and win the sport of the performer at the Triple S. HOWEVER Season 2 also sought to bring in a new monkey wrench into the fray by introducing the group “HEAVENS” led by Eiichi Ootori as he was flanked by Kira Sumeragi and Nagi Mikado and would face off in a “Must Win” scenario at the UtaPri awards where the loser would be forced to disband. STARISH won but HEAVENS would be spared from disbanding as the President of Shining Agency stepped in and made sure that that stipulation wasn’t fulfilled. They WOULD come back later as a 7 person group where each member was an opposite for a particular STARISH member and this season in particular (Revolutions) would be the last season also to aired around the release of a game. “Revolutions” aired around April of 2015 the same year that the final game for the PSP (VN wise) released which was in February. Now there is a reason we just went through this History lesson (and if I fucked anything up I apologize) but its because we NOW are going to talk about Shing Live! LET’S GO Okay when we talk about Shining Live we are going to break this down like this Story Gameplay Translation (This is a translation of a Japanese Rhythm game so this one is important) Overall fun factor Just so you know...I am tempted to talk about the translation LAST because of the fact that it is a bit of a hot button but with that in mind...LET’S GO! Story I know that UtaPri isn’t typically known to some for its story but if you pay attention enough the story and plot are some of the most interesting things in the series. I can’t tell you how ,when I watched every episode (52 and if we count the OVA then 53), I was always looking forward to what was going to happen in the next episode because the characters were compelling as all hell (and still are) and their personalities ,while some kind of grated on me over the years, were still varied enough that you could have your favorites So what IS the story of this game? Well QUARTET NIGHT and STARISH are performing a joint concert called “Shining Live” where they showcase the groups that President Shining Saotome has on display. In this case those groups are STARISH and QN. When the game starts the player (that’s you) are greeting by intros with each of the characters and that is our first introduction to ,not only the new translation for the game, but also the personalities of each character that will be on display at this time. I say “At this time” because we will be talking about the future soon enough. After an introduction from all the cast they play “Welcome to UtaPri World” which is your introduction to the gameplay. I’ll talk more about that in bit but basically tap the buttons in accordance to the song and as you do you will eventually progress to the title screen and go about your business After this the real story begins but...which story IS IT? See the game has 3 types Main Story Side Story Event Story The one that you will play a lot (or until you run out of certain items which I will talk about in a minute) is the Main Story. This starts with after the performance of “Welcome to UtaPri World” (which doesn’t count towards clearing songs on the setlist) and your first chapter consists of a story with STARISH AND ONE WITH QN where the STARISH boys want to try and get better than their Senpais to eventually overtake them. To do this they know they need to get better and to do that they need to keep on having performances and getting stronger. QN however knows this and knows they need to get better as a group themselves but of course we know they have their own issues too right? To clear a chapter of the game the player must play each song and clear them. Now there are 4 difficulties in the game so you have to play the one you are comfortable with but remember this Higher difficulties consume more LP (That stands for Live Points in this game) and can cause problems later on higher player levels...it can also help you progress faster in the game though with the XP system. As the player progresses in the story more and more songs become available. Remember that you need tickets to play the stories so not having them puts you in a position that is no fun so playing the songs repeatedly helps out greatly Speaking of...LET’S TALK ABOUT GAMEPLAY Gameplay The game play of this game is not unlike say...Klab’s Love Live. Rings come from a beam of light and your job is to tap them as close to perfect as possible and get the best score possible. Now this is where we are going to have differences in the way the game scores your taps. In the JP version the scoring went JUST PERFECT PEFECT GREAT GOOD BAD MISS Getting all “Just Perfect” and “Perfect” scores meant you got a “PERFECT COMBO” and a special purple board came around the screen. a Full Combo was just orange text When the Global Version was released they changed up two things and one was the grade for the note taps PERFECT GREAT GOOD BAD MISS Notice something: Yeah they removed the “JUST PERFECT” rank from the score. The belief is that having those would confuse the International audience so they scrapped “JUST PERFECT” and just left those in. Also now you can get “ULTIMATE COMBO” just for getting “Perfect” and “Great” grades all the way through...its the equivalent to the Crown in Music 1 or the Gold in Music 2 You also get a score rank in the game The game ranks you scorewise from D to S (although C is the first one on the rewards chart...more on that in a second) and as you score in the song the bar goes up. The better you grade on a note the more points and the better your shot of getting the elusive S rank on a song. How high you can go on the score meter is determined by a few things How well you tap on a note (although that can be wonky sometimes) The level/Grade of your phots Your traits for you and your partner in the song The first one we already explained how that kind of works...the others might be “Huh?” for some people so let me explain Every card has 4 rarities Normal Rare Super Rare Ultra Rare The higher the rarity of the card the better you have a chance to get an S rank...thing is your level matters too because every card gets EXP that participates in a song (BTW I know they are photos but I for some reason always call them “cards”...its a Yu-Gi-Oh! problem with me) so you want them to be in as much as possible. There is also the BOND of the card though too Alright how to explain this We all have favorite characters and we want them to get to know us better right? Well this game has a thing where has your number in the star of each character goes up you get new voice clips and the like from them...you also get rewards from the game as the game has missions based on songs ,player level and bond level between you and a character. The goals are always every 10 levels and you usually get 10 prisms for doing it each time so that is def something to keep in mind Oh right...that is another important aspect of the game and its getting the new cards So this game has a gacha system which involves a photoshoot (for the record B-Project also has something kind of similar too) and there are many different kinds. Some are based off of events like an MV for a particular video or even a Gacha that has cards from previous sets in it! Some might even be themed after a Holiday (There is an event going on right now where Natsuki is the UR for Valentine’s Day and if you are lucky enough to pull him HE WILL BE SO HAPPY!) and there is even a Photoshoot which I think was the very first one they ever did that is a standard (Its one with the Military Outfits..you’ll know it when you see it. There are also two other special ones for special tickets that you can win either in a slot machine or I think you can get those in a shop. I know for the V-Day you could get the SR+ one for sure in exchange for Presents! Some Photoshoots have an expiration on them and some are split into “halves” meaning that they will have one half have one UR card on them and then there is another half with another. An example of this would be Nats being the UR for this particular half of the V-Day and Ren is beginning on the 13th of this month. NOW SPEAKING OF THINGS WITH DURATIONS LETS TALK ABOUT THE EVENTS! @baku5ds asked me to talk about these so I will...ONLY COS SHE ASKED ME TOO! So the game has events that last for about a week and the way they work is not unlike the events of “Stand my Hero” (a Match 3 game with Otome Elements that has some of the UtaPri VAs in it) EXCEPT all of these are ranked! Here is how they work From about 1:59 PM JST (That’s 11:59 PM EST for us) and for the next 6 days the player engages in a battle with other players to try and win not ONE new Photo but TWO! The Photos are related to the Event Story we spoke about earlier as the characters on them are portraying characters for the story. The stories HERE (unlike for the main story) are 10 parts long BUT you get 5 Prisms each like you do for playing a side or main story chapter...that’s 50 prisms! You’re goal is to do one of two things in these 6 days 1. Make it all the way to the cards on your points ladder (good luck because every so often the points increase by 500 so to get to the UR card its every 3500 to get the next reward) OR 2. Finish in the top 10% of the rankings and you get TWO nice new shiny photos. IF you got both copies already on the points ladder this just means you get a 3rd of at least one of the photos so enjoy This is legitimately one of the most exhausting things the game can ask a player to do because you aren’t just playing other players but you are playing yourself as your will and endurance get tested because you are playing THE SAME SET OVER AND OVER AND OVER again...it can be exhausting BUT if its for cards you really want you will suffer for them and it will be worth it! I got a nice shiny UR for my collection so I’m happy :-) Are the events LONG...yes but if you have the patience and the endurance you can get through them easily...otherwise WHY ARE THEY SO BLASTED LONG?! (again that was for @baku5ds) Now let’s address the elephant in the room Translation (I know I said I would do “fun factor but...eh put that with the events thingy) The translation in some respects seems to be a bode of contention and I can respect that. I think for ME it hasn’t been an issue because it feels like when they did the translation they wanted to make it more “lighthearted” as an experience for new players (and potential new fans) as possible. If the story was “Angsty” as all get out how many people outside of the general base would play it? Does it have its issues? Well there was a part in the last event when Syo said to Natsuki “Hey want to come with?” and I mentioned this to a friend of mine and they thought it might have been some old slang that got in. One that became a meme was when Ren at the beginning of the game goes “Hello Ladies. Ren Jinguji is in the house” and I actually chuckled which I think is something this game wanted us to do from the start. Have a lighthearted romp through UtaPri and get to see the characters in situations that might not happen in the Anime because of the fact that the series is 13 episodes each season and 22-25 minutes a pop. A little lighthearted fun never hurt anyone (and let’s be real...we all needed that after Season 4). So now that I wrote what is no doubt a College Thesis on this game would I rec it for a new fan? SURE! The thing that you have to get over is sometimes the hit detection is wonky af when it comes to hitting notes and if you can endure the events when they feel like a Boston Marathon then you got that going for you too! All in all Uta no Prince-Sama Shining Live is a game that ,even if you aren’t a UtaPri fan but you love Rhythm games...check it out you won’t be disappointed!

#Amisbro #uta no prince sama #Shining Live Impressions #This went WAY LONGER than I thought it would #FUCK ME!

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